My So Called Life (Love Not Included Series Book 3) (24 page)

I
COULD LIE IN
this bed forever. As a matter of fact, I plan on doing it. When you find your heaven, you certainly don’t attempt to leave it. My head is on Ian’s chest and I’m listening to the strong beat of his heart while he plays with my hair.

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Sure, anything,” I respond.

“Why did you start going by your full name?”

“What do you mean?” I ask, confused.

“Christina. I heard
him
refer to you as Christina. And that wasn’t the first time. When I spoke to Henry about contacting you, he said you went by Christina now. Why?”

That random question came out of left field.

“Um . . . well, I guess when I got to California, I wanted a fresh start. I didn’t want to be the person I left behind, so I thought by losing a name that was me, and using one that was never tarnished, it was a fresh start.”

I remember meeting Lexi on one of my first lonely nights in California. A night I may never truly banish from my memory. If anything, she’s stayed consistent to her flamboyant personality, because no matter what shape I looked like that night, she was still yelling and yapping about some crazy nonsense. Her over-the-top personality struck me as strange at first, but with her not-a-care-in-the-world attitude and no reference to my disheveled self, I took a bit of comfort in it. After a solid forty-five minutes of her doing all the talking, she asked me what my name was and out of left field, I blurted ‘Christina.’ And I’ve used it ever since.

“Chris, your name was never tarnished, why would you say that?”

“Ian, every time my name was used, it was followed up with ‘you worthless little brat,’ or ‘I wish I never had to see your face again.’ Yeah, Ian, it became tarnished.”

“I remember whispering your name while kissing you and feeling my life was perfect. I also remember screaming and laughing your name when we would play tackle football in the back of the school field and you wouldn’t even bother paying attention to the game, once the whistle blew, you would just come straight at me and tackle me.”

That memory makes me smile. “That’s because I wanted any reason to be touching you. And at the age of sixteen, that’s all I wanted to do,” I finish, laughing.

“I also remember the first time I asked you what your name was and you refused to give it to me.”

This settles my giggles. I remember too. “That’s because I didn’t know why you were talking to me. And I thought you were pulling a prank on me.”

“And remind me again why?” he asks, laughing, holding me more tightly.

“Oh, you know. I thought someone was putting you up to it as a dare. I was only a freshman and you were a junior; it’s like, unheard of for people to talk to freshmen, and ratty-looking ones at that.”

He laughs softly. “You weren’t ratty. You were shy and kept to yourself.”

“Sounds like just a nicer way to say ratty if you ask me.”

“Whatever you say. What I remember is the moment you looked at me with those eyes. They looked so mysterious. Like you held the secret to all the world’s problems and just wanted to find the right person to share it with.”

Ha! At that, I laugh. “Ian, I was trying to ditch class, and you caught me in the cafeteria kitchen about to open the employees’ door. I think I looked more like a deer in headlights about to get myself detention.”

“Well then, you were lucky it was me who caught you.”

I sit up and catch that glimmer in his eyes. “I guess I was.” And I truly was. I was on my last strike with the office and if I was caught by anyone who gave a crap about their hall monitor duties, I might have been finishing my high school education at a GED center. Luckily for me, Ian not only helped me out the door that day, but went with me. We walked to the high school park, and sat and talked about anything and nothing. He never asked anything too personal or too deep. He never questioned my clothes. Or my sadness. He just listened to whatever it was I wanted to say, which wasn’t much.

That day led us into something that I’m not sure to this day we can explain. Love. Pure and simple. We met every day after school, mostly for him to walk me home. Met in the mornings or sneaked out in the middle of the nights just to swing on the school swings in silence. I never understood what he saw in me. I was nobody, a suffering kid who looked even worse on the outside than she felt on the inside. But he cared. And he never left. It was almost a year into our friendship when Ian made the first move. He kissed me.

Shocked as I was, I ended up shoving him clear off his swing instead. I think I was just more shocked that he finally did it than anything else. I remember he looked extremely hurt. I knew he had feelings for me. The way he would hold my hand in private or the way he would just look at me. He didn’t have to use words for me to know because I was screaming the same ones in my head day and night. The next time he tried was a few weeks later, and that time, I let it happen. I had never kissed a boy before so the first round I think I panicked because I was afraid he was going to be disappointed in my inexperience, get tired of me and move on. Thankfully, between his first and second attempt, I practiced, as every teenager does, and made out with my hand. A lot. French kissing your hand is never the best practice, but when it happened again, for real, the emotions that shot to my toes made me feel that we were definitely doing something right.

We had snuck out and walked to the school playground. As usual, we sat on the swings in silence, swinging with our thoughts. I could tell Ian seemed a bit off, but I never pressed. Before I knew it, he had stopped my swing and was standing in front of me. I remember his words like they were yesterday. “Chrissy, I wasn’t very proper the first time I tried this, but I can’t go a minute longer without trying again. Because I just can’t stop thinking about it. I’m going to be a gentleman and give you a fair warning this time, so get ready. Chrissy Daniels, I’m going to kiss you, so please let me.” Poor kid was breathing heavily, scared to death at what I might say. I could see the worry in his eyes that I would say no. So when the whispered, “Okay,” fell from my lips, he almost didn’t hear me. He looked like he was going to start round two of his argument, but then I grabbed his flannel and pulled him to me. Our lips touched and it was the most powerful connection till this day that I have ever felt. Young love poured out through a simple kiss is a beautiful thing. And what we shared was just that. Beautiful. I thought nothing would ruin us after that kiss that night. We would have it all. We would figure it out. Because we had each other.

“Hey.” Ian’s voice brings me back to the present. “Where’d you go there?”

“Oh, sorry. I was just thinking.”

“Should I be worried? Every time you seem to do that it doesn’t end well for me.”

“Ha ha. You’re so funny. And no, you shouldn’t be. Everything’s fine. I was just thinking about how life is strange sometimes. That’s all.”

He squeezes me closer to him and kisses the top of my head. “I’ve missed you, Chris,” he says into my hair.

“I’ve missed you, too.”

“How’s Pippa? I mean, is she doing okay? Healthy?” His chin caresses the side of my face, brushing along my hairline.

At that, I sit up, pulling my head from Ian’s chest and lock eyes with him. “If you’re asking if I’ve fed and clothed her in your absence, then yes,” I snap back, partially playful. “But you might have to step in and give a lesson . . .” I stall. “Okay, maybe both of us a lesson on the four food groups. We’re having some trouble getting off the breakfast, lunch, and dinner pancake/cookie train.”

He gives me that look as if waiting for me to say I’m joking. Now I’m tempted to say ‘ha ha’ just for him to stop looking at me like that. “Oh, wait, you’re not joking are you?” he concludes by my facial expression.

I smack his chest. “She’s a very persuasive four-year-old. You wouldn’t believe the things I actually won with her. And if I didn’t have
any
backbone, this house would be covered in puffy paint. We would own a pony and the backyard would be turned into an ocean floor under the sea in case Ariel ever wanted to have a sleepover!”

Ian is wearing the biggest grin on his face. “Really?”

“That kid has skills no four-year-old should have. If we’re smart, we’ll start saving for that Ivy League school she’s going to dominate.”

His expression softens.

“What?” I look at him, smiling at me. “What did I say?”

“You just said ‘we.’ And that makes me happy, knowing you’re still planning on staying with me.”

Well, duh!
Who in their right mind lets a piece of fine ass like this go?
Twice?
I just honestly spoke what I felt. The thoughts swirling in my head were an image of watching Pippa grow up and making sure she rocked it at a university.

I’m in deep thought when Ian brings me back down. “Do you not enjoy having social interactions with other people? You sure do a lot of it in your head.” He smirks.

“I do my best thinking when I am debating with myself, so possibly.” I smile.

Then, of course, I smack him in the chest.

“So are you going to address my comment?”

I look at him. That beautiful face. I move to his handsomely built chest, the thin layer of chest hair that my fingers are now grazing. I move down to his belly button, and then make my way back up to that now so-serious face.

“I plan on staying. And it’s most definitely going to be with you—”

That is all I get out before he flips me under him like a tiger that just caught his prey.

“Say it again.”

I giggle. “I plan on staying.”

“Again.”

“Ian.”

“Say it,” he insists, grabbing firmly on to my hips. “Ian Whitman, I plan on staying.” I’m laughing now. “And as much as you think you’re winning the golden prize here, I hate to break it to you but you might have a lot of wor—” Again he cuts me off. Not that I’m complaining. Any time he wants to shut me up by locking lips with me, I’m down for it.

Between some serious French kissing
—man, I love that word
—I hear him say it. “Thank you.”

Two words. Simple phrase. Tons of meaning.

All equate to the same ending.

Round two.

“W
E NEED TO STOP
.” That’s Ian, and he can barely catch his breath.

“See, I told you I would be too much work for you,” I choke out. I’m also fighting to get air into my lungs.

“No, I mean we need to get up. Pippa’s going to be home soon.”

I use all my energy to wave my hand in the air, swatting away his request. “No, we don’t. We’re all good.”

“And why’s that? I’m not sure it’s a good idea she comes home to find us in this compromising position. As a four-year-old, trust me, she will ask lots of questions.”

Man, you can say that again. I turn my head, which feels like a hundred-pound bowling ball, in Ian’s direction. “We’re all good. Patti’s keeping her for a sleepover again tonight.”

He raises one eyebrow. He looks curious, then impressed. “You sure did plan all this, didn’t you?”

“Well, yeah. I kind of put all my eggs in one basket with you. If you denied me, I was just going to chain myself to your truck and you would have no choice but to talk to me, or drag me in my undergarments across town.”

He takes a moment to see how serious my plan was, then smacks a wet kiss to my lips. He pulls away. “Change of plans,” he says and sits up, jumping off me. In his gloriously nude state, he grabs my arm and pulls me to a standing position with him.

“Why? We have a good thing going on here, and we have all night,” I argue, pulling him back down to the bed.

“We have longer than that, but right now, I want to go get our girl. And then I want to spend the night making up for all the time I’ve missed with you.”

And there’s the sigh heard around the world.

I mean, seriously. How is this guy not already taken? “How are you not tied up in some crazy woman’s basement right now while she makes hair dolls out of your locks?” Sounds way creepy but seriously, if I think about it . . . If he wasn’t into me, I’m sure in due time I’d have taken matters into my own hands.

In the form of kidnapping and forced entry. In the naughty way.

Dude. Too far. Too far.

Rephrase. “What I mean is how you are still single?”

He laughs. “Well for starters, I already told you. My heart has a one-track mind.” He tugs me into the bathroom and turns on the shower. “And secondly, I don’t think Amber has a basement; therefore, she hasn’t figured out fully how to hide my body yet,” he says, completely nonchalant.

Unlike me, who trips and completely chokes at this statement. “Oh, my God! So you
do
know. RBF is super loco on your ass
still.
”

“RBF?” he questions, totally confused.

“Yeah, her. Resting Bitch Face all over that! You need to be seriously careful. Or I’m gonna find myself in a cohort rescue mission breaking into her house in the middle of the night trying to unchain you from her gothic BDSM bed.”

He turns and gives me a look like I’m crazy. Then gives me that ‘shit, you’re probably right’ look. He pushes me into the shower and follows. “I’m serious, you have a target on your ass.”