Unspoken Memories (Unspoken Series) (10 page)

The light turns green and he turns to focus on the road once
again as he drives the car forward. I’m beginning to discover that I like
details, and I want lots of them. So of course, I push the subject, pressing
for an answer.

“So if you don’t do relationships, how many friends do you
have?” I ask, wondering whether I want the real truth to that answer.

A cocky grin spreads on his face. “I have one for every day
of the week.”

“Who’s the slut now?” I respond dryly.

“I wasn’t always this way you know,” he says in his defense,
trying to make his lifestyle seem normal. “I dated a girl all throughout high
school. You can actually say we were high school sweethearts. We made plans to
go to college together and then get married. You know the whole painted picture
of a love story, but life had other plans for us.”

As I’m about to ask what the plan was he continues.

“I got a scholarship for here in Portland and hers was to
Berkley. It’s the college her parents went to, so she was destined to go no matter
what. I thought of the pros and cons of the situation and I couldn’t refuse a
paid scholarship, so we chose to try to have a long distance relationship. It
worked for a bit, but eventually party life got to the both of us. We tried
really hard to be faithful, but it didn’t happen. We both made mistakes, which
eventually led to us having a touch and go relationship,” he says as he’s still
focusing on driving through the traffic.

“I don’t get it. How would this one relationship screw it up
for you, forever?”

He stays quiet for a moment, and then answers, “I guess I
thought it would be easier to have friends with benefits than to tie myself
down to one girl. In case my ex changed her mind and decided she wanted to get
back together.”

It occurs to me that he’s still in love with her. I can tell
by the saddened expression on his face and it’s also showing how much it’s
hurting him to talk about it. She was probably his first love, his first
everything, which most high school sweethearts are. Those kinds of girls are
always hard to let go.

“Do you still love her?” I bravely ask, almost at a whisper.

He takes a moment to quickly glance at me and answers my
question. “Of course.”

And there you have it. The answer I desperately didn’t want
to hear, but have to take because it’s reality. It’s his reality. The one that
I’m going to have to live with if I plan to keep
my
promise. No wonder
why he refuses to date anyone. He’s still holding out for the happily ever
after with Ms. Berkley.

Well, I’ve learned one lesson from all this. Sometimes the
truth really sucks.

THE NEXT COUPLE of days go by
normally, with the exception of Trey not being at the house. He was scheduled
to go home back south for the next several weeks, so it was just Matt and I. At
first, I had thought it would be very awkward with the two us alone since I had
started to develop an attraction for him, but things didn’t change. He never
made any advances on me. After the whole friends with benefits conversation in
the car, I had learned my lesson and forced my sexual attraction to take a
vacation along with Trey.

Somehow, Matt got the memo about the vacation my sexual
libido was taking, because he had grown comfortable with the
roommate
situation
.
He’d begun walking around in his boxer briefs when it was convenient for
him, torturing the crap out of me.

I had brought up the lack of clothing to him, telling him it
made me a little uncomfortable when he did that. He only laughed at me and
claimed that according to the photos on the Internet, I should be used to being
naked most of the time. So therefore, his boxer briefs shouldn’t be offensive
to me at all. I was so irritated with his response; I ended up throwing the
remote at him.

It had made him laugh harder as he caught it.

He might be intolerable with his boxer briefs, but I guess I
could let it slide since he was so good looking in them. It did give me a
distraction sometimes.

Another change that took place was the living arrangements.
Matt had taken permanent residence in the third bedroom, insisting that I take
his old bedroom. When I had refused, demanding that I take the third bedroom,
since technically I was the crash roommate, he ignored my request.

He pointed out that a girl needed a bathroom of her own and
since the master bedroom already had one, I was to keep the room. I didn’t feel
too bad when I noticed how disgusting the hallway bathroom looked. How in the
world did guys live like that?

Matt had also taken it upon himself to buy me a new phone. I
needed one after what happened to my original one. The second night in the
house I had sat down with Matt and Trey in the living room to turn on my phone
and listen to the voicemails that Bill had placed after I left. They were
pretty vulgar. He even went as far as threatening to kill me because of what I
did to him. By Matt’s reaction he wasn’t too happy with Bill’s messages and
words. He had grabbed the phone from my hand, throwing it against the wall,
cracking it to pieces. Which resulted in me needing a new phone.

At first, I was hesitant to take it, claiming that Bill
might be able to track me through it. But when Matt informed me the phone was
under his name, making it difficult for Bill to find me, I felt a lot more
comfortable using it.

It was a shiny new white iPhone that Matt had loaded with a
bunch of cool apps and songs. I was in love with it the minute he handed it to
me. I rarely put it down, unless necessary. It had come to the point that it
was now a permanent part of my body.

During this time I also discovered how good of a cook Matt
was. I was very surprised when he practically whipped up a full course dinner,
but he didn’t stop there. He also knew how to make an awesome breakfast and
lunch if needed.

The first night we ate his full course dinner, he wasn’t
expecting me to insist we eat at the dining room table. When we were about to
walk into the living room to eat as usual I asked, “Why don’t you guys ever use
the dining table?” Looking over at the table leaning against the wall, I
wondered why it looks more like a standing counter top where everything ended
up.

He looks over at it, shrugging one shoulder. “I don’t know.
We’ve never thought of using it for eating purposes. It gets more usage for
beer pong than anything else,” he said as he walked completely past it.

Not happy with his answer, I stop and place my plate on the
island, then head over to the table and begin clearing the things off. Matt
notices and heads back in my direction helping me and within minutes the table
is cleared. After a quick wipe down, we are finally able to sit down and have a
normal dinner, like normal people.

I would have said like a normal couple, but that was pushing
it a little too far when it came to Matt. Knowing that he was willing to change
one thing about himself to make me happy gave me some hope. Now if I could only
work on changing the one thing I
really
wanted to change about him, but
I wasn’t going to hold my breath trying.

ONCE I KNEW I had the power to make
some
changes, I took full advantage. The first thing I did was order new couches;
the old ones stank like sweat, and had stains. I don’t even want to know what
they consisted of. With them being guys, I was happy being kept in the dark.

When I told Matt his only response was a raised eyebrow, but
he didn’t argue. I had to keep in mind that men still lived in the house. So I
went with dark brown leather, hoping that it would prevent a reoccurrence of
the stains.

I did plan to keep Matt’s notorious leather recliner in the
equation. Even if it was huge and took up a great deal of space in the room, I
couldn’t bring myself to get rid of it. Especially since it was the one thing
that reminded me of the first day I’d met Matt.

What was hilarious though, was how Matt began to insist that
the recliner wasn’t going anywhere when the delivery guys showed up the next
day with the new sofas. He had thought that I intended on getting rid of the
recliner as well.

Knowing how much he loved that thing, I had put up a light
argument for the fun of it. Matt was just as hot when angry, as he was any other
time. It made me want to laugh. It was hard to stand there staring at him and
not tell him the truth, but after a couple of minutes I couldn’t hold in my
laughter any longer.

Realizing that I was only playing with him the whole time,
Matt smiled at me shaking his head and I had thought I’d gotten him good since
he didn’t really say or do anything to lecture me.

Oh, but I was wrong. What I didn’t expect was what happened
after Matt had walked the delivery guys out the door.

“Ms. Abigail Adams. That little prank of yours wasn’t very
nice,” he says, stalking towards me from the doorway with the look of a
predator on the hunt. The look worried me a bit. I had no idea what he was
planning on doing to me, but by the smirk on his face, it was going to be good.

I shrugged my shoulders at him. “You’re the one who made
assumptions, so I just went along with it,” I tell him with the same smirk on
my lips.

He starts to come around the large couch that is now in the
middle of the living room, and I slowly walk back around in the opposite
direction. I know it’s not helping my situation to give him a chase, but hell
if I am going to give in so easily.

As I come behind the couch with him facing me from the
front, he grabs for my wrist, yanking me down over the couch, and making me
land right on top of him. I instantly try to pry myself off his body, but he
proves how strong he is by wrapping his legs and arms around me. I’m completely
trapped against him.

I can feel his lean muscles beneath me and I inhale deeply,
taking in the special scent that I now equate with Matt. I can’t exactly
pinpoint what it is, but every time I breathe it in, it takes me to another
world completely. I can’t get enough of it.

“Now what do you think your punishment should be, Ms. Adams?”
he growls into my ear, sending a shiver to course down to the depths of my
toes.

As I take in his question and my imagination gets the better
of me, I’m quickly yanked from my impromptu fantasy of my enjoyable punishment
when Matt starts tickling me.

My body starts convulsing in laughter with his fingers
quickly moving against my ribs. I didn’t know how ticklish I was until now and
I don’t like it one bit. He keeps it up as my body keeps convulsing with
laughter against his body, making me scream, and yell as well. This
was
not
the kind of screaming and shouting I had in mind a second ago.

He’s still holding me in a firm grip against his body, using
only the tips of his fingers to continue to dig lightly into my rib cage. It’s
pissing me off at this point, making me yell at him in anger in between my
bursts of laughter. Matt doesn’t give up, but keeps at it, laughing along with
me from the enjoyment it’s giving him.

As I’m about ready to pee my pants, we roll off the couch
from all the wiggling that my body is causing between us and we land on the
floor with a light thump, with Matt landing on top of me. The shock of it makes
Matt stop his tickling, as he’s staring down into my face and my body is now
numb from the heat of his stare.

His hand gently pushes the hair that is loosely covering my
face out of the way so he can better see me. His face is so angelic as I look
into his eyes, returning the heat that is radiating between us. Right as I see
him lean his head down, I prepare myself, my body growing excited. When his
face is mere inches from my own, his phone goes off, announcing Trey’s
ringtone.

We both freeze up, but then his body relaxes just as fast.
Thinking he’s going to ignore it, he surprises me when does the opposite.
Bracing his arms on the side of my body, still looking down at me his face
grows regretful.

He pushes himself up and off the ground, walking away from
me, and into the direction of his singing phone.

Lying there on the ground, I close my eyes, already
regretting the loss of his body on top of me. Repeating in my head what just
occurred, I’m left confused and wondering why he had that look on this face. I
really hate not having answers.