Page 74 of Drilled (Dad Bod Contracting 2)
A part of me wants to be angry, wants to get defensive, wants to lash out at her and act like she’s abandoning me. But I know better. I can no longer ignore the blatant truth in everything she said and, like everything else in this entire situation, I hate it.
The truth burns.
I blink hard, but hot salty tears drip down my cheeks anyway. “I really want to hate you right now,” I whisper.
Imogen hugs me again, a tight, fierce embrace that lasts until I’m uncomfortable with it and start squirming.
“I know,” she says, eventually letting go. “I wish I knew what else to do, here, Audra, but I just don’t. I won’t apologize, because I know I’m doing the right thing, but I will say I’m sorry I can’t support you in the way you want me to.”
“I get it,” I say. “I don’t know that I have a way past this right now, but I’ll figure it out.” I pause as I suck back a breath and try not to totally break down in inexplicable sobs. “Somehow.”
“Audra, god—”
“You’re right, Imogen,” I cut in over her. “I know you’re right. You’ve been right. I hate it, and I hate you for it, but you’re right, and I love you, always and forever and no matter what.”
“I hate leaving like this,” she says, her voice thick.
“It’s fine.” I wipe at my eyes with the back of my wrist, and then open my door and shove her out. “Go. Wake Jesse up and fuck him senseless, because one of us has to be getting some.”
She laughs. “That was the plan anyway, babe.” She frowns. “So, wait—you’re not—”
“I haven’t been with anyone except Franco since the day I met him,” I admit. “I just…can’t. I’ve tried, too, and I just…can’t.”
Her green eyes lock on mine, and I see a spark and a sparkle, and a hint of a smirk on her lips.
“Don’t you say a goddamn word, Imogen Catherine Irving!” I say, laughing.
She mimes zipping up her lips and throwing away the key. “Not a word. But I don’t have to say it, do I? You know exactly what I’m thinking.”
“Yeah, yeah. I told you—he’s the one who shut it down, not me. I was on the verge of being willing to consider something, and he shut it down. So it’s on him, not me.”
“And since when do you sit idly by and wait for someone else to give you what you want, especially a man?”
“This is different, and you know it.”
She sighs. “Yeah, I guess it is. You can’t force him to want something.”
“Exactly.” I give her another gentle shove. “Go. Get out of here. You have a cock to suck.”
She rolls her eyes at me. “You’re so nasty and vulgar.”
“Yep. And you love me for it.”
She hesitates. “We’re okay?”
I laugh, another abrupt, unexpected half-sob escaping, tangled up with a laugh. “Yes, we’re fine. I’m not, but we are.”
“Can I leave you alone?” she asks.
I nod. “Yeah. I’ll be okay.”
“Don’t try to drink your way past this.” She lets out a resigned breath. “We’ve both done way too much of that, and it’s not healthy emotionally or physically.”
“I’m going to bed,” I tell her. “And you’re right, yet again.”
“Call me, okay? You’re not dealing with this alone.”
“I will, and I know.”
She walks away, then, and I watch her go. When she’s out of sight, I close the door, lock it, and turn back to my living room. The pint of ice cream is melting all over my side table, so I hurry to clean it up and throw away the melted remainder. There’s Imogen’s untouched glass of wine on the table and my partially finished glass, plus the partial bottle on the counter, the cork forgotten beside it. Not one to waste a perfectly good glass of wine, I set my resolve and find my funnel. I pour both glasses of wine back into the bottle, shove the cork into the bottle, and put the bottle aside.
And honestly, I feel a little better about myself for having done that.
I’ll never admit this out loud, but wine and ice cream don’t actually fix things. They make a hell of a temporary bandage, but they don’t really fix things.
I shut the TV off, climb into bed, and try to fall asleep.
I can’t, though.
I keep replaying that day at Franco’s house—specifically the moment he asked me if I wanted a now-what. I’d lied to Imogen about that—or rather, withheld the truth. I feel like shit about that, but I feel even shittier because I lied to him. And to myself.
I did want that. I did then, and I do now.
I don’t have the slightest clue what a now-what looks like or feels like, but I know I want a now-what with Franco. I want him bare inside me again, consequences be damned—and no Plan B the next morning either. I want him to kiss me. I want to go to sleep and wake up with him, and have more sex and have breakfast, and have more sex and watch TV and have more sex…
