Sinful Longing (Sinful Nights, #3)(21)
Tonight though, from the zip line to the museum visit to hand holding along Fremont Street…every single second was lovely, and a small part of her heart already longed for another night like it.
She never thought she’d have a bad time with Colin, but she hadn’t imagined they’d have such a good one. It made perfect sense that they’d gel, she reasoned, as the light changed and she hit the gas. The two of them had clicked from day one. They’d chatted easily when they first met, sharing a similar view on the value of community service, the importance of being role models for youth, and the benefit of giving kids a chance to have fun, too. But tonight she learned they had even more in common, little things, like their shared affection for mob movies and their fondness for the stories of Vegas.
Then there was the sex. Oh, the toe-curling, sheet-grabbing, mind-blowing sex. As she turned onto the street where Alex’s friend lived, her chest tingled with the memories of how he’d taken her against the sink after sending her over the edge in the stairwell. He was direct and dirty, and he seemed to embrace that she was, too. He was also commanding and intense, and relished telling her exactly what he wanted from her.
She wanted all the same things.
And admittedly, a quiet part of her wanted more of him. A part she rarely acknowledged. Try as she might to keep him in the friend zone, being friends with him only made him more appealing. But she had to stay strong. Had to maintain the boundaries. That was the only way to protect her son, and to keep her promises to herself. Colin was a great friend and an amazing lover, and surely she could have him as both for some time. No need for complications.
She pulled into the driveway, cut the engine, and walked to the door. Her girlfriend Janine answered, greeting her with “You all set for the match next week? Friday evening.”
Janine was the jammer on the Fishnet Brigade, their roller derby team.
“Absolutely. Gotta block for my Cool Hand Bette,” Elle said, using Janine’s skate name.
“Excellent. I’ll pick you up and drive?”
“It’s a plan.”
Minutes later, she was driving Alex home.
“How was the movie?”
“Awesome,” he said, then proceeded to tell her about how intensely realistic the velociraptor attack had seemed. Elle smiled and laughed, all the while thinking she could so do this.
Nothing was going to stop Elle “Moneybags” Mariano from having her cake and eating it too.
Not a damn thing.
Not even the crack of dawn.
Because that piece of her that had longed for more woke her up early the next day. It tugged at some untended spot within her, like a small child grabbing her mother’s shirt, asking for another cookie. She didn’t entirely know what her heart wanted. She wasn’t even in tune with the language it was speaking. But something compelled her to go.
As she peeked out the window, the sky turned the shade of dark blue that comes before the sun rises.
She pulled on shorts, a tank top, and a pair of her white roller skating socks with the row of red skulls around the knee, left a message for her snoozing son, and took off to surprise Colin.
CHAPTER TEN
This was a perfect dawn. Calm, quiet, and beautiful.
The craggy canyon rocks loomed larger as he drew closer to the lakeshore. The cool waters were still and serene, reflecting the soft rays of the rising sun that peeked over the horizon. Colin only had an hour free before he was due at the office, but he’d seized it. Times like these were precious.
The near-silence surrounding him was like a natural tranquilizer. Only the splash of the paddle with each stroke broke the quiet. He’d already gone for a swim, and tomorrow he’d tackle a morning climb as part of his training regimen for the triathlon. The event was less than a month away, and he was nearly ready. Way more prepped than he’d been last summer. He’d planned to try the triathlon again a year ago. But his last girlfriend, Kayla, hadn’t understood his drive to redo the race, and she’d needled him again and again to stop spending so much time working out. Rather than rock the boat with Kayla, he’d abandoned his quest to compete. The relationship fizzled out a few months later when he realized the obvious—he and Kayla weren’t right for each other, and he didn’t want to be with someone who didn’t understand what mattered to him. When he broke up with her, she’d left him a slew of angry messages—the kind that made him wish text messaging had never been invented.
At least Elle understood why he wanted to do this race. She got it. She got him. She understood that these moments before the day turned hectic and wild had become essential to his wellbeing, and to his recovery. At first he thought he could run faster, bike harder, or kayak longer to prove that he’d left addiction in the dust. Then he began to accept that recovery wasn’t something you could muscle through to a finish line.
It was a daily practice.
He practiced it with intense outdoor exercise that burned in his muscles and made his heart pound. He’d always been active, but getting the bad shit out of his system had given him the chance to become an athlete in a new way. The rigor of his workout was part of how he gave back—to himself. After years of pouring crap into his body, he now chose to do the opposite. To treat his body like a temple.
Of course, there were other ways he enjoyed being good to the body, and last night was a prime example. He replayed the stairwell, the sink, the sexy sounds she made, and the sounds he didn’t let her make.