Page 34 of The Love You Hate
CHAPTER NINE
Presley
I glance across the bakery to watch Nate serve a customer at the counter. He’s been there all morning while I’ve been stuck in the back on bake duty. We had a breakthrough last night and I was so close to kissing him that it’s quite literally all I can think about. There isn’t one time from my past I can remember being so obsessed with someone’s lips. If I wanted a kiss, I took it. If I wanted even more than that, it was mine. That’s not why I’m hell-bent on having Nate for myself, though. There’s an air about him that genuinely makes me feel whole. It’s so cliché and don’t even ask me to explain it, because I can’t, but he is the butter to my bread. The butter is fattening, but I know it will taste so good. When he’s angry or being hard to get a read on, it only intrigues me more. It begs the question, why? How can his willpower possibly be that strong?
Ryan comes over with a tray of croissants and tells me to watch out. After he passes by, he seems to realize I’m not working, and who I’m fixated on. “Yo, earth to Presley, are you, uh, going to join the living? I take it you and Nate haven’t worked through your aggression yet?”
That pulls me from my daydream. “Explain what you mean by that.”
“You want to eat each other for dinner. How it hasn’t happened yet is beyond me. What do you think the back and forth banter is about? The fights that aren’t really fights, but more of foreplay? I’m not a rocket scientist, just a simple man, but it’s plain enough for me to figure things out. Why haven’t you?”
I narrow my eyes at his broad back. “There’s something more I don’t know. I think he might actually be attached to someone else.” Really attached. Marriage attached. It’s the only thing that makes sense. Well, if I’m being vain it’s the only reason I can come up with why he’s not responding to my advances like I think he should. He’s attracted to me. He wants me just as bad as I want him, and yet, here I stand concocting scenarios in my mind of us naked, sweaty, and breathless. “He’s hard to get a read on. Incredibly difficult.”
“That’s because he’s scared of you,” Ryan deadpans. “How could he not? You’re intimidating.”
“What? There’s no way that’s it.”
Ryan shakes his head, looking confused. “Maybe you’re right. He did ask for a few days off because he had to leave Gold Hawke to deal with some family business. Could be going to visit a woman or something, but I just don’t think that’s it.”
My stomach sinks and my heart flutters as the truth sets in. I’m right. He’s leaving. What if he never comes back? If the lure of whoever the woman is, is so strong that he stays? Nate isn’t bound for life to this place, and I am. I swallow down the lump in my throat. “Oh,” I finally say. “Did he say when he’s leaving?”
“Tomorrow, I think. He didn’t tell you he was leaving?” I shake my head. He didn’t and it stings.
Sighing, I say, “I’m reading it all wrong.” It was something I should have said in my head instead of out loud.
“You shouldn’t have to read anything, Presley. Why don’t you talk to him?”
A lump swells in my throat. Because I don’t want to be abandoned or let down again. I wouldn’t survive it. “I’ve tried.” No, what I’ve done is tried to layer my sexual attraction to him on top of the actual emotions forming every second I’m around him.
Another customer walks in and Ryan says something I don’t hear as he heads for the back ovens. I continue kneading dough, a morose demeanor for the rest of the morning. The goal never should have been to make him fall in love with me, it should have merely been to make him stay. In any capacity. Nate serves the customer a quick cup of coffee and a bagel, and he gazes over his shoulder for the first time today.
He smiles a meek, mouthwatering smile and mouths the word ‘hi.’ It affects every nerve ending in my body. One dumb word not even spoken. I smile back and the moment is broken by another customer walking in. Last night at my house, my hands on his strong arms, and our faces inches apart is something I can relive anytime I want, but it’s not enough. I blow out a breath and bring a tray of dough back to Ryan. He grabs it from me and asks if I can make some Danish pastries next. I nod and spend the rest of the morning watching Nate work, trying to scheme ways to make him stay.
****
Spankies was just as scary as Nate said it would be. When he left quickly after our shift was over, without so much as saying goodbye, I decided to leave him alone, thinking I came on too strong and his indifference is my penance. Surely, he’ll talk to me when he’s ready. I really doubt he’ll leave town without saying something to me. If he does, I think my stupid heart might break a bit. A dancer named Skye gave me matching lace scraps to wear for my audition. Well, she sold them to me for a price that was double what was on the price tags, but I didn’t have an option. I didn’t bring anything else and evidently you don’t just parade around naked from the get-go, it’s a process. Guess I should have researched, but I mean, I’ve never even been inside a strip club, let alone try to gain employment at one.
The interview was with a seedy man named Todd in one of the back rooms of Spankies. There was a pole in the corner that I swung around like a baby deer trying to walk for the first time, and well, Nate was also right. He hired me before I removed the thong or bra, which is a good thing because I was sweating thinking about removing them with him alone. I thought an audition in a back room might mean he wants to audition me in ways I wouldn’t agree to, and God knows how that would have turned out. Todd smiled, flashing his lack of teeth on the bottom row, told me I could start next week, and told me the rules. No boyfriends in the club. No real drinking while working, if someone buys us a drink it is made virgin. No stealing, and Todd gets forty percent of any money I make in the back rooms. Which makes him my pimp, I guess. I didn’t tell him I don’t plan to go into the back rooms at all… ever, because he doesn’t know this is just a check mark on my redo bucket list, not gainful employment I expect to keep for the rest of my life.
I went home after, my whole body shaking with nerves and anticipation. Then I tried to get the internet to work so I could research tomato fertilizer and how to spin on a stripper pole. When it didn’t work, I decided to drive over to Nate’s cabin. Internet is a valid excuse, but honestly, I missed having him around today. My hands are sweating on my steering wheel as I try to steel my nerves to knock on his door. He knows I’m here because the dirt road makes a loud crunching sound and I’m parked right next to his side door. Instead of going inside, I walk down the path that cuts around to the back garden. He’s out there messing with the sprinklers.
“Hey,” I call out.
“I heard a car,” Nate says, standing to face me. “What are you up to?”
I swallow hard. God, he is handsome. His smile is wider than I’ve ever seen it and I’m not imagining it, I’m not, his eyes lit up when he saw it was me. “I was wondering if I could borrow some internet to do research.”
His teeth sparkle as his smile stretches farther still. “Sure, on what?”
“Tomato fertilizer, and uh, some exercising tips and tricks.”
Nate strides toward me, large body swaggering, drawing my gaze everywhere it shouldn’t be. “I don’t want to come off aloof, but I’m probably more informational than the internet when it comes to both of those things.”
I grin. It’s the easiest way to conceal my attraction. “I’d love to see you teach me how to do a flying spiral on a pole, but, I’m not sure your body is made for that.”
His face changes like it does every time I bring up Spankies and my heart races. It’s something that resembles jealousy at the very least. “Follow me and I’ll give you the laptop.”
“The plants look good. What are you doing with the sprinklers?”
