15. Hot Tomboy

15

HOT TOMBOY

J ealousy was a new emotion for Easton. Or at least in adulthood.

As a child, he’d always wanted what his cousin had. A family that cared.

He got it when his aunt and uncle took him in and he never took it for granted.

But jealousy over a woman had never entered his mind.

He always felt if the woman didn’t choose him, then so be it. He wasn’t begging anyone. Could be why Rachelle got so snotty when she’d left him.

He wanted to argue that she broke it off, not him.

“This pizza is good,” Laurel said thirty minutes later, reaching in for another piece.

“Sure your hands are clean enough?” he asked. “You didn’t chip a nail, did you?”

She turned her hand around and looked at her pale pink nails. “Nope. They look good. I should get them done again soon. These have lasted pretty long. Especially considering the amount of work I’ve done with them.”

Laying pavers and fixing his dishwasher. He couldn’t tell you the last woman he dated that would know the first thing about holding a conversation about those things let alone offering to help or even watch.

“I like how natural they look. Not that it’s my choice or decision, just a comment.”

“They are my nails,” she said, turning and showing him. “I’ve had fake ones before, and have no issues with it. It’s a personal preference, but they can get in the way. I’ve got nice nails, but I just like them to be stronger so the polish doesn’t chip.”

“Have I said I like that about you?”

“Like what?” she asked, taking a big bite of her pizza and then wiping her mouth.

“That you look like a woman. You can dress up, dress down, doesn’t matter, but you pull off feminine yet you’re not weak. That’s sexy.”

“That might be one of the best compliments I’ve ever gotten,” she said. “Growing up, I was the hot tomboy. Let me tell you, the girls didn’t like it.”

He laughed. “I bet. You were the competition to get the guys that liked arm candy and then those that like someone to toss a football around with.”

She pointed her finger at him. “There you go. I didn’t care if I got dirty or not. If my makeup was rubbed off or I broke a nail. I might swear about breaking the nail, but I wouldn’t let it stop me from having fun.”

“Your ex liked the way you looked but not acted?” he asked.

“Pretty much,” she said. “I thought we talked about this.”

“We did,” he said. “Just conversation.”

“They didn’t like my job either. His mother loved me when we first met. I looked the part at their country club. I could talk the way they wanted and had the manners they were looking for.”

“Sounds like snobs to me.”

She snorted. “Yep. And if I made a noise like that, they’d turn their nose up at me too. It was a lot of work, but I guess I just wanted to impress them. I told myself I didn’t have to live with them, just make nice for a short period of time. Philip never cared in the beginning that I liked sports or could carry on conversations with men.”

“Bet he thought he had a prize there. A woman all the guys wanted and one that could hang with the boys.”

“That was it,” she said. “But when he got a flat tire one night and I said I’d take care of it—oh man, you should have seen his face.”

He burst out laughing. “Tell me you’re joking.”

“Nope. I did it. Faster than he could have gotten someone to come out and do it. He was so embarrassed. Really appalled. He kept arguing that he paid for a service for that.”

“I bet he was more embarrassed at the thought of anyone seeing you doing it and him watching.”

She giggled some more. “I picked on him about it but then tried to say he could explain it that he was confident enough in his masculinity and was an equal opportunity man that a woman could do it too.”

Easton coughed on his bite of pizza and then picked up his beer. “Did he buy that bullshit?”

She smirked at him. “He did.”

“And that should have been your first sign.”

“That might have been sign number six or seven. Not sure what I was thinking. I guess I just wanted to be someone else for a while and realized in the end, you have to be who you are with those you’re closest to.”

“Yeah,” he said.

“You got all quiet. I think it’s time you tell me some of your past. You said you’d talk about your condo or something. How about your ex too?”

He didn’t want to talk about Rachelle, but he’d be fair about it. When he was ready.

“I live in a condo,” he said. “You know I grew up here. Went to college at UConn. Got hired right out of law school for a firm in Manhattan. Spent a few years there trying to be someone I wasn’t.”

“Ahhh,” she said. “Guess we’ve got that in common. Mine was only a year though.”

“I won’t say I’m not confident in myself.”

“You reek of confidence,” she said. “Never doubt that.”

“Thanks,” he said. “I don’t doubt it. But I didn’t have the most traditional upbringing. I worked in the family business with my uncle and Abe. I never wanted it to be my life, though I believe he would have given me a share of it.”

“You wouldn’t have taken it from your cousin because you would have felt that isn’t fair. That you weren’t their biological child.”

He nodded. Funny how she understood that.

“I didn’t see myself doing it for my career anyway. I wanted something better, but I couldn’t imagine myself in a courtroom or chasing ambulances.”

“Someone has to keep all those pesky business dealings in line,” she said.

“More than you realize. The big city was nice and exciting. I went into the office daily, and slept very little. It was a life many dreamed of, but it was wearing me down.”

“And then people started to work from home more,” she said.

“Yes. My tiny little apartment had a desk in the corner with a crappy view. I can practice law in several states. It didn’t matter where my office was. I’ve got clients all over the world. Our firm has branches all over the world too. Many in other cities were already working remotely and not going into an office.”

“So it was an easy transition.”

“Yes,” he said. “I started to look around and I loved that area when I was in college. It was still an easy commute to get into the office and I was doing it a few times a month.”

“Did you need to do it?” she asked.

“I went for team meetings when many others didn’t. I believe that helped get me promoted to partner because I was still working hard and showing up when others weren’t.”

Many probably slacked off when they weren’t being watched, but that wasn’t his problem. His team held their own and that was all he focused on.

“You feel more comfortable in Stamford,” she said.

“I do. Rachelle, she didn’t. That is my ex. She liked the life in New York City. Mind you, we had only dated about six months or so when I moved.”

“So she lives in New York City or that area?”

“She did. She moved in with me after a year of dating. Her job was remote too at the time. She could live anywhere. She said she liked the area more than she thought she would. It was more affordable. Then she switched jobs and had to go into the office half the time.”

Which was how he lost her.

She met someone she worked with. Not someone she just talked to but was actually face to face. They got close and the guy infringed where he shouldn’t have.

Did he think Rachelle slept with her coworker? He wasn’t sure. She claimed she didn’t. He wanted to believe it was just an emotional affair and she ended things when she was falling in love with Connor.

He supposed she thought she was doing the right thing. She probably did. But it didn’t make him feel much better that he couldn’t measure up either.

“You must have a big place if you both were working from home.”

“About twelve hundred square feet. Not huge. Three bedrooms and two were offices. Two baths and just our living areas. It worked for us. Or more like for me.”

“Did she put her touch on the place?” she asked.

“A little,” he said. “I never said she couldn’t.”

“But you didn’t tell her she could,” she said, angling her head.

He frowned. “I guess not. That doesn’t stop a lot of women,” he said. “At least in my experience.”

“I guess it depends on the woman. I might add some pillows or blankets, maybe a picture here or there if I moved into someone’s house. I wouldn’t do anything else that couldn’t be taken away or put away if they didn’t like it. I think I’d even ask though.”

“She never asked,” he said. “That’s the difference. If she had, I would have said sure. Looking back, she didn’t.”

“Because she wanted you to just tell her she could,” she said.

“Most likely. My mind doesn’t work that way. I asked her to move in. To me that was her house too.”

“Can I ask, did she pay for anything? Or did she like to be taken care of?”

He let out a sigh. “I paid most of the bills. It was my place.”

“Which is why I would feel as if I couldn’t do anything.”

“That is you,” he said. “And if you felt that way, I bet you’d bring it up to talk about.”

“I would,” she said. “I’d want to feel like an equal. Not that I think I’d be an equal with an attorney.”

“What about you with Philip?” he asked. “Did you live together?”

“Nope,” she said. “It was a good thing too. I stayed at his place but didn’t move in completely. Remember, everything was fast with us. He had a townhouse but wanted us to buy a place together.”

“Wait,” he said. “Back up. You called the wedding off like days before and yet didn’t live with him? Didn’t even move your stuff in yet.”

She started to laugh. “See, all these flags that I was blind to.”

“I’m serious,” he said.

“Me too. I still had my lease on my place. We were looking at houses. I didn’t have anywhere to store my furniture. We were going to get serious about house hunting when we got back from our honeymoon. We just figured it was best to keep my place for a few months. I had moved over most of my clothing, but not all. I was going back and forth. Is that better?”

“A little,” he said. It made sense.

“And it was easy when I left him. I went right to his place, packed up my clothes, pretty much just shoving them in my car on the hangers and anything else that was mine and was out the door with him trying to explain.”

Easton would love to have seen that sight.

“I’m sure you would have gone to your father’s if you had to,” he said.

“I went there anyway with my car loaded up. I know where to go when I need someone. But then I had to hold my father back from breaking Philip in two. I said it wasn’t worth it.”

“Not from what I could see of the guy,” he said.

“Back to Rachelle. She’s living with you and working from home at times. You see each other a lot when that happens. What caused you to break up? It’d been years living there by the sounds of it, so it couldn’t be she missed the action of the city.”

“She didn’t, but she did like to go out. We did at times. My best friend and his wife live in town. We spent a lot of time with Liam and Nicole. I work with Nicole. I’m the one who set her up with Liam.”

“I don’t picture you the type to set people up.”

“That’s another story.”

“We’ll get to it another time then,” she said.

“I thought things were fine with Rachelle.”

“Fine isn’t a good word to use in a relationship,” she said. “Just saying. Not from a woman’s point of view.”

“I learned that too,” he said.

“Did she want that ring and you weren’t moving fast enough?”

“That was part of it,” he said. “I didn’t feel the urge to buy it yet.”

“Ouch,” she said. “That hurts.”

He didn’t need to hear that either.

“She met someone else,” he said. “Someone to give her what I couldn’t.”

“That makes more sense. I want to say we’ve got that in common too, but it’s not like I wasn’t giving Philip sex and that is all he was getting out of those women. I’m not into kink, but I do enjoy sex so I don’t think there was much to complain about. Or that could be me being cocky too.”

He felt a rush of blood to his cock over the statement she’d made about enjoying sex.

“I’m willing to bet Philip was more into being spoiled and getting what he wanted when he wanted it.”

“There was that. I think if I didn’t put my foot down at times, he’d be a selfish lover. I guess that is part of it. He might have done that with those hookups but didn’t want to with me.”

He’d process those words at another time when it didn’t turn him on as much.

“As for Rachelle. She claims she didn’t sleep with Connor. They were coworkers. Going into the office, they’d flirt and he’d tell her the things she wanted to hear. Things I didn’t say or do. Not sure. She told me she was falling in love with him and didn’t want to hurt me.”

“One of those emotional things?”

“Yes. Since they are engaged now, I guess it was more than a passing thing for her. She got what she wanted. She said she saved me the embarrassment of cheating.”

“Okay,” she said. “Now I’m pissed. Internally though I felt for you and what you went through, I understand that sometimes you can’t control your heart and I thought maybe she felt she was doing the right thing. But to say she did it to save you. Nope. Bitch.”

He burst out laughing. “I thought the same thing when she said that. It was to save her guilt. My feeling is, if she was that unhappy with me, she should have said it. She didn’t. She used that as an excuse to fall for someone else.”

“I see it the same way.”

“And there you go. You know all about my ex too.”

“I’m sure I don’t know it all just like you don’t know it all with me either. But we’ll get there. Not a bad third date. Tools, pizza, and confessions.”

“You’re one of a kind,” he said.

“Hopefully that is a good thing,” she said, grinning at him.

“One of the best.”