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Nicholas catches me as I stumble back a step, with her shove being a little harder than she meant because I have embarrassed her.
He whispers into my ear, “Your man, huh? I like the sound of that.” And with that, he releases me again and walks toward the door, motioning for us to follow him. Of course, he doesn’t enter until we have walked past him. He can still be a gentleman when he wants to be.
Nicholas gets us both an iced tea while I start to show her around the house and what feels like a million bedrooms and bathrooms.
As we walk into the main bedroom, she stops and grabs my arm. “I don’t want a tour of your sex cave.”
And of course, I had just taken a sip of my drink and almost choke trying not to spit it out everywhere over the cream rug on the floor.
“Are you serious? Why would you say that?” I gasp, trying to calm my coughing reflex down.
“Because it’s true. Don’t you dare try to deny he hasn’t been tying you up in here and fucking you stupid.”
“Hmmm, being tied up,” I murmur, placing my finger on my chin like I’m pondering her words. “Haven’t tried that one yet.”
“Oh my God, I can’t be in this room. I bet if I shone one of those black lights in here there would bodily fluids on every surface.” She looks at me with all the jealousy I know she is feeling because she has been telling me all week that I’m getting enough for the both of us.
And I haven’t even told her the half of it. I can’t. I’m still coming to terms with what he has brought out in me that I’m not sure how Lou will cope with it. Before now, I would’ve said we were both conservative and the few times we have had sex with guys it was always the standard deal. Missionary or on top if we were lucky.
Just thinking about my life before Nicholas makes me squirm. It’s like I’m a totally different person, and even though I haven’t told her that, I think Lou can tell too. We have been in sync most of our lives since we became friends, so I can’t imagine it will be any different now.
“Then if you are worried about that, I suggest you don’t shine the black light anywhere else in the house either.”
“Who even are you and what have you done with my friend Tori?” she jokes with me, but I think there is part of her that wants the answer to that question.
“Shut up. You know I’m just joking with you… maybe.”
“You are not. Your face gives you away every time. And I’m not eating or sitting anywhere until that old man drives me home again.”
Backing out of the room, I can’t help but keep her going. “You better be talking about Wallace as the old man and not Nicholas; he will poison your food if he hears that. Plus, what makes you think the car is safe territory?”
“I hate you! Only you could spit on some guy, and he ends up being sex on a stick and treating you like a freaking princess in his ivory palace. I just want some man to look sideways at me to make me feel a cheap thrill.”
I stop and pull her into the spare room next to Nicholas’s room and shut the door. “Don’t you settle for that shit. I don’t know what the hell is happening to me. He might be hot as fuck, but this is complicated. Like Rubik’s cube hard-as-fuck complicated.”
Her face drops, and she understands that I’m talking for real now. Not the cotton-candy fluff that the last two weeks has looked like. “Tori, are you okay? I’m serious, should I be worried more than I already am?”
Landing in her arms that she is holding out for me, I know I can’t cry because there is no way I’m walking out in front of Nic’s friends looking like some pathetic woman who can’t handle this life. But just taking the comfort she is offering is what I needed.
“I’m all right, truly.” I hold her hands. “It’s just a lot, you know. This doesn’t happen to people like us.”
Lou drags me to the bed and sits us both on the edge. “Talk to me, Tori, and not just the fluffy stuff, like you said. No bullshit. What is going on?”
For the first time since that morning on the train, I spill it all as quickly as I can. I hear the guys are all downstairs now, and Nicholas will come looking for us any moment, but I need my friend. I need to let all my worries out and have someone who is far more rational than me, the person who knows me inside and out, tell me if I’m making the biggest mistake of my life.
“Holy shit! How are you still holding this together?” she asks, dropping my head to her shoulder with the weight of her words.
“Ummm, did you not just hear what I word vomited on you? I’m not. But I’m already in too deep, aren’t I.”
Both of us breathing deeply, Lou tries to just process my thoughts I have dumped on her.
“Time is irrelevant here, and there is only one question really that needs to be asked,” she says, putting her finger under my chin and making me look up into my best friend’s eyes so I can’t bullshit her in my answer.
“Do you love him? And not the pretend type of first flutters, but like the kind of love that will rip your heart out if he walks away?” She knows. With everything that I just said and how much of an asshole he is, I know it’s too late. I’m already gone.
“Yeah, I think I do. So much, that I will take the bad in spades, just to be smothered in all his goodness.” As I hold back the tears that are brimming in my eyelids, she pulls her shoulders back and wipes my eyes for me.
“Right! Then you fight for your man, like a woman shopping for a pair of Louboutin shoes at the Boxing Day sales at Harrods.”
