And that, of course, was the real problem. I was becoming too attached to my mark. I thought it was lucky that I happened to win over someone like him, but feelings muddled things, and I was spending more time thinking about him from an emotional and romantic point of view than I was from the cold-level of detachment that I needed. I was in here for revenge, for the strife I’d been subjected to for the last ten years. I was here to even the score with Travis. Yet Travis was the last thing on my mind. All I could think about was Javier and what he was going to do to me next. He excited me more than anyone ever had.
I thought, maybe, it was okay to just be excited. For now.
When Javier came to pick me up in the morning, my excitement and expectations suddenly tripled. Instead of going out for lunch like I had imagined, we actually swung by a medical clinic. Yes. A medical clinic.
It wasn’t terribly romantic, yet in some ways it was. He wanted to make sure I was going on birth control. He then made us both get tested for STDs. I didn’t know what he was expecting to find in my virginal blood, but the fact that he was taking control of the situation, especially a situation that many couples never discussed, meant a lot to me. Like, a strange amount.
“You’re my woman,” he told me, as we left the pharmacy, a bag of new birth control pills in my hand. “And I’ll be responsible with you. And for you.”
I was his woman. Two dates in and I was his woman. And who was I? A liar. I tried hard to bury those thoughts and found a bit of relief when he dropped me at my shift later. Things were moving so fast once again.
“So, how is Mr. Wonderful?” Julie asked me in her thick Southern accent, snapping me out of my thoughts. It was Monday night, the bar was totally dead, and we were wiping down the counters, straightening bottles, and doing everything we could to busy ourselves.
I smiled at her petite round face, the cascade of wavy brown hair that went all the way to her lower back. She was built like a p**n star, but I knew she had a very sweet boyfriend that she was completely over the moon for. His name was Andrew and she wouldn’t shut up about him, day in and day out. If it wasn’t for Javier—for my Mr. Wonderful—I would have been jealous.
“He’s good,” I told her, feeling my cheeks heat.
“Oh he’s very good, sug,” she said. “You know there’s nothing sexier than a man who can take charge, and believe me, Eden, he took charge of Thursday night.”
“I thought you said I took charge,” I teased her.
“Well behind every good woman is a good man,” she said, then noticed I was glaring at her sexiest remark. She jabbed me playfully in the ribs. “And vice versa, of course. He’s got such a way about him.”
“Javier?” I asked, surprised to see that same dreamy look on her face, as if she were talking about Andrew.
“Yes, your Javier.”
“Okay, he’s not exactly my Javier,” I said, as though he hadn’t just told me earlier that I was his woman and he was responsible for me.
“Oh, whatever!” Julie exclaimed, nearly slapping her thighs in overreaction. “It took Andrew two years and a trip on a Disney cruise ship with Nana before he even looked at me that way. I think it’s because he finally saw how much of a bad-ass I have to be to put up with my family. Believe me, it wasn’t easy. Between the food poisoning and the Catholic versus Protestant discussion, I almost lost him.”
And she had totally lost me. But it didn’t matter. I was biting the bait.
“How does he look at me?” I asked as casually as I could muster.
Julie placed her small hands on both sides of my face. “He looks at you like this.”
Her eyes drooped and she just looked drunk. And like she was maybe having a stroke.
“Inebriated?”
She let go and smacked me on the arm. She was an animated little thing.
“No! Like he’s been searching for you his whole life, and there you turned up, under a pile of garbage.”
“That’s…poetic,” I said, frowning. “But I’ve only known him a few days.”
“Oh that doesn’t matter,” she said, before sliding a beer down to a gentleman who hadn’t even asked for it yet. He was a regular, I knew that much. “Love at first sight happens. They say it doesn’t, but it does. Just look at me and Andrew.”
I would have, but I’d never seen the dude. “We aren’t in love.”
“You will be,” she said slyly, filling out a bar tab. “I can tell. With some couples you can just tell. And he’s different. He knows stuff.”
I nervously tucked my hair behind my ear. “What kind of stuff?”
“You’ll see,” she said with a wink. “And then you’ll tell your new pal Julie all about it. Ain’t that right, sug?”
And an hour later, Javier showed up at the bar, winning Julie over with his manners and blinding smile. She giggled in response, unable to form words. Again I was struck by how gorgeous he was. Not in that conventional, hunky way, but mesmerizing all the same. He was very bad and very, very beautiful.
He led me out to his car and we got in. I was very conscious of my overnight bag which was sitting in the backseat. I had packed it earlier, at his request. It sat there, ominous, reminding me of what was about to transpire. I couldn’t have been more anxious if I tried.
I cleared my throat as we drove toward Ocean Springs. “I took my pill a few hours ago.”
He smiled knowingly. “It’s going to take a few weeks of you taking it before it starts to work. Don’t worry, I have enough protection to get us through. I hope.”
Oh Jesus. What was going to happen after tonight? Was I going to turn into an insatiable horndog after one romp in the sack? Watching his skilled hands, his long fingers as they handled the wheel, I knew what the answer was.
It’s just sex, I told myself. It’s just sex. It doesn’t have to mean anything. It doesn’t have to be a big deal. Your body is not your heart.
Yet even though I chanted that in my head until we pulled up to his house, glowing white and pure against the starry sky, I knew there was no point. No matter what I told myself, I was at his mercy. I had no idea what to expect and he did. He was controlling the strings.
We went into the house, wordlessly, hearing only the waves crashing nearby, the rustle of blowing sand on the dunes. Javier plucked a bottle of deep red wine from the counter and two wine glasses and led me down the hallway, his hand guiding my back.