Thirty Happens (3 page)

Smile and nod. Smile and nod.

My cheek muscles silently screamed in protest as I stepped back a half step.

I disappeared a little into myself as I watched the interaction between my soulmate, the love of my life, and this man I had already forgotten the name of.

“Kar… Kar… Karyn, you there? Hello… “

I shook my head and looked into the eyes of my fiancé. Eyes that held an equal part of concern and offense.

“Uh, sorry. Was, uh, thinking about a story I was working on.”

That line got me out of so much trouble, so many times. Because the truth was, I was always on the job. So, I could spout out meaningless shit like that, and sound somewhat important, business and introspective all at the same time. Even I knew I was pushing my luck, throwing out two of my canned lines in one conversation.

Chris threw me a knowing glance.

“Mmmm hmmmm.”

Okay, so maybe it wasn’t quite going to work for me this time.

“Sorry, Honey,” I whispered into his ear as I traced my fingers on his shoulder as I walked behind him.

“Please excuse me, gentlemen.”

John and Chris both half stood up as I walked past. I turned, looked back at Chris, and grinned as he winked at me.

That little wink warmed me. All of my annoyance at being pretty much overlooked based on my gender sort of disappeared. I couldn’t help it. I loved the shit out of that man. And, yeah, a wink and crooked smile pretty much did it for me. What could I say? I was easy.

chapter three.

“
S
orry that our night was interrupted, baby.”

Chris was stroking my arm in the car as we went back home.

“Eh, it’s okay. I have sort of gotten used to it in the past couple of years.”

He grunted a response.

I looked over to see him just staring ahead at the road in front of him as he drove, no expression on his face.

His ability to keep his emotions in check was probably one of the things I loved the most and the least about him. I would love to know what was going on behind his eyes, but nope, nothing, nada.

“Could be worse, Chris. You could be the one being the trophy spouse.” I elbowed him, hoping to help him realize that I was just kidding. Well, sort of just kidding. I could never let him realize how much it really did irk me to be little more than a side thought to these people. Something pretty on his arm that had nothing materialized between her ears. In all fairness, this wasn’t his fault. He always tried to include me in the conversations.

The look he shot at me let me know that my attempt at humor fell flat. Again, I wished I could interpret what he was thinking when he was all quiet and brooding. While the whole tall, dark and handsome thing could be sexy as hell, it could also be infuriating.

Sigh.

“What?”

Oops, I guess that sigh was actually out loud and not just a part of my ever present internal running dialogue between me and my brain.

“Nothing, honey. I’m sorry. I was just kidding before. Truth is, I used to get stopped all the time no matter where I was. It was crazy embarrassing the time I went to the drug store to get a jumbo pack of super plus absorbency tampons, and Doc Thomas was tapping me on the shoulder hoping to get some coverage for the extra late night at the clinic.”

“Um, yeah.”

I looked over at Chris. He was mimicking the dry heaves.

Typical guy reaction when being faced with the reality of the fact that I needed feminine hygiene products. Never mind that there were words that occurred before and after the word ‘tampon’; all he did hear was a word that made him run in fear for the horror show that it brought approximately every twenty eight days.

I punched him in the arm.

“Ow!” He rubbed his arm and shot me a glare.

“At least I don’t ask you to pick them up for me at the store anymore.”

“Thank
God
.”

“That one time I did, you came back with the teensy tiniest tampons on the market.”

“They said ‘light’. The others said ‘plus’. I was trying to be sensitive to your feelings and not make you think I felt you were ‘plus-sized’. Chicks hate that sort of shit.”

I just had to raise my eyebrow at him and his eyes snapped back to focus on the road where it belonged.

Speaking of tampons… when was I due again? I pulled out my phone and opened up the app I downloaded to help track this sort of thing. Yes, they seriously had apps for that. And they are the best damn apps ever.

Huh… I was actually a little late.

I looked at Chris out of the corner of my eye. Should I warn him?

I tilted my head, thinking of the consequences of giving him advanced notice. He could barricade himself in the office, only coming out when he was certain I was not standing close enough to lash out so that he could get food and use the bathroom.

Nah. He’d just have a fun surprise this weekend when he was shut off.

Besides, I offered to load the app into his phone as well, so that he would know plenty in advance. You would have thought that I had offered to shoot his puppy from the look of horror on his face.

Yup, it was decided. No advance warning. Ever. Mwa ha ha ha.

“Want to watch a movie tonight?”

I looked at him in surprise. I mean, on the nights that we went out to dinner, we would usually come home, drink some wine, chat a little bit and go to bed. I didn’t mean to make us sound boring. We were so
not
boring, but we also weren’t the stay up all night kind of party animals, either.

“Uh, sure. Um, whose turn is it to pick?” We swapped off who got to choose the movie. That way one person wasn’t always getting to see the stuff they wanted while the other quietly seethed. Not that I would seethe.

Yeah, I would totally seethe. I would probably pout a bit, too. If Chris had his way I would be seeing body parts blown up and entrails parading across our big screen. No. Freaking. Thanks.

“You made me watch Frozen. That
has
to be good for more than one turn. I mean, seriously.”

“Come on, it wasn’t that bad. And no, you don’t get to make up the rules, especially for a movie you
barely
paid attention to over a year ago. No dice, but nice try.”

“Barely paid attention, my ass. I had ‘
Let it Go’
stuck in my head for a week. And got caught humming it in a meeting. I still haven’t lived that down. There are people in the budget committee who still call me Elsa.”

I snorted. That was awesome.

“It’s not funny.”

I burst into full on laughter, I just couldn’t hold it back any longer. When I looked over at him I laughed even harder, his lower lip was pushed out just a little, in a bit of a childish reaction.

“Aww, pumpkin.”

He turned his head quickly and glared at my placating tone. Okay, perhaps that was going a touch too far. But still. I was having too much fun.

He pulled into our driveway, turned the car off and stepped outside. I stayed put. One of the benefits of being involved with a guy who was a teensy bit older than you was the fact that he was actually raised with manners. Shocking.

Sure enough, despite his annoyance with me and his inability to let it go (snicker), my door opened and he reached for my hand to help me out.

Swoon.

Ugh.

Okay, I’d give in this time.

“Honey, I’ll let you pick the movie tonight, but I’m going on record that it’s my choice next movie.”

I threw that last bit in when I saw the look of victory in his eyes. He’d better be careful or I would make him watch either another Disney movie or The Danish Girl. I was dying to see The Danish Girl, but when I looked at him with anticipation when we saw the trailer a while back he didn’t even look at me when he said ‘talk to your mother.’ I probably shouldn’t use movie choices as a form of punishment, but I totally did.

“Thanks, Kar, I really appreciate it.”

I gave him a sweet kiss on the cheek and started humming ‘
Do You Want To Build A Snowman’
as I walked towards the house.

“Not funny.”

Yeah, it was.

***

Three hours later I woke up to Chris gently shaking me awake.

“Huh?”

As I sat up a string of drool connected me to his shoulder.

Ew. Not sexy.

I had to figure out how to wipe this off without being obvious that I was drooling all over him in my sleep. Hell, I had to figure out a way to make it seem as if I hadn’t really fallen asleep during his movie.

I opted for nuzzling.

I leaned forward into his shoulder, rubbing my chin on his t-shirt as I turned my head in to kiss his neck.

“Nice try, Sleeping Beauty, but my shirt is soaked.”

Crap.

“Sorry, honey. I really tried to stick with it. But it was so toasty warm curled up next to you under this blanket. I only closed my eyes once when the body parts started flying.”

Chris kissed me gently on the tip of my nose.

“It’s okay honey. I know you have been working long days. And you didn’t snore too loudly at all.”

What the hell?

I slapped him on the arm.

“I don’t snore.”

“Okay, if that’s what you want to believe.”

“I don’t
need
to believe it because I know it’s true.”

I crossed my arms and waited for him to admit it, that I didn’t snore because there was no way in hell I managed to snag this sweet and gorgeous man if I both drooled on him
and
snored.

“Well?”

“Well, what?”

I rolled my eyes.

“It’s well past time for you tell me that I don’t actually snore. Because I don’t. Snoring isn’t cute and you have told me constantly that I’m cute. So I clearly don’t snore.”

Chris smirked at me, the movement at the corner of his lips giving it away that he was trying desperately not to laugh.

“Um, you snore cutely?” With that, the laughter came pouring out of him.

I stood up and looked down at him.

“If that’s how you feel, I’m going to bed. Hopefully, my
cute
snoring won’t keep you up too long.”

I turned and flounced out of the room.

Cute snore. Huh.

From the living room, I heard loud, long, drawn out snores.

I leaned my left arm out of the doorway with my middle finger held up high. This caused more laughter.

I got changed into a t-shirt and a pair of yoga pants. I know that I should probably invest in sexy nighttime lingerie and all, but I needed to be comfortable when I slept. A piece of rough lace riding up my butt crack was not comfortable. Not in the least.

I settled into a stack of pillows and turned on my Kindle. I had finally gotten around to reading the Fifty Shades series that everyone else in the universe, including seventy year old grandmothers, had read about five years ago. I didn’t normally give into fads or popular book series. But, when Alex gave the book a five vibrator recommendation, I knew that it was one that couldn’t be missed.

Forty five minutes later, I didn’t even hear Chris come into the bedroom. I don’t think I had ever read a book so quickly. I also didn’t think I’d ever had hot flashes before. Perhaps I should visit the doctor to make sure I wasn’t into early menopause or anything. Well, I guess I was pretty certain at this point that they weren’t a sign of menopause, but, seriously, hot
damn.

If I were honest with myself, the writing style maybe wasn’t the greatest, and the sex scenes were crazy repetitive. But judging by the way the lower half of me felt like an inferno, the book was doing exactly what it should. And besides, who was I to criticize a word of what she had written? The author had sold bazillions of these books and made a hell of a lot more than I ever would as the writer for a local paper.

I had never been even remotely interested in bondage or domination or whatever you’d call this stuff. This book made me interested. Sweet baby Ray, was I interested.

“You’re still up?” Chris spoke softly to make sure I was actually awake and reading, not asleep with the Kindle still on. Because that had happened more times than I cared to admit.

“Um, yeah. Sorry, what time is it?”

“Eleven thirty.”

“Holy crap. I have an early day tomorrow.”

I knew I should power my reader down and go to sleep. I knew that was the smart thing to do. But, still.

“Honey, why don’t you ever hit me?”

“What the hell? Why would I ever hit you? What kind of screwed up question is that? Real men don’t hit women.”

He looked absolutely scandalized that I would ever even consider asking him such a question.

“No, honey, like… during sex. Why don’t you hit me during sex?”

“What the hell are you reading? Whatever it is, you need to put that away. There is nothing about hitting you that would get me off in any way, shape or form. I am not some sick, perverted freak.”

Oh, crap. He was getting angry. But he was kind of hot when he was angry. I should use that to my advantage. Under the covers, I took advantage of his back being turned while he got ready for bed. I shimmied out of my yoga pants and got down on the bed on all fours with my butt stuck up in the air and my face on the bed, turned so I could see him.

“Holy shit, Karyn. What are you up to now?”

He stood there shaking his head at me.

“Spank me, I’ve been a naughty, naughty girl.”

“You did
not
just say that. Those cheesy words didn’t just come out of your mouth.”

“Yes, they did. Spank me. Slap my ass.”

“Have you been watching seventies porn again?”

Ugh.

I was never going to live that down. The
one
time I pulled up some online porn and he had to walk in. It was horrible, too. So not worth getting caught watching it.

“Man up and freakin’ hit me, already.”

Chris’ mouth gaped open in shock just a bit. He slammed it shut, firmly shook his head no and pulled the covers back on his side of the bed.

“Go to bed Karyn. You’re either over tired, drunk, or both.”

Okay, this was getting me nowhere and I was on a mission. I pulled out the heavy artillery.