I Found You

“Yeah,” I said in a quiet voice, feeling suddenly solemn and low again, as I looked across at the heart of New York, too.

Declan would be over there somewhere. I doubted Jason Macinlay could even begin to imagine how I’d lived my life. Fast. Reckless.

“We should be getting back,” he said. “I’ve got to get up for work in the morning.”

“Yeah, Mr. Boring, we have lived our lives very differently.” I laughed. He didn’t. He just glanced at me, and then gestured with his elbow for me to take his arm. It was the first time he’d offered it. I’d just taken it before. It was a sweet gesture.

My laughter turned to a smile, and he smiled back.

God, I liked him.

Chapter Four

I was half asleep but desperate for the toilet when I woke up.

Jason wasn’t in bed. He must have gone to work already.

My eyes half shut, I didn’t looked at the clock, merely rolling onto my side then got up, trying to cross my legs a little as I headed for the bathroom. I was seriously bursting, and with my mind focused on that, I didn’t hear the sound of the shower running, until I opened the door.

“Fuck, sorry, I need the toilet.”

God, he was gorgeous. When I’d opened the door, his hands had been on the wall either side of the shower and his head had been down as he let the water run over it and then down his body. It had been running down his back in a waterfall, and that back, and his butt… The air that had got trapped in my lungs left them.

The older guys I’d dated, or rather fucked, had been all swarthy with hard muscle. His skin was pale and it looked soft, and the muscular definition beneath it was sinewy and lean. I longed to touch… Nope, I didn’t just want to touch, I wanted to have him. His buttocks were so tight, I wanted to grip them with my fingers as we did it, and feel the strength of his thighs between my legs.

I was a messed up, bad girl––he was taken. And I was trouble.

His head had turned toward me, and I saw his brown eyes watching me. He’d seen me looking at his ass.

There were droplets of water caught on his dark eyelashes.

He really was beautiful, the most beautiful guy I’d ever known.

“Give me a second, I’ll be out…”

His words brought me back to reality, to the fact I was standing in his bathroom staring at him as he stood naked in the shower. “Sorry, I’ll wait outside.” I think I must have turned bright red as I exited, and then I remembered just how badly I needed to use the toilet, and leaned against the wall, crossed my legs and bit my lip. But the image of him was still in my head. I didn’t think it was ever going to leave.

I heard the shower turn off. A couple of moments later the door-handle shifted. I tried to straighten up without having an accident.

“Rach…” He had a towel wrapped round his lower half, secured low on his hips, so now I got a front view of the glorious chest I’d seen the definition of through his body-hugging top on the first night.

He didn’t have any hair across his chest, apart from a couple of stray ones around his nipples, but he had a line of dark hair protruding upwards from his groin which just slightly showed above the top of the low slung towel.

Fuck, I’d forgotten I needed the toilet again as my eyes swept back upward over his perfectly defined abs and pecks, and I couldn’t breathe when I met his brown eyes which seemed to be expressing laughter.

“All yours. Do you want coffee?”

“Yeah.” My body remembered it desperately needed to relieve itself, and I darted past him and into the bathroom, shutting the door and sitting on the toilet as quickly as I could.

My head rested in my hands. Stop it Rachel, he’s a good guy, you can’t have him, leave him alone, you’d only mess him up, and mess up his life.

I stayed in the bathroom longer than I needed to, simply to get a grip on myself.

When I came out and went into the living room to eat my humble pie I was conscious of the fact I was wearing just his borrowed tee and my new satin underwear.

I found him fully clothed. He had a crisp pale blue and white striped shirt on and light gray work pants which hugged his ass, which I could now picture naked beneath them.

My eyes lifted firmly to his face. “Sorry, I was half asleep. I didn’t realize you were in there.”

He smiled. “It’s okay, we’re even now, that’s all. I walked in on you the first night…”

It wasn’t quite the same. He didn’t have a habit of acting inappropriately and uncontrollably with girls, like I did with guys.

Still, what he’d said told me one thing, he remembered me naked just as I was going to remember him.

He handed me the coffee.

“Thanks.”

I rested my elbows on the counter leaning over and watching him put on some toast. He glanced back. “Do you want some? I’m going to poach an egg.”

He was a modern guy who looked after himself, as well as nice––even more not my type.

I nodded. “Thanks.”

Still looking back over his shoulder, his brown eyes dropped to look at the bandage wrapped about my right hand. “We ought to change that dressing tonight and check out your hand.” His eyes lifted to mine again.

The memory of my naked body had made him think of that… That wasn’t so flattering. I straightened up, nodding before I sipped my coffee as my wicked head wondered if he’d ever thought of fucking me.

He was probably too nice. He’d probably consider even thinking about it too disloyal to his Lindy.

Damn, I wished Lindy wasn’t on the scene.

We ate the poached eggs at the counter, he on one side, me on the other, facing each other, as I questioned him about what he was likely to be doing at work; it kept my splintering thoughts focused. He asked me about the shifts I’d agreed to and what time I was starting and finishing today.

I’d be out when he got in from work.

He offered to come and meet me at the restaurant and walk me home.

I said thanks as he put his tie on, getting ready to go.

I opened and held the door, while he put on a jumper, then his coat. But I stopped him before he walked out, and straightened his tie a little. Afterwards I tapped his firm chest and said, “Have a nice day!” in my waitress voice.

He laughed and left smiling.

Dammit! This was getting out of hand. I was getting far too close to him. I felt good with him. I could even feel normal with him. In a way I hadn’t felt normal for years. Although it just felt like a game, like I was stealing someone else’s life and playing husbands and wives with him, boyfriend and girlfriend. We shopped together, we ate together, hell, we even shared a bed.

I went into the bathroom to have a shower, but all I could think of as I ran the washcloth over my body was his hands on me and mine on him. It was bad news. It would be a couple of weeks before I’d earned enough money to pay him back and saved up for a deposit on my own room somewhere.

Dammit. Stop it Rachel. Hands off.

~

When I picked Rach up from work, she initially looked pleased to see me as she came out the back door. But her smile dropped as I saw the chef wink at her again as he passed, and then smile at me.

After last night, I suppose they thought I was her boyfriend.

She didn’t grip my arm, even when I offered it. She’d gripped it every other time we’d walked together since that first night.

It occurred to me, she was still embarrassed about this morning. I didn’t actually care. She’d been really nonchalant about me seeing her, like it was nothing. I’d assumed she’d have thought nothing of seeing me either.

Still, images of her naked figure had been drifting in and out of my thoughts all day when I was at work and when I’d been running.

I’d mentioned what had happened to Justin, at work. He’d just laughed.

I wondered if images of me had been running through her mind too.

I’d tried to convert mine into images of Lindy, but I couldn’t even remember Lindy naked now, I’d rarely seen her so. Lindy wasn’t the emancipated type. She wasn’t that comfortable with her body.

As we walked, I urged Rach to talk about her shift, to dispense with the awkwardness.

I remembered her laughing at me last night over the fact I’d only ever slept with Lindy. I wondered how many men Rach had leaned over the bar toward tonight and flashed her cleavage at, and how many she’d taken home or gone back with in the past, in previous jobs.

Was it really emancipation, or just lack of self-worth, and was it that which had brought her to stand on Manhattan Bridge one freezing evening and think of jumping off?

I had an urge to put my arm about her shoulders as I glanced at her. I didn’t.

Her reservation tonight was probably a good thing.

We’d probably been getting too close.

I kept my distance from him on the way home, physically. We didn’t make any detours either, just walked straight back. But we talked, and I was glad of his company. He asked me about my night. I asked about his day.

It was good to have him around. I just had to ensure I kept telling myself now he was someone else’s person-who-cared not mine.

When we got home, he insisted on looking at my hand. He’d bought a new bandage and unwound the dirty one, gently gripping my fingers as he’d done that first night while I sat on the bath edge and he sat on the toilet with the lid down.

The environment constantly reminded me of the beautiful figure I’d seen that morning, like some naked statue in a fountain in a park.

I wondered if tending my wound was reminding him of when he’d done this while I’d been sitting naked in the warm water. He showed no sign if it did.

But I enjoyed his touch and his attention far more than I ought.

The wound was healing okay, knitting together well, and he got me to move my fingers, stretch them out and then curl them up. It didn’t disturb the cut, and proved it was only the skin of my palm which was damaged.

He cleaned it again before re-bandaging it, and once he’d done that, he looked up and smiled at me. “What about a beer and a game of something on my Xbox?”

It was a brother-like smile, and a brother-like sentimentality and that’s what I should try to think of him as, nothing else––but I had no brothers to judge such a relationship by. Or rather none that I’d had anything to do with since I’d been fifteen.

I gave him a smile back. “Thanks, and, yes, to beer, and, yes, to the game.”

He stood.

I stood too, only to realize it brought us too close physically, and foolishly stumbled back, nearly falling into the bath. He caught my arm.

“Steady.”

“Thanks. I’m forever saying thanks to you, aren’t I?”

“It doesn’t matter, Rachel. I’m happy to help.”

“Well, I’m glad you’re happy, because it’s gonna be a couple of weeks before I can get out of here.”

His smile was gentle. “That’s okay. There’s no hurry.”

I smiled again, too. “And again, thanks. Now where’s the beer you offered me? I’m gonna thrash you on your Xbox––and, women’s prerogative, I get to pick the game.”

He laughed.

I found him so easy to get along with.

Think like you’re his sister. Sister… Sister… Sister…

I sat down on the beanbag before the TV and leaned forward to turn it on.

The beanbag was the only piece of furniture he had beyond the mattress in his bedroom. I doubted anyone else had been in his apartment but me. It was hardly set up for entertaining.

He really did need something beyond an Xbox in his life.

I switched the game on and then picked up the controllers.

He came to sit next to me, handed me a beer and then sipped from his bottle before slouching sideward and resting his elbow on the beanbag next to me.

Fuck!

Think like you’re his sister, Rachel…

Chapter Five

Rachel rushed out of the back door of the restaurant, waving her pay packet. “Got it! Are you ready for our big night out?”

I laughed at her over-exuberance. It was just a pay packet. But she was bursting with pride, or perhaps her excitement was over our planned night out.

She’d suggested it. It had been Thanksgiving yesterday but she’d had to work and she’d known I was going to be sitting about the apartment on my own, so to celebrate Thanksgiving, albeit late, and her first pay packet, she’d said we should let our hair down, and go a bit wild––all her words. She’d insisted I went to a club with her. She wanted to get me out of the slow lane, as she called my life, and get me to take a bite out of the Big Apple.

She did make me laugh, and for the last week and half she’d carried me on the tide of her high spirits. It was great having her around, and it had become normal. We were good friends. I felt like I’d known her all my life. Although I still knew very little of her past, and I knew nothing about why and how she’d ended up standing on Manhattan Bridge, wishing herself in the water below.

But that really didn’t seem to matter anymore, because this Rachel was a different person than the one I’d met that first night. This Rachel was constantly smiling, and vibrant, and happy.

I’d eaten at the restaurant during her shifts twice more and both times I saw her laughing and chatting easily with customers, and flirting with men for bigger tips. But it was like she drew energy off people. Like she consumed other people’s smiles into herself and fuelled herself with them.

“So, you up for this?”

“Course. I’m not running away now, you’d call me boring again.”

“Well, you are boring.”

“I’m not going to be tonight, I’m up for anything tonight. Call my bluff and I’ll prove it to you.”

Her smile broadened and it shone in the jet heart of her eyes too.

She wasn’t just an incredibly good-looking woman; she was an incredibly sexy woman when she had her vibe on like this.

She winked at me then, and pursed her lips as she started down the street. “Mmm… Now let me think how might I call your bluff…?” She turned and walked backwards a couple of steps, her pay packet still bobbing up and down in the loose grip of her thumb and forefinger, with the rhythm of her backwards steps. “I’m gonna have to think of something really reckless … ”

I laughed again, at her teasing. She was always teasing me. I loved it. I loved the way she lightened my mood whenever she was around. I’d begun really looking forward to picking her up after her shift. New York no longer seemed like this fog of stuff I couldn’t get on with, because I always had her to look forward to.

I’d come back from work and run; always thinking of meeting Rachel later on. Then I’d get home, shower, and call Lindy, like I’d always done before walking down to collect Rachel.

My calls with Lindy would be their usual dull strained discussions all about life and people back home, what Lindy had done, who Lindy had seen, what my parents were doing, what my friends were doing. Then at the end of the call Lindy often threw in a jab at Rachel. ‘Is she still there? Hasn’t she got the message yet? Surely she’s…’ Sometimes I left my cell on the counter and went to get a drink or something when she started on about Rachel. I never listened anyway, nor replied, just let Lindy get her rant out.

When I came to pick up Rachel she’d breeze out all smiles and questions about what I’d been up to all day at work, and how my run went. Lindy never asked those questions.

I talked constantly with Rach. I couldn’t remember ever talking this easily with Lindy.

Rach and I liked the same TV shows and video games, we had some discussions on music choices, but disagreements made us laugh because she only teased, she didn’t argue. We had the same sense of humor, too.

“Come on you lazy boy,” Rach urged me, before turning to face front again. “I wanna get back and change, I’m not going on our big night out like this.”

I wanted to run with her, she said she’d never run and she wasn’t into it, but I thought she would be if I got her started; she had so much energy, I knew she’d get the buzz. Lindy had never got it. She’d hated me running when I was back at home. She’d begged me to give it up, once.

But I liked running; I’d feel like I’d missed out on something if I didn’t run.

Rachel said she didn’t get running, but she did get what it meant to me. I knew she did, because she always asked where I’d run and how far, and if I’d enjoyed it.

She’d finished two hours early tonight so we had plenty of time to go out, and I knew she’d bought new clothes with money from tips––money from the men she’d flashed her cleavage at as she’d served. But I only knew because she’d asked permission to spend the money on herself before paying me back. I’d told her go ahead, treat yourself, you deserve it.

She’d kissed my cheek, when she’d said thank you, which was the only physical contact we’d had since I’d last fixed up her hand.

She wasn’t wearing the bandage any more, she’d taken it off. The wound was healing okay though, I’d made her hold her palm out and show me.

“Hurry up!” she called from in front of me.

My hands were in the pockets of my leather jacket and my lips twisted to a half smile as I walked. Of course, I could break out into a run and see if she could keep up, her heels weren’t that high.

My hands slipped out of my pockets and I started slowly, jogging past her and glancing back at her over my shoulder. I’d worn my running shoes with my jeans to come fetch her.

She started running too, hitching up her tight pencil skirt with one hand.

I ran a little faster, it didn’t even make me breathless but it was so easy to leave her behind.

“Wait! Hey wait! Not that fast! Wait!”

I upped my pace again, although it was nowhere near the pace I usually ran at.

“Jason Macinlay! I said wait! I can’t keep up with you!”

I stopped dead and turned around laughing. There were others in the street looking at us oddly, I didn’t give a damn.

Rach had her shoes in one hand and her other gripped her skirt, holding it hitched up to the top of her long slender thighs, as she ran the last few paces in stocking covered feet over the cold ground.

She had a good stride. I was sure she’d be good to run with.

When she reached me though, she doubled over panting and pressing her palm to her side. “Dammit. I got a stitch. What did you have to do that for?”

I laughed at her. Well, she could run if she got used to a little exercise. “You need to work out, girl.”

She stood upright, her fingers still pressing against her side as she dropped her shoes onto the sidewalk, and then, when she slipped her feet into them one at a time, putting them back on, she met my gaze. “What I need is a night out, not a work-out.”

She was smiling at me like she was having the best time of her life. But I’d got the impression from Rachel that every day was the best day of her life. God knows what had made her contemplate ending it all? Probably some guy who’d let her down. She was so openhearted she wouldn’t have seen it coming.

But then any man who’d let her down was a fool. It was his loss, not hers.

Her blonde hair was in a ponytail but there was a loose strand brushing her neck. My fingers itched to tuck it behind her ear as we walked.

When we got back to my apartment she disappeared into the bathroom while I quickly changed into a shirt and a black pair of skinny cut pants. I also swapped my running shoes for the one pair of decent shoes I owned and used for work. All the time I was changing, I heard the shower running.

I’d never gone to a club. I’d only ever gone to bars with Lindy and my friends. I was sure I was in for a wild night with Rachel. I was looking forward to it. My heart beat rapidly as I walked from the bedroom back into the living room to get a beer. Rach hadn’t told me where we were going.

To calm the energy still buzzing in my veins from my run, and to control the cocktail of anxious excitement within me, I sat on the floor and started up a game on the Xbox.

I heard the shower turn off and then Rach singing in the bedroom.

“Man. Why don’t you have a hairdryer?” Her voice reverberated through the closed door.

“I keep my hair short so I don’t need one!” I shouted back laughing.

“That’s just selfish…” There was laughter in her voice, too.

“Want me to come and blow on it!”

“Ha, ha. No thanks, I’ll manage.”

She went silent then but I could hear her moving about, getting stuff out of bags.

She started singing to herself again and then shouted, “I won’t be much longer… I hope you’re ready?”

“I’m ready. I’m waiting on you!” As I shouted my thumbs carried on working the controls.

Rach was getting good at my games. Her scores were starting to beat some of mine. She’d play in the morning, before she started a lunch shift and I’d play after my run, before I met her from work. It had become a competition between us to play the same game the other one had played and beat their last score.

She was becoming like one of my best friends. In fact in some ways she was more fun than them.

“Hey.”

I glanced round. I hadn’t heard the door open, and… Fuck…

None of my friends were hot like her.

I’d dropped the controller without even thinking, letting the car just crash, and now I stood, unraveling from my crossed legged position on the floor.

“Fuck, Rach…” That wasn’t the thing to say obviously, but she looked amazing. She was wearing stiletto heeled black leather knee length boots which hugged her slim calves and a scarlet red jersey dress. I’m sure most women couldn’t have pulled the dress off, but she could.

Fuck.

I was lost for words, and then finally the right words came out. “You look amazing… Beautiful.”

Her hair was a bit messy. Obviously she’d turned upside down and shaken it to dry it a bit. But even so, its ruffled look only made me think of how she looked when she was asleep, when I got up in the morning, and I always thought that was a good look.

Shit.

She was wearing make-up too, and I’d never seen her in make-up. Her lipstick matched the color of her dress and the mascara on her eyes seemed to highlight the unusual light green even more.

“You look fabulous, Rach,” I said more calmly.

“You scrub up pretty good, too.”

Her gaze swept down over my clothes. I knew they were really nothing special, Lindy always moaned I didn’t have a gift with style.

To stop feeling awkward I finished off my beer, then turned and put the empty bottle down on the counter, saying, “Ready,” as I turned back.

She’d taken her little black leather purse off her shoulder, and was pulling some dollar notes out of it.

“Here.” She held them out to me. “You’d better take this before I get drunk and spend it.”

“You don’t have to, Rach.”

“No, I do. I’m not gonna keep owing you forever. Take it. And we’re Dutch tonight, right, no manly I’m buying all the drinks bullshit. We’re half and half.”

I smiled. “Okay, it’s a deal.” I took the money off her. I couldn’t refuse. It would be cruel to refuse. She was busy turning her life around. I wasn’t going to stop her.

After I’d put the money in my wallet, I reached her coat down from the peg and held it up for her.

“Why, thank you kind sir, it’s amazing what a figure-hugging red dress can do.”

“Very funny…” I was smiling at her, even though my words were dry. But she was right, the dress was figure-hugging, it clung to every curve and left nothing to my imagination. Not that I needed imagination, I could still see the image of her on that first night in my mind as she’d lain naked in the bath. Shit, tonight was not the night to be thinking about that.

I reached for my coat, then put it on.