Page 3 of Wild Catch
The darkness is pierced by a giggle.
My brain latches onto that anomaly and starts to focus. I remember having turned on all the lights, so it shouldn’t be so dark. With a little groan, I turn my face and find myself breathing better. It’s because I had buried my face into a cushion. I open an eye by a slit and shut it quickly. The overhead lights almost gave me a headache.
That’s when I notice the giggle again. Did I leave the TV on?
I crack the other eye open and it falls on the black TV screen. Yeah, that checks out. Pretty sure I faded away before even finding the remote.
“Oh, Ben.”
Wait a second. That’s not my voice.
I spring to a seat, opening and closing my eyes to catch my bearings. Another sound comes next, this one different. The same one that people make when they eat really delicious food, or when…
My head whips in its direction.
There, up against the door, are Ben and a woman tangled together. All I can see is his back from here and for some reason, I latch onto the fact that he’s wearing one of his favorite date outfits. Fancy jeans and an expensive polo that makes him look like a frat boy. He’s wearing the woman’s legs around his waist like a belt, using his hands to keep her in place while he devours her mouth.
For a moment, all I manage is to swallow the cotton in my mouth.
Trembling, I reach for the coffee table where I left my phone. It’s a few minutes past nine, which means I was out like a light for three hours. But as the screen lights up, I notice a text that Ben sent me around two hours ago.
James Bond BF
Hey babe, we’re finishing up pretty late here and I need some rest. See you in tomorrow’s flight?
Rest?
I glance back up and the woman’s hands are now working his polo up, while he buries his head against her neck.
My hands are still unsteady as I center my phone’s camera and take a quick video of the action, and snap a few pictures.
Occupational hazard, maybe, but I’ll need proof that this happened so that I never consider being a guy’s secret ever again.
They’re so involved in each other that they don’t even hear me get up from the couch and grab my things. It’s only when I’m a few steps away from them that I clear my throat, say, “Excuse me,” and they stop.
By this point, Ben is shirtless and his jeans are unfastened. The woman’s legs slide down until she stands behind him and before the door I need to exit. Slowly, my ex turns over his shoulder. His eyes widen.
“B-Babe?”
“No,” I snap through gritted teeth. “Miss Mena to you.”
“Er, I can explain it. This?—”
“Excuse me,” I repeat even louder, leaning to the side until I find the woman.
There’s only marginal relief that she’s someone I don’t know at all, but the confusion on her face tells me she literally didn’t expect another woman to be here. Which tells me this asshole obviously didn’t tell her he had a girlfriend.
Is this why he really never wanted to make us official?
Heat rushes to my eyes and I have to steel every muscle in my body against the visceral need to break down. Instead, I set my attention on her in her date dress, similar to mine—tight, short and pretty. “Can you please step aside? I need to leave.”
“I—I—” Her jaw slackens. She looks up at Ben Williams and back at me. “Did you just call her babe?”
“No, I…” He grunts. “Rose, wait a moment.”
He dares put his hand on me and I jerk free right away. I cast a withering glare at him that works—he does, in fact, shrink a little. “I guess I should thank you.”
“What?” He scrunches up his face.
