“Are you watching me sleep?” I ask, my voice still a bit hoarse from my slumber.
“Too creepy?” she asks drolly.
“Depends,” I reply, laying back down and lacing my hands beneath my head to stare back at her. “Were you considering doing dirty things to me while I was sleeping?”
It’s too gloomy to see if that causes her to blush, but she does dip her head a bit as if maybe I’d caught her having kinky thoughts.
But she ultimately shakes her head. “I can’t sleep because I’m worrying.”
That gets my attention. Not so much the words, but the real concern in her tone. I lift, pressing my elbows into the mattress to better see her. “About what? Matthew?”
“No, not Matthew,” she replies with a shake of her head. Although I know he is, indeed, a worry of hers, that’s not what’s eating at her. “Us.”
My stomach rolls a little, feeling something ominous. “Us?”
A slight nod, another dip of her head before she lifts her gaze again. “Did we just ruin our friendship? Are things supposed to be weird now? Like the way they were… you know… the last time we…?”
She can’t even bring herself to finish her thoughts, and I hate her distressed expression. I make a lunge toward her, nab her around the waist, and pull her to me. The sheet slips free, and I ignore her beautiful naked body for the moment, instead pulling her into my side and settling us down onto the mattress.
“See,” she exclaims trying to squirm away from me. “This is weird. Best friends don’t cuddle like this.”
“Best friends don’t fuck like crazed animals all night the way we did either,” I point out.
Mollie gives me a solid push with two hands against my chest to put some distance between us. She glares. “This is serious, Kane. What we did last night changes things.”
Those damn insecurities of hers, creeping in. I sense it would be very easy for her to slip away, insist we go back to the way things were.
But fuck that.
After last night, I’m not going backward.
I resist the urge to pull her back to me, to kiss her, fuck her… make her see that last night was fucking transcendental to our relationship, but she’s too skittish for brute force right now.
Instead, I reach out and take her hand, rubbing my thumb along the back. “Mollie… last night was amazing. Please don’t try to convince yourself it wasn’t.”
“No,” she rushes to assure me. “It was amazing. Too amazing. Like I’m not sure I could even tell you that we need to go back to just being friends, but at the same time, I’m terrified for what this means for us. Are we… are we…?”
She gets frustrated, blows a lock of hair away from her forehead, and shrugs. “What the fuck are we?”
“Still best friends, Mollie,” I say gently. “Always.”
Her eyes drop to where I’m holding her hand, the doubt etched on her face.
“What if the sex was bad?” I ask, and that has her head snapping up. “Let’s just say it was really awful, you faked your orgasms, and well… I can’t fake that shit, but that it was the worst one I’d ever had. What would we be after that?”
“Two people who couldn’t look each other in the eye,” she mutters.
“Wrong,” I exclaim, giving her hand a squeeze. “Still best friends. Because the sex wouldn’t define what we were to each other. We’d be embarrassed and awkward, but we’d go on as before. Nothing would change between us. I’d always still be there for you, and you’d do the same for me. I’d never mention to any potential suitors what an awful fucking lay you were, and you’d still remember how great my cock was.”
That got me a backhand with her free hand to my chest, and I laugh.
Then she laughs, and I finally feel like I can pull her into me.
She comes without hesitation, laying her head on my chest as my arms wrap around her waist to hold her tight.
“The truth is, though,” I say softly. “Last night was a fucking revelation to me.”
“You mean the sex was really good?” she inquires, lifting her eyes up to mine.
“It was fucking stupendous, and you know it,” I admonish. “But it means that you and I had been tight on many, many levels before, and we’re tighter yet now that we’ve reached a new level of intimacy.”
She doesn’t respond, but instead snuggles in closer until I can’t see her face anymore. She lays quietly for so long I think perhaps she’s having some internal dialogue I don’t feel I should be cut out of.
“But if you think this was wrong, and that we shouldn’t do this again, I’ll respect that.”
She doesn’t say anything and the quiet is alarming.
“Mollie?” I prompt, giving her a slight squeeze. “What do you want?”
She pushes back from me once again so I can see her face. “The way I see it, you take two best friends and the start of a sexual relationship, then that is the highest level of relationship you can have. It’s deeper than what we’ve had before. It’s serious.”
“Yes.”
“And well… you’re the type of man who is built for that Kane. You’re all about stability, and well… I’m a wanderer. I don’t even have a home. Haven’t had one since I graduated college.”
She’s not fucking wrong. It’s been the thing that has always been a wall between us whenever I’d ever imagined having something deeper with her. Mollie would constantly be gone, and hell, my career keeps me on the road a lot.
“Maybe,” I posit after a moment of thought. “Maybe our friendship is our home.”
She frowns. “What do you mean?”
I shrug. “I’m not quite sure, but I guess a home can be anything we make of it. We can consider our friendship to be four walls and a roof, and what you and I have on the inside is all that counts, right?”
Her frown deepens. “When did you turn into a fucking philosopher?”
Chuckling, I roll on my side to face her, touching my palm to her cheek. “I just think with all we’ve been through, and all we mean to each other, the sex shouldn’t change our definition. We’re still best friends. Now with some supreme benefits, I will point out, but maybe you and I were always destined to end up here. Everyone has said it. You and I just chose to ignore it. And last night, we both wanted this. We were both clear-headed when we made the grab for each other. We knew the consequences then, and we’re ironing them out now, but I don’t see why we can’t press forward.”
“As a couple?” she hedges.
“Yes. As a couple.”
“But I don’t know where my future is?” she laments, reaching up to pull my hand from her cheek, but only to bring it in to clutch over her breastbone. “What if it’s back on the open road? Are you going to leave your career to join me?”
The thought of walking away from hockey causes the pit of my stomach to tighten. All I can honestly say is, “I don’t know.”
“Or what if I give that up to stay here by your side, then hate you because I gave up traveling?”
“I don’t know that either, Mollie.” The truthfulness in my words causes her eyes to fill with sorrow. “But what I do know is that we’ll never know, not unless we move forward. It’s either that or perhaps have a lifetime of regret.”