Page 66 of Seven Year Itch
I glance around at the women peppered throughout the club. They’re all showing a lot more skin and seem at least five years younger than me, further fueling my insecurity.
“I made a bad choice.” I tug on my long sleeves. “This dress isn’t slutty enough.”
“It’s slutty enough.” Calder takes a sip of his beer, barely looking at me.
“Even the coat check girl looked hotter than me.”
“Would you stop?” He frowns at me as his eyes drift down to my chest. “The dress is good.”
I try to sip my drink, but a hot brunette is staring at me and not in theyou go, girlkind of way. “Maybe we should leave. This was a bad idea. I don’t know how I made it in here the last time.” I make a move to walk back toward the coat check, but Calder’s hand wraps around my wrist, and he yanks me back into him.
“I’m fucking hard already, okay?” he growls, irritation all over his grumpy face as I stumble into him, my leg brushing against something in his groin area that does feel a bit firm.
“What?” I sputter, my hand flat on his chest as I try to regain my balance and stop myself from pressing up against his dick. My eyes drop down to his crotch and widen when I confirm what I just felt. But how do I know he’s not turned on by the coat check girl? Hell,Iwas turned on by the coat check girl.
“I’ve been hard since the truck.” He sits down on the barstool and turns away from me, his jaw taut with irritation as he glances back at me. “The dress is hot. Now, shut up and sit down and have a drink.”
I’ve never been happier to have a man tell me to shut up in my entire life.
With a smile I can’t even remotely hide, I slide onto the stool next to him and grab my cocktail glass. “Yes, sir.”
A rumble vibrates from his lips, and I can’t help but giggle.
“You’re going to fucking kill me, Ace.” He turns to look at me, and his grumpy mood lightens as I continue smiling and fighting back a laugh. The corner of his mouth tugs up, and he looks away again.
God, we are dysfunctional.
One second we’re getting along and then, bam... back to bickering. I don’t know why it’s so easy for me to fight with Calder. It’s like we’re wired to pick at each other until one of us cracks.
The only time I ever really fought with Randal was when he was drunk. It was a different kind of fighting than what I do with Calder. With Randal it was mostly just him being a bully and me being too stunned to really fight back. Then the next day, everything would be swept under the rug, which meant that by the time we went into divorce proceedings, there was loads of dirt for us to clean up.
I swallow the uncomfortable knot in my throat as my mind slips back to the yucky place I’d been living in for the past few years with him. The place he yanked me back to with one stupid phone call the other night. It’s no wonder my body changed, I was living in a nightmare I couldn’t wake up from. An endless loop of Randal coming home from the bar and picking a fight with me. Literally even waking me up to do so.
But putting my depression aside, my body could have just changed because I’m not as young as I once was. It’s entirely possible it was always going to change because that’s just life! And obsessing over a dress size is so uninteresting to me. I know in my bones that my worth and my beauty are not tied to my weight, no matter how many assholes like Randal want to make me believe it is. Those aren’t the men I want in my life anyways. I want a man I feel confident enough to fight with.
That is what this experiment with Calder is about. To find the girl I once was, who doesn’t give a fuck what anyone thinks because loving herself is enough.
“What was your first time here like?” I ask after sipping my drink and allowing the alcohol to calm my nerves.
Calder inhales deeply. “I guess you could say I was on a warpath.”
My brows lift. “What does that mean?”
He licks his lips, and his eyes tighten. “My brothers and I had justfound out that this woman we knew was pregnant with another man’s child.”
I frown. “Why would that bother you?”
“Because we were all sleeping with her at the time.”
My eyes nearly bug out of my head. “Like... together-together?”
“No.” Calder rolls his eyes and takes a drink. “She was sleeping with all of us separately... but at the same time.”
“And you didn’t know?”
Calder shakes his head. “Not really. I think we might have suspected, but we were all sort of vying for her attention. It was kind of a game, and we are all way too competitive.”
I need to process this. Three Fletcher boys after the same woman... She must have been something truly special. “Most people are competitive when it comes to sports, not humans.”
