Page 11 of Bad At Love

She leaned back into the cold leather seat as nineties melodies belted out of the radio. The exhaustion of the long day, the shitty breakup, and the rollercoaster after with DP himself…her body finally caved in under the weight of it all.

“Sleep, Char. It’s a long drive,” DP said, his fingers tapping her cheek.

The seat warmers kicked in. She groaned deeply, like a cozy baby bird tucked up in the safe warmth of her nest. “You don’t mind?” she said, fighting a monstrous yawn that nearly broke her jaw.

His laughter swaddled her like a warm blanket. “No.”

Chaaru rubbed her cheek against his rough palm and decided to let her worries about their relationship go. For this car ride at least, things were good between them, which meant her world itself was right.

She pulled her legs up to her chest, wrapped her arms around her knees, and promptly fell asleep, before the lights of downtown flickered out of sight.

5

“Chaaru…honey, wake up!”

Chaaru opened her eyes to find DP leaning over her in the passenger seat, his bare bicep gleaming in the streetlight. The damp made his short hair curl and the sweater vest stretched taut across his chest.

She blinked, the aching gorgeousness of him making her belly flip and roll, beating out the bone-deep weariness from a long day. “DP? Did I forget we’re supposed to meet?” she said, wiping at her mouth with the back of her hand.

“No. I’m dropping you off at your place, remember?”

A groan barreled out of her as the disastrous evening came back to her. She rubbed her eyes and looked at the familiar red-bricked facade of her townhome.

Her crowning achievement and her haven.

And yet, DP himself was just as much a landing place as the house made of bricks and concrete. The thought both warmed and worried her.

“Right. I ruined your date, but you still rescued me.”

“Are you going to start every sentence with an apology now?”

His tone was so abrupt that she stared. Her skin buzzed when he leaned forward to grab his phone from the dashboard and his arm brushed her chest. And then it came again—that new, unfamiliar awareness, arcing at every glance and touch. She needed to find the ground under her feet, fast.

Straightening the rumpled shirt, she grabbed the pizza box. The door opened on her side. “I’m good from here,” she mumbled, without looking at him.

“You want me to leave?” he said, holding the door open.

His broad shoulders shielded her from the rain and the little light from inside the truck highlighted ropey veins on hairy, corded forearms. She had the most insane urge to run her lips over those veins.

“Char?”

“What? No,” she said, shaking herself out of the miasma of longing. God, she was a forty-three-year-old woman. Not a teenager with new boobs and unfamiliar tingles. “I didn’t mean you should leave.” The lie was as smooth as the butter-soft leather under her ass. “Let’s get out of this damned rain. Maybe my brain will take pity on me and come online.”

She put her stiletto-clad foot on the narrow, wet step and hesitated. Her driveway was a steep incline, and she had four-inch pointy heels on. God, she hated DP’s truck.

She’d had enough of her ex trotting out metaphorical penises all over their married life in the form of a huge plasma screen tv and a bike that she, in her worst moments had wished would maim him. Let’s not forget the mortgage for an enormous house in a suburb they couldn’t afford. A house he’d expected her to maintain like a model home without a speck of dust or toy out of place.

She didn’t doubt it was DP’s brother TJ—a player if she’d met one, who’d had the truck all souped up. Even with her long legs, it always made her feel like she was jumping off a platform.

Beer cans dangling from one hand, DP waited patiently as Chaaru went through scenarios where she could get off the truck without touching him. He extended his hand.

She exhaled in frustration. “Can you please look away? I don’t want to flash you-”

“Fuck, Char! Why the hell are you suddenly acting like I’m some sketchy stranger you don’t want to touch?”

Her name on his lips, bit out in a rough growl, shouldn’t have felt like a stroke between her legs, but it did. Something about riling up his steady, cool temper sent an achy pulse to her core. She wanted to get under his skin as much as he already was under hers.

Sighing, Chaaru put her hand in his and slithered to the edge of the seat. His large hand swallowed hers. Struck by the contrast, she hesitated.

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