Broken Ever After (31 page)

“
Baby, I just wanna talk.”

“
So talk, you have thirty seconds before Riley kicks you out of that door and hands your arse to building security.”

“
I didn’t do what you think I did, Olivia. I didn’t sleep with her. I mean, yeah I slept with her.” Tears pricked my eyes again.

“
Get out.”

“
No, Olivia, I
only
slept with her. She’s practically my baby sister, Liv! All we did was sleep!”

“
So why when I walked in were you both dancing back into your fucking underwear, Jamie?”

“
That’s not what was happening! We-”

“
I don’t want to hear any more! I want you to leave!
Get out!
” I screamed. Riley pulled him to the door, as I turned and ran to my room.

I curled myself up into a ball on my bed
, willing myself not to cry. Willing myself not to think about Jamie; willing myself not to think about anything at all.

A dip in my bed startled me.
“He’s gone. Are you ok?”

“
Yeah.” I sat up and pushed my hair away from my face, folding my legs underneath me. “I just- I want to be alone.” I looked up at him and smiled weakly.

“
Let me know if you need anything, ok?” I nodded and watched him leave.

I was slowly driving myself crazy staring at the walls of my bedroom. After what seemed like my thousandth sigh, I pulled myself up from my bed, grabbed one of my new bikinis from my wardrobe and changed. I poked my head out of my room, listening for Riley before sneaking out of the apartment. I jumped in the lift, hammering on the button for the basement before Riley had realised I’d gone.

The pool in the basement was
empty so I quickly shimmied back out of my shorts and top, kicking my shoes to the side. I leaped in to the water and swam, focussing all of my energy on the next kick of my legs, the next rotation of my arms and tumble turn against the ends. I got to my fifth length before thoughts of Jamie crashed through my mind. Why was I letting this hurt so much? We’d hardly been together any time at all to be this distraught over it. It’s not even like we said we’d be exclusive or anything. Sure he’d asked me to be his girlfriend so I’d thought exclusivity was implied, but he never said he had any intention of me being the only one. Did he even love me like he said he did? Was it just a ploy to fill his time? Or fulfilling a fantasy of bedding one of his students and no one finding out?

I
’d lost count of how many lengths I’d swam after the twenty-fifth, but I’d come to the conclusion that I no longer cared what the hell Jamie was doing. He could go and be the fucking playboy he’d been hiding from me. He’d used me and expected me not to find out.
Well fuck him! Fuck him to Hell
. I was done caring.

I pushed myself for two more lengths
, before pulling myself up to lay on to the side, breathless. Standing up I noticed I wasn’t alone any more. Riley sat on the end of a lounger, legs apart resting his elbows on his knees, with his hands clasped together in front of him. Watching me.

“
How long have you been here?” He remained silent, his face neutral. I walked over to him wringing out my hair, to pick up my towel and clothes from between his feet. “Can I have my things?” He didn’t move, he just continued to look up at me with that blank stare. “So you’re not talking? Awesome.” I said sarcastically as I bent down to retrieve my shorts and top, throwing them onto the next lounger.

“
Do you have
any
idea how
dangerous
it is to not tell me where you are going when you leave? Do you have
any
idea what could happen to you if someone finds you? Alone and dressed in that” He gestured to my top.

“
What’s wrong with my t-shirt?”

“
Nothing, I meant that fucking bikini” I bristled at his tone.

“
Why do guys have such problems with bikinis?”

“
We don’t. It’s controlling ourselves when we see hot girls in them that we have problems with.” He took a deep breath, clearly biting his tongue to stop himself from saying anything else. He thinks I’m hot? Is
that
was he was saying?

“
Well, you can rest assured that from now on, every time I plan to blink I’ll let you know.” I huffed pulling my Converse back on. “May I blink?” I stared at him raising my eyebrow. When he never answered me I stormed back out to the lift, scrunching my eyes closed against the stinging sensation from not blinking.

***

Resigning myself to the fact that I was trapped in the apartment for the time being, I sat on the sofa with my sketch pad in my lap, twirling my pencil through my fingers as I tried to think of something to draw. I didn’t even feel like drawing but I couldn’t think of anything better to do; TV was rubbish, nothing was happening online, going out without a chaperone was out of the question. I gazed across the room to see Riley sat at the large dining table looking over the daily newspaper, his finger tracing over the rim of a can of coke.

“
Some job if you get to sit around all day.” I muttered to myself.

“
What was that?” He asked, not looking up from his paper.

“
Nothing.” I could hear his huff from across the room as he continued reading. I looked between my blank page and Riley’s still form bent over the table and began to let my pencil wander over the paper effortlessly, tracing his outline. His face was beautifully illuminated by the large windows. I sketched his perfectly styled hair, his arched eyebrows that furrowed with concentration as he read; his piercing blue eyes and straight nose to his wonderfully kissable lips that were parted slightly as he mouthed the words he was reading and his jawline that looked like it could chisel granite.

I was almost finished
, looking up one last time to make sure I’d captured him perfectly when I saw that he was no longer there; his paper lay open on the table.

“
You drew me?” His voice startled me from behind the sofa.

“
Jesus, Riley!” I thrust my hand over my heart feeling its quickened rhythm under my palm. “Didn’t your mother ever teach you it’s rude to sneak up on people?”

“
No.” He answered simply before sitting beside me on the sofa. “Didn’t your mother teach you it’s rude to stare at people?” I childishly poked my tongue out at him.

“
No. That would imply that she actually spent time with me.” He snorted at my response.

“
Mummy issues much?”

“
Oh shut up, Riley.” I scowled. “What kind of name is Riley anyway? I thought you were Scottish?” I asked as I flipped to a blank page and started to doodle flowers.

“
What’s that supposed to mean?”

“
Well it doesn’t sound very Scottish” he laughed as he snatched my sketch pad from my lap and flipped back to the previous page.

“
And you don’t look very Greek but I’m no questioning you on your surname am I?” I giggled at the way he said Greek, earning a strange look from him. Oh God, just keep talking.

“
Well it’s just not what I expected. So where are you from?”

“
Wales” he replied sarcastically.

“
You’re hilarious.” I said dryly.

“
Glasgow.”

“
Oh, like Uncle Frank?” He bristled slightly as he turned back further in my pad looking through other drawings that I had done. “Did you know him before you started working with the company? Is that how you got the job?”

“
Do you know there are about half a million people in Glasgow? Probably more.” He gave me an incredulous look before closing my pad and throwing it back into my lap. “Those are really good by the way.” He patted my knee and stood, walking away to his room. He turned by the hallway to call over his shoulder. “You should keep that last one by your bed at night, good visualisation.” My eyes widened in shock at his reference to the previous night. I launched my pad towards him but he retreated quickly, laughing as he went to his room.

I received a call from Uncle Austin a while later to inform me that he wouldn
’t be home for dinner and more than likely wouldn’t be home at all. He’d had another call from his mystery woman and he was planning on staying with her again. I sighed as I realised that I was cramping his style by staying with him. No guy wants his teenage niece hanging around when he’s trying to be with his new girlfriend. Total buzz kill.

Austin said he
’d left some cash on his desk if I wanted to get a take-away, after my stomach rumbled for the fourth time I decided I’d go and see what Riley would like to eat. I headed down the hallway and stopped outside of his door; I was about to knock when I heard him talking on the phone.

“
Yeah, everything’s going ok. All according to plan. I know that. The end of the week? Jesus. Right, ok. I said OK! Aye, catch ya later.” I heard something bang before he yelled a string of colourful words. I decided I’d give him a minute to calm down and grabbed my iPad to look up the menus of local restaurants. I pulled up a few as I wasn’t sure what he’d like and knocked on his door. He swung it open to reveal himself in
that
pair of jeans and nothing else, his hair slightly damp from the shower again, with a towel hanging over his shoulder. My mouth dried instantly; I tried to swallow but my stubborn throat refused to work.

“
Do you like food?”
What?
“Erm, I mean, do you like Chinese food?” I pulled my eyes away from his toned body and busied myself by flicking through the open tabs. “Or Mexican? Or Indian? Italian?” My stupid eyes kept flicking up to glance at the abs that appeared just over the top edge of the iPad. “Uncle Austin said he” oh god, he stepped closer. “Said he- erm- he won’t be home again tonight.” I gulped. “I thought we could order something. For dinner. If you want?”
Breathe, woman!
I mentally scolded myself.

“
Aye, sure. I want what
you
want… I’ll have whatever you’re having.” I narrowed my eyes at my screen, wondering what his tone was trying to convey.
That he’s hungry, you idiot!

His hand moved from the doorframe to his stomach to rub
over the perfectly formed ridges of muscle. I longed so desperately for those fingers to be mine. My grip tightened as I tried to shift my focus back to-
what was I doing again?
“I’m actually really hungry right now.” Oh right, food. Was he even talking about food? The way he was talking didn’t sound like he wanted food. So what was it he wanted? I know what I’d like… I’d like him to stop scrambling my thoughts.

I stared hard at the screen
, trying desperately to see the words. “You know it helps if you stick the rotation lock on that thing. It saves you having to read upside down.” Huh? My eyes focused on the screen for sure this time.
Oh god
. I stumbled slightly and tried as best as I could to walk back to the living room to sit down, mumbling my thanks to him as I went.

Oh get a grip! This can
’t happen. It would be stupid to like him, he works for me! I needed to just get over it. He’d only end up breaking my heart like Jamie did. A wave of emotions washed over me as I remembered everything. Anger and sadness rose in my chest and I had to hold in the scream building there. Tears sprang to my eyes with no signs of stopping no matter how much I tried to push them back with the heel of my hand. I groaned, frustrated with myself and slammed my fists down on to the seat beside my legs. Riley was stood watching me with his arms folded across his bare chest. God, isn’t he paid enough? Buy a shirt!
No, don’t!

“
Are you ok?” I nodded and handed him my iPad as I stood.

“
Can you pick something? Anything, I’m not bothered what. I’ll just- I’ll just go and grab some money.” I turned, heading for Austin’s office. Once in there I ran into the small bathroom located inside and locked myself in. Wadding up a huge pile of tissue I proceeded to let the rush of tears flow, turning myself into a big blubbering mess.

I felt so angry. Angry at myself for being upset over Jamie; he was simply too perfect for me to not be suspicious.
How could I be so naive? I should have known that as soon as my back was turned he’d be with someone else. She was probably his real girlfriend and they were probably both now sat at home,
their
big, beautiful home in
their
big cosy bed laughing at me over his promise to give me that stupid room, over his promise to give me my happy ever after.

I felt even
angrier at myself for being even remotely attracted to Riley, especially after just being with Jamie. Jumping from relationship to relationship wasn’t a good idea.

“
You’re such an idiot!” I hit myself repeatedly with the heel of my hand between my eyes. “Idiot! Idiot!
Idiot!
”

A knock on the door startled me.
“Yeah?”

“
I ordered. They said it would be about twenty minutes.” Riley called through the bathroom door.

“
Oh, ok.” I heard his feet move back across the floor and let out the sob that was lodged in my throat. “Oh for…
Just stop crying!
” I hit myself again and again. Why did I have to be so stupid?

“
Liv, open the door” I heard Riley call through the door again.

“
I… thought you’d gone.”

“
Open up. Now.” He was angry? I stood up and splashed water on my face from the cold tap and opened up the door. I headed back over to the sink to splash my face again and kept my eyes averted down away from his. That didn’t last long when he stood behind me a little too close for comfort. I squeezed myself up against the sink as much as I could but he stepped closer still, his hard chest pressing against my shoulders.

I looked up at his reflection in the mirror through my
wet lashes to see him rest his hands on the counter on either side of me trapping me in. He was making a habit of doing that.

“
Why were you crying?”

“
It doesn’t matter.”

“
It does if it’s upsetting you. Was it him? Did he contact you?” I nodded then shook my head.