Dangerous Curves Ahead: A Perfect Fit Novel (18 page)

Their time together was wonderful and she had no regrets but for the sake of her heart they could not repeat tonight.

“Grab it out of the fridge for me. Cups are in the cabinet over the sink.” He pecked her mouth. “Our snack is ready.”

She turned away to do as he asked, her lips still warm from his kiss. He was seated at the table when she turned around, a steaming omelet in front of him. When she went to pull the chair across from him out it wouldn’t budge.

She looked at him in question.

“Sit here.” He patted his lap.

Is he on drugs?

“I’ll break you.”

He frowned at her. “That’s what you said when I asked you to be on top. I think we both know how well that turned out.”

Ellis’s cheeks burned at the recent memory. It had worked out. Very, very well in fact. “That was different. We were—you were—” She sighed in frustration. “—on a bed.”

“Come here, Ellie.” He lifted his arms, urging her closer.

“Fine,” she grumbled. “I hope your chair is sturdy enough to handle this.”

She gingerly sat on his lap, holding most of her weight off him. He wasn’t happy with that and squeezed her against him until she relaxed. She expected to hear the chair groan in protest but it remained blissfully quiet.

“I love the way you feel, Elle.”

She wrapped her arms around him and rested her head on his shoulder.

You like making poor defenseless women fall in love with you, too.

“I think you have a secret fetish for fat girls. Did you know some men have a thing for being squashed? They pay money for big women to sit or lie on them. It’s a good business. Maybe I should charge you.”

Mike sighed heavily, “Why do you always have to say things like that?”

“Why do you pretend that I’m not fat? We both know I am.”

“I don’t see you as fat.”

“Really? Aww.” She grinned at him “We need to get your vision checked.”

He cupped her face in his hand. “You’re curvy and sexy and have an ass I would photograph and frame if you let me. Why can’t you just accept the fact that I’m seriously attracted to you?”

“I accept it,” she said after a moment. “And I don’t say those things because I don’t like myself or because I’m looking for reassurance from you.” She smiled softly at him. “But every girl likes to hear she’s super sexy once in a while.” She kissed the tip of his nose. “I’ll never be a size that has single digits and my thighs will always touch when I walk but I’m okay with that. And I want you to know that and try to ignore my insanity.”

Thoughts of Jack entered her mind. He was so different from Mike. Jack had claimed to love her. He had told her every day but as soon as she did something to displease him the comments about her appearance would begin—or about the way she ate or spoke or smiled. She didn’t realize he was slowly tearing her apart, that he was trying to break her until their very last conversation when the words
fat pig
were spat at her. It took a long time to build herself back up from that point.

She knew Mike wasn’t looking for forever but she was also beginning to learn that he wouldn’t tolerate anybody tearing her down. It was nice to know that.

“I get it, but it still bugs the shit out of me.”

“I’m sorry, Mikey.”

“Don’t be.” He picked up the fork and dug into the rapidly cooling omelet. “Eat up. It’s getting cold.”

They fed each other, shared kisses, and for the next twenty minutes talked about their childhoods. Ellis inwardly sighed. Tonight had been the most romantic night of her life. It reminded of her of the night they’d shared four years ago and the conversation that had made her fall for him in the first place. She was sad it was all over.

“I should get going.” She attempted to get off his lap but once again found herself stuck.

“It’s two thirty.”

She glanced at the microwave, discovering he was correct. “I guess time flies when you’re having fun.”

“It does.” He paused for a moment. “Stay.”

“Stay? You can’t possibly want to have more sex? Aren’t you … exhausted?”

“I am exhausted and I always want to have sex with you but that’s not why I am asking you to stay.”

“You don’t do sleepovers.” She searched his face to see if he was serious. He was. “Why do you want me to stay?”

“I don’t know. I want to wake up with you tomorrow.”

“Oh.” She blinked at him. Her stupid heart was pounding. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. Tomorrow her life would go back to normal. She would reopen her store, finish her dresses, return to her happily single status. It was too soon after her breakup to be falling in love. She had too much on the line this time. Her store. Her future. Her heart. The risk was too much. But tonight was a different story. Tonight she would enjoy her time with the man she’d never dreamed of being with.

She stood, extending her hand to him. “Okay. Let’s go to bed.”

Chapter Thirteen

Mike stared at himself the next morning as he shaved. He looked tired. He
was
tired after managing only a few hours of sleep the night before. Ellis asked him to make love to her again before they fell asleep, and when they woke up he spent an hour doing the same. Yes, he looked tired, but he also looked dumb. He couldn’t stop his lips from curling in a stupid self-satisfied grin. It was foolish for him to think that once he had her he wouldn’t want her as much.

He tapped his razor on the sink before rinsing the blade. If he didn’t hurry he was going to be late for work. But for some reason he couldn’t make himself move faster. He opened his medicine cabinet to pull out his aftershave when he spotted them. The condoms. An entire box that he should have used last night. His stomach clenched.

All women were on birth control nowadays. Weren’t they? It wasn’t like him to be so careless. He never forgot to use protection. He had never had sex without it before. That must be the reason it felt so different with Ellis. So damn good.

“Shit.”

Sex at her house. At his house. All those times that neither one of them paused to think about the possible consequences. He was going to have to speak to her, to find out if there was any possible chance that she could be pregnant.

“Shit.”

*   *   *

Work that day went by in a blur for Mike. He couldn’t stop thinking about Ellis. In between panicked thoughts of fatherhood came ones about them in bed. He wanted to regret their night together but he couldn’t. He would do it all over again if he had the chance.

He walked into her shop right before closing time. A few customers were scattered about. Cherri was manning the register.

“She’s in her office,” she told him with a little smile.

Mike thanked her, wondering if Ellis had shared any details of their night together. Probably not. She didn’t strike him as that type of women. The truth was he barely knew what kind of woman she was. He did know that she’d told him she didn’t want kids. He believed her. He also believed that if she did have his baby she would be good to it. Motherhood may have not been her chosen path but his gut told him that she would be a natural.

“Hey,” he said to her when he walked into her office.

Her eyes went wide. “I didn’t think I would see you today.”

“Here I am.” He gave her a halfhearted smile. Shutting the door behind him, he leaned against it. “I need to talk to you.”

Immediately her expression grew wary. “Okay.” She put down the dress she was working on and spun her chair to face him. “Shoot.”

“We didn’t use any protection last night…” Mike wasn’t sure how to continue. “I wanted to—I was just wondering if—Are you okay?”

She rose from her chair with a smile on her face. Her arms came around him. “Of course I’ll marry you, Mikey. I always wanted a spring wedding but I’ll be too big by then. You think I’ll be showing by Christmas? A Christmas wedding could be a lot of fun. We could dress as Santa and Mrs. Claus.” She giggled. “Our wedding pictures would be so cute. Don’t you think?”

“Um … yeah.” He shut his eyes and buried his face in her hair, trying to slow his rapidly beating heart. Marriage. He felt queasy, but not panicked. He wouldn’t be like his father. He wouldn’t let her raise a kid alone.

“Mike?” Her hands touched his face. “You do realize that I’m joking, don’t you?”

His eyes snapped open. She was frowning at him. “Uh, yeah.”

“No, you didn’t!” She backed away from him, crossing her arms under her breasts. “Oh, how typical! You
would
think I would want to marry you. Well, I don’t, even if I were pregnant.”

“Wait a minute. If you were pregnant we would be getting married. I’m not going to let you raise my baby without me.”

Shut up, you idiot
, he told himself.
You don’t want to get married.

“Thank God I’m not pregnant,” she huffed. “I’m on the pill. You don’t have to worry about me trapping you into a loveless marriage.”

He opened his mouth to tell her it wouldn’t be loveless but then shut it. Where the hell did that thought come from? “I wasn’t worried. I wanted to make sure I did the right thing by you. This is the first time I forgot to use something.”

“I forgot, too, and I know better.” She locked gazes with him. “Maybe this is a sign that last night was a mistake.”

Her words were a punch to the gut. “A mistake?”

“Yes.” She looked away from him. “You’ve been with a lot of women and I didn’t think about that before I slept with you. You could have man-whore cooties or something.”

Mike wanted to defend himself, to tell her that she was wrong but he couldn’t. “I haven’t slept with as many women as you give me credit for. I haven’t been with anybody but you for a year.”

Ellis’s mouth formed a perfect O. She was speechless for the first time since they had met. She was right about one thing: Even though he was careful to protect himself and his partner, he could never be sure. But she was wrong about them. Last night was not a mistake, and he would make sure he proved it to her.

*   *   *

When Ellis returned home that evening her stomach was in knots. That morning after Mike had given her a long kiss good-bye she’d floated home on a cloud of sexual satisfaction—but all of that died when she noticed the light blinking on her phone.

“Hey, it’s Dina. Where the hell are you? I sent you three texts.”

She had forgotten all about her sister. They had been trying to make an effort to stay connected since that dinner with their parents but Ellis hadn’t spoken to her in days. She was too wrapped up with Mike. Maybe she should come clean about them.

She disregarded that idea almost immediately.

Dina didn’t need to know that Ellis had slept with Mike because it was over between them, just one night of very good sex. It didn’t matter that she thought about him one hundred times that day or if her heart leapt when she saw him walk into her office. Michael Edwards was officially off limits. Being with him was too risky. She was just finding herself. There was no way she could lose herself in another man.

Ellis sat down on her couch and dialed her sister’s number.

Dina answered on the first ring. “Why the hell didn’t you pick up your phone last night? I was worried sick.”

“What?”

“Where were you last night? Mom told me your store got robbed. She told me you got hurt. She said your face was all busted up. Damn it, Ellis. I kept trying to call you to see if you were okay.”

“I was … uh … in bed,” she said, telling a half-truth. This was not what she expected to hear from her sister when she picked up the phone. She never thought in a million years that her sister would actually care. “You spoke to Mom. She told you I was fine. Didn’t she?”

“Yes, but I needed to hear from you myself.” She was quiet for a moment. “Listen, Elle, I know that I have spent the majority of your life treating you like the stuff that grows under rocks. But I happen to love the stuff that grows under rocks very much and would hate it if something happened to it.”

“Dina…” Tears clogged Ellis’s throat as guilt tore up her insides. While her sister was worrying about her, Ellis was having hot sex with her ex-boyfriend.
Classy.
“I’m okay, I swear. You don’t have to worry.”

“Oh, I’m not going to worry anymore because I’m picking you up and we are going to the shooting range.”

“What? Guns. I’m pretty sure New York State doesn’t just give out gun permits willy-nilly. And you know our nonviolent pacifist mother will not approve of this adventure.”

“So what? We won’t tell her. I know you’re all brave and shit but I need to do this. I need to know that if the time ever came you’ll be able to protect yourself.”

“Where the hell was this sister when we were kids? I could have used you in junior high.”

“Nah, it would have never worked then. I had too much fun torturing you.”

“Bitch.”

“Brat.”

“Thanks for calling, sister.”

“I’ll call again. We will get this sister thing right eventually. I promise.”

They disconnected and for the first time in a long time Ellis was really hopeful that things would work out with her sister.

*   *   *

“I’m hungry,” Colin complained as he studied the contents of Mike’s refrigerator.

Mike stared at his friend’s back, wondering if he could burn a hole through his shirt with his gaze alone. He had been in Colin’s company for over half an hour and for the first time in the fifteen years Mike had known the man he wanted to punch him. How could one man have so many jokes?

“Forget about your goddamn stomach for two seconds and get me an ice pack.”

Colin glanced over his shoulder and grinned at him. “Your head hurts, does it?”

“You know it does,” he snapped. Mike had been through few experiences in his life in which he was truly embarrassed; today was one of them. Today took all those other experiences combined and made them seem like small potatoes.

“Don’t get your knickers in a knot.” Colin opened the freezer and tossed Mike an ice pack. “You know you’re scared of needles. I don’t know why you had to go rushing off to the doctor today.”

“I’m not scared of needles.” Mike winced as held the pack to his forehead. “I don’t like them. Big difference.”