Page 60 of Castling the Rook (Checkmate 3)

“This sucks.” I toss my shirt to the floor at the end of my bed and flop back down onto my side. If I use my imagination, I can pretend we’re lying in bed together, facing each other, enjoying the magic that is the after-sex glow.

Flattening her lips, Dee studies her screen. “This really sucks. I was asked out on a date tonight.” She says it so fucking casually, so easily like it doesn’t do things to my gut. “It’s a guy I’ve seen around a lot the past year, he asked me out and promised a good time. You know what I did instead?”

I don’t answer. I don’t speak, because the thought of her dating other men makes me sick to my stomach.

“I told him no thanks, then I came home and called you instead. Becauseapparentlyphone sex with you is better than anything another man can offer me. You have no clue how much that annoys me.”

My lips twitch at her admission, because I love that she told a guy no just so she could come home and talk to me.

“It’s not funny!” she snaps. “There is nous. There’s just chemistry, and libido, good flexibility on my part, and an annoying tendency to prefer your dick over others.”

“I’m not sorry.”

“I’m sure you aren’t. Maybe I shouldn’t call you,” she ponders quitely, splintering my stupid romantic heart. “We had our fun, but we live thousands of miles apart. It was fun while it was fun, ya know? But now it’s not fun, because I want you when I can’t have you.” Sparkling blue eyes watch mine. “I’m determined to live a happy life, asatisfiedlife. Not a life where I become bitter because I want something I can’t have.”

“Dee…” A second ago, we were hot and heavy, but like the flip of a switch, she’s turned cold on me, ready to pick her shit up and ditch. “It doesn’t have to be so serious right now. I just had the best sex I’ve had all week, and it was with myself.” At least that draws a reluctant smile to her lips. “We can have a couple weeks of this, right? It’s fun, and neither of us are rushing into anything else. Just let us do this until we work it out of our system.”

“I don’t do this, Riley.” Sniffling, she wipes a hand beneath her nose. “This isn’t who I am.”

“What don’t you do? Phone sex?”

“Pine,” she admits on a sigh. “I don’t pine after men. I don’t sit on my couch on a Friday night and wish for a man I can’t have, especially not when another man offered up a good alternative. A dick’s a dick, right? He would have felt better than my dildo.”

Her easy dismissal enrages me. I’m over here thinking about her day in, day out, but she thinks it’s so easily thrown away. “It’s not about his dick or mine. It’s about our chemistry, it’s about the fact we havesomethinggoing on here, and until we work it out, you’re not going anywhere.”

Her eyes flash with challenge. Hot. Cold. Hot. Cold. “I’ll go where I want, Riley. When I want. With whom I want. I called tonight because I wanted to come. Mission accomplished, and now I’m done.”

“Glad to be of service,” I seethe. “Would you like to take a survey to help us better our services for future customers?”

“Fuck you! I didn’tbuythat, Riley. I don’t have to buy a man.” Her nose flares with the same rage I feel. “Shove your survey up your ass. I’m going now.”

“Yeah, awesome. I’m feeling all kinds of fucking mellow now. Thanks, Dee.” Where did this conversation go wrong? How could we go from sex to this so fast? “I’m so fucking happy you called just to take your shitty mood out on me.”

“Shove a dildo up your ass, Cruz, then go wash the jizz off your stomach. It makes you look stupid.” She hangs up with a snarl and turns my room from a dark sanctuary where I could lie in mellowed bliss, into a prison, a dark, shitty, lonely fucking prison.

Getting up from my bed and moving to the master bathroom, I flip the lights on and step into the shower. Blasting frigid cold water over my exhausted body, I wash my belly and press my forehead to the cold tiles. She’s been a ghost for a week, totally unaffected by our time together, calls tonight and gets her own way, then makes out that I’m the fucking monster. Why’d she even call if she was just gonna get pissed about it? Why not just go on her date with the other asshole? She’d get the same result – an orgasm – and she wouldn’t have to take her shit out on me.

Fuck her for being a spoiled brat.

Fuck her for not caring about me even half as much as I care about her.

Cold water runs over my face and drips off my nose. Running a hand through my hair, I ignore the shitty feeling that settles in my gut and decide to have a proper shower; not just a wash the jizz off your gut shower, but one where I flip the hot water on and wash up with soap. Five minutes later and not at all tempted to touch my dick again, I step out and wrap a towel around my waist. Stopping in front of the steamed mirror, I wipe a hand across it and stare into my own eyes.

It’s strange that I look sad. That I let a woman – a woman I’ve only spent a few nights with – affect my mood so deeply. I need to harden the fuck up, because she’s a wild mare, and I’m in for a lifetime of this bullshit if I continue to chase after her. She warned me at Oz’s wedding; no attachments, no feelings.

So why the fuck are my feelings hurt?

Riddle me that bullshit.

With a disgusted shake of my head, I head back into my bedroom and pull on a pair of sweatpants. Rubbing the towel over my still wet hair, I step into the hall and head back to the kitchen for a glass of water before I hit the sack. I should stay up tonight, sleep all day tomorrow to get ready for my week of nights, but I don’t want to. I want to go to bed and clock out for the day.

Walking along the dark hall, I narrow my eyes at the small light at the end. Like she knows the shit’s about to go down, Ninja darts past me and into the bedroom to make herself comfortable in my closet. With my towel around my shoulders, I slowly move into my kitchen and find Jay standing at my counter with a bag of roasted coffee beans. Fists full, mouth resembling that of a squirrel hiding nuts, his wild eyes come up to mine when he’s busted eating the fucking beans.

“Jesus, Jay!” I storm forward and snatch the bag out of his grasp. “Pull yourself together.”

“Give it back!” He leaps across the kitchen, sending beans skittering to the floor and bouncing off the walls. With frenzied hands and snapping teeth, he comes at me for the fucking beans like they’re cocaine… because they’re the closest thing to an upper he’ll find in this house. “It’s just fucking coffee,” he snarls. “Give it back.”

“No.” I shove him back when he comes for a second shot. I swear, it’s almost enough that I worry he’s going to scratch and pull hair. Spinning fast and using an arm and a leg to keep him away, I toss the bag in my sink and flip on the garbage disposal until the sound of grinding beans almost drowns out Jay’s howling cries.

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