Ready For You (6 page)

So, Kara and I had gone to one of my favorite local spots, and we’d had a good time. We’d talked and commiserated over work and our summer plans, and then…nothing. I had walked her to her car, and I could see that expectant look on her face. She’d wanted more, and God, I’d wanted to give it to her, but I just couldn’t. I had looked into her eyes, and they were all wrong. Mia had intensely blue eyes, almost bordering on aquamarine, and the deep brown of Kara’s eyes had just mocked me, reminding me of what I’d lost. I’d realized I wasn’t ready to move on. I’d told her that I had a great time and that I would see her on Monday. That had left her in a stunned and bewildered state as she stood by her car in the middle of the parking lot.
 

I’d made excuses every time Kara asked me to lunch or out for drinks. I’d been trying to dodge any more awkward exchanges. There was a reason I would give a different name to the few scattered women I’d taken home from bars over the years. I couldn’t stand the thought of hearing another woman whisper my name before our lips touched or call out my name as I made love to her. I’d only made love to one woman, only heard one woman say my name as I came inside her, and even though I needed to, I never wanted to change that fact.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her. Wearing cutoff shorts that barely covered her ass and a tank top that exposed her tanned skin, she bent over to drop a pile of lumber in the already accumulating pile in her front yard. I was moving before my brain could even register it. She looked up and caught my gaze just before I closed the car door. We both stood there, frozen in place, unable to look away.
 

It was me who took the first step forward. I walked across the street until I was in front of her, closer than I’d been in eight years. If I reached out, I could touch her, tuck that stray hair behind her ear, or show her exactly what was racing through my mind as I watched her nervously bite her lip.
 

“Hi,” she said hesitantly.

“Hey.”
Yep, that was a good start. I was the master of small talk.
 

She looked at me expectantly, and I realized I should probably explain why I was there.
 

“Leah said that you banged up your leg pretty bad while ripping out your floors the other day. I thought you might need a hand.” I shifted awkwardly and ran my fingers through my hair, unsure of what to do with my hands. I wanted to touch her, yet I didn’t. I’d never had a conversation without touching her, and now, I felt twitchy and unnatural.
 

“You talk about me?” she asked.

“Oh, uh…I mean, Leah mentioned you the other day when I went over to her house for dinner. But I didn’t ask about you,” I said. Ouch, that hadn’t come out the way I meant it to.
 

Judging from the way her eyes widened and dodged mine for a moment, I gathered she had taken it exactly how it had come out.
 

This was going fan-fucking-tastic.
 

“Look, do you want help or not?” I asked in frustration.
 

“No, I’m fine. Thank you.” Her arms were crossed, and she looked pissed.
 

Well, that made two of us.
 

The never-ending stream of curse words started up in my head again, and I was seriously ready to just say,
Fuck it
, and leave. But then, she turned slightly, and I saw the bruise on her leg along with the Band-Aids on her hands and arms. Mia was never one for grace. She could trip over her own two feet.
 

“I’m not leaving. Get your ass back inside.”

She opened her mouth to protest, but I stopped her, placing my finger on her lips. It was the first contact we’d had since she walked away from me all those years ago. The heat from her soft lips seared my skin, and I heard her gasp from the contact.
 

Our eyes locked as I said, punctuating each word, “I’m. Not. Leaving. Understand?”

She nodded her head in agreement, and we both turned to make our way inside. I rubbed my hands together, trying to savor the warmth I’d felt from her mouth, but it quickly disappeared—just like her.
 

There wasn’t much in the way of furniture. A red couch was tucked in the corner, still covered in plastic. It was obviously new. A table that looked like it had seen quite a number of years and a couple of chairs sat in the kitchen.
 

“There isn’t much yet. I’m waiting to get more furniture until the floors down here are done,” she said before turning around.

“Why did you get such a big house in the first place?” I asked, giving an appraising glare.

This was supposed to be our thing—buying an old house and fixing it up. We had planned to do this together. While on the phone or cuddled up together on the hood of my car as we looked up to the stars, we used to talk for hours about what kind of house we wanted and what we’d do to it.
 

This was our dream, not hers.
 

“Uh…I don’t know. It was all I could afford.”

Bullshit.

“So, where do you want me?”
 

“What?” she asked, suddenly flustered.
 

“Put me to work, Mia. That’s why I’m here.” I tried not to laugh at her reaction to my words. It was good to know I could still ruffle those stuck-up little feathers of hers. God knows I’d spent a good part of my teenage years doing so.
 

“Hey,” I whispered, leaning forward in my desk chair.

Nothing.

“Hey,” I muttered softly. This time, I took a piece of binder paper, wadded it up, and tossed it at her head.
 

That had gotten her attention as she let out an audible gasp and turned around in her seat to face me.

“What do you want?” she asked coldly.
 

Brr…

“Your name. I want your name.”

“Why?”

“So, I know what to call you on our date,” I answered with a sly grin.
 

I’d been watching this girl in my homeroom class ever since the first day of school two weeks ago. She’d come from a different middle school, so I had no idea who she was, but the second I’d seen her, I’d wanted to know her.

“We are not going on a date!” she scoffed.

“Of course we are, and I can’t ask you out on a second one if we don’t go on a first. See where I’m going with this?” I replied back.

“And why would I go on a date with you?”
 

“Because you’re already falling madly in love with me. It’s hopeless.”

I was honestly waiting for her to smack me. When I saw just a hint of a smile appear at the corner of her mouth, I knew I’d gotten to her.
 

“Amelia,” she said.

“Huh?”

“Amelia—that’s my name, stupid.” She giggled.

“That’s kind of a stuck-up name, Amelia. I’m picking something else.”

“You’re renaming me?” She laughed.
 

She was now completely caught in my trap.

“Yep. From now on, you will be known as…Mia.”

“Oh, um…are you good with a crowbar?” she asked, pointing to the large tool propped up against the far wall.
 

“Better than you, I’d wager.” I pointed to her leg.
 

She gave me a sour look before showing me what still needed to be ripped up.
 

“You know these are original floors that you are tearing out, right? They’re probably over a hundred years old,” I said as I started pulling up the oak in the dining room.

“Yes, I know that, but they can’t be rescued. Apparently, the owners before me didn’t care so much about the historical value of them because they were trashed. They looked like someone had taken a sledgehammer to them and then left an entire litter of cats to urinate on every board for a month.”

“Is that what smells in here?”

“Did you think it was me?”

“Well, I mean—”

“Garrett!” she shrieked, leaning over to playfully hit my arm.
 

She realized what she had done a second after she did it, and she stepped back. It was scary how easily we had just fallen back into our normal banter. It made me wonder just how little effort it would take to tumble back into everything else.
 

Rather than suffer through the impending awkwardness, I started my job of taking up the wood floors. She busied herself by sweeping the four-thousand nails that were being thrown all over the place from each board being pried out of place. We worked through the afternoon.

In the evening, Mia asked, “Hey, do you want to order a pizza or something?”

“Uh…actually, I have to go to my sister’s for dinner tonight.” I didn’t really, but I’d reached my threshold for the day. The silence was getting to me, and if I had to spend one more hour in here watching Mia bend down in those shorts, trying not to see her ass cheeks peek out from the bottom, I would go crazy.
 

“Oh, okay. Well, you better get going then.” Dodging my gaze, she became very interested in a spot on the wall that needed to be patched.
 

“Yeah, I guess I should.”

I walked to the door and stopped. I swung around on my heels, finding a surprised Mia behind me.
 

“What time tomorrow?”

“Excuse me?” she asked in surprise.
 

“What time do you want me to come back over tomorrow?” I repeated.
 

“You’re coming back?”

Our eyes met, and I nodded. “Yes, I like to follow through with things until the very end.”

The double meaning was not lost on her.
 

Chapter Five

~Mia~

Like clockwork, he showed up at my doorstep the very next day.
 

Then, the day after, he returned when I was done with my shift at the hospital.
 

He even came back the following night, holding a bag of takeout in one hand and a change of clothes in the other. This was the second day he’d arrived in a suit. It was further proof that the boy I’d left on the football field after graduation day had disappeared, replaced by a man I barely recognized.

This new Garrett was not the lighthearted boy I remembered. He was a little rough around the edges and a bit bossy, and he had a hardness to him that I didn’t recognize. It wasn’t what I was used to, but if I had to admit it to myself, it was sexy as hell. I had adored playful, carefree Garrett. He was always loving and gentle, and he’d dedicated himself to me completely. But grown-up Garrett was full of mystery and angst. I didn’t know what he would do from one minute to the next, and I hated myself for liking it.
 

He wasn’t for me, and I didn’t need to add complication to his life again. He was just doing me a favor with the floors, and I needed to keep my distance. If the past had proven anything, it was that he deserved someone a hell of a lot better than me.
 

“You brought food?” I asked as he breezed past me toward the kitchen.

“Well, you have absolutely nothing in your refrigerator, and I nearly starved to death last night, so I decided to take matters into my own hands. You know you’re a grown-up now, right? Food doesn’t grow on trees. You have to actually go to the store, pick it up, and prepare it.”
 

He was also incredibly sarcastic. That, unfortunately, wasn’t new.
 

“I know I am a grown-up, Garrett,” I huffed, crossing my arms over my chest.
 

His eyes immediately dropped, hungrily watching the way my breasts strained against my tank top from the pressure of my arms. His emerald gaze traveled back up to meet my eyes, and I blushed like a teenager. I looked away to find plates for the Chinese food he’d brought over, but I could see him smirking out of the corner of my eye. He knew he’d gotten to me.
 

“You still wear that necklace.”
 

It was a statement, not a question. I’d wondered if he would say anything about it. I’d caught him staring at it on the first day he’d shown up to help. We had been hours into destroying my floors.
 
Leaning against the wall, I’d tried to catch my breath, and I’d quenched my thirst with a glass of ice-cold water. When I had looked up, I’d seen the crowbar on the floor, and his eyes had been locked on my chest. I’d instantly heated, thinking he was blatantly checking me out, but then I’d realized the heat in his eyes was from anger, not passion. He’d seen the sterling silver key pendant with his birthstone in the center hanging from my neck. He’d given it to me for my sixteenth birthday, and I’d never taken it off since he’d placed it there.
 

“I’ve never taken it off.”
 

He just grunted and continued pulling out cartons of takeout. His eyes drifted up to mine briefly, and he held our stare as if he wanted to say something, but then he let it go. We loaded up our plates, sat down at my kitchen table, and silently ate our moo shu pork and fried rice.
 

“Why?” he asked, breaking the silence.

I stilled, unable to look up and meet his penetrating gaze. “I…I needed to keep a part of you with me.”
 

I looked up and our eyes held for a moment before he pushed away from the table, startling me.
 

“I’m not hungry anymore.”

I finished my dinner alone with my knees pulled into my chest, and then I pushed my plate away. I listened to him in the living room, tearing up the floor like a madman. I could hear boards flying and nails hitting the walls. The tears rimming my eyes threatened to spill over as he took his anger and hurt out on the floor. I finally rose from the table to clean up our plates and glasses.
 

What had I done to this man? Had I really thought this would be better? No answers, no closure had turned into just anger and lost hopes. I’d done this.
 

It was just another reason he deserved so much more.