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My arms went up around his neck, encircling it, crushing my breasts to his chest as his tongue worked mine.
His body curled, moving to press me down on the mattress.
But his arm was still under me.
His hurt arm.
Making him let out a hiss and loud curse as my body weight pressed down on it.
"Sorry sorry sorry," I said, voice a bit frantic as I lifted up, curling into a seated position as he got onto his knees, pulling his arm upward.
He wouldn't say it, but I could see the pain in his eyes.
"Here, let me check," I said, reaching out for the edge of the gauze, unwrapping it carefully, expecting blood. Like a gush of it. You didn't roll around in bed with a woman when you had as many stitches as he had.
"Lucked out," I murmured when it looked like just one stitch pulled, leaving a small little trickle of blood. "And, actually, this looks a lot better," I added, seeing the bright, angry redness mostly gone. "You might want to just go dab some more tea tree on the pulled stitch though," I advised him, finally looking up to find his gaze fully on me, not his arm.
"Livvy..."
"What?" I asked, feigning ignorance.
"We started something here," he added, not the type to simply let things drop, it seemed.
"And now it is over," I told him, wishing like hell I meant it as much as it sounded like I did.
Roderick watched me for a long moment, eyes unreadable, before turning and walking away, closing himself in the bathroom.
He came back out a few moments later, reeking of fresh tea tree oil, getting into his side of the bed.
This time, he flicked on the TV, wanting the distraction. In a mood, it seemed, though content to keep it to himself. It was something I would normally be grateful for. But I found myself fretting about it, wondering what the look had been in his eyes before he had closed himself into the bathroom.
I was not a 'talk it out' kind of girl when it came to guys and the literal or figurative stickier things in life, but I sat there pretending to watch Friends reruns while my brain raced with all the possible things he might have been thinking, what he was thinking about me.
And I couldn't help but wonder if he would make a move again, if the door was closed shut.
I mean, not that I wanted it to happen again.
That would be a huge mistake.
It would only complicate things.
I knew that rationally.
But my body was saying that maybe, just maybe, once all the gun replacing was finally done, we could hop back into a bed for some sweaty fun.
One for the road, as the saying went.
One night that would put an end to the clawing need in my core.
Roderick eventually fell to sleep what felt like ages later.
And my creepy ass couldn't help but watch him for a long minute or two, the gentle rise and fall of his chest, the way his muscles somehow still contracted on and off even in sleep. People were supposed to soften while unconscious, but Roderick was all hard lines. Even his jaw seemed like steel as he slept.
I forced my eyes away, turning back to the screen, watching the episode where everyone mistook a raw defrosting chicken for Rachel's hairless cat, something that always used to make me laugh, but not managing to muster any humor.
Three hours of Friends turned to George Lopez which then turned to infomercials. And I sat awake watching all of them, knowing sleep was a pipe dream, something that would never come to me. Even though the larger part of me wanted me to fall asleep again, to roll into him again, to wake up to him touching me again, to finish what we had started.
But there were things in life that, no matter how much we wanted them, we simply could not have.
And judging by the way Roderick gave me the figurative - and literal - cold shoulder when his alarm woke us up, turning his back on me as he sat off the end of the bed, shooting off texts in silence, then disappearing into the bathroom, only emerging when he was showered and dressed, telling me the shower was all mine and that he was running down to grab some breakfast, yeah, it seemed like there was no way anything was going to happen with us again.
Which was fine.
What I wanted.
At least that was what I tried to tell myself to ease the weird sinking sensation in my stomach.SEVENRoderickShe wanted to keep things professional.
I got that.
It was hard enough to be a woman in a male-dominated profession. She didn't want to be known as someone who would fall into bed with her contacts.
First, because she didn't want to be known for that.
