Page 88 of A Matter of Time

Head back, body rigid, he weaved his fingers through my hair as he called my name. I smiled before I took him in my mouth again. The look in his eyes when they met mine, full of me, full of trust and surrender, made my heart hurt.

ELEVEN

Iwas lying on the couch the following evening answering Dane’s emails and building his schedule for the following week when Sam came out and sat behind me.

“J?”

I looked over my shoulder at him. “You all right? You got all quiet after the farmers’ market this afternoon.” It had been weird. He was fine in the car on the way over, but while we were there he had slowly withdrawn until he finally went silent. I had racked my brain thinking of what I could have done. “Did I do something?”

“No, sorry.”

“You don’t hafta be sorry. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yeah, I just have to meet my buddies, and there’s nothing I can do about it. We go every weekend.”

“That’s fine, I can entertain myself.” I yawned, going back to my Excel spreadsheet. “Besides, I got a ton of shit to do.”

“But I don’t want you out at some⁠—”

“No.” I cut him off. “I’ll call a few friends and catch a movie or something if I get done.” I leaned back between his legs and kissed the inside of his thigh. “I’ll be good.”

“Okay,” he said, getting up. “Thanks.”

“No problem.” I yawned again and realized I had booked two appointments for the same day. “Crap.”

It had been a cold, wet, frigid day, and the night was no different. As I sat there on the thick rug with my hot cup of tea near the roaring fire, in a really old pair of jeans, socks, and a T-shirt, I was feeling very cozy. I was ordering Chinese when he walked back into the room.

“What’s going on? I thought you were going out.”

I shook my head as I hung up the phone. “Nah. I’m gonna have hot-and-sour soup and pork dumplings instead. I don’t feel like goin’ out at all.”

“You don’t?”

I looked up at him. “No. Hey, you look nice.”

“Oh yeah?”

The faded Levi’s 501s were hugging his legs like a second skin and the thick turtleneck was bulky, but still gave you the idea that the chest and shoulders underneath were massive. He pulled on his black leather jacket and adjusted it as he stared at me.

“Yeah. You look great.”

“Okay…so, you have a nice night, J. Don’t wait up.”

“Nope.” I smiled at him before returning my attention to my laptop. “See ya later.” I heard the door close, and I got up to lock it as I went to get a refill on my tea.

Dane’s schedule took forever, and by the time my food came, I still wasn’t even halfway through it. The email he had sent me the day before also said he wanted me to work up the anticipated revenue for the coming quarter to send to the accounting department. I could do it, but it always took me a little longer to do the formulas. I took a break an hour later, did a bit of reorganizing in Sam’s kitchen, then got back to work.

The bump woke me, and I jerked to the left, hitting the floor so hard that I knocked the wind out of myself. I had rolled off the couch and ended up more under it than beside it. The TV was off, the room silent, bathed in blue shadows and moonlight. The fire had died without attention, and it was really cold. There was a scrape and the jingle of keys and the door opened. I leaned sideways and saw a couple silhouetted in the hall light for a moment before the door was closed with a rattle of unhooked chain. Wrapped in each other’s arms, kissing ferociously, neither of them taking a breath, together looking like the picture of raging passion. There were grunts, moans, and whimpers, and then the woman’s coat hit the floor, followed by the high heel that came to rest inches from where I was hiding.

“I missed you.”

The sultry-voiced confession was low and husky, and I saw them again for a moment, shadows moving in the soft glow of the streetlight, man and woman tangled up in heat. They were pulling and yanking at each other, spilling into the darkness before he suddenly threw her over his shoulder like firemen do and carried her off toward his bedroom, the giggling and squealing echoing down the short hallway.

I rolled out from where I was, stood up, and waited. Waited to see if I was wrong. Waited to wake up. Waited for something to tell me that this was not reality and I was only dreaming. Nothing happened except the slamming of the bedroom door.

When I moved, I realized that, unlike my place, his floorboards did not creak. So I was able to walk in my socks on his hardwood floors and stand outside his door without making a sound. Frozen there, feeling like a stalker, I listened outside his bedroom. I heard the moaning and stood there, frozen, torn between throwing open the door and exposing his lie, cracking it just a sliver to see, to make sure and confirm what I knew anyway, or just walking away. I had to know for sure, but at the same time my flight response was screaming in my head. Stupid, but I had to see, to make sure, to know beyond a shadow of a doubt that Sam Kage was screwing some woman in the same bed I had been in just that morning. I shivered hard and reached for the door handle at the same time the lights went on in the living room.

I turned as Sam closed the front door, tossed his keys on the table beside the love seat, and dumped his jacket on the couch.