—
When Tyler came to, it was from a rest so deep it took him a moment to collect his bearings. His eyes opened to an unfamiliar ceiling, an unfamiliar bed, and the decadent scent of his favorite cookie-girl sweet on the sheets beneath him.
A glance at the clock warned him that sleep wasn’t nearly so complete as he might have thought. Four A.M., and he was pretty sure they hadn’t actually made it to bed until after two.
Made it to sleep, anyway. The bed had been put to good use at least twice prior to that. Once before the shower. And once after the kitchen counter.
He could not be getting hard again already.
But yeah, sure enough. And if Maggie were still snuggled against his side the way she’d been when they finally knocked off, he might have thought to do something about it. Only she wasn’t. Which at this hour was pretty weird.
Throwing his legs over the side of the bed, he rubbed the stubble on his jaw, then the mess of his hair. He looked around the floor for his jeans and pulled them on commando, before following the light down the hall.
At the kitchen doorway, he came up short at the sight of Maggie hunched over the table, the box of condoms from her bedroom in one hand while in the other…
“Seriously, Maggie, a glue gun?”
He’d been reminded of Sam and Ava’s weird fixation on this box of rubbers hours earlier. They’d already used the two he’d brought with him, and standing in Maggie’s open doorway, he’d been giving her a last goodnight kiss—one that ended up migrating south to between her legs.
By the time they’d made it back to the bed, Maggie had torn into the box in a frenzy, swearing she’d figure something out.
Obviously, she had.
“Perfect!” she declared, beaming up at him.
And that smile. There was nothing like it. Nothing like her.
Admiring her handiwork, he chuckled. “An awful lot of work for that little box.”
“I’m protecting your honor,” she said with a smirk, slumping in her chair.
Pulling up his own, he sat. “Appreciated. And hey, what we did tonight is nobody’s business but our own. Still, the glue gun seems a mite extreme.”
Maggie turned the box around in her hands a few times before looking at him over the top. “I guess I’m feeling kind of private about it. And come on, a booty call in Sam and Ava’s own backyard—the teasing would be merciless.”
That it would. But from what he knew about Maggie, she got off on teasing and trash talk almost as much as that sweet spot behind her ear.
“Booty call, huh?”
She shrugged, the corners of her mouth tugging up. “I texted. You came.”
She had him there. “More than once.”
He didn’t have a problem with privacy; it was just that with how close Maggie was with Ava, he had to wonder. “You really think you’ll be able to keep this from your best friend?”
“Not even close. But I guess I’d rather share it with Ava on my own terms, rather than later this morning when she springs into my bed and stumbles across the box.” Then her eyes traveled over him, and she let out a reluctant sigh. “Or you. Looking all half naked and completely hot in my bed might tip her off.”
He pushed out of his chair and stretched.
“Hint taken. My services are no longer required,” he teased. “Time to go.”
—
Maggie was not going to feel guilty.
Okay, she already felt guilty. But she was going to keep telling herself not to, because what she was doing wasn’t wrong. It wasn’t deceitful. And it didn’t involve betrayal. Just a liberal amount of Pine-Sol, Lysol, Tide, and Pledge, as she’d spent the last four hours scouring her apartment for evidence of her late-night tryst with Tyler.
The place was immaculate.
Glistening.
And cold. Running back to her room, she closed the cracked window and then returned to the kitchen, where she’d lit a s’more-scented candle.
Plopping down at her kitchen table, exhausted, she stared at her hands.
No guilt.
Sex between consenting adults was not up for public discussion. Not always.
From the hall she heard a key turn in the lock and braced for the evasion to come.
Ava danced around the corner, carrying a sleeve of Oreos, her brow crinkled as she sniffed the air. “You cleaned already?”
Maggie opened her mouth to explain that she hadn’t been able to sleep, which was the absolute truth, when another set of words spilled out instead. “I had sex with Tyler last night. Over and over. And it was insanely hot and so totally dirty and worth it even though we’re never going to do it again, because we’re just friends.” And then the tears started coming with a rush of more words. “I was going to lie to you, because I wasn’t really ready to share it, but then I saw your face and I couldn’t, so I’ve been cleaning to hide the evidence for four hours for nothing.”
The air sucked into her empty lungs on a gasp and Maggie slapped her hands to her cheeks.
Ava stood locked in place, her mouth half open, brows sky high. “OMG, you had sex so dirty…you had to clean the entire apartment to cover the evidence?”
Maggie nodded, her belly still in knots, the air not quite flowing from her tight lungs yet. “Yeah, he’s kind of a rock star.”
Ava rushed to her side, kneeling beside her at the table as she clutched her hand. “How many times? That’s all I want to know. To start. But then I want every sordid detail.”
“Four. No, five. Wait, I don’t know if you count it as five or six when—never mind. Five. A solid five.”
Ava swallowed. “Against the wall?”
“Which wall?”
Her friend’s face pinched up and she looked like she was going to cry tears of pure joy. “Oh, little Ho-skanky, I’m so happy for you!”
Squeezing Ava’s hand, she grinned. “Me too.”
When the front door sounded, Maggie urged Ava up off her knees. “Act casual,” she whispered. “I’d rather the guys not know.”
Ava made a “no problem” face and leaned a hand against the table, crossing her legs in what had to be the least casual-looking stance of all time.
Sam rounded the doorway, flicked a glance over Ava, and let out a muffled laugh before walking past her to the freezer, where he plucked Maggie’s green lacy panties off the top of the door. “Three?”
—
Ava shoveled another bite of French toast into her mouth, and then pointed her fork at Maggie. “So this was strictly a six-times deal? No chance of romance or even a repeat performance?”
“Zilch. We both understand this is just about a couple of friends helping each other out. And I really think it was five.”
A sturdy waitress, probably close to fifty, slid an order of bacon in front of Sam and pinched his cheek when he asked her to run away with him. Then, without missing a beat, he turned back to the table and dug into his skillet.
“Nah, Ava’s right,” he said, chewing around his words. “That’s six. Definitely.”
Ava nodded. “So in terms of the pact, you closed out your January in spectacular fashion. Too bad it’s only the twenty-eighth. Couple more days and you could have straddled February, too.”
Gah, the pact. Of course. “I’m not sure it would count. I mean, swearing up and down we’re nothing more than friends scratching a mutual itch doesn’t exactly smack of open to the possibilities.”
Sam split a strip of bacon and handed Ava half. “With sex there’s always a possibility. And something tells me the stakes were getting raised with each round, based on that full apartment-cleaning blitz.”
Maggie shrugged, quietly surprised by the pinch of regret she experienced knowing it wasn’t the case with Tyler.
She shook it off. She wasn’t interested in the possibilities with Tyler or anyone else. Too much risk and hassle.
They’d had sex. Amazing, off-the-charts, world-rocking, life-altering, expectation-crushingly hot sex. Her libido
had been fed, and any hour now that prickly crush would burn off.
And she was absolutely not alarmed to actually be feeling closer to Tyler, more connected rather than less. They’d shared something intense and meaningful that only friends as solid as they were could share and still go back to being friends after.
That she couldn’t stop thinking about what they’d done? What more there might be if they had time…well, they didn’t. She’d get over her awe in a day or so. Easy.
—
“So I’ve got it straight: you don’t need to call or take her out again?” Tony asked, adjusting his jeans as he kicked back on the couch in Tyler’s living room. “No flowers or anything. It was straight sex for sex’s sake. No strings. Just a couple of friends dropping their shorts and saying let’s screw?”
Tyler looked across to the front windows where Maggie cringed, meeting him with guilty eyes.
He’d gotten her single-word text “Sorry!!!” about five seconds before he’d heard someone thundering up the stairs and the subsequent banging on his door. So far as he could tell, Maggie had spilled to Ava. Sam figured it out himself—something about damning evidence. Ford overheard Sam and Ava discussing it. And Ford, who Tyler had clearly been giving too much credit, took it to Tony. And the guy about broke his leg making a beeline to Tyler’s apartment, where after an overlong man-brace, he wiped his teary eyes and parked it on the couch to start interrogating him.
Thirty seconds and twenty-three questions later, the rest of the gang had piled in the door, too.
Now, listening to Tony’s description of the shorts-dropping call to screw, Tyler was wondering if any of them would ever want sex again.
“Yeah, that’s exactly it, Tony,” he answered with feigned enthusiasm enough to score one of Maggie’s laughs.
And he had his answer. Hell yes, he was going to want sex again. Because, that sound—nothing else got to him the same way.
Too bad it wasn’t going to happen.
Even amid all this awkward discomfort, that sound had him imagining a different life. One where all he had to do was find a way to get her alone. Murmur dirty innuendos in her ear until he earned another laugh, this one breathier, and edged with something hot—
“And then you just slap her ass and go?”
Jesus, Tony.
Maggie cut in. “No. I’m the ass slapper, but because I’m a lady with manners, I toss out a compliment before asking him to lock up on the way out.”
Nice.
Tony swallowed, and turned toward Ava—who’d already snapped up her hand, wagging one finger at him as she replied to his obvious yet unspoken question. “Not in this lifetime, bub. Don’t even ask.”
Chapter Nineteen
Leaning a hip against her kitchen counter, Maggie let the mixer run, beating the life out of her butter, sugars, eggs, and vanilla as she assured herself it could have been worse. A thousand times worse.
Fine, maybe only a hundred times, but whatever. Tyler had been gang-grilled by her pack of friends over their previous night’s activities, something they’d agreed to keep private mere hours before. It had been embarrassing and awkward, but he’d taken the teasing without so much as the bat of an eye, even offering up beer during the peak of it.
She was impressed.
Impressed with how he’d stayed cool under pressure.
Impressed with how easily he’d maintained the space between them while it had taken everything she had to keep from reaching out to touch his hand, his hair, his arm.
Taking the mixer down to low, in went the dry ingredients. A quick combine, a scrape of the sides, and her chocolate was next.
And she was especially impressed by how, when she’d offered one last heartfelt apology as she’d been leaving with everyone else, he’d managed to discreetly lean down to her ear to tell her…and only her…it had been worth it.
Cue the belly flip and hot, achy places.
Gah.
Spooning generous scoops of the dough onto her waiting cookie sheets, Maggie slid the first batch into the oven.
Eleven minutes later, they were cooling on the rack and Maggie’s apartment smelled like home. Like Friday afternoons with her mom and every special occasion she could remember.
It should have been calming, but with the way her mind kept sneaking back to Tyler, not really. She stuffed a still-too-hot cookie into her mouth, chewing morosely.
Those five, maybe six, times with Tyler had created a monster. A sex-crazed, totally obsessed monster who was at that very minute considering the new low of using her cookies as bedroom bait. Opening the front door and wafting the melted chocolate and baked brown sugar smell into the hall. Playing like she had no idea what she was doing and just seeing what happened.
She should be ashamed.
Another cookie, only moderately cooler than the one before, met her mouth.
She was ashamed.
Because chances were good she was going to plow through this whole batch wishing she had just one more night with Tyler.
—
“Admit it, you did it again,” Ava demanded, munching on one of the few remaining cookies left from the night before. At the shake of Maggie’s head, Ava scowled, then immediately brightened, latching on to her next idea. “But you’re totally going to. Why else would you be doing all these hellacious pike roll-outs?”
Maggie stopped mid-pike, her butt high in the air, her core muscles burning like she’d lit them on fire. “Please. This torture is because I ate two-dozen cookies last night and God only knows how much dough. It’s corrective action is all.”
Ava snorted. “It’s preparatory maintenance. You love him and you’re going to get married and live happily ever after.”
Ugh. “I like him. So don’t go picking out bridesmaid dresses.”
“Too late. I was thinking something in an ice blue would be nice.”
Rolling off her exercise ball, Maggie pretzeled up her legs and wiped the sweat from her brow. She reached for a cookie even though she’d sworn up and down she’d never eat another.
“Don’t rain on my after-dirty-sex parade with your wedding talk. You know how cranky that stuff makes me.” There’d been a time when she’d been so wrapped up in her white-dress fantasies she hadn’t been able to see anything else. Hadn’t been able to see the writing on the wall. Hadn’t been willing.
She’d wanted to marry Kyle so badly. Wanted everyone who suggested they slow down to go away and mind their own business so she could get on with her very own happily-ever-after.
But that’s not how it had gone.
And now, even all these years later, she couldn’t hear the word wedding without her stomach knotting and all the bitter lessons she’d never be able to forget pressing firmly against the forefront of her mind.
Stupid.
Selfish.
Home wrecker.
“Sorry, I know. You’re sensitive about the wedding thing. But I guess I figured if the right guy came along that maybe you wouldn’t be?”
Maggie smiled, tucking up her knees. “Tyler isn’t the right guy, Ava. We’re friends with a single incredible night between us. But that’s all.”
Ava scooted next to her so they were both leaning against the couch.
“I kind of think you’re more than that. Maggie, you don’t let anyone in, but this guy…?”
“Yeah, this guy is pretty amazing. But a relationship between us just isn’t in the cards. Neither of us wants what we’ve got to be anything more than what it is.”
“How can you be so sure? I mean, maybe with a little time you’ll realize you want—”
“No,” Maggie cut her off, because the truth was she didn’t even want to think about maybes or anything else that might confuse what was pretty clear. “Tyler isn’t even sure he’s staying in the Midwest.”
This was where it got dicey, because Ava knew only so much about what had brought him to Chicago. There had been a woman and the relationship hadn’t worked out. She didn’t know
that there had been a baby, or that the heartbreak over his loss was so great, Tyler still couldn’t share it with most people.
Rolling her eyes, Ava shoved up from the floor. “I know, I know. The courting firm from New York. But he hasn’t gone yet. What if he decides he likes it here and he wants to stay?”
If Tyler stayed, it would be because his life was essentially on hold while he waited for an opportunity to get his son back.
Working to contain the sigh fighting to get free, she answered with the truth. “It still wouldn’t be like what you’re talking about.”
Chapter Twenty
FEBRUARY
The next few weeks were a period of readjustment. Reestablishing boundaries. Drawing lines and testing them out under the framework of this newly defined relationship between them.
They were friends again. Of the reestablished just variety. Friends with an open awareness of an underlying attraction they’d indulged in once—or five, maybe six times—but were no longer acting on. They went out as a group or not at all.
Experience had proven it was easier to stay within the lines that way.
Or at least as close to easier as it got.
Maggie’s eyes drifted across the cluttered expanse of Ava’s living room to where Tyler was standing beside Sam, watching as Ava and Ford competed to see who could assemble their new TV stand first without using the directions.
Her one Saturday off a month, and this was how she was spending it.
“That’s my girl,” Sam cheered. “Ava, you’ve got him by at least two steps. Shit, Ford, how the hell do you function on a daily basis?”
And okay. She didn’t really have a lot of complaints.
“She’s got that all-in-one thing you bought her,” Ford groused. “Total advantage.”
Ava was silently gloating, too intent on the win to comment. But by Maggie’s estimate, Ford might be right. Sam had a late-night home-shopping habit that was the primary reason Ava’s place looked the way it did. Every time he saw something cool he thought Ava could use, he bought it. Thus, the throw on her sofa was a Snuggie. Ava’s rooms were lined with miracle exercise solutions, foot spas, and As Seen On TV debris as far as the eye could see. Maggie liked to tease, but in truth, some of this stuff was seriously handy. Like the tool thing Ava was working right then.