Let Me Be the One

Chapter Five

Vicki would have happily remained under the softest sheets she'd ever slept in, had it not been for the incredible smell of bacon and eggs coming from the kitchen.

How long had she been asleep? She couldn't remember heading to bed...or, she thought as she looked across the room and saw her dress draped carefully over the arm of a chair, taking off her dress for that matter.

Oh God, she thought as she felt her face heat up, had Ryan undressed her last night? She had a vague memory of being in his arms, with her arms around his neck, and his skin warm beneath her lips.

She gasped aloud at the horrifying thought that she might have thrown herself at him, her gasp turning to a moan at the even more horrifying realization that if she had, the solo state of her bed and the intact state of her underwear meant he certainly hadn't taken her up on it.

Her heart was pounding hard as she stripped off her underwear and got into the shower. The water pressure from the multiple expensive showerheads running down the wall from her head to her calves was heavenly, but she could hardly enjoy it while worrying about what she had - or hadn't - done to Ryan last night.

She knew he'd be a total gentleman about her throwing herself at him...but that didn't mean she wouldn't forever be hugely mortified about it.

Not able to stand not knowing what had happened for another second, she quickly dried off, slicked her hair back into a ponytail that she'd pay for later when the top of her hair was flat and the bottom looked like a bunny's tail, and threw on a pair of fatigue-print capris and an army-green tank top. Her heart thudded as she made her way down the hall to the stairs.

At the stove, Ryan's back was to her, but as soon as he heard her footsteps, he turned and said, "Perfect timing. Breakfast is almost up."

She carefully studied his expression for any awkwardness, but he looked just as easygoing as always. Relief flooded her at the desperate hope that she hadn't made a complete idiot of herself last night.

Still, the near miss was a very good warning to remember to keep her guard up around Ryan. The last thing she wanted to do was make him uncomfortable in any way. Especially after he'd rushed to her rescue last night and was now letting her crash at his oceanfront mansion.

"Was the bed okay?"

He handed her a plate full of bacon and eggs and toast, and her stomach grumbled in appreciation. "Between the bed and the shower and now breakfast, I'm not sure you'll ever figure out a way to get me to leave."

She'd meant it as a joke, but he didn't so much as smile at her. "Sounds good to me."

Her skin tingled under the intensity of his gaze and she sternly told herself to snap out of constantly fantasizing that there was something more behind his words than there actually was. Still, she needed to make absolutely certain that she hadn't crossed the line last night.

"I feel really bad about falling asleep on you last night. You know what a lightweight I am, especially after a few sleepless nights at Roach Central Station."

He sat down at the breakfast bar beside her and poured them both coffee. It smelled like heaven, but she was still too churned up over being this close to him to do more than cup the mug in her hands.

"My ego will get over it eventually," he joked, but a moment later she was surprised to see her easygoing friend look a little bit nervous. "I didn't think you'd be comfortable sleeping in your dress, obviously."

Now it was her turn to joke, "Just as long as you kept your eyes closed."

The lacy undergarments were her big post-divorce splurge, a last-ditch effort to try to feel the slightest bit sexy again. Now, even though they weren't exactly practical, she wore them as often as she could simply because they'd been so expensive and she was hell bent on getting her money's worth out of them.

She couldn't help wondering if he'd liked what he saw, even though she knew tall, brunette, size-four supermodels were his type rather than small, blonde, curvy girls like her.

He held his hands up as if to admit that he had, in fact, taken a peek or two. "Sorry about that. Forgive me?"

If he had been anyone else and she hadn't been horribly, excruciatingly attracted to him - say, if he were g*y - she would be rolling with this no problem.

Yes, that was what she'd do.

She'd pretend he was gay.

Or that she was.

Actually, it would probably be safer just to pretend both of them were completely, utterly into their own team.

Forcing herself to shrug, she teased, "Just so you know, the next time I fall asleep on you, I sleep best with nothing on at all."

Ryan choked on the bite of eggs he'd just taken and she silently cursed herself for saying exactly the wrong thing to diffuse the situation.

"So," she said a little too brightly, "what's on your agenda today? Practice? Or a game?" She crammed a huge handful of bacon into her mouth to make herself shut up.

Ryan drank some coffee to wash down the rest of the eggs before saying, "There's an afternoon game."

"Are you pitching?"

"Tomorrow night. Any chance you can make it?"

"I can't today, but hopefully tomorrow." She'd never been a baseball fan until she'd seen him play in high school from her spot in the shadows of the big oak tree some distance back from the field and stands. "The board will be coming by this afternoon to check in on all of this year's fellowship contenders."

Ryan's expression tightened. "Is James going to be there?" When she nodded, he said, "Make sure you don't end up alone with him, Vicki."

"Don't worry," she said, "I'm not going to be that stupid ever again."

"He tricked you."

"Maybe, but I should have known better, enough to at least trust my instincts about him when he gave me the creeps at the studio. In any case, between his thinking you and I are an item and all the people that will be at the studio this afternoon, I can't imagine he'd try anything."

"He'd better not." Her friend's expression was fierce. "You mean too much to me. Why don't you give me the address of the studio, just in case."

He'd just typed it into his phone when it rang.

"It's my cousin. Sorry, I need to take this." He put the phone to his ear. "Rafe, hold on a sec."

He rattled around in a kitchen drawer and pulled out a set of car keys. "I wish I could take you back and forth from the studio, but now that I've moved you way out to the edge of the city, why don't you use one of my cars so you're not stuck on my schedule?"

She knew he was right, that it didn't make sense for her to try to get from Sea Cliff to the Mission on the bus. But as she took the keys, she felt more and more like she was taking advantage of him. Not only was he playing her fake boyfriend, but he'd also given her an oceanfront mansion to live in and now she held the keys to one of the shiny cars in his garage.

Ryan gave her an absentminded kiss on her cheek before he walked away, but she could tell he'd all but forgotten her as he walked off to talk with his cousin.

Vicki took their plates over to the sink, then washed and dried them while trying to enjoy the view of the morning sun over the ocean despite feeling like a complete interloper.

As she watched the gold and green and blue water merge, then break against the shore, a buzzing began just beneath her skin.

It was that feeling she got when inspiration hit. Big-time inspiration.

She rushed back up to the bedroom to put on some flip-flops and grab her bag. Even the luxurious interior of the Porsche convertible Ryan had given her to drive barely registered as she raced against traffic toward the parking garage nearest to the studio.

She'd waited so long to feel this rush of inspiration again that she could literally feel the energy about to burst from her fingers.

Vicki practically ran from the parking garage to the building the fellowship committee had opened up to the candidates. Making a beeline for her small studio, she flicked on the light switch, dropped her bag to the ground, and grabbed a new container of Plasticine modeling clay. Later, if she nailed a small-scale model, she'd make it full size with oil-based clay.

It was so easy to overthink this feeling, to stop and drill down to see where it had come from, to want to know not only where exactly it had come from, but also where it was going. Fortunately, after years of experience, Vicki knew better than to make the mistake of doing any of those things.

All she needed to do today was go with it, let the clay talk to her through her fingers...and pray that it all made sense when she resurfaced.

It was, she suddenly realized, like trusting the ocean tide to take her out with it before bringing her back in again, refreshed and renewed.

Slipping on her headphones and putting a recording of the ocean on repeat, she placed her hands on the clay and closed her eyes. Following her instincts, she let herself shape and carve, enjoying the sweet pleasure of the emotion flowing from the center of her chest, then down her arms and out of her fingers.

The rhythm of water in her ears matched her heartbeat as she worked steadily, lost to time, to thirst or hunger, to anything but the pure, sweet joy of creation.

* * *

Ryan slipped his phone back into his pocket and stared out over the ocean as he thought about what Rafe had told him.

James Sedgwick had come up clean. A little too clean, according to his cousin. Ryan was fully confident that if there was anything to find on the guy, Rafe would find it. Unfortunately, it looked like he was going to have to wait for his cousin to dig deeper.

While he'd been on the line with Rafe, Vicki had headed out. Unable to shake the feeling that he and Vicki had left things in a strange place at breakfast, Ryan decided to drop by her studio to see her and her project before going to the stadium for a pregame workout.

As he drove back into one of the seedier parts of San Francisco, just thinking about Vicki working in this part of town made it hard to keep his possessive, protective nature in check when he wanted so badly to make sure nothing ever hurt her again.

All those years, if he'd known she hadn't been happy with her husband, he would have -

What?

What would he have done?

Chased her halfway around the world and begged her for what? To let him sleep with her like every as**ole who wanted a piece of her?

Or, he suddenly found himself wondering, would he actually have been begging for something more?