Page 29 of Yours Truly

“Don’t get angry. Don’t fight me. Don’t fight this.”

“I’m good, man,” I say, my ego choking the rational parts of me, not allowing me to admit that he’s right. Not only do I need to get better, but this is the place to do it. And with the people I love? The only people I love? It’s time. But I fight. Because admitting that I’m broken—admitting that I let her break me—it’s a jagged pill I refuse to swallow.

There’s a knock at the apartment door, jarring our focus. I slam the glass of water and come around the counter to the door.

Opening it, there’s a woman on my porch. Black makeup is pooled beneath her eyes and her hair looks like it would benefit from a brush. At eight in the morning, she’s wearing a pink miniskirt and black cowboy boots and nothing for a top except… a bikini.

She looks past me to Deuce, who lifts a hand to silently say hello. Smiling awkwardly at him, she returns her focus to me. Despite the whisper she’s using, I know Deuce can hear her. For Christ’s sake, he’s less than one foot behind me.

“Hey, Trace, umm, I think the condom is stuck inside me. You know, after last night.”

I twist in the doorframe, facing my friend. The sign that he’s right is asking me to pull last night’s condom out of her. And I haven’t even had my coffee. “Fine. Whatever. I’ll… I’ll move into the place next door. I’ll start fixing it up. I’ll… Fine,” I say as Deuce gets to his feet with a grunt.

The girl eases her way inside. “Help me get it out?”

“That’s my cue,” Deuce says, shimmying past her. From outside the apartment, he outstretches his hand and we shake on it. “Come by my house after… this,” he says, nodding to the girl. “I’ll give you the key and show you the place.”

He leaves and ten minutes later, she’s gone, too.

Deuce was tired because his son was teething and as I stand beneath the spray of the hot shower, washing away this morning’s condom retrieval, I think about how I want to be tired for good reasons, too.

Deuce really is right, damn him.

It’s time to get better.

NINE

You have dick on the brain.

Ivy

“Shading.”

My mouth is so dry, confidence is challenging but I manage. “Shading,” I repeat slowly. Trace nods and I do my best not to stare at his bustling biceps and all the gorgeous ink covering them as he tightens his bun.

I especially do not glance at the tempting strip of skin between his jeans and t-shirt, and the thatch of dark hair above his waistband. I do not look at those little muscular dips of his waist, and I definitely do not pay extra attention to the heart wrapped in barbed wire inked on his belly.

Nope.

“Yeah, I mean, your first solo session ain’t too far from now, so I figure you work on the shading on today’s piece.” He rolls his neck, and the cracks make me jump.

“That doesn’t hurt?” I ask, nodding.

“If it hurt, would I do it?” he snaps back, his nostrils flaring.

“No would’ve worked just fine.” I roll my eyes while internally flipping him the bird. Pushing past him, I move to the backlit table in the back of the shop.

He doesn’t apologize for his snarky comment and I don’t expect him to. He never does. Maybe no one taught him that simply acting like it never happened isn’t an apology. Or that gifting or giving someone something after you treated them like crap doesn’t mean it’s okay.

Settling in at the table, Trace comes and sits next to me, his large leg bumping mine beneath the top. I wonder how many tables have seen future lovers bump knees, hands sliding onto thighs. Heat swims through my leg and into my center, making my stomach clench and my pulse spike.

The scent of his pine aftershave hits my nose, and my nipples grow hard and plucky beneath my oversized DARE t-shirt. Trace reaches up, flicking on the lamp, before he pulls his portfolio out, laying a sketch across the table for us both to see.

It’s a lighthouse. So far just black and white from the graphite, but highly detailed. Sun pours over the solar valve on top, leaving a cascade of perfectly angled shadows along the tower. Small but full of detail, I pinch my gaze on the tiny window on the tower, where there are living quarters inside. A man stands with one palm pressed to the glass. He’s so small that his expression is unreadable, but the fact that the detail of a person alone in the lighthouse has been added is ethereal and eerie.

I love it.

“Not all lighthouses are red and white striped,” he adds as I continue to silently peruse the beautiful sketch. “I explained that to the client and they’d prefer black and white anyway.”

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