SWNOVELS Center Ice: Chapter 29
When I push open the door from the basement into our kitchen, Jules spins around in surprise, almost spilling her bowl of soup down the front of the Our House sweatshirt she’s wearing with her dirty work jeans. She comes home a bit early on Wednesdays so I can make it to my dance class.
She takes one look at my face, and asks, “What’s wrong?”
I’d been downstairs printing the revisions for the Livingston plans before leaving for my class, but walking up those basement stairs has all kinds of memories washing through me.
I bite my lower lip, which I know is a nervous habit, but I still can’t seem to stop myself. “Long story.”
She glances over at Graham, who’s engrossed in an episode of his favorite show that I told him he could watch after he finished his dinner while I changed for dance. She looks back at me and points to the kitchen.
I follow her in there, but with our open floor plan, it’s practically a part of the living room and not far from Graham. “What’s going on?” she whispers. “Why are you being weird?”
“I’m not being weird. I just…” am not any good at lying! Why can’t I think of anything to say to finish that sentence?
“What the hell, Audrey? You’re scaring me.” Jules’s voice is approaching a normal speaking level.
“Keep your voice down,” I hiss, glancing over at Graham, but he’s entirely focused on Spiderman. When I glance back at her, she’s set her soup on the counter and folded her arms across her chest.
“Then tell me what’s going on, so I don’t have to make a big deal out of it.” She narrows her eyes at me.
“Fine, so those basement stairs hold…certain memories…of…”
“Oh my God,” she groans. “Spit it out.”
“A certain person, whose name I’m not going to say right now”—my eyes track over to Graham so she’ll understand why—“and I…kind of…”
Jules snorts out a laugh, then drops her voice to a whisper. “Did you and Drew do it on those stairs?”
I can’t tell if she’s horrified or delighted.
“Sort of.”
“How do you sort of have S-E-X with the father of your kid?” she whispers.
“I meant we were sort of on the steps. It was more like…up against the wall…on the landing at the bottom of the stairs?”
“You sure?” Her light brown eyebrows scrunch down toward her gray eyes. “Because you seem confused.”
“Don’t be an asshole. You know I hate talking about this stuff.” It does make me wonder, though, why I had absolutely no issue keeping up with Drew’s dirty talk on the phone that night. Something about him brings that out in me, I guess.
“Well, don’t be such a prude and I won’t have to be an asshole about it. So why can’t you even walk down the stairs now?”
I can’t think about yesterday without picturing it happening all over again—images of the way he kissed me like he owned me, how he held my ass as he drove himself into me, the deliciously full feeling of him sliding against my inner walls, the way my nipples dragged against his chest as his body moved… Heat flashes through me, and my mouth parts with a breathy sigh, and I can feel the dampness pooling against my underwear.
“Holy shit,” Jules laughs as she watches me. “This is what happens when you think about it? Must have been some damn good sex.”
“You have no idea,” I say, and then when I see the look that flashes across her face, I instantly regret it.
“Truth.”
I didn’t mean it literally, but that’s how she took it.
“Jules…” I say, starting to apologize, but she raises her hand to cut me off.
“Time to say goodnight to your mom, Graham!” she all but yells, as I give her my most apologetic look.
Graham jumps off the couch and comes running into the kitchen to give me hugs and kisses goodnight. As he does any night I go out, he makes me promise that I’ll come give him more kisses when I get home—which I always do, and he always sleeps through.
“I won’t be out late,” I tell Jules when Graham heads back to the couch to finish his show. She nods in response, but she’s doing that thing she sometimes does where she gets quiet and withdrawn. I can tell by the way she’s tugging on the gold disk of her necklace and staring blankly out the window into the darkness that she isn’t ready to talk. It’s so opposite of her normal hold-nothing-back personality that it used to scare me when she got like this, but eventually I accepted that this is how she deals with her feelings. There’s no point in pushing her when she’s like this. I’ll have to wait for her to be ready to talk.
“Oh good, you’re still alive.” Danika’s voice cuts through the music that’s pumping throughout the studio, and I have to scan the dark space lit only by purple spotlights to find her. She’s at the mobile cart that contains the sound system near the far wall.
“Yep, just barely survived,” I call out. I head toward the long wall at the back of the room where we keep our bags and drop to the floor to remove my shoes and street clothes. I leave my sweatpants on, as I’ll want them while we warm up, but I toss my sneakers and sweatshirt into my bag. And then Danika’s platform boots appear right next to me, like they did last week when I’d crumpled to the floor. I’m still laughing at how I was half-way dying on the floor at her feet and she still told me, “this ain’t no sleepover.”
“I kept searching the obituaries, but your name wasn’t there, so I figured you were okay,” she says.
My laughter escapes so fast it comes out more like a cough. “Thank you for your concern.”
“You recovered enough for this?” she asks.
I stand, and even if she wasn’t wearing 7-inch platform boots, I’d still be looking up at her. “I think so.”
“Good, because if whatever you had last week didn’t kill you, tonight’s workout probably will.”
I tilt my chin up, acknowledging the challenge. “Looking forward to it.”
And I am, because I am finally feeling recovered enough from my illness to do this. And even when it kicks my ass, pole dancing still makes me feel strong and badass like nothing else can. A few months ago when I started, I could barely hold myself up on the bar. Now I can do some impressive stuff, even if it does come with some bumps and bruises.
So when Danika puts her headset on, changes the music to something slower, and starts calling out directions, I approach the pole eagerly. I need to channel my inner-badass so I can deal with the complicated emotions I’m having about Drew and our relationship.
An hour later, I’m regretting all my life choices, but most especially whatever stupid bravado led me to think I could do this. Danika wasn’t kidding about this workout being a killer. Tomorrow, the inside of my right thigh is going to be covered in bruises to match the ones already springing up on my left forearm from where it connected with the pole when my hand missed it. But you know what? I still did it—even though it was hard and, at times, painful. And that’s exactly why I leave every week feeling so good about myself, knowing that I can overcome difficulty and pain and still come out on top.
“Good work today, ladies,” Danika says. “And I expect you to practice at home before next week, because if you thought this was hard, you better prepare yourselves for seven days from now. It’ll be easier if you practice what we learned today.”
I groan internally, because there’s no way I can practice at home unless I get a pole, and no way I could hide that from Jules. I’ve thought about installing one of the temporary ones in the basement playroom and claiming that it’s a climbing pole for Graham, but I feel like she’d see right through that or catch me practicing on it.
I don’t know what it is that prevents me from telling her about these classes—we really do tell each other everything—but for reasons I can’t quite explain, this is something that I want to keep to myself.
Maybe I’m just waiting until I’m really good at it before I share, or maybe it’s because I’m still buying into the stigma that pole dancing is just for strippers and, by my very nature, I’m a good girl who never does anything risqué. Well, except for the phone sex the other night, and actual sex in my office yesterday. But as long as I’m not around Drew, I’m the queen of good decisions.
I’m still pondering whether I should just break down and tell Jules about the class so that I can actually practice at home, when I walk out of the studio and am hit full-force by the chilly night air. The middle of October has brought unseasonably cold nighttime temperatures, and I rush toward the small parking lot two buildings down. I’m not paying attention to anyone around me, so I almost don’t notice my name being called. It probably wouldn’t have even registered if that same voice hadn’t been saying my name, along with a lot of other nonsensical things, like how he couldn’t live without me while he climaxed inside me yesterday.
I stop, my whole body going rigid, as I stand rooted on the sidewalk. Shit. As much as I’m conflicted about our situation, I crave Drew in a way I never have anyone else. I want to see him. I want him near me. But not here. Not steps from the dance studio with its bright neon sign.
I hear his soft footfalls behind me and am not surprised at all when his large hand clasps my shoulder. I want to melt right back into him, but my body seems to have a case of rigor mortis from the shock. What are the chances that he’d happen to be here, on the same city block, the minute I’m walking out of my class?
“Hey, where are you rushing off to?” he asks as he turns me to face him.
“I have to get home to Graham. Jules is watching him for me while I…run errands.” I pause just long enough before saying “run errands” that I know it sounds like I was thinking something up.
Drew’s eyes slide down my body, and my skin reacts as if he’s sliding his hands along every curve, goosebumps following the path of his gaze as he takes in my sweats and sweatshirt, then my high-top sneakers. His eyes track right back up to my face, no doubt noticing how sweaty I am, my hair slicked back into a now-damp ponytail. “Errands, huh?”
“Yep.” I use my elbow to push my bag behind my back, as if he won’t notice the wide canvas straps over my shoulder.
“Are you sure”—his gaze flicks back to the neon City Pole sign hanging above the door I just walked out of—“you weren’t at your weekly dance class?”
Even the cold wind that whips through at that moment can’t stop the full-on flush that creeps across my face. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say, even though I’m pretty sure he just watched me walk out of there, and the sign—with its electric blue pole and red high heel—leaves no room for interpretation.
He gives me his trademark smirk as his eyes continue to assess me. “I think you do. And I think you want to tell me about it, but you’re not sure how I’ll react.”
“I think I just want you to mind your own business.” I shove my hands into the pockets of my hoodie, wishing I could just melt into the sidewalk so we didn’t have to have this conversation.
He steps in so close that I have to tilt my head up to see him. “You are my business, Audrey. And the sooner you accept that, the sooner we can move forward here.”
I open my mouth to respond, but pause when I hear, “Jenkins,” yelled at the top of some guy’s lungs from behind me.
“Fuck,” he mutters.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, knowing this is about to get awkward.
“It’s Colt. I’m meeting him for dinner.”
“Shit.” The word comes out on an exhale, and I look over my shoulder to see Colt barreling toward us. “Hey, Colt!” I call out, plastering a smile across my face and hoping that acting like my brother’s best friend seeing me and Drew together isn’t a big deal. And then I realize that it isn’t, because I already told Jameson, who probably told Colt.
Colt pauses mid-step, clearly surprised to see me talking to Drew on the street. Then his face goes hard as he looks at Drew. Okay, so Jameson hasn’t told him.
“Audrey,” he says with a small nod as he stops next to us.
“Good to see you. Okay, gotta run. Jules is at home with Graham, and I told her I’d be back as soon as I finished my errands.”
Colt’s lips press together like he’s trying to hide a smirk. “Tell her I said hi.”
“Why? You trying to piss her off?” Jules and Colt have a tumultuous relationship, where he’s always egging her on, trying to get a rise out of her. It was funny when she was a kid, but now it just annoys her, and by extension, everyone else.
“Always. We still doing Halloween, like usual? Or are we moving it to Jameson and Lauren’s this year?”
“Hmmm, we haven’t talked about it yet,” I say, wondering why Jameson hasn’t brought it up. Halloween is always the holiday he made the biggest deal out of. He loved to decorate the outside of our brownstone with enormous cobwebs and huge, fuzzy spiders. On the day itself, he’d usually stay home so he could sit on the front steps and pass out candy, while Jules and I took Graham out trick-or-treating.
Then a few years ago, Graham wanted to be Woody from A Toy Story for Halloween, and he insisted that Colt be Buzz Lightyear. Luckily, Colt’s pretty much an overgrown kid and thought it was a great idea. And he’s come trick-or-treating with us every year since.
“Okay,” Colt says, “well, keep me posted.” Then he turns to Drew. “You ready for dinner?”
“Yeah,” he says, then glances at me. “Good seeing you.”
“You too,” I say, then head off down the street toward the parking lot, feeling like I dodged a bullet by not having to finish that conversation with Drew. For now.
And when I turn the corner, I glance over my shoulder, and Colt and Drew haven’t moved an inch. Instead, they look like they’re engaged in a pretty heated debate, which doesn’t bode well for Drew if he’s trying to build a good relationship with his new teammates.