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My eyes fluttered closed, and I sank in my seat. He wasn’t saying anything I didn’t already know and hadn’t told myself, but hearing it out loud was like taking a knife to the stomach. It hurt. Really fucking hurt.
“I really can’t do this right now.” I tilted my head back to look at him. “I have to go.”
Asher shook his head, his nostrils flaring. “I should have goddamn known better.” He stepped back and gripped the edge of my door. “Why the fuck did I think kissing a stripper was a good idea?”
I leaned back in my seat as all the air seemed to escape my lungs. “I’m not just a stripper,” I whispered.
“I fuckin’ know that now,” he gritted out, and his tone was one that had me on high alert. The kind of tone which told me a threat was imminent. I’d taken it from everyone around me: my mom, her boyfriend, Knox. And I was sick and tired of being their punching bag. I was done with letting another person make me feel like shit with just their words.
I stared up at Asher, narrowing my eyes at him. “You only kissed me,” I whipped out. “It’s not like you fucked me, or even married me.” His eyes swirled with something I couldn’t place, but right then, I didn’t care. I wasn’t afraid to stick up for myself. I wasn’t afraid to say what I was thinking. I wasn’t afraid to be me. “Get down off your goddamn high horse, Asher. This isn’t about you.”
He opened his mouth and closed it, and I wasn’t sure what to make of the move. Had I made him speechless? Did he not expect me to talk to him like that? My hands started to shake the longer he stared at me, and for a second, I doubted what I’d said and the way I’d said it. “You know what?” He let go of my door and stepped back, each of his movements calm and calculated. “You’re right.” I blinked, waiting for him to continue. “It was just a kiss. It’s not like I’ll see you again anyway.” He chuckled, but it was a sad-sounding laugh. “Let’s just both forget it ever happened, yeah?”
My stomach churned at the thought of forgetting the way his lips felt against mine. Or not remembering the way his body pressing against mine made me feel safe and wanted. I didn’t want to forget—I wouldn’t forget. But it wasn’t like we could do it again. My two worlds had collided, and I couldn’t hide from it any longer. I couldn’t separate them in my mind, not if Asher was involved in any way.
And besides, I had Knox. Knox should have been the only person I was thinking about. So, I nodded at Asher and pulled my car door closed, shutting him away from me both physically and mentally. I could feel his eyes burning a hole in the side of my head as I turned the ignition and the engine rattled to life, but I didn’t look at him. I couldn’t look at him.
We both had to walk away before it was too late. Too late to walk away. Too late to turn our backs. Too late to acknowledge our spark could turn into a roaring flame.
* * *
ASHER
I threw my fist at the punching bag and swung my leg at it, wincing as my foot connected with the leather the bag was coated in. I’d been running through MMA moves for the last two hours, needing to consume my mind with something other than what had happened over the last week. I wasn’t even sure why I was so consumed by it—by her. She’s taken up space in my head she had no right to, and it felt impossible to erase her from it.
I stepped back from the bag and wiped a towel over my face as I tried to get my breathing back down to normal. I trained in the same gym I had when I was a kid, and although I didn’t take part in the fights anymore, I did help my old coach out with some lessons for the younger students from time to time. But today was all about me. Today was me venting my frustrations out in a way that wouldn’t hurt anyone else.
“You only kissed me. It’s not like you fucked me, or even married me. Get down off your goddamn high horse, Asher. This isn’t about you.” Her words echoed over and over in my brain, and I wondered if I was acting insane. We’d kissed—once. And okay, she hadn’t been honest with me, but had I even asked? We’d only had two real conversations, but I’d felt something. My stomach churned when I thought about her, and my lips pulled up into a smile when I looked at her. There had been something there. Something I hadn’t felt before, at least not in this way.
But now it wouldn’t be anything. Now I just had to pretend like we’d never met. It wasn’t an impossible act. I could do it. I just didn’t want to. Fuck. My mind was a scrambled mess, and I had no idea how to make it right again.
I glanced around the gym, seeing only one other kid in here training, and decided I needed to get out of here. I needed to relax my mind and focus on shit I needed to get done. Like clearing out the empty apartment above my shop. It was Sunday, the only day I closed the shop, and although I’d been taking extra clients, I’d put a stop to it because I was burning out. Maybe that was the reason I was overthinking this.
I grabbed my bag and water bottle off the floor, nodded at my old coach on the way out, and headed toward my truck. The gym was in my old neighborhood, and although I could have found a new place to train, nowhere ever felt like home the way this one did. I’d spent more hours here growing up than anywhere else, which was why, when I was at my most frazzled, I came here.
My truck roared to life, and I stared out of the windshield, looking at nothing in particular. I was zoning in and out, and I knew if I didn’t make sense of everything in my head, it would happen more and more. I needed to focus. Focus on the here and now and not the what-if and why.
I took off the handbrake and drove out of the lot and toward my shop. I passed my house on the way, but I didn’t stop. My body was sweaty, my workout gear wet in places, but I knew if I went home, I wouldn’t come back out, and all I’d do was overthink everything.
Even though it was Sunday, it was still a nightmare to find a parking space outside East Ink, so I ended up farther down the road. I pulled into the first space I could and didn’t bother to look around as I switched the engine off and got out of my truck. I was in a world of my own, on a mission to distract myself, so I didn’t hear someone calling my name the first time. But when a hand touched my arm, I froze. My immediate thought was to spin around and grab the offender’s arm, but I stopped myself, knowing I wasn’t in any danger.
“Asher?” a soft voice said. I blinked several times, trying to clear the fog descending over me. The face blurred in and out, and I stepped back so their hold on me would be gone. “You okay?”
“I…” I shook my head and cleared my throat, realizing it was Aleste, the owner of the dance studio. She’d come to get a tattoo from Lara a few weeks back. “Hey.” My voice was rough, but I tried to lower it.
“You’ve gone really pale,” Aleste said, moving forward, and it caused me to take a step back. I didn’t know why. It wasn’t like she was going to hurt me, but my instincts were kicking in. I’d been frazzled for a few days, and I knew it was because of Lotus—or Elodie. Whatever her name was. Fuck. I couldn’t even deny how beautiful her real name was, and I—
“Aleste?”
My head whipped around at the sound of her voice. What was she doing here? Why was she everywhere I turned? Why was she in my head and in front of me? Jesus, I couldn’t get away from her. I stared at her, but she was doing everything in her power to look anywhere but at me. Maybe she was thinking the same thing about me? Maybe she was wondering why I was everywhere too.
“Oh, sorry, Elodie.” Aleste laughed and rolled her eyes at herself. “Asher, this is my student, Elodie.” She waved her arm at Elodie, and it took everything within my power not to glance back over at her. We’d gone years without ever meeting, and now it felt like we saw each other all the time. The earth’s force was pushing us together, at least, that was what it felt like. Or maybe I was overthinking again. The latter was probably more accurate.
“Elodie, this is Asher. He owns East Ink.”
“You do?” Elodie asked, her tone shocked, and I couldn’t keep my focus on anything but her. She was a magnet, pulling my stare to her and refusing to let it go. How the hell could she have so much control over me when I barely knew her? Was Aleste aware that she was a stripper too? Or was that a secret? Or maybe Aleste was the one who taught her. I had so many questions, and I was afraid I’d never get the answers to any of them.
