“D’you need your inhaler?”
“Both of them.” I nodded. “Please.”
I lay unmoving as he got up and walked over to the air box on the wall facing us. He returned to the spot next to me and held out my inhalers. I took the blue one first. I uncapped it and took a few puffs to open up my airways, just in case. I waited a few minutes them I took a few puffs of my brown inhaler to combat any symptoms that were lurking.
“You’re dangerous,” I told Risk. “Between your kisses and sex, I don’t know which one is gonna off me first.”
Risk smiled as he took my inhalers and put them back inside their box.
We both got under the covers of my bed then and instantly drew one another in close. I plastered myself against Risk’s hard body and deeply inhaled. His scent was a mixture of his cologne and sweat, but it was so primal, so male, so him. I loved it. I closed my eyes and couldn’t even remember falling asleep.
When I opened my eyes, I was alone in my bed and the room was dark. I sat up, catching my duvet against my naked chest. I touched the empty space next to me and it was still warm. My heart jumped.
“Risk?”
I heard a door open and close then my bedroom door opened.
“Hey.” The door clicked shut. “Did I wake you? I was in the bathroom.”
“I thought you’d left.”
I couldn’t see him; the room was too dark.
“What?” He climbed back into bed, tangling his body with mine and lying us back down under the duvet. “Why’d you think that?”
“Because you’re gonna leave,” I said. “You aren’t staying here forever. I . . . I already miss you.”
“Hey,” he nuzzled my neck with his mouth. “Don’t do this, Frank. Let’s just enjoy each other and we’ll figure out how to move forward when we have to, okay?”
“Okay.”
The only reason I agreed was because I didn’t want to think about a situation where we couldn’t figure something out and we’d go our separate ways again. I couldn’t be without him. I’d lived that way and it wasn’t even living, it was existing. I wanted, needed, him in my life. Even if it was only for a little while, even if it was only through phone calls or the occasional visits. I would take it all.
I’d take Risk any way that I could get him.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
FRANKIE
I missed work.
For the first time in my entire time of working at Mary Well’s diner, I overslept and missed work. I woke up to a phone call from Joe, he was very worried about me because I had never missed work before. If I knew I was going to be late, I’d call ahead to let him know. When I told him I overslept, he laughed. When I began to freak out, he told me to just take the day off and he’d have one of the other girls cover my shift. That was how I found myself home on a Saturday morning, lying on my bed staring at the ceiling. After the phone call to Joe ended, I realised that Risk wasn’t anywhere to be seen.
He’d left a handwritten scribbled note on the pillow he slept on.
Had to go to May’s, our manager needed us for a video conference call about us heading to London tomorrow. I didn’t want to wake you. You’re so beautiful, Cherry. Not an ugly sleeper at all. Risk x
I laughed when I read it then I rolled over and quickly winced. I looked down, shifted my thighs and winced again. Oh, I was tender. I didn’t know why I was surprised. I went from having a five-year-long dry spell to a five-times-in-one-night sexathon with Risk Keller. I lifted my hands to my face and giggled into them. I had sex all night with Risk Keller. Me! I bet there were millions of women, and a hell of a lot of men too, who would leer at me with jealously right now. I knew people who loved him would give a kidney to be in my position.
I felt like a sex kitten.
I grabbed my phone and stared at the screen. I really, really, wanted to google Risk. I wanted to watch videos of him, hear him speak in interviews and I really, fucking really, wanted to hear him sing but I was still scared. I knew I was in a little bubble of happiness right now because I had Risk for another twenty-four hours before he had to leave, I was worried I’d upset myself if went against what has kept me sane for the last nine years. I had heard ‘Cherry Bomb’ by accident when I turned the radio on the day before on my way to work. The second I heard Risk’s voice I was compelled to listen to it. That song though . . . God, it hurt my feelings. I knew it was about me, he described my body to a T.