Ten Tiny Breaths (6 page)

I can’t control the bit of heat from crawling
up my neck. “Yeah, Trent,” I say casually as I set the machine.
Even his name out loud sounds hot. Trent. Trent. Trent.
Stop it,
Kace.

“Well, I haven’t talked to this Trent but I
saw him and … wowza.” Her eyebrows waggle suggestively.

Great. My gorgeous Barbie neighbor thinks
Trent is hot. All she has to do is adjust her shirt and she’ll have
him on his knees. I realize my teeth are clenched painfully and I
focus on releasing my muscles.
She can have him and all the
trouble he comes with. Why do you care, Kace?

Slamming the doors shut and hitting the on
switch, Storm exhales deeply, blowing her long bangs off her face.
“Are you going to be here for a while?” She glances at the
newspaper and marker I’ve brought down with me. “Would you mind
just turning my stuff over when it goes off? I mean, if you’re
around and it’s not too much trouble.”

I look at her again, at her drawn skin and
the purplish lines marring her pretty blue eyes and see just how
worn she is. Young, single mom with a five year old and she works
six days a week, up until three a.m. every night?

“Yeah, no problem.” That sounds like
something a nice, normal person would do, I tell myself. Livie will
be proud of me.

“Are you sure? I don’t want to impose.”

I notice that she’s biting her lip and her
shoulders are pinched together and it dawns on me that she’s
nervous. Asking for my help likely took her a ton of courage and
she must be desperate enough to do it. Realizing that makes me want
to slam my head into a wall. Clearly, I haven’t tried very hard to
be approachable, like I promised Livie I would. And Storm’s nice.
Really, genuinely nice.

“Why, Ma’am, I reckon it’d be my honor to
wash your drawers,” I drawl in a fake southern accent, picking up
the paper to fan myself with it.

Her face lights up with surprise as she
giggles. She opens her mouth to answer, but nothing comes out. Me
having a sense of humor has floored her.
Dammit
,
Livie’s
right. I am an ice queen.

I quickly add, “Besides, I owe you for last
week. It’s the least I can do after pulling out Hannah—the dirtiest
of all weapons.” I smile and it’s not forced. “I’ll just be going
through the jobs section so I may as well do that in this
paradise.”

She frowns. “Starbucks not working out?”
Livie must have told her because I sure didn’t.

“It’s fine, but the pay’s shit. If I want to
live of Spam and scrape blue spots off of bread for the rest of my
life, I can make it work.”

She nods, thinking. “You guys should come
over for dinner tonight.” I open my mouth to decline the charity
and she adds, “as my thanks to Livie for taking care of Mia today.”
There’s something in that tone, a mixture of forced bravery, but
also a level of natural authority that makes me slam my mouth
shut.

“And …” she shifts her feet a bit hesitantly,
like she’s not sure if she should say what’s on her mind, “… do you
know how to mix drinks?”

“Uh …” I blink rapidly at the sudden change
in topic. “Isn’t it a little early in the day for that?”

She smiles, her perfect teeth gleaming. “Like
martinis and Long Islands?”

“I pour a mean tequila shot.” I offer
half-heartedly.

“Well, I can talk to my boss and see if he’ll
hire you, if you’re interested. I bartend at a club. The money’s
good.” Her eyes widen with those last words. “Like, really
good.”

“Bartender, huh?”

She grins. “So, what do ya think?”

Could I handle it? I don’t say anything,
trying to picture myself behind a bar. The visual ends with me
smashing a bottle and kicking a grabby customer in the head.

“I should probably warn you, though.” She
hesitates. “It’s an adult club.”

I feel the frown line zip across my forehead.
“Adult like …”

“Strippers.”

“Oh …”
Of course
. I look down at
myself. “Yeah, I’m a ‘keep clothes on in crowds’ kind of girl.”

Storm’s hands wave my words away. “No, don’t
worry. You wouldn’t have to strip. I promise.”

Me? Work in a strip club? “You think I’d fit
in, Storm?”

“Can you handle being surrounded by sex,
booze, and loads of cash?”

I shrug. “Sounds like my teenage years, minus
the cash.”

“Can you learn how to smile a bit more?” she
asks with a nervous giggle.

I flash her my best fake grin.

She nods with approval. “Good. I think you’ll
do well behind the bar. You have a look they’ll like.”

I snort. “What look? The ‘I just got off a
bus from Michigan and I’ll do anything for money so I don’t have to
eat Spam’ look?”

The corners of her eyes crinkle as she
giggles. “Think about it and let me talk to my boss. It’s
really
good money. You wouldn’t have to eat Spam again.
Ever.” With that, she skips up the stairs.

I think about it. I think about it as I watch
Storm and Mia’s clothes spin around in circles. I think about it as
the timer goes off and I flip the clothes over into the dryer and
start two new loads. I think about it as I sort and fold their
freshly clean clothes into neat piles and reload the hamper, paying
a little too much attention to the skimpy outfits in Storm’s pile.
Like a tiny black top that looks like a cross between a sequined
sports bra and something a wild animal mangled. I hold it up. Does
she serve drinks or her body in this? That would explain her
ridiculous boobs. Wow. I might be making friends with a stripper.
That’s sounds weird. And then I acknowledge that I’m going through
her underwear. That sounds way weirder.

“Tell me where you wear that so I can be
there to witness it.” His deep voice startles me again.

I gasp as my head whips around to see Trent
strolling toward me with a laundry bag slung over his shoulder. My
breath hitches at the sight of him and those deep dimples he
flashes shamelessly. It’s been more than two weeks since I bumped
into him here, yet seeing him instantly ignites a fire within
me.

Again, with the laundromat? What are the
chances?
Inhaling deeply, I force myself to relax. I’m better
prepared this time.
I won’t act like a space cadet. I won’t let
his beautiful face disarm me. I won’t
… “Well, well. The
Laundromat Lurker strikes again.”

Trent smirks as his attention grazes over my
body, stopping to survey the tattoo on my thigh for a moment before
flittering back up to my face. By the time they get there, my pulse
is racing and I think I may need to change my underwear.
Dammit.
Here we go again.
“Round two,” I mutter before I can stop
myself.

His eyebrow quirks with surprise as he moves
toward the open washer.

I try not to ogle his body through his fitted
white t-shirt, watching him dump a set of white sheets into the
wash. “You wash your sheets a lot,” I observe coolly, thinking
that’s a fairly innocuous comment.

Trent’s hands pause for a second and then he
continues, chuckling and shaking his head but saying nothing. He
doesn’t need to. I’ve clued into what my observation could imply
and I groan inwardly, fighting the urge to smack myself in the
forehead, my face growing even warmer. Any upper hand I thought I
had when he walked in just dissolved into a hot mess at my
feet.

I’m sure his sheets see a lot of action. He’s
got to have a girlfriend. Someone like him must have a girlfriend.
Or a string of fuck buddies. Either way, now I want to crawl into a
hole and hide until he leaves.

“What can I say? It’s hot in Miami without
A/C,” he offers after a moment as if to ease the awkwardness.
That’s what I fool myself into thinking anyways, until he throws
in, “even without clothes, I wake up boiling,” and deftly layers on
to my mortification.

Trent sleeps naked.
My mouth dries as
my focus unavoidably latches onto his frame again. On the other
side of my living room wall is this god, in a bed, lying naked.
Though I thought impossible, my pulse quickens even further.

I open my mouth to change topics, but I can’t
grasp onto anything coherent. Words swim inside my head, stringing
into gibberish. I can’t come up with one damn remotely intelligent
answer. Not one. Me, who can crack orgy jokes and crush arrogant
ball sacks with the best of them, is floored. He has smoothly
splintered my defensive shield with nothing but bed sheets and a
naked visual.

And those damn dimples.

I watch the muscles in his shoulders shift as
he pours detergent into the machine. Who knew doing laundry could
be sexy. When he turns to me and winks, I jump.

“You okay?” he asks.

I nod and try to make an affirmative sound
but it comes out sounding like a strangled cat and I’m sure my
entire head has caught on fire now.

He slams the lid on the washer and pushes the
coins in to start the wash, then turns to me, leaning in. “To be
honest, I saw you walking past me with your laundry and I grabbed
the first thing I could think to wash.”

Wait … what’s he saying?
I shake my
head to kick the haze out.
I think he’s telling me something
important.

He grins as he pushes a hand back through his
unkempt hair.
I want to do that
, I think, involuntarily
flexing my fingers.
Please let me do that.
In fact, I want
to do all kinds of things to him. Right here in this dingy
basement. On the washer. On the floor. Anywhere. I battle the urge
to lunge at him like a rabid animal. Hell, I’m panting like one
right now.

“So, what do people do for fun around here?”
he asks, leaning back at bit to give me space, like he can read
that I’m about to pass out from his proximity.

“Uh …” It takes me a moment to find my voice.
And my wits. “Hang out in laundromats?” My words come out shaky.
Dammit—what is wrong with me?

He laughs, his gaze settling on my lips. The
feel of his eyes there makes me spew out words that my brain hasn’t
approved yet. “I don’t know. I just moved here. I haven’t had any
fun yet.”
Ohmigod Kacey. Shut up! Just shut up! Now you sound
like an airhead and a loser!

With a lopsided grin, he leans against the
washer and crosses buff arms over his chest. And then he stares at
me. That stare lasts an eternity, until sweat starts to trickle
down my back. “Well, we need to change that, don’t we?”

“Huh?” I croak, heat igniting in my lower
belly. He has effectively stripped me bare of my titanium cover
again. He’s tossed it to another planet where I have no hope of
ever finding it. I am naked and vulnerable and his eyes are boring
into my core.

His body slides across his washer until he’s
leaning on mine, his hip nudged up against me, his arm stretched
out to the opposite corner of the machine in front of me,
effectively invading all personal space. “Change the fact that
you’re not having any fun,” he murmurs. My breath snags. I feel
like he’s reached into my body and seized my pounding heart. Does
he have any idea what he’s doing to me? Am I that obvious?

His index finger reaches up and runs down my
temple, down my cheek, to join the rest of his hand to cup my jaw.
He rubs my hanging bottom lip with the pad of his thumb as I gawk
up at him. I can’t move. Not a muscle, like his touch has the power
to paralyze. “You are so very beautiful.”

My nerves are a ball of contradictions. His
fingertip feels so damn good against my lip and yet that voice is
screaming,
No! Stop! Danger!

“So are you,” I hear myself whisper and I
instantly curse the traitor within.

Do. Not. Let.This. Happen.

He leans in closer and closer until his
breath caresses my mouth. I’m paralyzed. I swear he’s going to kiss
me.

I swear I’m going to let him.

But then he stands up straight, as if
remembering something. Clearing his throat, he says with a wink,
“See you around, Kacey.” He turns and vanishes up the stairs, his
long legs taking two steps at a time.

“Ye … Yeah. Fo … for sure,” I stutter,
leaning against the machine for support as my legs turn to jelly.
I’m sure I’m two seconds away from melting into a puddle on the
concrete floor. I fight the urge to chase after him.
One … two …
three
… I struggle to shake off the uncomfortable edge that has
slinked into my body. Hunching over, I lay my cheek against the
machine, my flushed skin reveling in the feel of the cool
metal
.

He’s one hell of a player. I’m usually so
good at shutting them down. Being a female in a male-dominated gym,
I dealt with those juiced up egomaniacs at O’Malleys every day.
Hold my bag for me
…
Dominate me
… The comments were
never-ending and uncreative. Then, when the lot of them decided
that I must be a lesbian because I hadn’t dropped my shorts for
anyone, the stupid comments increased tenfold.

I’ve never had issues resisting the hottest
of them. None of them have broken though this masterful wall of
self-preservation I’ve constructed around myself. I enjoyed
sparring with them. I loved knocking them to their knees. But never
had they stirred any interest from me, physical or otherwise.

But Trent … there’s something different about
him, and I don’t have to think hard to see it. Something about the
way he takes over a room, the way he looks at me, like he has
already identified and can disarm every one of my defense
mechanisms with no effort, like he sees through them to the
disaster lying beneath.

And he wants it.

“Fucking player,” I mutter as I run to the
sink. A splash of water temporarily douses the flames in my chest.
He’s smooth. Oh so smooth. Way more sophisticated than the asshats
I normally deal with. “You’re so very beautiful,” I repeat,
followed by a harsh mock of myself saying “so are you.” I’m sure he
tells everyone that. Watch, he’ll meet Storm and say the exact same
thing.
Oh God.
My gut spasms, my fists clenching so tight
that my knuckles go white. What’ll happen when he meets Storm?
He’ll fall in love with her, that’s what. He’s a guy. What guy
wouldn’t fall in love with Sweet Stripper Barbie? And then I’ll
become nothing other than that head case in 1C and I’ll have to
watch them cuddle on the couch, and listen to them have
wild-stripper sex on the other side of my bedroom wall, and I’ll
want to rip Storm’s arms off.
Dammit.
I crank up the cold
water and splash my face again. In no time, this guy has created
permanent fissures in my carefully constructed suit of sanity, and
I don’t know how to fight against it, to protect myself, to keep
him out.