“Matt. Come on.” I shook my head, rolling my eyes before taking a sip of my wine. “I invited you over here to cuddle. On. My. Bed.”
It was Monday night. Matt was standing in my kitchen, chopping vegetables for homemade tomato sauce. He claimed he only knew how to make three dinners: lasagna, meatloaf, and grilled anything.
I was sitting at the countertop, enjoying the view, and had finally broached the topic of why it had taken him so long to make a move.
“What was I supposed to do? Force my lascivious attentions upon you? Send dick pics? Hope the sight of my cock would bring you to your senses?” With each question his irritation eased into good-natured teasing. “And, as data collection for future seducing efforts, will that work?”
I had to take a deep breath before responding, because Matt said the word cock so easily. He didn’t say it often. In fact, this was the first time he’d said it outside of sexy times, but I hadn’t yet grown accustomed to it coming from his mouth.
I hadn’t grown accustomed to his dirty talk during sex either. Though I hadn’t yet told him how much I enjoyed his skill in this area, I got the impression he knew anyway.
“How much more obvious should I have been?” I challenged.
“No, no, no. There is no obvious. Not after a friend-zone maneuver. A friend-zone maneuver is the end of a book, not the end of a chapter. It’s the nuclear weapon of maneuvers. Short of flat-out telling me you wanted to change the nature of things between us, or stripping naked and ordering me to pleasure you, I wasn’t ever going to catch on to any hints.”
“You seriously had no idea? How is that possible?”
“Friend zone. Friend. Zone. Otherwise known as The Scoreless End Zone.”
“I only did that because you said you weren’t interested in long-term relationships.”
He gave me another look of incredulity. “What?”
“You said you were finished with long-term relationships. You said you’d read that book, blah, blah, blah. In fact, when I asked you if you ever wanted to get married again, you said hell no.”
“That’s the reason? That’s why you friend-zoned me?”
“Yes. I even told you that, if you recall, that night I saw you at Sandra and Alex’s and you walked me to the hospital so I could visit Quinn.”
He blinked at me. “I thought that was just an excuse.”
“What? Why?”
“Because. You weren’t that into me. I thought you were lying to spare my feelings.”
I choked on air. “Is that a joke?”
“No. Not a joke.” His attention moved back to the mushrooms he was chopping, and he laughed.
“Matt, you said you didn’t want anything long-term with anyone.”
“We’re now stuck in a recursive loop. I am the chicken, you are the egg.” He scooped up the mushrooms and added them to the big stockpot, stirring a few times with a wooden spoon, then replacing the lid, letting the contents simmer.
I huffed, feeling enormously frustrated by my inadvertent—though well-meaning—self-sabotage. “Do you mean to tell me, you’ve been open to a relationship with me all this time?”
He hesitated, coming around the counter and standing next to me, stealing a sip of my wine. “Define relationship.”
“Falling in love. Being together. Long-term.”
“No.” He shook his head once. “You are correct. I wasn’t open to that. Not when we met.”
“Oh. Really.” I crossed my arms, lifting my chin. “So what did you have in mind when we first met?”
“So many things.” He wagged his eyebrows, grinning wickedly around another sip of wine, then added more seriously, “To be honest, I thought you were a long shot. I wasn’t open to a relationship with anyone and I couldn’t imagine a scenario—even before you friend-zoned me—where you would want something like that with me.”
“Why? What made you think I was a long shot?”
His head reared back. “Have you met yourself? You’re . . . intimidating.”
“What? No I’m not.”
“You are. Your confidence is intimidating, because it’s entirely valid. And your goodness. And,” his gaze blazed over my body, “the rest of you.”
That had me smiling, so I forgave him for stealing my wine. “When did you change your mind?”
He didn’t respond right away. Instead, he finished my glass while he shifted his eyes up and to the left. Abruptly, his gaze cut back to mine and I got the sense he was bracing himself for my reaction.
“I changed my mind when I came home and found you and Jack in the hallway. Last month.”
I stiffened, my heart giving a twinge of protest at the memory, and I dropped my eyes.
Crap.
“Marie.”
I really didn’t want to talk about this. I didn’t want to be reminded of him with another woman, not when my feelings for him had been so strong, even then. It felt like he’d cheated on me, on us. Rationally, I knew he hadn’t, but once again, believing and knowing were two different things.
“I don’t want to talk about this.” I shook my head.
“Too bad.” His hands came to my shoulders, pulling me up from my stool. “Look at me.”
I didn’t look at him. “I was so mad. And hurt.” My heart gave another painful lurch.
“I love you.”
“Sorry.” I shook my head, more resolutely. “I don’t think I can talk about this.”
“We have to.”
“Why?” I glared at him. “Why do I have to talk about the night I found out you’d been sleeping with other women?”
“Because I don’t need therapy to know not discussing things that bother you is a terrible idea.” The set of his jaw struck me as remarkably stubborn.
Damn his pushing! Why can’t he just let me be the dehydrated horse this time?
“We can discuss it later.” I shrugged out of his hold and walked the pithy distance to my living room.
“Or we can discuss it now, and have make-up sex after.”
That earned him another glare.
He glared back, not looking contrite.
“Fine. I’m angry that you slept with someone else when we were spending so much time together.”
Aaaand I was yelling. But once I started, I couldn’t stop.
“I rented a car and drove to my parents’ house three hours away,” I pointed in the general direction of where they lived, “and cried on my mother’s shoulder for fifteen minutes. Do you know how much that pissed me off? I haven’t cried to my mother about anything since I was in elementary school and Rhena Davis said I smelled like a dumpster.”
Matt twisted his lips to the side. “That bitch. Rhena Davis is the one that smells like a dumpster.”
“I’m serious,” I raged. I was then unable to keep the hurt out of my voice as I added, “You slept with someone else and it hurt. A lot. Exorbitant hurt. Don’t make a joke out of this.”
“I didn’t.”
“That wasn’t a joke?”