Page 25 of After the Rain
“You could say that, baby. You could definitely say that.”
Nineteen
Rain
When I met Aidan, he was this gruff, silent, brooding type. Then, as I got to know him, it became clear that he is actually the sweetest, kindest, most thoughtful man in the world, who also struggles with anxiety. What I was not ready for was the sexy-as-fuck, growly, possessive animal who sucked my soul out of my body, then came all over my face to mark me as his last night. I. Was. Not. Ready.
Seriously, even now, getting ready to meet Poppy and Wren for coffee, I’m dealing with a whole flock of birds swooping in my stomach at the memory. Phew. That man –myman – is hot as hell.
I pull on my favourite hoodie of Aidan’s, his dark green one that has a very faded print of mountains on the front, and head downstairs to where Aidan and Pax are playing with a tennis ball.
“Hi,” I say as I lean in for a kiss. He throws the ball blindly for Pax to chase, then wraps his strong arms around me and pulls me down onto the sofa until I’m lying on top of him fully. He growls and nips at my neck, and I flinch as the feel of his beard scraping my skin sends shivers down that side of my body.
“Hi.” His voice is muffled as he speaks into my shoulder. “I don’t want you to go.” It’s ridiculous how much I would quite happily relent so easily and stay here with him, but honestly, with how much Corey has been on my mind, the thought of getting out with some new friends and trying to come up with some ideas for how to reach out to him is seriously appealing. I’ve never really had many friends, and so I want to put effort into these new friendships of mine. It’s hard to make friends as an adult. It’s no longer as simple as sitting down in the playground next to some kid and saying, ‘Will you be my friend?’ If myself and Corey are – or were – any example, these days we send porn links to people we like and hope for the best.
As adults, we all carry scars from past friendships that have come and gone, and we all have our insecurities that can make approaching people hard. So, when you find people who you click with, it’s so important to put that effort in and not assume that the friendship will bethere waiting when you deign to show up. Wren showed up for me when she fixed my car, showed me how to do my job, and helped Aidan welcome me to my new life. Poppy showed up when she made me feel so welcome after I had just finished trauma-dumping on Aidan in the middle of her café, almost as soon as I met him. Since then, she’s gone out of her way to get my phone number from Aidan and has been checking in and feeding me a steady stream ofCharmedGIFs and memes.
And so, I’m going to show up for them and grab coffee, and catch up about what is going on in their lives.
“I’ll be back before you know it, love.” I pull his head out of my shoulder and give him a deep kiss that my dick reacts to all too quickly. I try to get up before this descends into something more, but Aidan’s arms tighten around me as he tries to grind his hips up into me. “Nope. Nope. Nope. I have to go!” We tussle a little as we laugh, but he eventually releases me and follows me up off the sofa to the door. He watches me put my shoes on with an adorable pout on his lips. I stand up to find him holding his lumberjack coat open for me to slip my arms in.
As much as we joke about not wanting to be apart, I know he’s just as keen for me to make some good friendships as I am. We talked about it a week or so ago and agreed that we both need tomake time for friends outside of the two of us. I need more than one person in my life, and he can’t neglect his brothers and his friends. So, while I’m out with the girls today, he is going fishing with Nash, Archer, Cole, Chris, and Sam.
I wait while Aidan zips me into his jacket, which, let’s be honest, is now my jacket, and then he pulls me into his chest for a kiss. I kiss him back, my tongue just teasing his lips for a second before I pull away.
“I love you,” Aidan whispers before he lets me go. I will never get tired of those words.
“I love you, too, sweetheart.” I palm his cheek, and our eyes meet for a few seconds before I force myself to leave, after a quick head-scratch goodbye for Pax.
I pull open the heavy door to Poppy’s, noticing the ‘closed’ sign on the door, and find Wren and Poppy sitting opposite each other in one of the booth tables on the other side of the café to the windows.
“Flick the lock, please, babe,” calls Poppy. “I can’t be arsed to get up again if someone comes in. Your coffee is here already.”
I do as instructed before joining them and taking a seat next to Poppy. Taking a sip of my caramel latte, I groan at the sweet flavour.
“Yum. Thank you. This is delicious.” I peel myself out of my jacket and toss it over the back of a chair at the next table before turning to the girls. Poppy and Wren are both trying and failing to hide their smirks as I settle into my seat. “What?” I ask them, confused and amused.
“Uhm, you got a little something just…” Wren points at her neck.
“Yeah, just here.” Poppy does the same. What the fuck? I touch my neck but can’t feel anything. I stand up and head over to the mirrored sign on the wall by the counter. Leaning in, I look at my neck, only to discover that Aidan apparently left a fucking hickey when he was hiding his face in there before I left.
“Motherfucker,” I grumble to myself, pulling the collar of my hoodie up and burying half my face inside. I head back to the table where Wren and Poppy are pissing themselves laughing. I can feel a blush across my face. Yeah, OK, my whole fucking body. “I’m going to have to kill him,” I mumble as I sit back down.
This, of course, only makes them laugh harder.
“I don’t know why you’re laughing, Wren, he’s your brother,” I clip out, indignantly. Wren stops short, and then her nose scrunches up in disgust.
“Gross. I hadn’t thought about that.” I look her in the eye, and before long, we are all laughing together. This. This is why I need friends. Unabashed laughter, sharing inappropriate TMI details, and taking the piss out of one another.
Two coffees and a slice of carrot cake later, Wren and Poppy have dragged my life story out of me. I left out too much detail about Dan, I just said he was an abusive prick, but his slightly dodgy business dealings and the viciousness of his last attack on me? No, that’s too much information even for a TMI convo with friends. We’ve caught up on Wren’s latest dating disaster and her unrequited crush on Sam. They had a date a few weeks back, apparently, and went back to his for sex but ended up having what Poppy and I agree was ‘the night’. You know ‘the night’? Where you stay up all night talking about anything and everything and ultimately fall in love with a person in the space of a few hours. But apparently, when Wren woke up in Sam’s bed, he was not there and had just left a note saying she could let herself out.
“I didn’t even think about it,” Poppy says, gently, “but the last few times we’ve been at the pub quiz, he’s not spoken a word to you, has he?” Wren shakes her head sadly. I’ve texted him a few times, but he just leaves me on read. I don’t get itbecause he really isn’t that guy you know? And I keep going on dates in his pub to try and prompt a fucking reaction, but nope. Nada.”
“Babe, I’m sorry. That sounds really shit,” I say, meaning it. I’ve spoken to Sam a few times, and he’s always seemed like a really lovely guy. He’s built like a brick shithouse, as apparently, he used to play rugby semi-professionally or something, but despite his size, he comes across as a big, soft teddy bear. I don’t get this behaviour from him at all.
Wren swallows the last of her black Americano with a shrug. It is shit. It hurts, and after what he said that night, honestly, I don’t know what I did to—” Both Poppy and I explode at her words.
“No! You’re not doing that,” I exclaim at the same time as Poppy cries out.
