Juvante had texted me to let me know Chanos was seen in Tana’s neighborhood making threats. I couldn’t have my past collide with my present now that Tana was in my life. Back then before I’d met her, I had nothing to lose and I hadn’t given a shit whether I lived or died. Now, I had it all to lose. Before I let anyone hurt her because of me, I’d break her damn heart and drive her away until she despised the sight of me. It was the best plan I could come up with even though the thought of doing that hurt me in places I didn’t think would ever feel anything again.

I opened my mouth to tell her to get out but then she dropped her robe and stepped into the water. She put her hand on my chest and I wasn’t made of steel.

With the water pouring over her, drenching her hair, she looked like a fantasy morphing into reality. She raised up on her toes and kissed me, nervously sliding her tongue into my mouth. As if it hadn’t been satisfied in years instead of last night, my dick hardened.

“You can teach me how to do to you what you did to me in the chair yesterday if you want to,” she whispered shyly.

Teach Tana oral sex so she could give some other guy head in the future that she couldn’t have with me? Yeah, that was gonna happen. “No.” I put her back against the wall. One more time. I would be with her one more time and it would have to last me forever. Her legs went around me and I positioned her so I could go inside. She was wet and ready. “Hold on.”

“Don’t take it easy,” she nipped at my chest with her teeth.

I drove into her, pulling in and out at a fast pace, acting like the selfish sonofabitch I was, but managed to hold on until I felt her quivering, felt her muscles tighten around me and when she gave in, I let go. As soon as I poured into her, she tilted her face upward, frantically seeking my lips.

The desire to kiss her, to whisper things a guy like me had no right to say rose up inside of me, so I let her feet slide to the floor of the tub and turned away from her lips, ducking my head beneath the spray of the water.

“Let me finish showering and then you can have it.” I filled my voice with as much of a brush off attitude as I knew how to give. The same attitude I’d given to other girls but had never dreamed I’d one day have to use with Tana. Pain dug deeper into my heart and I slammed the door against it.

She touched my back, tentatively tracing the scratches her fingernails had left behind. “Ryan? What are you doing?”

“Showering.”

“Oh. Okay.”

I gritted my teeth at the hurt in her tone but didn’t acknowledge it. I had to be the dumbest shit in the world. I’d known Tana was more important to me than any other girl and I hadn’t listened to myself. I’d known my past was already stirring up trouble before we ever drove up here. This was my fault and I deserved to pay for it.

I heard her inhale deeply and then in a calm voice, she said, “There’s something you should know.”

“If you tell me you didn’t take the pill, I’m gonna be pissed,” I warned.

“Could you face me, please?” She eased by me, her breasts brushing my arm, to stand under the spray of the water.

“What should I know?” I let my gaze drink in her face, wishing that I could kiss her and hold her. Wishing I could make promises.

“That night on my front porch when I said that I loved you as a best friend...”

What could never be made my voice hoarse. “Don’t, Tana.”

“I do love you as my best friend, but I think we should take a chance we could be more.” She pressed her hand on her heart. “I feel you in me and I don’t mean only physically. You’re my hero. You’ve always been my hero.”

Hero? She had it all wrong. I’d always been the villain in my own life and in the lives of others. I don’t know what the hell she expected from me. To sweep her into my arms and break into a song like some damn lame movie star? Didn’t she get that the people I let myself care about always ended up fucked over because of me? My mother had died protecting me. With her last breath, she’d told me she loved me.

I’d held onto Donny as he lay broken and bleeding and dying. I’d sworn after him that was never happening again. I couldn’t love and I couldn’t let others love me. And now with Chanos back in the picture, it was even trickier. I couldn’t let someone else I cared about get hurt. Especially Tana. She was the only girl who had the power to bring me to my knees. I stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel, wrapping it around myself.

“Nothing to say?” She bit her lip, waiting, hope alive in her eyes.

“Thanks for the fuck.” I walked out of the bathroom and heard her call me an asshole. I had my back to the bathroom door when she finally finished her shower and came into the bedroom. I didn’t turn around. I didn’t want to see in her eyes how much she hated me.

Chapter Eleven

TANA

Redefining awkward. Having sex with your best friend, wanting to explore the possibility of something more meaningful, something I knew could be beautiful, and him not feeling the same. I’d been so stupid with Ryan because I’d had the suspicion that being with him was about more than I was willing to face. I didn’t know where this put our relationship now.

I shifted on the sofa, trying to get comfortable. I remembered on the trip up to the house with Ryan, I’d wondered if I would feel an ache between my legs after having sex for the first time. As it turned out, the ache was in my heart. The rest of me was fine. Except maybe there was a giant sign on my forehead with the word “idiot” on it. It had never been about losing my virginity only I’d been too blind to see that. It had been about being with Ryan and only Ryan.

Digging my iPod out of my pocket, I stuck the earbuds in, skipped Paramore, Justin Timberlake, and Cobra Starship. I settled on Zedd’s “Clarity” because the music and lyrics fit the way that I felt about Ryan and me perfectly. I figured I’d listen to music until Mom and Creature arrived home and then I’d smile and pretend everything was okay even though my world had just experienced an earthquake.

I would never forget the storm in the depths of Ryan’s eyes as he’d told me in a cold voice that he’d delivered as promised and there was no way in hell he was letting me change the parameters of our friendship.

I’d tried to suggest again that maybe we could be more but he’d shut me down. He wasn’t interested. There was nothing I could say that would change that. It wasn’t fair that he was so damn hot or that having sex with him made me want him around even more. But the emotional earthquake had changed everything. Him. Me. Our friendship. I needed him to stay away and I’d yelled that at him as he’d brought me back to the house. I needed distance physically so I could figure out a way to shut him out emotionally so that it wouldn’t hurt so much.

As I listened to the lyrics of the song, the ache in me grew wider until it became a chasm. I pressed my hand against my heart as if I could touch the brokenness. How could I not have realized what Ryan meant to me? Putting my head down on my knees, I fought to keep from crying. If I had a red nose and puffy eyes when Mom saw me, she'd want to know what happened and I’d have to make up something. She thought I’d spent the night with Shelby and Brooklyn at Shelby’s house.

Right after six, the front door opened and Mom and Creature came in. He was grinning and his eyes were shining. Plucking out my earbuds, I said, “You look excited, what’s going on?”

“We saw a sign that the theater is having dollar shows this week. Mom said I could go tomorrow.”

She would be at work. “I guess that means I’m taking you? Who says I want to be seen at the theater with you?”

He launched himself at me, throwing his arms around my neck in a tight squeeze. “Come on, Tana. Please, please, please?”