Waving goodbye, I ran to Savvy Sips to get a couple of things from the bakery. I wished I could have procured some rainbow cotton candy, but these baked goods would have to suffice, because I was one hundred percent going to run over to Audra’s house. The tipping point for that decision was when Maeve dismissed her day as just a bad day. It didn’t take that advanced degree to know that Audra didn’t tell her the extent of what actually went down. Maeve would have been raging about the fact that the dad of that kid was intimidating her. She’d probably push to find out who it was and concoct some revenge plot shit. If I were the only one who knew all about what happened, it was my responsibility to check in on her, right? Yeah. That’s what I was going with.
I pulled up to her house and rang the bell. After a minute,she opened the door flushed and sweating with a pair of headphones around her neck, wearing a tiny pair of spandex shorts, and a tank top sports bra combo thing that she was spilling out of. Clearly, she was doing some kind of workout. I lost my ability to speak. The blood drained from my head, inconveniently rushing right to my dick when I looked at those thighs and thought about them wrapped around my fucking head. My eyes wandered up and then down to her legs again. Holy shit those were tiny shorts. Was I an ass man or a boob man? It didn’t matter; Audra King had both in spades.
“Donovan, I wasn’t expecting to see you. Is everything ok? How are you?” she said, out of breath.
“Fine. Everything’s fine,” I stuttered out as if I weren’t the one who was the surprise visitor.Pull it together, man. “I brought you a snack,” I said, holding the bag out as an offering. Good Lord, I had never been so awkward before.
“You came here to … drop off a snack?” she questioned me as she tilted her head.
“Yes … No. Uh, I came by to check on you after yesterday. It was an emotional day, and I would have texted you, but I don’t have your number. Just wanted to see how you were feeling.”
“Oh. That is incredibly sweet, Donovan. I’m feeling better. You were completely right. That walk was the best thing I could have done. How do you know so much about adrenaline crashes?”
“I spent years in a boxing gym honing in on those fight-or-flight feelings,” I laughed.
“Let’s spar!” she said enthusiastically, her breath catching up to her.
“Ah, I haven’t been in a ring in five years.”
“No matter, I’ve never done it at all.Will you teach me some moves?” And she threw a couple of punches into the air. This girl was magnetic.
“Oh gosh, yeah, you clearly need coaching after those punches,” I joked with her.
“Watch yourself, Wright. You don’t know what you’re getting into.”
Fuck, don’t I know it.I definitely don’t know what I’m getting into with Audra King.I thought as she threw some more punches and then accentuated it with a Mortal Kombat Uppercut move. When she growled out “Get over here,” my snicker turned into a full-blown laugh.
“Mortal Kombat and Magic 8 Balls. You’re barking up my childhood tree there, King. We’ll throw it on our list of bar games and have some sort of pentathlon event. What did I interrupt you doing?”
“Pentathlon day would be my dream!” she exclaimed as she held her hand over her heart in an exaggerated motion and fluttered her eyelashes.
Once again, we were interrupted by a voice that I would rather never hear again. Fucking. Theo. This guy was a cockroach. He strolled up like he owned the place, and Audra froze. “What are you squatting these days, Audra? That ass is looking good.” He turned to me. “She strength trains in the basement,” he dismissively said, insinuating I didn’t know, which I didn’t, but it infuriated me. Had he been within earshot but out of our eyesight? That was unnerving.
“Why are you here, Theo?” Audra said icily.
“Just walking around the neighborhood. Looking at some properties. You’re a property guy, right, Donovan? Any advice?”
I ran my tongue along my inner teeth and felt my handsball into fists at my sides. “I don’t give out advice to people I’m not working with.”
“Oh, and here I thought we were friends. Don’t worry about the money, Wright. I have enough to hire you.” He turned his attention back to Audra. “Still have that weight bench we liked so much, Audra?” He was goading me with his disrespect to both of us, and I could feel myself rising to take the bait. Speaking of those fight-or-flight responses, my adrenaline was pinging through the roof, body prepping to have a go.
“Fuck you, Theo,” she responded.
“Been there, but I could have another go,” and he grabbed his crotch and licked his lips in a perverted way.
Welp. Here we go. Fight it is.
I took a step towards him, but before my next footstep hit, Audra grabbed the back of my shirt to pull me back. Could I have broken free from her grip? Sure. But she tugged again, and I appeased her as I stepped back and glowered at the piece of shit in front of me. She stepped in front of me so we were chest to chest and brought my attention to her. With her back fully to Theo, she put both hands on the neck of my shirt and slowly, but forcefully, pulled down. I bent to her will, and she crashed her lips onto mine. It was so unexpected that it shorted my entire goddamn system.
What the glorious fuck?
My brain caught up, and I tilted my head to kiss her back. Her lips were so damn soft and she tasted faintly of fruity chapstick. I’m sure she did it to get Theo to back off, but this kiss ... it felt fucking unreal. I had never kissed someone and had the explosion of something so intoxicating flow through me. It was so powerful that I wanted to pick her up and claim her on her front porch.Instead, I settled for wrapping my arms around her back and flicked Theo off. Then, through her parted lips, she let out the smallest little moan. I’m sure I’m the only one who heard it, but my dick jumped in my pants. She pulled away from the kiss, and I was left panting. I tried to adjust to hide the erection I was sporting in my grey Tom Ford’s, but I’m sure it didn’t work out so well.
She glared at Theo and pulled me by the arm into her house, slammed the door, put her back against it, and sighed. He shouted ‘Fuck you both!’ before he stomped away.
“Oh my God, Donovan. I’m so sorry. That was a disaster.” She put her hands over her face.
I took a step closer. Because yesterday when she was talking about adrenaline, I conveniently left out that the best thing for me to do after a fight in the ring when the adrenaline was high was to fuck it out of my system. And right now, I had a lot of fucking adrenaline coursing through me.
