One Week with the Marine (Love on Location)

Just like my mom. Just like me.

So, what does this mean for me? What does this mean for us?

Chapter Seven

When they got back to the house, Holden made quick work of removing the shard of glass from Avery’s foot, disinfecting, and bandaging it—though she imagined her stream of swear words did nothing to help his concentration.

Thereafter, he headed for the bathroom, and Avery shuffled into her bedroom. Right now, she needed sanctuary, a place to hide. Though at the moment, she wasn’t sure who she was hiding from. Or what.

She closed the bedroom door behind her and leaned back against the wood. The room looked the same as it had when she’d left—a giant mass of silky lavender bed things piled into the middle of the mattress amid a stack of pillows. Her closet doors were wide open, displaying every color in the visible light spectrum. Clothes hung precariously on their hangers.

It was a perfect, comfy wash of chaos.

She pulled off her clothes and threw on an old T-shirt. It was one Holden had left behind on his last visit. A football shirt from their old high school—East Maryland High, home of the Fighting Crabs. Though based on her memories of the place, it had really been the cheerleading squad that had been fighting the crabs.

Sighing, she pulled on a pair of ruffled shorts and glanced down at her outfit. Nothing about it said “come and get it,” but it also didn’t scream “tell me about your feelings, I’m totally comfortable.” It was just normal. Perfect.

With a deep breath, she opened her bedroom door and popped back into her living room, settling herself on the couch to wait for Holden.

There was no reason to panic about the beach. She’d done enough thinking in the car ride home to last her a lifetime. The thing she needed to focus on was the conclusion—no matter what she told Holden, or what he told her, they both knew the terms of their agreement. He was her friend. He deserved to know about her hang-ups.

Overall, it had just been a regular old good day. Some good sex. A good friend.

What else could she ask for?

She sucked in her cheeks and settled back on the cushions when she heard Holden rifling through her medicine cabinet on the other side of the door.

“Mouthwash is under the sink,” she called. He never remembered that. Not in all the times he’d been in the apartment. She smiled faintly as she heard the door open and he called back his thanks.

Catching the smile, she bit her bottom lip and shook her head. What if the intimacy hadn’t just been in her head, though? And what about the other st

uff? He’d paid for dinner. That was so…sweet. And also, so…territorial. Like he was taking care of her.

Then there was that look. The one that softened the corners of his eyes and made his full lips look so damned kissable that she could hardly hold back. She had to, though. She’d done a shit job of it so far, but something inside her needed to snap back into place and remember the agreement.

They were friends—good friends—who had sex. No strings attached.

It didn’t matter that she didn’t see other men. That was a coincidence. It didn’t matter that he’d leave one day. That was a fact.

When that day came, he’d be better for it. He’d find a woman who could live with not knowing when or if he’d be back. He’d find a woman who would stand by his side and take care of his children, someone who’d been raised in some ranch-style house in Nebraska with a mom and a dad and a dog. The whole works. Someone who was the very opposite of Avery.

Avery was not the girl for Holden. He knew it, his family knew it.

She knew it. And she hated it.

Every time he touched his warm, gorgeous lips to her own, the stabbing reminder of that fact twisted between her ribs as a not-so-subtle reminder. She pushed the thought from her mind. She didn’t need to worry about it. He wouldn’t mess up their friendship, not when it was so obvious they had no future.

Sure, they had fun. They laughed, and liked a lot of the same things. And he was sexy. Very, very sexy.

But he was Holden. He could do better.

One day, they’d both look back and smile at the memory of their time together, and that would be that.

Avery frowned and glanced at the TV. Suddenly, she was struck by exactly how dusty it was, and she hobbled over to wipe the screen. Then she turned to find that everything else was, well…askew. She straightened the pillows on the sofa, cleared off the counters and her coffee table, even dusted the cinderblocks beneath the TV, as if she were Martha freaking Stewart.

All the while, she listened to Holden moving around in the bathroom, the sounds he made as he got in and out of the shower. And each time she thought he might open the door, her heart gave a little leap and she doused another table with Pine-Sol and scrubbed furiously.

When at last there was nothing left to clean, she put her hands on her hips and glanced around the newly sparkling apartment. She was pretty sure the place had been messier than this when she’d moved in. Now it practically gleamed.