Page 17 of Black Lace

I drop my clothes on the bed, then head into the bathroom. As soon as I’m under the hot spray, tears startto fall. I cry quietly, exhaustion seeping through every cell of my body. I’m emotionally wrecked as well as physically tired. My pussy aches, reminding me of what I did with Dec, but despite being done with Ben, it still feels like I betrayed him somehow by fucking his friend.

I take my time washing my hair with the shampoo and conditioner that’s kept stocked in this bathroom. As I lather my hair, I’m hit with a memory of being pushed up against the glass of the shower by Ben. I scrub my hair harder and grit my teeth as I push the memory away.

I close my eyes and lean my head back to rinse the conditioner from my hair, and my brain supplies an image of Dec, naked and glorious. I imagine him here in the shower with me for a second, my heart beating faster in my chest before I shake my head and push that thought away as well.

My mind is in turmoil as I get out of the shower and dry myself with a fluffy, light blue towel, then head back into the bedroom, where I find my suitcase sitting by the bed. Dec obviously brought it in for me, and I’m grateful that I don’t have to go and find it because it gives me a few more moments to try and clear my head.

I pull on some soft green pants and a cream cashmere turtleneck, then take a deep breath and let it out slowly before I leave the room. Butterflies tumble about in my stomach as I make my way out of the room to face Dec.

When I find him, he’s sitting on the sofa we so recently fucked on. His hair is wet, indicating that he’s showered as well, and he’s looking down at his phone. As I approach, he looks up at me. My heart beats faster, and heat floods to my cheeks before I manage to force a smile onto my face.

“Hey,” I squeak out in a much higher pitch than normal.

I shiver as he smiles at me and I get goosebumps on my arms. I’m overwhelmed with everything that’s happened in the last twenty-four hours. It feels as though I’m a bottle of soda that someone’s picked up and shaken all about and I’m certain that I’m about to explode.

“Should we, um, talk?” I ask hesitantly.

Dec’s smile slides off his face and he asks in a strange tone, “Should we?”

I drop onto the sofa as far away from Dec as I can manage while my brain is flooded with memories of what we did here less than an hour ago.

“Probably.” I can’t look at him, so I just stare out the window at the nearby beach and try to corral the emotions swirling inside me. “What we did. I don’t know. It doesn’t feel like it was a mistake, but my brain says that it was and it’s too soon.”

I’m not sure why my heart hurts as badly as it does for suggesting this because I’m not lying when I tell him that I don’t think it feels like it was a mistake. It doesn’t.It feels like an inevitability, but I also can’t wrap my head around the concept of jumping headfirst into any kind of relationship with Declan McLean.

“Don’t say that, Tiff.” Dec’s voice is croaky and he gives a small cough before he continues. “If it’s too soon for you, it’s too soon. I’m not going to push you for anything more.”

I turn my head to look at him and I can’t gauge his expression, which is strange for me. I have always been able to tell exactly what Dec is thinking at any given moment.

“Just please don’t suggest it was a mistake. Please don’t tell me that the best thing to ever happen to me was something bad for you.”

My heart twinges painfully because I can tell how much this hurts him to say. “I didn’t say it was bad, Dec.” I give him a rueful smile. “I’d be lying if I said the sex wasn’t good, but I just broke up with Ben. I shouldn’t have jumped straight into bed with you.”

“Would it help if I pointed out that you technically didn’t?” he asks with a grin and it breaks the tension between us.

“Shut up,” I laugh. “You know what I mean.”

Dec laughs with me, then sighs and stands from the sofa. “Yeah, I do.”

He walks over to me and holds out his hand. I take it instinctively and he pulls me up to standing. He’s too close to me and the tension returns swiftly to the roomaround us. It’s not an awkward tension this time, but the same sexual tension that crackled between us in the car.

“We should probably go watch a movie or something,” he says.

He’s so close to me right now. I can smell the scent of his cologne and whatever body wash he used when he showered. I suffer an onslaught of images of him being the one fucking me in the shower instead of Ben, and I want nothing more than for them to be a reality.

What Iwantis to take him upstairs to a bed and fuck him stupid but I know it would only complicate everything further. I feel bad because he warned me before we had sex that there was no going back from this and he was right.

“Sure. Sounds good,” I agree, but I can’t miss the look of disappointment on his face before he turns to lead the way to the theater room.

I follow him, doing my best to get my raging hormones under control. There is a massive part of me that wants nothing more than to throw him back down on the sofa for a repeat performance of what we did not too long ago. I also know that I'm currently too mixed-up to do that and I frown as I consider what the fuck I'm doing right now. How is it even possible for me to want something like that anyway? My heart feels weirdly bruised and broken whilst also being so very full ofsome weird feeling for Dec that I don't quite want to think about or put a name to right at this moment.

I'm grateful when he enters the theater room and takes a seat in one of the solo armchairs in the back row. The front row contains a couple of two-seater sofas and I'm not sure I could handle sitting so close to him right now. As it is, I can smell his scent and feel the sexual tension crackling in the air between us when he looks over at me.

"What would you like to watch?" he asks with a sexy smile.

Not sexy.Polite.

I chastise myself internally for thinking of him in that way and force myself to keep a neutral expression while trying to think of a movie that isn't sexy. "Um, I haven't seen Zoolander in forever."

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