Page 5 of Just Between Us

I didn’t really want to leave. The opposite was true; I wanted to stay. Ideally, we would get right back to where we had been before Annie called me. Biting my lip, my mind raced with all the ‘could have been’ ideas it was throwing my way.

“I’d like that,” I said softly, and Rich glanced over his shoulder at me. The look he gave me was positively primal, but he looked away again and went back to cooking.

Disappearing into the hall, I headed upstairs to the bathroom. Once behind the closed door, I lost it, whispering to myself in a rant.

“Fuck! What am I thinking? This is Rich, for Christ’s sake. I can’t cross that line. I need to get a grip.” I stared at my reflection. I took a deep breath in and puffed it back out again. “Lucy Park, this is your best friend’s father. You are being insane. You need to calm yourself down and focus. You do not fancy Rich. You do not fancy Rich. You do not fancy Rich...”

“Lucy, curry’s ready.” Rich’s voice echoed up the stairs. I looked in the mirror one last time before flushing the loo and washing my hands to hide the fact that I’d been talking to myself in there. I took a deep breath, repeated my mantra in my head, and headed back downstairs.

CHAPTER SIX

RICH

When Lucy went upstairs,I exhaled a sigh of relief.

“Rich, stop being a fucking idiot,” I told myself. “Jesus Christ, you have to stop getting a hard-on over your kid’s best mate. That doesn’t exactly make you Dad of the Year material.” I sighed and shook my head, disgusted with my behaviour.

I finished up the curry, set a plate on the breakfast bar for Lucy. Standing at the bottom of the stairs, I called to tell her it was ready, then took mine into the living room and put on the TV.

I heard her coming back down and braced myself to stop being a lecherous old dickhead. When she came in with her plate and sat on the other sofa, I breathed a silent sigh of relief. Had she been beside me, I don’t think I could have controlled myself.

We sat there, neither of us saying a word, eating as the news reports scrolled on the screen in front of us. The sexual tension hanging in the air between us, was unmistakeable. Neither of us could look at each other. When we did and the other one caught us, we looked back at the TV as fast as we could.

Without speaking, Lucy stood. She lifted her empty plate and came over to me, took my plate from my lap, and disappeared into the kitchen.

I rubbed my hand over my face. This was going to be harder than I thought. I shook my head, and she came back in with two open bottles of beer, handing me one before sitting beside me.

Glancing over, she smiled at me and held up her bottle. “Here’s to good curry and good company.”

I nodded, clinked the neck of my bottle against hers, and then took a long sip. This was definitely not a smart idea.

“Did you record that film you were talking about last week?” She meant the 1980s classicPretty in Pink.

“I did.”

“Do you want to watch it? There’s nothing else on.”

I shrugged. Did I really want to watch a story about unrequited love? About teenage angst and a guy liking someone all the social norms said he shouldn’t be with, with someone who was pretty much my personal embodiment of that story. Sure I did.

I brought the film up on the TiVo and hit play.

Settling myself on the sofa, I put my feet up on the coffee table, and drank the beer Lucy had brought me. I wasn’t really paying attention to the film. I was constantly side-eyeing Lucy, observing her reaction to the movie. As she watched and drank her beer, she nestled into the sofa and got closer to me.

The first time her arm brushed against mine it was like a lightning bolt had sent electrical energy surging through my veins. The second time, the electricity headed straight for my crotch, bypassing every other part of my body.

“Back in a second.” Lucy smiled and disappeared upstairs.

I took the chance to roll my eyes at myself and adjust my hardening cock in my jeans. All the same familiar thoughts kept swimming round and round in my head on repeat. I needed to stop being a dirty old man.

Was that really what I was being, though? Was I all that old? Sure, she was the same age as my daughter, but I had been areasonably young dad. My life wasn’t at the stage where I needed to be put out to pasture just yet. Was it really such a hideous idea?

I puffed out a huffy sigh. I needed to get a damn grip of myself. She was the same age as my only child; they had been through thick and thin together. I wasn’t about to take that away from Annie, even if I did want to find out how things could be with Lucy if I just let it happen.

CHAPTER SEVEN

LUCY

I was wet,I was frustrated, and I needed to get Rich back to the point where he was about to kiss me. He’d seemed like he had been tempted before, and I wanted him to be tempted again. I glanced at my reflection in the mirror and fixed my boobs in my bra, making sure they were looking their best.

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