Carlyle
“No . . . no . . . no . . . Agh!” Slumping over the arcade machine, Valerie groaned in frustration, and I rubbed her shoulders as she glared at the stuffed cat she’d been trying to claw for almost twenty minutes now. “I almost had that bastard.”
“Can I try?” I expected her to say ‘no’ again, that she would definitely get it this time, but she surprised me when she nodded in defeat. Sticking a dollar into the machine, I clenched my jaw under brows furrowed in concentration, and she stepped back, but not too far. “I bet you’d be a riot at a carnival, Valerie.”
“I’ll have you know that you’d win that bet.” Hunched over this game, I only guffawed at her grumble, and I wiggled the joystick. This evening hadn’t gone the way I thought it would, but that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Valerie hadn’t asked me to take her home at the very least.
It was getting harder and harder to keep my damn mouth shut, and I would be damned if Valerie didn’t havesomeinkling of something vague.
“If you get this on the first try, we’re breaking up.” Surprise rattled my spine, and my head whipped to the side as my thumb bore down on the joystick in an effort to clench a fist. Valerie jumped a little, her breath catching, and alarm glimmered in her eyes, widening as they caught mine. “What? It was a joke.”
“I didn’t know we were together.” Her slender brows nearly flew off her face, and my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth. “Valerie . . . ”
“No, no, it was a joke, Carlyle. I mean, how could someone . . . ” My cheek twitched in agitation when she trailed off, and Valerie shook her head as an ugly, black blotch engulfed my heart and lungs. Before I could even really think about alternatives, my mind went straight to the worst, and I grabbed her face to squeeze. Fire scorched my throat, and she gasped as her cheeks went pale above my stretched fingers.
“How could someone like me not be a disconnected, pompous ass, thinking everyone’s beneath me because I have money?” Goosebumps blanketed my entire body from the ice flooding my chest, and Valerie shook her head hastily, her dark hair making her look ghostly, almost. Scowling darkly, I released her to turn on my heel and walk away, but I wasn’t expecting her to follow me.
What the fuck did she think we were doing? If I didn’t want to be around her, I wouldn’t be.
Stuffing my fists into my pockets as my nails dug into my palms, my scowl twisted into a sneer at the thought. If Valerie was just another slut, I wouldn’t have fucked her. I would’ve gotten some head and ignored her any other time. UnlessIwanted something.
“Carlyle . . . Carlyle, that’s not . . . ” Frantic hands grabbed my arm, but I didn’t break pace as Valerie practically tripped over herself, trying to keep up. “That’s not what I was going to say, damnit! Stop walking so fast!”
“Thenwhat?” My nasty snarl made her jump away, and my heart squeezed even as I pinned her to a column between stores. I could feel people staring at us, but I ignored them as the tendons in my hands bulged from the tension zinging through me. Valerie lost some of her puff, and my throat tightened around a growl as she so gently set her palm against my chest.
“How can someone break up with you after that kiss?” Cutting my hiss off, Valerie’s words rolled off her tongue in a slur, and I tensed when her hand fell from my chest. A little, tiny, sad smile crested her cheeks, and a light extinguished in her eye as my heart palpitated painfully. “Let’s just go back. It’s not that important, I guess.”
“The fuck does that mean,not that important? Of course, it’s important!”What the fuck is happening right now?My elbows gave out on me as the question dug ruts into my brain, and I suddenly found myself nose to nose with her. “Do you think I’m doing all this because Idon’twant to be with you? For sex? For a job? What?”
“I hoped you would know what, Carlyle.”
“What the fuck isthatsupposed to mean?” I lost my shit at that, and I glared hotly at Valerie as she struggled not to look away. “I invited you out because I wanted to spend time with you. That’s the only God damn reason. Yeah, I went to your apartment because I had a shit day, and I wanted to see you, but I didn’t invite you out as a distraction. Jesus,fuck.”
Pushing myself away roughly, I raked my hands through my hair and down the back of my head, and Valerie crossed her arms over her bust with a sour expression. She didn’t look the least bit scared or uneasy, but she did look nervous, and I scoffed loudly.
“You know what Idoknow, Valerie? I wasted my fucking time.” All this fucking drama over astuffed animal. Rolling my eyes, I turned on my heel to storm down the causeway, and I could hear her pattering after me. Valerie just shot the shit out of absolutely nowhere, and I blinked hard as I tried to wrap my head around it. Pulling my phone out of my pocket, my hand shook as I unlocked the screen, and red seeped into the edges of my vision.
I was distracted by her big ass and sharp wit. Obviously, she wasn’t lying when she said painting and sex were all of her personality.
“Carlyle . . . ” Ignoring the call, I dialed Carl’s number, but Valerie rushed around me to hold my phone down. “Stop . . . I . . . ”
“Take your hand off menow.” Hurt rippled across her delicate features, and she tentatively withdrew to hold her hand to her chest as the demanding ground through my teeth. I pulled the phone to my ear only to listen to the ring, and I swore under my breath. I’d let Carl off for the night, and he’d probably left his work cell in the car before heading home.
“Can you . . . can you just . . . hear me out? Please?” It physically hurt to listen to the waver in Valerie’s tone, and I slid my phone back in my pocket to cover my mouth tightly. She took my silence as acceptance, but I really didn’t want to say something I’d later regret as her swimming eyes met mine. “Please, Carlyle. I get it. I shouldn’t have made the joke. I’m sorry, okay?”
“What the fuck is with you tonight, huh?” My lip curled back, and Valerie went a little gaunt as I scratched my jaw and neck in irritation. “Do you need me to fucking spell it out for you or something, Valerie? It’s not about the damn joke. Jesus, it’s . . . why are you trying to pick a fight with me? Answer me that.”
“I wasn’t trying to do that, Carlyle. I just . . . we just . . . got our wires crossed. I didn’t mean to imply in any way that . . . ” I fucking saw that shit— that fraction of a second when she decided to give up, that maybe I wouldn’t believe her, that tiny dim in her eye. “I don’t want to fight with you. I’ll go get my phone and call an Uber.”
“Don’t . . . don’t fucking do that. Don’t try to avoid the issue.” Taking her shoulders as gently as my stiff hands allowed, I frowned when she ducked her head. The last half hour sped through my mind’s eye, and I clenched and released my jaw in the ensuing, terse silence. “Did you do this because you’re afraid to get a new phone?”
“No . . . not entirely.”I can’t get a straight answer from you, can I?Valerie was going to set my God damn brain on fire, that’s what she was going to do. Rocking back on my heels, I flopped my head back to exhale a hot breath, and she leaned to rub her crown against my sternum. “Ca-can I be on your plan?”
Surprise rocketed through me, and I lowered my gaze to find her sort of shrinking as she hunched her shoulders. Was she really that upset about that phone call?Then again, Valerie’s mom is involved. That woman would know everything. Birthday, social, everything. It’s a good reason to be scared.
“Of course you can.” Wrapping my arms around her, I kissed the top of her head, and Valerie exhaling a shuddering breath that weaved between the buttons of my shirt. “What else is bothering you, Valerie?”
“You don’t kiss girls often. I could tell.” The short answer warmed my cheeks, and I tangled my hand in Valerie’s hair to tug gently. Embarrassment raged across her features, and I made it a point not to hesitate as I captured her thick, beautiful lips. This time, she couldn’t catch me off guard, and she sunk against my chest to slip her arms around my waist. She tasted like the remnants of her ice cream and something so much deeper, and my tongue snuck out to prod the seam of her mouth.
“You’re right, I don’t. Does it bother you? The pressure of knowing that?” Her lips parted at my mumble, and Valerie’s sigh caressed my tongue and the roof of my mouth. “You didn’t have to goad me into a fight, Valerie. You could’ve asked to be on my plan. It’s just Verizon. If you want, I’ll open up a line with a different service for you.”
“It’s not exactly something you ask on the . . . fourth date.”Fourth?As if sensing my confusion, Valerie nodded as she pulled her long, mahogany waves over her shoulder. “I count lunch on Saturday. Basically, any time we get food or snacks or eat anything of any kind. I guess that means I should count that morning at the coffee shop because I had coffee.”
“Alright, I get it.” Kneading her scalp, I shook my head a little, and she cracked a smile even though tension lines formed around her mouth. “Regardless, Valerie, I won’t expect anything. You’ll be an employee of mine at some point. I treat my employees very well. That includes a work cell. Okay, no more stalling. Let’s go.”
