Three Little Words (5 page)

            Adele was avoiding me.

            I’d called and texted her every day, but she hadn’t responded. I’d drawn the line at going to her apartment, because in my books that was borderline creepy, but I was getting desperate.

            I’d been an ass. I couldn’t deny it. However, what I’d said—or hadn’t said—had nothing to do with how I actually felt. She’d given me almost three weeks now to think about that, about the emotions that the redheaded spitfire brought out in me.

            I wanted her back. I just didn’t know how to bridge the chasm that I’d forged with my thoughtless words.

            Across the table from me my date Laurie gasped over something on the screen of her cell phone. I repressed the urge to roll my eyes, as I’d done countless other times that night. It should have been fun, the formal party with my fraternity brothers and tons of hot sorority chicks, alcohol flowing freely, good music played by some popular Australian band.

            I was miserable.

            Laurie was a member of my frat’s sister sorority. Blonde haired, blue eyed, with tanned skin, white teeth and big boobs, she was everything I’d always looked for in a girlfriend—prelaw like me, she was pretty, came from a good family, was headed for an Ivy League school. She had impeccable manners, could hold up a decent conversation, and if I was interested she would probably lift up the satin skirt of her formal gown and initiate some perfectly acceptable sex when I walked her back to her dorm at the end of the night.

            I wasn’t interested at all. It wasn’t fair to Laurie, but I couldn’t stop comparing her to the woman who turned to liquid heat under my touch.

            Where Laurie was a pleasant spring day, Adele was a raging thunderstorm, sweeping sheets of rain and electric bolts of lightning. She was in my blood, and I couldn’t get her out.

            I didn’t want to.

            Laurie gasped again. I barely repressed a wince.

            “What’s up?” I asked, and since I’d been raised to be polite, I tried to keep the fact that I wanted to be somewhere else out of my voice.

            Laurie looked at me with wide eyes, sliding her cell phone across the table to me.

            “Some Omega Pi guys just posted these crazy pictures on Facebook of some three-way hookup at their party two weeks ago. I’ve seen the girl around. I can’t say I’m surprised. She
looks
like the kind of chick who’d be into that, you know?” Pursing her lips in judgment, she shook her head slightly. “I guess it’s gone viral. Serves her right for acting like a slut.”

            Incredulous, I looked at her, the pretty blonde who was supposed to be an ideal match for me. She smiled as she tapped her cell phone, wanting me to look at some pictures of some big school scandal that was none of her business and that she would undoubtedly perpetuate regardless. I had no interest in looking at those pictures; in fact, her attitude made me mad enough that I knew I’d do my best to avoid them.

            I stood there, the stupid custom made suit that my mom had ordered for me just for this event effectively suffocating me, and felt like I was putting on a new pair of glasses, ones that actually let me see.

            I didn’t want this—this girl, this party, this quality controlled
life
.

            I knew what I
did
want, though.

            I wanted Adele.

            Shaking my head at Laurie, who still looked like she expected me to pick up the cell and participate in smearing the reputation of some girl I probably didn’t even know, I pulled my wallet from my pants and peeled off a twenty.

            “Here. Take a cab home. I’m out of here.” Normally I would have tried to sugar coat the words more, would have feigned illness or something to spare the girl’s feelings.

            In that moment I didn’t care. If she was willing to smirk over photos like that, then I didn’t think I had to be overly nice in return. Plus, while I might have wanted to flatter myself, I knew that she didn’t care about me any more than I did about her.

            She would party with her friends. She’d be fine. And I’d be free to go to Adele.

            Not waiting for Laurie’s reply, I turned on my heel and made my way through the crowd. The band was on a break and their sounds had been replaced by a deejay, but the place was packed with undulating bodies regardless.

            I pushed my way through, only pausing to snatch a bouquet of flowers from one of the vases that stood in the centre of every table. They were roses, classic red ones—not what I’d have chosen for Adele, but I hoped she’d see the gesture behind the flowers regardless.

            I was going to go see her. I had to convince her to give me a second chance.

            Like a man possessed, I pushed through the last of the crowd and burst through the doors that led outside. It was colder out than it usually was mid November, and the chill shocked me out of the tunnel vision that was blinding me.

            Halting, I sucked in a lungful of the frigid air as I worked through the crazy mess that had been my mind since I’d met Adele Cavanaugh.

            What if she refused to let me in? What if she threw the flowers back in my face?

            I had to take the chance.

            “Whoever you’re taking the flowers to, best not tell her you nicked ‘em from your fancy party.”

            The male voice carried easily on the thin winter air, startling me, since I’d thought I was alone.

            Turning around, I found the lead singer of the band that had been playing inside lounging against the brick wall, the smoke from his cigarette curling upwards in sinuous spirals.

            I nodded, not sure what else to say.

            “Must be a special girl, to make you run out on all this.” The guy gestured with the hand not holding his smoke, pointing to the party I’d just left behind. I heard the sarcasm on his Aussie-accented voice. “Or guy. Whatevs. I won’t judge.”

            Eyeing the strange man, I raised an eyebrow, not sure whether or not to continue this conversation.

            But it was giving me a moment to calm my nerves before pounding on Adele’s door, so I went with it.

            “It’s a girl,” I informed him, feeling like an absolute ass in my suit. Even though his band was performing at a formal party, he was wearing jeans and a T-shirt covered by a leather jacket.

            Unconsciously my fingers lifted to tug off my tie and release the top two buttons of my starched white shirt. “
The
girl, I think. If I haven’t fucked it up.”

            “Hmm.” The band guy took another drag from his cigarette, regarding me thoughtfully from dark green eyes. “Well, we all fuck up, mate. But what the hell are you waiting around here for?”

            It should have been weird, talking about this with some stranger, and even weirder still because dudes just didn’t talk about their feelings, like ever. Still, I found myself responding.

            “This is my last chance,” I told him, eyeing the cigarette. I wasn’t a smoker, couldn’t be if I wanted to stay on the football team, but right at the moment I could have used the stress relief. “I have to make sure I do it right.”

            “If she’s the right one, then it’ll all work out.” Grinning at me, he dropped his cigarette to the concrete and ground it out under his foot. He looked so casual, so comfortable with himself, so like everything I wanted to be, that I scowled.

            “Easy for you to say, dude.” I raked my fingers through my hair, blinking against the dryness in my contacts. I wished I’d worn my glasses. Adele loved my glasses. “You’re in a band. You probably have a different Miss Right every night.”

            Which wasn’t what I wanted. No, I just wanted the one.

            To my surprise, the spiky haired blonde man shook his head and let a thoughtful expression cross his face. “Naw, mate. I could; you’re right about that. The sheilas dig musicians, that’s for sure.”

            Rubbing a hand over his chin, he turned to study me. Again, I felt like this whole conversation should have been really freaking weird, but instead it kinda felt like just what I’d needed.

            “Don’t get me wrong—I’m no saint. But I believe in soul mates, fairy tales, happy ever after, all that shit.” His eyes narrowed, daring me to laugh and yet unashamed at the same time. “And I tell you, once I find the right one, I’ll do whatever it takes to make her mine.”

            If I’d been looking for a sign, this was it. I nodded, feeling my adrenaline surge.

            Whatever it took to convince her, however much groveling I had to do, I was going to show Adele that we were meant to be. I didn’t give a shit what anyone else thought.

            In fact, introducing her to my parents would be entertaining as hell.

            “Thanks, man.” I held out my hand to the other man, shaking when he accepted. “And I’m Mal, by the way.”

            “Dorian.” Reaching into the back pocket of his jeans, Dorian removed a worn, folded up piece of paper that turned out to be a promotional flier for his band.
Three Little Words
, the Aussie rockers with a cult following at American colleges.

            Slapping the paper into my hand, he nodded, then began to saunter back toward the door. I wasn’t into dudes, but I could see why chicks would dig him.

            Dude had swagger.

            Dorian paused just before he opened the door, turning to look over his shoulder at me.

            “The band’s e-mail is on that flier. Let me know how it goes with your sheila.” Grinning at me, he saluted and pulled open the glass door. “Case you can’t tell, I get off on the romance stuff.”

            Then he was gone, leaving me alone with the bouquet of roses and a newfound determination.

            Whatever it took. Adele was the woman for me.

            ***

 With my heart in my throat, I knocked on Adele’s door. My fingers were numb from the cold—I’d walked the whole way across the massive campus, the roses wrapped in my suit jacket for protection, and I was fucking freezing.         

            The cold must have seeped into my brain as well, because I knocked two more times before I realized that the glittery purple frame Adele had attached to her door was gone. Looking down at my feet, I could just make out some of the bits of glitter, ground into the industrial weave of the cheap carpeting.

            Unease began to trickle through my gut. Something was wrong.

            Though I supposed she could have been out for the night—and my mind didn’t want to think about her spending the night anywhere but in my arms—I could tell that something was off. The space behind Adele’s door seemed empty, devoid of life.

            My stomach sinking like a boulder was nestled in it, I set the roses on the floor and marched down the hall to the door marked ‘Building Manager’. It was after midnight, but for the first time in my life I didn’t give a shit, pounding on the door until I heard someone fumbling with the deadbolt.

            The door swung open, and I found myself face to face with the biggest man I’d ever seen. Built like a tank, he was wearing an undershirt and boxer shorts, and when he sneered at me I caught the glint of a gold tooth in the upper row.

            “Tell me why the fuck I shouldn’t beat your ass for waking me up.” The man’s bald head shone in the neon light of the hallway. I looked him straight in the eye, prepared to be polite but not leaving until I had an answer.

            “Adele Cavanaugh. Apartment 4.” Fuck, this guy was big. I wasn’t exactly tiny, and I was fit from football drills, but he made me feel like Mickey Mouse. “She’s not answering her door. I’m worried about her.”

            The big man grinned, rubbing a hand over his stubble. Shaking his head, he reached out and thumped me on the shoulder, knocking me back a step.

            “You poor fucker. Cavanaugh paid me the next month’s rent and hightailed it out of here three days ago. Left most of her furniture and shit behind, but said she ain’t coming back.” He studied me, that metallic tooth glinting. “Forgot to tell the boyfriend, huh? You’re better off. Girl like that’s too wild for a pretty boy like you.”

            I nodded stiffly as I walked back down the hall, trying to process what the big man had just told me. I should have been pissed at yet another person commenting on how wrong Adele and I were for one another, but my attention was caught on what he’d told me right before that.

            My mind rejected it. I didn’t want to believe it. But I knew he was telling methe truth.

            Adele was gone.

            I lugged the last moving box into the tiny apartment and straightened, stretching out the aching muscles that I’d used and abused all day. I looked around my new home as I tried to ease a particularly nasty knot that had formed at the base of my neck.

            “What a fucking dump.”

            My words didn’t hold much heat, both because I was too tired after hauling my shit around all day, and also because while the place was indeed a dump, I wasn’t all that upset to be living there.

            After two years at an Ivy League school across the country, I’d never thought I would wind up back here, in the town where I’d done my undergrad work.

            But this summer I’d finally managed to find the balls to do what I’d been trying to do my entire life. I’d told my dad to fuck off and let me lead my own life.

            He’d responded by cutting off my cash flow.

            I didn’t much care that I was now dirt poor, living on the tight budget provided by my student loans. I was still in law, because I’d realized that that was what I’d truly wanted to study, but now it was on my terms.

            I was
free
.