Freefall (Santa Cruz Skydivers Book 1) (14 page)

“Levi, I’m fine, but you’re bleeding. We need to call 911 and get you to the hospital or something. That cut looks like it needs stitches. Maybe I should call Bobby?” My words tumbled out of my mouth. I was panicked and a little hyped, unsure of what to do.

“I’m fine, it’s just a little blood. It’s not the first fight I’ve been in. I’ll just go wash my face. She’ll be right,” he said, speaking his Aussie slang again.

People began hovering around us, concerned for Levi, and led us back to the bar area. I spotted Frankie standing in the back of the crowd, but she disappeared when I caught her eye. The owner of the skydiving company was there sorting out the security, who were threatening to call the cops and kick Levi out, while the Jump Boys were drunkenly discussing chasing down Ben for retribution. Thankfully, Levi managed to calm them down before anyone else did something stupid.

The room was abuzz with everyone asking what happened—it was a private party after all. I overheard a few people expressing they were surprised Levi didn’t hit back. That also puzzled me. I couldn’t work out for the life of me why he just stood there letting Ben lay into him like that. Or even what would have provoked Ben into doing that.

After he was positive I hadn’t been injured, Levi left me sitting at the bar to go wash up. He came back after a short while holding a wet paper napkin to his cut. Playing nurse, I made him take away the napkin to see how bad the cut was. I cringed. I had always had a weak stomach for blood. “Don’t you think you should go get that seen to?”

He put the paper towel back on the cut and shook his head. “Nah, it’s not that deep. A sterile strip should be fine.”

He leaned over the bar and asked a member of staff for a sterile strip. Once the staff gave him the strip for the cut, he disappeared briefly to plaster himself. When he returned, security told us that because Levi hadn’t caused the fight or thrown any punches, he could stay, and assured us that Ben was gone. The crowd around us began to disperse now that the excitement was gone, and slowly began filtering away until there was only Levi and me left sitting at the bar.

“Are you okay?” I sucked up my blood issues and took the wet napkin from his hand. Gently, I dabbed the cut, which despite the sterile strip, was still oozing a small amount of blood.

He pushed my hand away. “I think it’s high time we get serious about this drinking competition, don’t you?”

“You don’t want to talk about it?” 

“Not really, no. Want I want to do is get drunk with you, party girl.”

I forced a tight smile at him. I would have to prove I was trustworthy. I would find out sooner or later what was going on.

“Okay, party boy, bring it on.” Where there was a will, there was a way. I’d get him drunk then find out what was going on. Everyone spilled the beans on alcohol. “Tequila?”

“Tequila.” He nodded his head, giving me an evil smile before he got the attention of the bartender and called him over. “Six tequila shots and keep them coming.”

“I get it, you don’t want to talk about what just happened, but you gotta give me something. Talk to me, Levi.”

He let out a puff of air. “Fine, shoot away.”

I smiled triumphantly. It was a start. I waited until the bartender had finished lining up six shot glasses and poured tequila in each. Levi handed over a hundred dollar bill and told him to put the rest toward a tab for us.

“Alright, I’ll start with an easy one. How’d you end up in Santa Cruz?” I was eager to learn more about him from the beginning.

“Well, it’s a long story,” he said with his slow Aussie drawl. “Short version is, I followed a girl to LA from Australia. But not long after I arrived, I found out she had cheated on me.”

He looked at me briefly, sizing up my response, salted his hand up, licked it, and threw back one of the tequila shots. He flipped the now empty shot glass and slammed it back down on the bar, chasing it with a slice of lime.

His eye squinted and he gave a shudder. “Whoa, nothing like cheap-ass tequila to hit the spot. That was four years ago. I was twenty-one and madly in love. She broke my heart and I haven’t been in a relationship since. Don’t think I’ll ever go down that path again. Anyway, I got sick of LA, and transferred here last week to replace Phil.”

“I’m so sorry about your girlfriend.” I reached over and rubbed his forearm sympathetically. Any excuse to touch him, really. “Females can be such bitches sometimes.”

Levi laughed off the serious turn in discussion, lightening the mood instantly. “It’s all good, no problems here. Andi, there’s something I’ve meaning to tell you. I wanted to tell you before, but Ben interrupted us. I really like you, and no, that’s not the cheap tequila talking, just in case you are wondering.” He smiled at me and wrapped one of his arms around my shoulders. He pulled me close to him with a one-armed hug. “Even though we’ve only just met, I can tell you’re going to make a great mate. Thanks for listening, and thanks for making me talk.”

I forced a smile. There it was again, the friend reference. So much for him begging me for sex. Looked like my makeover hadn’t changed anything.

“It’s just all part of the friendly service,” I replied, a little too enthusiastic, finishing with a little friendly punch to his arm. “Besides, I like you too. Friend.” I was such a liar. I liked him much more than that.

“Enough talking, party girl. Anyone would think you’re stalling. It’s your turn.” He handed me one of the shots in front of him and hit our glasses together a little too hard, tequila spilling out of my glass onto my hand. We both cried “cheers” and proceeded to throw down our drinks together.

The amber liquid burned my throat like the lie I had forced out. God, I hated myself. I quickly grabbed another shot he had already lined up and I downed it, trying to burn out the self-hate. Now he thought of me as a confidant, someone to drink with, someone he could trust. He was looking for a friend, and I was a devious, lousy person lying just to get close to him. Really, I was no better than his ex-girlfriend. Looked like more alcohol would be needed to forget myself.

Chapter Fourteen

Andi

Half a bottle of tequila, several beers, and three hours later, I had momentarily forgotten to hate myself. The last to leave, Levi and I stumbled out of the bar well and truly inebriated. Our arms wrapped around each other’s shoulders, we were laughing so hysterically I was having trouble walking.

“Stop, Levi.” I grabbed the back of his jacket as I doubled over, clutching a stitch in my side from laughing so much. “I think I’m going to pee my pants.”

His loud laugh echoed through the empty street.

“Now that would be funny. Even funnier than you just falling off the barstool. I wish I had videoed that.”  He poked me in the ribs with both hands, tickling me, making me laugh even harder. “It would’ve gone viral, and we’d be famous.”

I tried to push him away, but he tickled me even more.

“Stop it,” I laughed, and wriggled around as he continued to tickle me. “I’m super ticklish.”

Eventually, I managed to pull myself together and started to run away from him, tripping and stumbling as I went. He laughed at my drunk running and chased after me. Before I had even managed to run thirty feet, he caught me and tackled me from behind, both us going down hard on the ground.

“Ouch,” I laugh-cried as my shoulder hit the concrete. “If I wasn’t so drunk, that would have really hurt.”

“Sorry,” he said, and rolled me over so my back was on the ground and I was looking skyward facing him.

He was lying on top of me, his arms on either side of my head keeping his full weight off me. Both of our laughter died away as we looked into each other’s eyes. An electric current zinged through both of our bodies. I was only too aware of every part of his lower anatomy pressed up against me. If there was ever a perfect moment to make a move, this was it. I looked at his lips and imagined kissing him. Time stopped, just for that one perfect moment. I reached up, but instead of caving into my impulses and wrapping my hands around his neck, I put my hands up to his chest and pushed him off me. He didn’t want me like that.

“I can’t believe you caught me. You’re fast,” I said, breaking the awkward silence between us as he rolled away from me and stood up.

Pushing myself into a seated position, I examined my knees and elbows for scrapes from hitting the pavement. Thankfully, my jeans had protected my knees from any scrapes, but my elbows and right shoulder were grazed.

“Andi, you’re bleeding. Here give me your hands, let me help you up. I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you.” He reached down, grabbed both my hands, and in one swift pull, helped me to my feet, catching me in his arms as I overbalanced and fell into him.

My head spun. “S’okay.” With the utmost care, I brushed my finger across his cut. “No worse than your wound. Luckily, I’m too drunk to feel anything at the moment.” Except maybe regret.

Why didn’t I kiss him when I had the chance? I knew why. I wanted reciprocal love, or at the very least, the guy to be attracted to me. And as much as I wanted Levi, I knew he didn’t feel like that toward me. In fact, I’d given it a lot of thought the past few hours as we threw back shot after shot. Even if I did cave into myself and we slept together tonight, that would be it. I’d never see him again. He wasn’t looking for a relationship. He had made that perfectly clear. I figured I would rather have a strictly platonic relationship with him than no relationship at all.
Besides,
I reminded myself again,
he doesn’t want you like that.

“Come back to my apartment and let me clean you up. I don’t live far. Walking distance, in fact. It’s late and there are no cabs around to take you home.”

I swallowed a huge lump in my throat, my eyes widening at his invite. Had he just really asked me to go home with him? My stomach did a little excited loop-de-loop at the thought of spending the night with him. Maybe I had read him wrong after all.

“No funny business, I promise.” He looked me straight in the eyes.

Stupid girl. Of course not. He’s just guilty he made you bleed.

“I’m not worried. I trust you with my virtue.” I laughed, attempting to make the mood lighter, hoping he didn’t see the disappointment written on my face.

He laughed with me, our little moment a thing of the past. “Believe me, if I didn’t like you so much as a friend, your virtue wouldn’t stand a chance. So think yourself lucky.”

My heart sank. Of course a guy like him could get any girl he wanted. Clearly, he would never be interested in me as girlfriend material, so I had best stop romancing the idea before I got myself in too deep with infatuation.

“Come on, mate.” He wrapped his arm around my shoulder again. “I’ve got the perfect ingredient at my place to fix those wounds.”

****

Turned out that perfect ingredient was another bottle of tequila. This one tasted smooth and was no doubt very expensive, unlike the cheap stuff at the bar. Levi certainly enjoyed the perks of being a billionaire’s son. We drank until the sun came up and I could no longer form coherent sentences. I didn’t remember at what stage I passed out, but I woke up in his bed in only my panties, tucked up against his shirtless chest with his arms wrapped around me. I was horrified, yet thrilled at the same time. I couldn’t believe this was happening. I lay there searching through my memory for any clue as to how I ended up almost naked in his bed.

After we came back to his apartment, bits and pieces of the night seemed to have been wiped clean from my brain. My last clear memory was of him cleaning up the grazes on my elbows and shoulder with iodine and putting a plaster on them before we started playing some drinking games, which may or may not have included body shots. There was zero recollection of me taking my clothes off and getting into bed with him. Closing my eyes again, I almost groaned out loud. As much as I wanted it to happen, I prayed that we hadn’t had sex. That would be a very, very bad move. Especially since I couldn’t remember it.

I had to get some clothes on and get out of here. I couldn’t face him like this. Sober and almost naked. But I didn’t want to move in case I woke him up. Talk about being stuck between a rock and a hard place, and believe me, in bed with him right now, I could definitely feel the hard place pressing into my thigh.

Slowly, I lifted his dead arm draped over me and attempted to roll away from him, when his arm stiffened and he pulled me back into his chest.

“Where do you think you are going, party girl?” he murmured in my ear, sending shivers up my spine.

I looked up at him, but he still had his eyes closed.

“I’m awake, in case that’s what you’re thinking. I just can’t open my eyes. I think they’re glued shut.” He exhaled and laughed at the same time. “What a night!” he exclaimed, his eyes still firmly shut. “Man, do you know how to party. I thought only Aussies could drink like that. By the way, I won. I was last man standing. Literally.”

I cleared my throat. “Um… how did we end up in your bed?” My voice was rough from copious amounts of alcohol consumption. “And how did I end up practically naked?” I was hyper aware of the fact my breasts were currently pressed up against his flesh.

He gave a booming laugh that made me jump, which only made him laugh even more. He lifted his arm, rubbed his eyes with his fingers, careful to not hit the cut on his cheek, and ran his hand through his hair. I didn’t dare move in case I exposed anymore of myself to him. Slivers of sunlight shone through gaps in the drawn drapes, giving the room a substantial amount of natural light, just enough to see my almost naked body.

This was new territory for me. I had never awoken next to a guy, let alone shown parts of bare anatomy to anyone. My one and only experience hadn’t been exactly the kind where we took all our clothes off. In fact, my pants had remained around my ankles and my top hadn’t even come off. Why I was thinking about that awful experience right now, I had no idea.

Quickly, I pulled the bed sheet up high above my breasts and moved away from him slightly so we were no longer touching. After he finished rubbing his eyes, he propped himself on his side and faced me, his eyes slightly bloodshot and the skin around the cut under his eye starting to come out in a light shade of purple. My God, the man was hot, even with an obvious hangover and black eye. I was even partial to his unshaven morning look, extremely partial. Naked, unshaven, bruised, and disheveled. He looked like he should be at a photo shoot for
GQ
, not in bed with me.

“You don’t remember playing strip jack poker?” His eyebrows raised in question. “It was your idea, after all.”

I clutched the sheet tighter to my chest and rolled onto my side, mirroring his position. Now that my breasts were covered and I had some distance between us, I could relax somewhat. Even though intimate parts of my body were craving his touch.

“Um now you mention it, vaguely,” I admitted, and smiled at him sheepishly, crossing my legs tightly and trying to ignore the tingling sensation between them.

A memory of me losing horribly to him in poker flashed through my head. It all began flooding back. Thank God we had made an underpants exclusion rule or I would be lying here naked. Not that it made much of a difference anyway, because my lace panties were completely transparent.

“I seem to remember you cheating somewhat.” I hit his arm with my free hand that was not protecting my modesty.

“That’s a lot different to how I remember it.” He caught my hand in his and linked his fingers through mine. “You just suck at poker and kept claiming that I was cheating.”

He looked at me mischievously, challenging me to dispute him.

“That’s because you were,” I said rising to his challenge. “You played dirty. Making me down extra shots.”

“That’s how we play in it in Oz,” he said with a cheeky smile. “Do you remember the body shots?”

“Vaguely, but I don’t remember much after my top came off,” I admitted, somewhat embarrassed. “That includes getting into bed.” I paused and looked at him. He still had a big smile on his face. I wondered whether I should ask him the big question. “Um, we didn’t, you know, have sex?”

There, I asked him.

His face turned serious. “I’d never take advantage of you like that.” He looked at me directly in the eyes. “Besides, after I carried you to bed, you made it very clear that under no circumstances did you want to have sex with me.”

I pulled my hand out of his and covered my face with embarrassment. Ugh. He must think I hate him.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, my hand still over my face. I don’t think I could ever look at him again.

“It’s okay,” he said reassuringly, and pulled my hand away from my face. “You told me you liked me too much as a friend to ruin our friendship by having sex.”

At least I didn’t blurt how I really felt. Alcohol tended to act as truth serum for me when at my drunkest. Gently, he ran his fingers across my shoulder where he had applied the plaster on my graze and moved his hand further along my collarbone. I inhaled sharply, my body now aching for him.

“Does your shoulder hurt?”

“No.” I shook my head, clutching the sheet tighter in my fist. “Does your eye?”

“My eye is fine. What about your head? Any sign of a hangover headache?”

“My head’s fine too,” I replied. “Although, judging by how normal I feel, I may not be completely sober.”

“Hmmm, me too, I think,” he mused, tracing his fingertips along my arm, leaving a trail of goose bumps. His mind was obviously somewhere else at the moment. “You know, there are other things we can do that don’t involve sex.”

He now moved his hand toward my hand that was clutching the sheet and enveloped it in his.

“What about the ‘I don’t have sex with my friends’ thing?” I asked.

“As I said, there are things we can do that don’t involve sex. Anyway, I’ve been seriously rethinking that. I’m really attracted to you, Andi. Plus, we get along really well. I think it would be a waste if we didn’t at least have some fun together.”

“Levi, I’m not sure about this.” My voice shook with nerves, or excitement. I couldn’t tell the difference. “I’m attracted to you, too. But...I’ve never been intimate with anyone.”

His eyes widened slightly at my shocking confession. “Ever? I thought you were joking about that.”

“Well not
ever
. I’m not a virgin. I was joking about that. I’ve only ever been with one guy, but it wasn’t exactly what I would call intimate either. I didn’t even take all my clothes off. Really, it was a complete disaster. Then there was this one other time at a frat party with Lili and I passed out before anything happened. So...” I trailed off, forgetting what I was saying as he rubbed his thumb across my bottom lip.

“I like you, Andi. I just can’t commit to a relationship right now.”

I closed my eyes and savored the taste of him on my lip. “I understand. I like you too,” I whispered, and opened my eyes, staring into his unblinking gaze.

“I won’t do anything you don’t want me to. Just tell me to stop if I go too far. You’re not looking for a relationship and neither am I. Whatever happens, it doesn’t have to change our friendship. Do you trust me?”

I couldn’t talk, so I nodded.

“Then let’s get rid of this.” He reefed the sheet from out of my grasp, exposing my breasts. My nipples were instantly erect at the sudden change in temperature.