Marco (The Men of Indecent Exposure #1) (31 page)

Silence.

“And that… right there… is why you fall asleep hugging pillows at night instead of real women,” Justin concluded. “The hell is wrong with you, man?”

I laughed and Logan shook his head.

“Yeah, that’s probably
not
the approach I’ll take, but thanks for the advice anyway.” It was my turn to play again, so I stepped to the edge of the table.

“Whatever. I’m trying to help
you
out. Plus, I’m trying to cut this conversation short ‘cause all this talk about love and feelings is making my dick invert. So, on that note, I’m gonna head on over to the bar and talk to the young lady who’s been eyeing me.”

I followed his gaze in that direction and shook my head as he made his way over.

“Just don’t use that line on her,” Justin called out, earning himself two middle fingers when Carlos raised them into the air without looking back.

I angled my cue, lined it up for the shot, but then someone caught my eye from across the bar. Someone I didn’t know well, but definitely knew
of.

Naseem.

He sat there, nursing a beer and, from the looks of it, he’d had several already.

When I stood upright again instead of taking my shot, Justin asked what was up. I let out a breath and recalled our one and only run in, which had been at the hospital when Brynn had the scare.

“I know that guy. He’s one of Brynn’s friends,” I answered.

As I stood there watching him, Naseem noticed me, too, and a look of disgust filled his expression. Apparently, being under the same roof as me wasn’t going to work for him, because the next thing I know, he stood and felt his pocket for his wallet. Tossing down a few bills, he tucked it away again, and then took out his keys next.

His keys? Was he really about to try and drive like this?

One of the bartenders noticed his state when I did and rushed over to him, trying to stop him from leaving. There were words exchanged that I couldn’t hear and, from what I could tell, Naseem was putting up a fight—albeit a clumsy one as he stumbled to even stay on his feet.

I took another deep breath, knowing I couldn’t just stand by and watch them struggle. Nor would I be able to live with myself if I let this guy drive himself home in that condition.

He’d either kill himself or someone else.

Taking a deep breath, I went to place my pool stick back on the rack. Realizing my night was about to be cut short.

“Well… looks like I’m gonna have to call it a night,” were my parting words for the guys as I crossed the room, still observing Naseem’s rant.

The bartender glanced over at me when I approached. “You know this guy?” he asked.

I gave a nod. “Unfortunately.”

“Is there someone you can call? Someone who can come pick him up?” was the next question.

While that would’ve been a great alternative, I didn’t know anyone Naseem knew other than Brynn and calling her out here to come get him wasn’t even an option. So, that only left one person to deal with him.

Me.

“I’ll make sure he gets home,” I offered, feeling my jaw tense when I did. Relieved, the bartender shifted Naseem’s weight to me. Even in his drunken stupor, he didn’t readily accept my help. He knew I didn’t like him.

“No, I’m fine. I can manage,” he insisted, straightening his posture as he attempted to tuck in his shirt.

“You sure you have him?” the bartender asked, double-checking before going back to his post.

I gave a nod and then he walked away.

“I’m… I’m perfectly capable of driving. I only had one bottle,” Naseem lied with slurred speech.

“Yeah… okay,” was all I bothered to say back as I flung his limp arm over my shoulders.

This wasn’t exactly the way I saw tonight going, but I didn’t have much choice.

Sucks having a conscience.

Marc
o

Naseem tripped over his feet all the way to my truck, swaying a little when I propped him against the back door. He didn’t have any fight left in him after the light tussle with the bartender, so escorting him out was easy.

“Don’t puke in my ride, dude. I swear you won’t like me if you do,” I warned, despite him being incoherent.

I got the door open and felt his pocket for his wallet so I could check his address on his license. Once I had it memorized, I got him in, grimaced at having to buckle the seatbelt of a grown man, and then I got in, too. Once the address was in my GPS, I followed the route it highlighted.

We were on the road for fifteen grueling minutes. Every bump I hit, I was glancing over to make sure this guy didn’t ruin my leather interior. We finally pulled up in front of his house and I was all too happy to kill the engine. I went to his side of the car and got as far as unbuckling his seatbelt before again checking his pockets, but this time, it was his keys I searched for.

And of course, they weren’t there.

A heavy sigh puffed from my mouth as I paced beside my truck. He had to have dropped them or set them down when trying to argue with the bartender. I stood there, trying to wrap my mind around having him in my passenger seat for another half-hour roundtrip if I doubled back to the bar. He moaned in the seat and I recognized the look on his face right away.

He was about to hurl.

Scrambling, I lifted him beneath his arms and would’ve set him down gently, but the sound of dry heaving beside me made dropping him seem like the better option. He managed to hover on all fours as the contents of his stomach emptied onto his front lawn.

This just kept getting better.

“You nasty son of a… Man, what the hell
did you eat?
”
I yelled out into the darkness.

Not only did he ruin my night out, but now I had to stand here while he ralphed in the grass. It’d be one thing to go through all this trouble for a friend. But for a dude I didn’t even like? Nah, I wasn’t happy.

Naseem groaned again and collapsed onto his side. I gave him a few minutes more just to be sure, and then grabbed a few napkins from the glove box. My face was twisted while I wiped the remnants from his chin—only because I didn’t want anything to get on my shirt when I picked him back up. If it hadn’t been for that, he would’ve been on his own.

Hell, I was two seconds from letting him spend the night out here beneath the stars. As far as I was concerned, I’d already done more than what was required of me.

I got him up again and just stood there, wondering if maybe I should look for a spare key. However, I didn’t feel like searching all over the place just to come up empty if he didn’t have one on the premises. So, I thought of something else. Brynn was less than ten minutes away. I could take him there.

Deciding that was the best option, I hoisted him back inside my truck, but didn’t bother belting him in this time, mostly because I was pissed being out here doing this in the first place. If his head hit the dashboard the next time I pressed the brake, that was
his
damn problem.

I didn’t even think to call and tell Brynn I was on my way. All I could think about was getting Naseem somewhere stationary so he wouldn’t throw up again. I pulled into her driveway and was glad to see her living room light on. That meant I wasn’t waking her. Chances are, this was another sleepless night.

I climbed out and went around to get Naseem out again. Dude was snoring and everything, barely waking up enough to shuffle his feet across the pavement leading to Brynn’s door. Knowing it would be a challenge to get him up her steps, I sat him down on them and knocked first.

The sound of footsteps padding across the floor reminded me of what I’d said to her earlier, the thing we hadn’t discussed yet. There was no time to rehearse all that now, because the next second her door was open and I laid eyes on her as she stood there in a purple nightgown, looking cute as usual. Because of how her midsection poked out, the material was hiked up a bit, not covering as much of her legs as I imagined it did pre-pregnancy. Even with all the night’s drama, I still stole a glance at her smooth, brown thighs where the material stopped halfway down them.

“Everything okay?” Brynn asked instead of greeting me. She stared up at me with bewilderment in her eyes. At first, it was because she wasn’t expecting me and I’m sure I looked like I’d just gotten done with a workout, but then the look shifted to Naseem’s slumped body at the bottom of her porch.

“What happened?” she asked, unable to hide the concern in her tone. She rushed out and down the steps to look him over.

I gestured toward him with my hand while explaining. “I was at the bar hanging out with the guys and he was there… drinking, obviously. He was about to take himself home, but I stopped him. Somehow, his keys got left at the bar, so this was the first place I thought to bring him.”

She pushed his hair away from his face and tilted his head back to get a better look at him. “Is he okay?” she asked.

“Yeah, he just needs some sleep. He’s gonna be mad as hell at himself in the morning, though, once that hangover sets in.”

She lifted his arm, not thinking, and I stepped up the next second. “Can you help me take him inside?” she asked, as if I’d let her do such a thing.

“It’s cool. I have him. I just needed to set him down while I waited for you to get the door.”

She went back in, but stayed close, watching as I basically dragged her friend’s lifeless body across the threshold.

“Can you get him up to the guestroom?” was her next question.

I glanced at the stairs to gage. When I nodded, she led the way, peering back over her shoulder every once in a while to make sure I was managing.

We reached the top of the stairs and she directed me to the second door on the left where I found a neatly made bed and a wall stacked waist high with boxes of diapers of all sizes she’d apparently been collecting.

I set Naseem down kinda rough and he moaned. Brynn came over next to pull off his shoes and I stopped her when she attempted to lift his legs to the bed, taking over so she wouldn’t strain herself.

She hovered over him for a moment and I saw something. At the hospital, the connection between them was missing. There was coldness behind their eyes when they looked at one another, a chill to their tones when they spoke.  Their argument had hidden it from me. It had hidden their love for one another. There was no denying it now, though, as I watched the concern on Brynn’s face while she looked him over.

It didn’t upset me, but it was there plain as day. It wasn’t like the love I believe she carried for me, but it existed nonetheless and I recognized it right away. It was familiar to me because it was the same kind of love I have for Justin, for Carlos, and for Logan. She loved Naseem, but it wasn’t a form of the emotion that threatened me. Maybe once, it’d been more, but now, at least on Brynn’s part, their bond was clearly only one of friendship.

I left her up there alone to care for him in whatever ways she saw fit. As long as she didn’t hurt herself doing so, it was okay with me.

Leaving tonight wasn’t an option, so I hoped she was okay with me crashing on her couch. All I could think of was this guy getting up in the middle of the night, falling all over himself, falling all over her, and she’d get hurt. Or if he fell and she tried to lift him, or if he tossed his cookies again—she’d try to take care of that, too, and those kinds of things would be difficult in her condition.

I had to accept the fact that, if Naseem needed anything tonight, that’d be on me.

I heard the faucet running upstairs and I could only guess what Brynn was doing—either getting water to set by the bed for him in case he woke up in the middle of the night, or she was cleaning him up after his ordeal in the grass. My wipe down was far from thorough, so chances are that’s what she was taking care of.

Maybe fifteen minutes later, I heard her on the steps and glanced over that way, meeting her gaze with a dim smile.

“Thank you,” she said with a sigh. “For bringing him here, I mean.”

“No problem. It was nothing.”

She shook her head, clearly disagreeing with that. “No, it was incredibly kind of you to make sure he was safe tonight. You could’ve easily let him get on the road like this, but… you didn’t. So, thank you,” she repeated.

An incredibly grateful stare came my way and I dipped my chin once. “You’re welcome.”

“I uh… I hate to ask anything else of you, but… do you think you can stay? I don’t know what kind of night he’s gonna have and—”

“I was already planning on it,” I cut in, saving her from having to explain.

That made her smile and my attention went to her glossed lips. She sat beside me and the smell of cinnamon hit me like usual. I came to realize she carried it on her skin all the time. With her close, it filled the air around me—warm, sweet, inviting. Aggressively wayward thoughts came to mind next, like they do every time I’m around her. Tonight was clearly no different even with all that had gone on.

“I’m sorry your night got cut short because of this,” she said, stealing my attention from the memory of her giving me head that night after the club.

I waved her off, letting her know an apology wasn’t at all necessary. And it really wasn’t. After all, I ended up here with her, so it wasn’t all bad. “It was just pool,” I replied. “I can hang out with them anytime.”

One corner of her mouth curved when she smiled. “Well, good. I’m glad you’re not disappointed.”

She glanced away and so did I, laying eyes on an open book face down on the coffee table. Gesturing toward it, I asked, “Couldn’t sleep again?”

Her head shook from side to side. “Nope. Thought reading might help, but so far it hasn’t.”

“Are you just restless or are you in pain?”

“Restless,” she answered. “Always.” After she spoke, her hand went to her stomach as she lightly dragged her nails across it and I guessed she was trying not to scratch.

“And I’m sure that doesn’t help. The itching,” I clarified.

She glanced down, not even realizing she was doing it. When she did, her hand dropped to her lap. Poor thing couldn’t catch a break. It seemed like, at every turn, something else was ailing her.

“Did you put something on it like Dr. Rubino said to?”

Brynn nodded. “I did after I got out the shower, but it’s been a couple hours.”

“Petroleum jelly, right?” I asked, scooting to the edge of the couch to stand.

“Yeah.”

“Where do you keep it?” I stared down on her, waiting for an answer.

“Far right side of my dresser.”

I nodded and made my way toward the stairs to retrieve it, but her voice stopped me. Her
suggestion
stopped me.

“I’ll just follow you up. Doesn’t make sense for you to come back down as late as it is.”

Apparently, that was my invitation to share her bed. I hoped that would be the case, but didn’t expect it. Yes, she was welcome in mine the two times she stayed over, but I wasn’t sure how she’d feel about that with someone else also staying over at her place.

I watched her double-check the lock on the front door before coming to my side, taking my hand as she led the way.

Naseem was knocked out, calling the hogs from the spare room when we passed by the door. I’d been in Brynn’s bedroom only once and that was to grab her purse when she’d forgotten it on her bed before an appointment. Never to spend the night.

Nothing lit the space but a dim lamp on the dresser, illuminating the pale, lavender paint on her walls. That smell, her scent, was potent here and I breathed it in as it surrounded me—soft, beautiful, feminine. Just like her. A matching comforter with a lace overlay covered her bed, topped with about eight throw pillows all with splashes of yellow in their patterns—a hint of her favorite color hidden in the details. Everything was so neat, this time and the last. I almost didn’t want to sit, thinking I’d wrinkle something if I did.

She sat on the edge of her mattress and then swung her legs up, reclining against the mountain of pillows as she pulled the covers over herself. I closed and locked her door before approaching the empty side of the bed and was suddenly more aware of the rough feel of my jeans against my legs. I didn’t want to get in her bed with clothes I’d been out in the street wearing, nor did I want her to think I was assuming something was happening between us tonight just because we’d be sharing a bed. Taking my clothes off as I stood here would definitely give her that impression.