I had no interest in Derek either. Absolutely none.
“It’s okay if you did, Athie,” he said, friendly again. “We’re … friends. You can tell me.”
Friends …
Shit, that stung.
“Oh, then …” I sucked in a sharp breath. “Um, maybe a little.”
The easy look on Charlie’s face disappeared, and his jaw twitched. “Oh, okay. Cool.”
Cool? Charlie never said cool.
“Yeah, but it was just so he’d leave,” I whispered. “Nothing more! Really, he’s not even my type.”
“You have a type?”
“Yeah …” YOU!!! “Derek doesn’t fit it.”
“Who does?”
Internally screaming! What should I say?!
I shuffled my feet on the turf. “Oh, um, I don’t really know how to explain it. Just … nice and funny. Derek seems a bit too self-absorbed for me. You know, it seems like he thinks his shit doesn’t stink and …”
And now I am freaking rambling!
Charlie stayed quiet for a couple of moments, then nodded. “Next time he comes to our place, call me immediately.”
“But—”
“Athie …” Charlie whispered, grasping on to my chin and drawing his thumb across my lower lip—something he had never done before, especially in public. “I don’t want anything to happen to you, Athie,” he whispered. “You’re important to me.”
My heart pounded so loudly that I could hear it in my ears. Important to him? Of course, only in a friendship kind of way, right? That was what it had to be. There wasn’t a possibility that he actually wanted a relationship with me.
Or else … he would’ve made a move these past few years.
Or else … he wouldn’t have just called me a friend.
“Nothing is going to happen to me,” I said. “Trust me, okay?”
“I trust you, but I don’t trust him,” he said, and then his voice dropped so I could barely hear it, but I gathered, “not to take you away from me.”
My eyes widened slightly, and I moved closer to him. “We’ll always be best friends.”
“Best friends,” he repeated, but the words didn’t sound like they usually did.
I wondered if the word friend stung as badly for him as it did for me.
He brushed some hair out of my face, his fingers gliding against my skin, and moved closer to me. I stared up at him through wide eyes, my heart racing. We had always been this close in public, but not after what had happened. This somehow felt different because we had actually been together, fucking all over our high-rise.
And I might be having feelings that I shouldn’t.
My gaze dropped to his lips, and I pressed my thighs together.
One little kiss wouldn’t ruin our friendship, right?
I mean, we had already done more than that, but in public? That would kinda make it feel a little too real. Like it meant more than sleeping with each other a couple of times in private. Like he actually wanted this too.
