Page 64 of A Lot Like Forever
“I appreciate the offer, but I need some time to myself.” She didn’t want to be staying with her brother while she was heartbroken over Nate, was craving just being alone for a while.
“I’m not leaving you alone,” Sam insisted.
She squeezed his hand back. “Well, you’re going to have to,” she said. “This is just something I need to do, Sam.”
He grumbled but didn’t say anything else, and she leaned across and pressed her forehead against the cool glass of the window. She was going to make the most of the next few days. She was going to cry and wallow, but she was also going to make goals and plans. She was going to take charge of her future and make sure nothing and no one stopped her from getting what she wanted from life.
Nate had been fun. Nate had been delicious. Nate had been exactly what she’d needed at a time when she’d been low. He’d made her feel amazing and worthy and confident. Which was why he’d always hold a place in her heart that she doubted any other man would ever be able to fill.
“You sure about the motel?” Sam asked, his tone more gentle now. “Because Kelly would never mind you coming to stay for a bit.”
“Yeah, I’m sure,” she said.
And so Sam drove and she stared, wondering if she’d perhaps just made the biggest mistake of her life or whether she’d done exactly what needed to be done. Either way, she’d done it, and there was no going back.
* * *
Nate was still breathing heavy when he walked into the house, laughing with Chase as they headed for the kitchen.
“You’re all fired up today,” Chase joked. “I thought I had you at the bend, but you smoked me.”
Nate hauled the fridge door open and passed his brother a bottle of water. They both unscrewed their bottles and guzzled.
“I had a good night. Maybe that helped.”
Chase groaned and leaned forward, grimacing as the cool of the stone hit his bare skin. “Lucky you. We had Harrison in bed with us all night. I’m craving the night he starts to sleep through. Morning sex is a thing of the past.”
“Morning sex is overrated,” Nate said with a laugh, seeing a notepad and pen discarded at the other end of the counter. “Just go to bed earlier and get it on. Then you don’t have to worry about morning breath. Or rushing to work.”
“Hey, I only have to roll out of bed and I’m at work. When I say I miss morning sex, I mean it. Hope’s hot in the morning, all rumpled and warm from sleep.”
Nate laughed and reached for the notepad. He set his water bottle down when he realized it was a note from Faith.
“Faith!” he called out, walking fast through the kitchen to the bottom of the stairs. “Faith!” he called louder.
Nate paused when he didn’t hear anything, read the softly scrawled words on the paper he was holding. He read it once, then again, before dropping it and taking the stairs two at a time. He stopped outside his room, looked at the empty bed still rumpled from the night before, threw the closet door open, and saw the empty space where her things had been hanging.No.
She was gone.Faith had gone like a ghost that had never been there in the first place in the short space of time that he’d been out running.
“No!” he bellowed.
Chase appeared behind him, still bare chested and holding his water bottle, top tucked into the waistband of his running shorts.
“What’s happened?” he asked.
“She’s goddamn left me,” Nate muttered.
Chase didn’t say anything, just took a step forward and gave him a firm pat on the shoulder, his hand lingering. “She’ll be back. You guys were great together.”
“No, she won’t.” Nate stormed into his bathroom and turned the faucet on, stripping off and stepping under the water. “She’s gone,” he called out to Chase from the shower, “and this is exactly why I never should have let her move in in the first place!”
Damn Faith Mendes. She’d played him like a pro, seduced him and wiggled her way into his life until he’d wanted her there for good. Last night they’d made love like it was their last night together, and now he realized that it had been exactly that. Faith had known she was leaving in the morning; it was why she’d asked about his run. So she’d fucked him and tricked him.
He rubbed shampoo furiously into his hair, fingertips dragging against his scalp. Faith was gone and he had to forget she’d ever been part of his life. So what if he’d been falling for her, if he’d started having irrational thoughts about what it would be like to have her in his life long-term?
They’d only ever meant to have fun. It had only meant to be short-term. He grunted as he stood under the water and let the hot blast his face.
At least now he’d had a taste of his own medicine. All the women he’d been with, all the women he’d told he was just wanting a good time with and had ended up breaking their hearts. Now he knew how they felt.
