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Huh.
Guess I learned something about myself.
I shake the water from my hair and grab a towel off a lounge chair, shaking it out before wrapping it around my hips. I don’t need to walk around with a semi in wet boxer briefs while Nic’s here. He’ll think it’s him and his ego doesn’t need that.
He follows me inside. “How’d last night go? When I left, you were getting friendly with a woman who hadn’t relegated you to the friend zone.”
I open the fridge and pull out one of his smoothies. “Nothing happened.” One mouthful and I know why he didn’t take the drink away from me. I spit it back into the container with a gag. “Stop worrying about my dick and start worrying about food poisoning.”
“I’m worried aboutyou, not your dick.” He takes the smoothie to the sink and hands me a glass of water, which I drain. “Are you suffering from a sudden attack of celibacy?” he asks. “Do you need to see a doctor?”
“I’m fine.” I’m not and there’s nothing sudden about my celibacy, but he hasn’t been around to notice until Addison kicked him out. Anyway, Nic’s more of a mess than I am. “You’re the one approaching sex like it will solve all your problems. Tell me, you feel good after?”
“After getting laid? Yeah, fucking fantastic.”
“Nic.”
He stares at me for ages. I stare back. His face is giving nothing away, and Nic’s not good at acting, despite the Warwick role.
“For a little while, yes,” he says eventually, and the mask cracks. He sags against the counter.
“And then it doesn’t,” I prod. I fell in love with Mina before I meant to. The first few months, I wasn’t happy about it. I tried to fuck her out of my system. It didn’t feel good—outside of the thirty seconds on either side of climaxing—so I stopped.
Nic’s situation isn’t all that different. Using sex to forget or cover feelings isn’t the answer.
He scrubs a hand over his face. “I try not to think about it.”
This is as close as I’ve gotten him to that big scary thing he doesn’t want to acknowledge. We’re in the same hemisphere now. “Maybe your heart wants something else.” Like my twin sister.
His face darkens into a scowl. “I’m not in love with Addison.”
Nope, still not even on the same planet. I open the fridge and hand him one of my yogurts to replace the one of his I ate. “I don’t think you ever were.”
Nic doesn’t say anything, looking away as he peels the top off the yogurt. “You’re right. I can’t remember ever loving her. And I asked her to marry me anyway. What is wrong with me?”
“Do you really want me to answer that?”
He shakes his head and opens a drawer to pull out a spoon.
I study him for a long moment as he leans against the counter, eating the yogurt, his gaze a million miles away. Some introspection would be good for him.
He clears his throat. “Thanks for taking The Bus for me, by the way.”
Okay, guess we’re talking shop instead of feelings. I’ll allow it. Don’t want to push him and have him shut down.
“The choreo is tough.” The Bus is what it sounds like—a bus but on a hydraulic rig that allows it to tilt, swerve, and buck. Nic does a lot of his stunts, but he’s never mastered the trickier fight sequences. He’s also a bit freaked out about heights and the bus is a good ten or fifteen feet above the ground depending on the position it’s in. So, I get to do it. Which is great, because I love it.
Right now, I need the clarity of mind that comes from focusing on movement. For about ninety seconds this morning, from the moment I jumped to the balcony to the moment the pain of hitting the water receded, I forgot about Mina and Dex, my stupid broken heart, and Jackie Chan squeezing my nuts.
I can’t fuck myself out of love, but I can work my heart back to whole.
Nope. That won’t work either. Can’t even fool myself. But this pent-up frustration, this rage and sadness, has to go somewhere, so it’s Take Your Broken Heart to Work Day for the foreseeable future.
After barely making it through the rest of the weekend, Monday morning rolls around and I am itching to throw myself into work. The real heroes of the film transform me into the character Warwick, which means black leather pants and a corset-like vest that makes everything I have to do uncomfortable but does wonderful things to my ass. I get the wardrobe guy to take a shot of my butt before I realize I can’t—shouldn’t—send it to Mina. I send it to my family group chat instead.
I’m prepared, but Danny opts to run through the scene a few times before we start filming. What I’m not prepared for is Dex.
“She’s so fucking hot,” I overhear him talking to Curtis.
