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Chapter 9 - Sad Story

I pulled up at the underground parking that belonged to our building. It was around 5 pm now. Once the gate opened, I drove around and found the second parking spot allocated to our apartment. Since Taylor was the only one with a car, Rocky packed in the other spot. I grabbed my stuff from the trunk and walked to the lift. I stopped in the lobby area to check our mail. As I was about to get back into the lift, some yelled, “hold the lift.” I put my arm out and stopped the door from closing, and waited for the person to come into view. What was up with boys working out today? Blake walked to the lift. He was panting and sweating. He got in, and I moved my arm.

“Thanks, Rosy. Welcome back!” He said in between his panting.

“No worries. Have a good run?” I asked. The lift doors closed.

“Yeah, I went all the way up to the bay and back. It’s such a nice route.”

“Yeah, it is. If I weren’t so lazy, I would go for walks and admire that view, but neeehhh,” I said, and Blake started laughing. The doors pinged, and Blake grabbed my bag.

“Here, let me help you with that” he walked out and towards our door.

“Thank you, but I’m competent, you know” I opened the door and let myself in. Blake walked in and placed my bags on the couch.

“I know you are, but having someone help you isn’t always a bad thing.”

He was right, but I wasn’t going to admit that out loud.

I walked around the place, turning on the lights.

“How was the funeral?” He asked, leaning on the kitchen counter.

“Yeah, it was good. Of course, everyone will miss Grace dearly, but she’s in a better place now. I got to see Taylor’s family, and it was good catching up with them. Then it all got rudely interrupted by my boss who insisted I needed to be back for Monday since this stupid CEO of ours doesn’t have a life,” I said, crossing my arms and narrowing my eyes at him.

He laughed and played along. “What a stupid man he is! Why would you do such a thing!? Ugh, unbelievable” he threw his arms in the air dramatically.

“Can I ask you something?” I asked him after we had a little laugh. He nodded.

“Why did you come to Mariners Bay? Was it really because of your grandfather?” I chose my words carefully.

His expression changed a little. “What have you heard?” He asked.

“I’ve heard many things. This one caught my attention the most. We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.”

He stared at me for a bit and then cleared his throat. “You must be hungry. Can I buy you dinner? Chinese?” He asked and started to walk to the door.

“Yeah, sure”

“Alright, you order. I’ll quickly have a shower. I’ll be back to pay,” Blake called out as he walked into his place.

Maybe he didn’t want to talk about it—still a sore spot. I picked up the phone and dialed the restaurant. After ordering, I started unpacking my clothes and turned on a load of washing. As I was putting the bags away, there was a knock on my door. Blake had left the door open, so the delivery guy stood there awkwardly.

Blake still wasn’t back, so I asked the guy to wait and went to find Blake. His apartment door was open too. I walked in and called out his name. No answer. I tried again and started walking towards the rooms. Should I be going this way? I called out his name once more, and when there was no answer, I decided to go back. As I got back down the hallway, I heard a door open behind me. I turned to find Blake standing there on nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist and one around his neck.

“Everything okay, Rosy?” he asked.

I ran my eyes over his body. If I thought he looked good in a suit, then I was definitely wrong. My eyes traveled from the bottom to the top, and the towel left very little to the imagination. When I finally got to his face, he had a smirk and a raised eyebrow. Cocky much! I thought and snapped out.

“The foods here, and I was gonna ask if I should just pay for now, and you can get dinner another night?” I said quickly and turned around.

“It’s okay, Rosy. I’ll be there in 2 minutes.”

“Okay,” and I walked out. I went from not wanting to get involved with guys to seeing two guys half-naked in one day. What was happening?!

I asked the guy to wait for a little bit and walked in with the food. As I grabbed us some wine and cutlery, Blake walked in and handed the guy some money, and closed the door.

“Sorry that took a little longer than needed,” he said and followed me to the living area. I had put everything on the coffee table and sat on the floor.

He must have been hungry because he quickly grabbed a container and dug in.

“Hungry much?” I laughed.

“I’m always hungry. Honestly, if you give me food, I’ll be your best friend. The only way to make me happy.”

“Really? See, I was told sex was the way to keep a guy happy. If food gets it all done for you, then wow, your very low maintenance,” I replied and started laughing.

“Hmmm, now that you say that, it does have me thinking. Food or sex?!” He pretended to look like he was thinking. “No, I can’t decide what I like better. I’ll have to do more research on that and get back to you,” he finally replied and laughed, making me laugh harder.

“Hey, from what I just saw, I’m sure you’d find plenty of test subjects to do your research work.”

He looked at me and smirked. “Did you like what you saw that much?” He asked, wagging his eyebrows.

Shit, what did I just say? “That is not what I meant,” I replied quickly, and he laughed. My cheeks heated up, and I looked down at my food.

We ate a little in silence. Blake kept looking up at me and then back at his food.

He finally cleared his throat. “Kyra Banks. Her name was Kyra Banks, but I’m sure you’ve already heard that” he said.

Okay, so we were going to talk about it. I grabbed a cushion and leaned back. “Go on; I’m listening.”

He sighed and put his container down.

“We met in college. First-year. Kyra was gorgeous, and I fell head over heels. She had been the cheerleader captain in high school and wanted to carry on in college. I played football and had a football scholarship, so I had to play in college. We had very different goals in life but somehow ended up wanting to stay together. People kept saying to me that she was over-friendly with other guys and that they had seen her in places with others, but she had an explanation when I asked. A believable one, and I believed her. But, now that I think about it, they weren’t believable, and I was just stupid” he hung his head, and his voice cracked a little.

I didn’t know if this was all the wine taking over, but I moved closer to him and rubbed his shoulders. He looked up at me and smiled a little.

“We were in our final year when I proposed, and she said yes. I thought I was the luckiest guy alive. Everything was going so well. After graduation, I got stuck in helping dad and pops with the business. They were both getting me ready to take over. I bought us a penthouse, and she started planning the wedding. The wedding date was set, the venue picked, and invitations sent out. The closer we got to the wedding, the more irritated Kyra got. She was always angry about something. She kept complaining that I was never around to help her with anything, and I tried to explain how important work was. Our arguments went on for days. That should have been my first red flag. Finally, my best friend Scott, who was also meant to be my best man, came to my office one day. It was three days before the wedding, and I was really busy with a merger. Scott told me that I should take a couple of days off, spend time with Kyra, and help her out. He said she had spoken to him, and she was stressed out and needed me to be around. His words were, it’s your wedding, bro, go chill with your to-be wife.”

“I really didn’t expect things to be this way. It felt like things had moved too fast. I said to Scott I really couldn’t and had way too much work pending. Why was Kyra like this when we had the rest of our lives together? She was acting as though the marriage was the only important thing. So anyway, Scott left, and I got back to work. At around 4 pm, dad called and said my mum had told him off for making me work so much so close to the wedding, and he thought I should take a break and go home and sort stuff out with Kyra. I was doing almost 12 hour days, and I honestly didn’t care. I loved my job, and I was good at it.

On the other hand, Kyra went from being ambitious to becoming one of those bitchy high socialite brats! It drove me crazy, but I loved her. I packed up my stuff and went down to the local flower shop and got her favorite flowers. I was gonna surprise her by being home early and telling her I was gonna be by her side. When I got to the penthouse, Scott’s car was parked in the spare space we owned. This was natural because Scott had, been helping Kyra with wedding planning and had been around our place quite a bit. I got up to our apartment, and I couldn’t find them anywhere. Then I heard voices from my office and I opened the door to find Kyra bent over my table with her panties on the floor and skirt pulled up. My best friend of 10 years was drilling her from behind, on my table.” Blake’s voice cracked even more and turned into sobbing.

Oh, this poor guy!

I moved closer and hugged him. He leaned into me and pressed his forehead to my shoulder. I rubbed his back gently, and we just sat there. He finally stopped sobbing and sat back up again.

“Needless to say, it was all over. I grabbed my phone and took a picture to have proof in case she tried to make up some story. I walked out of there and went straight to my parent’s place. I showed them the picture and told them what had happened. Dad called his lawyers, and mum started getting everything called off. I was a mess. I spent four months moping around and four months fucking my way through anything I could lay my hands on. Not my proudest moments. I told myself I needed to get over Kyra. Someone told me she was trying to get some big shot lawyer hooked and failed miserably.”

He was talking about Vince. So Vince really had turned her down. So then why did he see her that Friday night?

“I just got rid of everything and moved on. The more I moved on, the more stories I heard. Apparently, Kyra and Scott had been fucking behind my back since college. She was my girlfriend but fucked her way through many of my friends. I shouldn’t even call them that.” I could hear the anger in his voice now and his body rigid.

“Dad and pops were worried I would end up getting some girl pregnant with how much I was sleeping around, so they got me into therapy, and after about two months of that, I got my head straight. It took a while, given Kyra and I had been together for six years. I had my life planned with her. I got there eventually, and it’s finally better. Pops was like, here I have this task pending in Mariners Bay; go sort it out. The way I moved was so sudden nothing went according to plan” he shook his head, and his story was over.

“Blake, I’m so sorry you went through that. She’s an absolute bitch for what she’s done to you. I can’t believe people like that exist in our world. But, like you said, you’ve moved on and on to better things.” I rubbed his back again, and he looked up at me.

“Thanks, Rosy. Thank you for letting me talk to you about this. It felt like I was carrying a weight around because no one here seemed to know what happened. I’m glad someone knows now”

“Well, more than one person knows now,” I chuckled. “Taylor’s brother Chris was the one that told us. So they know too. Just in case you think I’ve told them. The rest of the story stays between us. It’s your business, and I’m just happy you’ve found some peace sharing it with me. Rocky and Taylor don’t need to know.”

“That’s okay. I’m sure they won’t go around telling people. I literally only got to see Taylor for like an hour before she left, and she already knows more about me than I do about her” he leaned back and laughed. We both laughed, and I tried to get up and move away. Blake grabbed my arm and sat me down again. He wrapped his arms around me and gave me a big tight hug.

“Thank you, Rosy. Thank you very much,” he said as he pressed his face to the crook of my neck. I could feel his breath on my neck—his skin against mine. I felt him inhale deeply. Was he sniffing me?

Oh, those brewing feelings were back. Something inside me was bubbling and wanting to get out. I hugged Blake back and let go. As I went to pull away, Blake’s face was so close. I looked down at his lips and back at him. Okay, this was definitely the wine.

Before I could react, Blake had his lips pressed to mine. He tightened his arms around my waist and pulled me closer. I couldn’t help but melt into his embrace, giving in to the kiss. It felt magical. It was something I had never done before. Our lips started to move in sync, and I tightened my arms around his neck. Electrifying sparks were running between us, and it felt so good.

There in the middle of our living area, I had my first kiss. Blake wasn’t a total stranger, but he was still someone I wouldn’t have thought I’d kiss. What had I done?! Once that thought hit me, I panicked. How could I have let this happen?!

I finally pulled away, trying to catch up breathe. I opened my eyes and looked up at Blake. His eyes were dark as night. Pitch-black was the best way to describe it. They were burning with desire, and if I wanted more, he would have given me more. I could see he wanted more. I couldn’t even wrap my head around what had just happened. I pushed away gently, and Blake let me go.

“Shit, Rosy, I’m so sorry,” he said, looking as confused as I did. His eyes changed back to his usual blue after he blinked. Maybe it was the lighting. “I just...”

“It’s late, Blake. Let’s call it a night” was all I said and started picking up the food containers. He got up and picked up the glasses and put them on the counter, and headed to the door.

“Goodnight, Rosy” was all he said as he walked out and shut the door behind him.

I leaned against the counter and buried my face in my hands. What had I done !!

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