Page 45 of The Beautiful Collision
I should look away. Give her privacy. Instead, I watch like a starving man at a buffet as she moves around my room, completely comfortable in her nakedness. She finds her panties under my desk, her bra dangling from the chair. She puts both on, then doesn’t bother with the dress.
Yep, we’re in our Maya is comfortable around me in her underwear era.
And in a setthatsmall, it’s a sight to behold.
“Are you OK?” she asks, crossing the room to stand in front of me. “You look… constipated.”
I realize I’ve been staring, and her joke startles a laugh out of me, real and unguarded. “Just thinking.”
“Dangerous territory for you,” she teases, but there’s something soft in her eyes. “Thanks for last night. I think you needed it after a tough day.”
The words are casual, but the way she says it, the quick glance over her shoulder before she disappears into the hallway and back to her room, makes me think it might mean more. But as I watch the wiggle of her ass and fight the overwhelming urge to chase after her, I realize I’m fucked.
The smart move would be to shut this down. Create distance. Treat her like every other hookup—friendly but detached, fun but ultimately forgettable. But when I hear the shower start down the hall, when I picture her under the spray wearing nothing but water and the marks I left on her skin…
Yeah. I’m completely, utterly, irrevocably fucked.
fifteen
MAYA
“Your hair lookslike you’ve just been fucked.”
Sophie’s observation cuts through my hangover like a scalpel. I pause mid-sip of coffee, the ceramic mug warm against my palms, and resist the urge to smooth down what I’m sure is an absolute disaster of tangled black strands. Because, this morning, I want to wear the mess atop my head like a trophy.
“I was,” I say instead, letting a slow, satisfied smile curve my lips. “Extremely.”
Sophie’s apartment is everything mine isn’t right now—clean floors, organized surfaces, and a scent that isn’t beer and body odor. It’s a sanctuary of adult responsibility, the kind of place that people with relationships and with their shit together like to inhabit. Where people don’t sleep with their emotionally complicated roommates because he had a bad day and because I was feeling lonely. Not that I’m going to tell her that last part.
“So.” Sophie tucks her legs underneath her on the opposite end of the couch, her mug cradled between her hands. She’s wearing her Saturday morning uniform: yoga pants and an oversized Pine Barren Hockey sweatshirt that belongs to Mike. “Are you going to tell me, or do I need to drag it out of you?”
“There’s nothing to drag.” I take another sip of coffee, buying time to arrange my thoughts into something presentable. “Maine and I hooked up. It was fun.”
The words come out exactly as rehearsed. Casual. Confident. The same tone I’d use to describe trying a new restaurant or buying a pair of shoes. But, deep down, I’m not sure if they’re true. Because as much as I’ve spent the last few hours telling myself it was transactional, I still can’t shake the look of him with Chloe, or how good it felt to have him inside me, connected, blowing his mind as someone finally took care of him for once.
Sophie’s eyebrows lift infinitesimally. “Fun,” she repeats, the word hanging in the air between us like a challenge.
“Yes, fun.” I smirk. “You know, that thing people have when they’re not overthinking everything?”
She doesn’t take the bait. She just sits there with her knowing brown eyes and her perfect posture, waiting. I hate when she does this. The silence stretches, filled only by the distant sound of Mike’s shower running and the tick of her kitchen clock. Fine. If she wants details, I’ll give her details. The sanitized version.
“Look, it was exactly what I expected.” I set my mug on the coaster on the coffee table, because Sophie’s the kind of person who has coasters. “Maine’s hot, he’s good in bed, and most importantly, he understands the rules. No strings, no complications.”
The lie slides out smooth as silk. I don’t mention the way he’d surrendered control completely, letting me take what I needed. I don’t mention how different he looked without his performer’s mask, raw and exhausted and achingly real. I definitely don’t mention the way he’d said my name like a prayer when he came.
Because none of that matters.
What matters is the narrative, the story I’m telling Sophie and myself.
The one where I’m totally in control.
“No feelings,” I add for emphasis, the words tasting like chalk. “Just good, uncomplicated sex.”
Sophie’s expression doesn’t change, but something shifts in her eyes. Concern, maybe. Or, worse, pity. “Maya…”
“What?” The defensiveness in my voice surprises even me. “Don’t give me that look. I know what I’m doing.”
“I’m sure you do.” She takes a measured sip of her coffee. “I’m just wondering if Maine knows what you’re doing.”
