No Time Like Mardi Gras Page 10

  “Thank you,” she said again, but this time she meant it.

  “It’s true you’ve got a lot on your plate, but don’t panic over it. Embrace it. You can’t start over just to spite your past.”

  His voice was soothing and slightly hypnotic, and it didn’t help that he was still shirtless, mussed and delicious-looking. She still had too many post-orgasmic endorphins rocketing through her bloodstream for that to go unnoticed by her libido. Being friendly or not, part of her recognized that he was clearly trying to woo her back to bed, and damn it, it was working. She wasn’t going to address his last comment, because that might lead to more oversharing, and there was still an awful lot of that she needed to sort out for herself before she started taking advice from others. But the other thing he’d said... “I wouldn’t mind having a friend.”

  He smiled at her, and while she returned it, the moment felt a little heavier than she’d have liked or wanted to think about. “We don’t have much in common,” she warned. “My laptop is strictly for surfing and shopping, and I’ve never seen Star Wars.”

  “That’s a pity, but I have other friends for that.” He held out his hand, palm up.

  Jamie hesitated for a moment, part of her thinking it wasn’t such a bright idea, but another part of her shouting that it was, for all kinds of reasons. It was a little confusing, but in the end, it came down to two things: she liked Colin, and the occasional brain-scrambling roll in the sack would be good for her overall mental health.

  Not to mention very satisfying.

  She put her hand in his and his fingers closed around it. There was an exhilarating rush of excitement as her body shifted into gear, expectation shimmering through her insides.

  But there was something else, too. Something she didn’t want to investigate too closely.

  But that was okay. She’d just take everything one step at a time.

  And the first step was back toward Colin’s bed.

  * * *

  The sky was beginning to lighten as she quietly closed the door behind her. She was exhausted, bleary eyed and not fully steady on her feet. Colin had grumbled when she got up to get dressed, coaxing her to come back to bed, to sleep a little while longer.

  Thankfully, he’d fallen back asleep quickly, his breaths slow, deep and even.

  That was a good thing, because she wouldn’t have been able to give good reasons why she wouldn’t—or actually couldn’t—stay. How was she supposed to articulate the fact that spending the night, the whole night—and actually sleeping with him, much less waking up with him—would put her in very uncomfortable territory?

  It seemed smarter and safer to not go there quite yet, hence her stealthy exit.

  Dark stubble had lined Colin’s chin, and his hair stuck up at crazy angles. He, though, had still looked scrumptious in ways that nearly had her crawling back under the covers with him. She couldn’t say the same for herself, as the image that greeted her in the rearview mirror was downright scary.

  Anyone who saw her would know exactly how she’d spent the night.

  But she couldn’t really bring herself to regret it. She felt calmer than she had in weeks, more relaxed and sure of herself. Maybe there really was something to that whole you-just-need-to-get-laid thing.

  She still wasn’t convinced that getting involved with someone was a good idea at this point, and she’d never had sex with a man she hadn’t been in a committed relationship with. She’d heard of friends with benefits before, and wondered if it could possibly be that easy.

  It would certainly be nice.

  * * *

  “It was so cool. You just don’t appreciate the level of detail that goes into them until you see it up close. And they’re huge.” Jamie sat cross-legged on his living room floor, the pizza in front of her gone cold as she bubbled over, sharing every detail she’d learned on her tour about how parade floats were made.

  He laughed. “So you’ve told me. Six times.”

  Jamie made a face at him. “I’m sorry I’m not as jaded about the whole thing as you are. I still find it very interesting and exciting.”

  “You know, I’ve lived here my entire life and I’ve never been to Mardi Gras World.”

  Her jaw dropped. “You’re kidding.”

  “Nope.”

  She grabbed the brochure she’d brought back with her. “There’s a VIP tour that’s like twenty bucks extra, and I’m really thinking about going back to do that. You could come with me when I do.”

  “I’ll pass, thanks. Anyway,” he pushed to his feet and went to the kitchen for a refill, “I thought you were busy job hunting, not sightseeing.”

  “I’m doing both, thank you very much. I sent in three more résumés this morning before I went on my tour. In the meantime, I took your advice and got a job waiting tables in the interim. I start day after tomorrow.” She grinned as she finally picked up her pizza and took a bite.

  “Good for you.” He sat next to her on the floor and leaned against the couch. “I happen to know for a fact that the money at the Lucky Gator is pretty good.”

  She shook her head as she swallowed. “Not the Gator. It’s a place called Beauregard’s.”

  He nearly choked on his drink. Sweet God. “Beauregard’s is kind of rough, don’t you think?”

  She waved that away. “It’s fine.”

  “No, it’s not. Didn’t someone get stabbed in the parking lot a couple of weeks ago?”

  “And things like that never happen in the Quarter, of course,” she said, rolling her eyes.

  “But I know Teddy would look out for you.”

  “I don’t need Teddy to look out for me.” At his look, she sighed. “Fine. I promise I won’t hang out in the parking lot, okay? The servers make good money there, and it’s close to my place. That’s all I really care about at the moment.”

  “Teddy would give you a job, you know.”

  “I know. But I don’t want to work at the Lucky Gator.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because.”

  That wasn’t a good answer. “Because why?”

  Exasperated, Jamie tossed the rest of her slice back into the box. “Because Teddy is a friend of yours, and I wanted to see if I could get a job on my own.”

  “And now that you know you can—”

  “I’m going to keep it,” she interrupted, leveling a hard look at him.

  He shrugged. “I’m just trying to help.”

  “And it’s appreciated, but unnecessary. I’m a big girl, Colin.” She wiped her fingers on a napkin, then crawled across the floor to straddle his lap. “I know you mean well, and it’s very sweet—if also a little annoying,” she warned. “But I’ve got to do this on my own. It’s important to me.”

  “It would be easier, though, if you’d just—”

  She put a finger over his lips. “Subject closed. Now, I’m going to the Backstreet Cultural Museum in Tremé tomorrow. Want to come with me?”

  “I thought you went there already.”

  “No, I was going to, but I went to the Presbytere instead. They have a fantastic Mardi Gras exhibit, but Backstreet is supposed to go deeper into the cultural aspects and African-American influence on Mardi Gras.”

  He settled his hands on her hips and adjusted her so he still kept circulation to his legs. “You know, there’s so much more to New Orleans than just Mardi Gras. We do manage to entertain ourselves the other ten months of the year.”

  She grinned. “But I like Mardi Gras.”

  “So do I. But there’s music and food and all kinds of history and...well, things that aren’t Mardi Gras.”

  “I know. I bought the guidebook, Colin.”

  “I’m talking about the things that aren’t in the guidebooks. The places the tourists don’t really know about. Yo
u’re a local now, so you should experience what New Orleans is really like.”

  “I’m not really a local yet.”

  “But you don’t want to live like a tourist forever, do you? Let me take you out and show you the real New Orleans. My New Orleans. The clubs, the restaurants...all the reasons I love this city.”

  Her head tilted to one side. “Like on an actual date?”

  He hadn’t really thought of it like that. He and Jamie had been spending a lot of time together this week, but it was mostly in bed. He knew every inch of her body, every way to make her whimper and scream, but they hadn’t had what anyone could call a date. It sounded a bit like backtracking at this point, but... “Yeah. Like a date.”

  She slid off his lap. “I’m not sure I’m ready for that.”

  He had to wonder about Jamie’s ex, what he’d done to her to not only send her running off to a new city but to also have her build such solid walls around herself. She never talked about her past except in very vague terms, but then she never asked about his past, either, thank God. He didn’t want to get all confessional about his life and his family, so he couldn’t get too upset over her avoidance of the same kind of topics.

  So it was a rather weird arrangement, being both more and less than friends. She’d come to his house, they’d have amazing, hanging-from-the-chandeliers sex, but she wouldn’t stay the night, always heading home once the afterglow faded. And while they talked about everything from pop culture to politics, they simply didn’t delve too deeply into personal topics. It was either very healthy or very sick, and the sad part was that he didn’t know which.

  “It’s dinner, not a marriage proposal, Jamie.”

  “I know, and it seems silly, considering...” She sighed. “Sure. It’ll be fun.”

  Boy, Jamie was tough on his ego. “Your enthusiasm is simply overwhelming.”

  “It’s not a lack of enthusiasm. It’s just strange. I mean, I had a plan for moving here. Get a job, maybe a cat, get my head screwed on straight.... Dating wasn’t really part of that plan.”

  “But celibacy was?”

  She shrugged. “Kind of. I mean, why complicate life unnecessarily?”

  “But...”

  “But here I am with you. And I’m not saying that’s a bad thing,” she added quickly, “just unexpected. Hell, I’m already giving advice to other people about their love lives, and if that’s not the most ironic and ridiculous thing ever, I don’t know what is.”

  “I’ve read your first Ex Factor column. It didn’t seem ridiculous to me.”

  “Really?”

  He nodded.

  She elbowed him. “And? Did you like it? Is it okay?”

  “Fishing for compliments?”

  “No. I’m simply worried I’m going to screw this up right out of the gate.”

  He rubbed her leg. “I thought it was great. Insightful and amusing at the same time.”

  “Really?” She looked both earnest and pleased at the same time. “You wouldn’t lie to me to make me feel better?”

  “Nope.”

  She blew out her breath. “Good, because I don’t want to let Callie down. She barely knows me and she’s letting me fill in for her.”

  They were a bit far afield from the earlier topic of going out, but this seemed important to her, so he went with it. Maybe relieving that worry might bring her around, too. “Even if it wasn’t good—which it is, so stop worrying—Callie isn’t going to hate you for it. It’s just a little advice column.”

  “And it’s a little scary, because I’m not sure I should be giving advice about other people’s love lives and problems, considering my own past.”

  He couldn’t consider her past or her ex, but there was no sense mentioning that. “These are people who write to strangers for advice. Anonymous strangers who do not even pretend to have any education or training to back up that advice. It would be kind of hard to screw that up.”

  “Callie’s not anonymous on the site.”

  “True. They know they’re asking an unmarried wedding planner and her ex-boyfriend for relationship tips. That’s messed up in ways I can’t even describe.”

  “Yet you do it anyway.”

  “As a favor to Callie.”

  Casually, almost too casually, Jamie said, “Callie’s great. I like her.”

  “Good.”

  “Should that be weird?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Callie’s your ex, and we are...” She fumbled for words. “Well, we are this.”

  Well, that was an enlightening description. “Callie and I haven’t been a couple since our freshman year in college. Any weirdness is long past.”

  “But you still care about her.”

  “Of course. We’re friends.”

  “Yeah, but so are we, and...” She looked at him evenly. “Look, if there’s something going on between you two, I really don’t want to get in the middle of it and mess it up.”

  “If you’re asking if I’m still in love with her, the answer is no. If you’re asking if we still sleep together occasionally, the answer is also no. We’re not that kind of friends.”

  Jamie nodded without lifting her eyes from her hands. “Can I ask how long it took for you to get over her?”

  “What?”

  “Y’all were obviously together for a while.”

  “A couple of years. But we were kids.”

  “What broke you up?”

  “A lot of things.” When Jamie didn’t say anything, he sighed. “Didn’t you ask Callie? I thought y’all were friends now.” This seemed exactly like the kind of things girls would dish about, and that actually made him a little uncomfortable, now that he thought about it.

  “Not like close friends. She just said y’all dated in high school and left it at that. I didn’t want to pry.”

  “But you’ll ask me about it?”

  “Yeah.” When he didn’t say anything, she nudged him with her foot. “Come on. What happened? I’m curious. Did you cheat on her?”

  There was something in her voice that told him more about her ex than she probably intended. “No, of course not.”

  “Then what?”

  “You’re not going to let this go, are you?”

  She shook her head.

  He sighed. So much for not prying into the past. “Callie went away for college—”

  “Which hurt your feelings?”

  “Maybe. In a way. She could have stayed local, but she got a scholarship to Wimbly Southern and took it. She changed while she was gone.”

  “People do that when they go away to college.”

  “I was only eighteen, remember? I didn’t have any type of perspective on life. All I knew was that my girlfriend chose to go away, became a totally different person, and then I had to go save her ass when she got into trouble. We had a huge fight, and I was going into my exams, and I nearly flunked them all that semester. And since I wasn’t on a scholarship like she was, I knew I couldn’t afford to retake the classes. Things went downhill from there pretty quickly.”

  “So it was her fault?”

  That was a tricky question, not that Jamie had any reason to think so. He’d blamed Callie at the time, but he had perspective now. He’d driven all the way to Mississippi to bail her out of jail, only to get blasted by her, as she did not want nor need his help. The long, miserable drive back had been bad enough, only to arrive home to find that his mother had been taken to the hospital in a nearly psychotic rage. That episode had been bad enough to finally get his mother officially diagnosed and medicated, but the guilt of his trip pushing her to that edge and his anger and misery over his fight with Callie had nearly derailed his exams. It had taken him awhile to put the pieces back together that time. Callie had been more the
catalyst than the cause, so he couldn’t lay all the blame on her. At least not now.

  He looked sideways at Jamie, who seemed to be patiently awaiting his answer. He might not want to share, but he didn’t want to lie, either. “Not entirely, but that was the last straw. For both of us, but for different reasons.”

  “But you’re friends now. And you write The Ex Factor together.”

  “That took a while, though. We lived in the same town, we had a lot of the same friends.... It wasn’t like we could cut each other out of our lives completely.”

  “But you didn’t get back together.”

  “Young love is great, but it doesn’t have staying power.”

  Jamie’s mouth twisted and he remembered her saying something about meeting her ex when she was nineteen. Oops. At the same time, she was proof he was right. “And The Ex Factor?”

  “The Ex Factor was kind of an accident. I built her website for her a few years ago, and one day I noticed she had written her take on a recent celebrity breakup. To this day I don’t know why, but I responded. People loved it and it became a thing.”

  “That’s nice.” Jamie stared at her hands again.

  “So is this really about Callie, or is it about your ex?” This time he had to nudge her when she didn’t answer.

  She made a noise between a snort and a laugh. “I don’t see me and Joey being friends in the future. We’re not kids, and this isn’t kid stuff. There’s a bit more dirt and disaster going on.”

  He shouldn’t be pressing this. He’d be a hypocrite to do so when he’d been almost as vague about him and Callie and their breakup. But there was one thing he did want to know—and it was fair game since she’d started it. “Are you still in love with him?”

  “No. And I don’t want him back, either.” She answered quickly and adamantly—almost too quickly and adamantly. As if she might be trying to convince herself as well as him. “I certainly can’t forgive him. But he was a part of my life for a long time, so...” She shrugged. “It’s weird.”

  “Life is weird.”