64 #TheManUpstairs

July 23, 2017
Sunday

[9:35 AM]TORI: Open the damn gate.

[9:35 AM]TEDDI: You’re here?  WHY are you here?  Shouldn’t you be at church?

[9:36 AM]TORI: I want to hear about your date.  God understands.  Now lemme in.  I have pastries. 

 

Teddi hoped there were enough pastries for the man upstairs – Jon, not God.  As of twenty minutes ago, he was still snoring but probably wouldn’t sleep much longer.  He’d come in search of coffee to find Tori and her pastries. 

 

Pastries sound good.

 

A croissant would be quite welcome, actually.  She hadn’t eaten anything since getting up an hour ago.  Watching Jon sleep, showering, dressing, and makeup, yes, but she’d gotten waylaid on the way to the kitchen. 

 

Her pool bag in the foyer needed to be put away and emptying that had led her to the office.  When she plugged in the phone to charge, she automatically started checking email and found a slew of unread messages from Julia. 

 

Her assistant worked from her own home yesterday, even though Teddi explicitly gave her the day off, and it looked like she’d done quite a bit of work.  There were new clients in the queue, which was excellent news.  The work would keep her busy while Jon was in the Hamptons.

 

For now, though, Teddi rose with a grimace.  The tenderness between her legs proved that uninhibited sex did not come without completely without consequence.   If it was the only reminder of her actions, she would be grateful.  The things she’d said… The things he’d said…

 

“I want to be more.  Let me be more.”

 

They were just the words of a man set free by wine and wickedness, she reminded herself.  Hopefully, he’d file her freedom of speech under a similar heading, or better yet… the whole thing would be a pleasant but hazy memory for him. 

 

She navigated the two foyer steps with deliberate caution as the front bell rang.

 

“Well?  How was it?”  Tori burst into the house with nothing resembling a proper greeting, but the bag she held excused the lack of manners.  It bore the logo of a beloved French bakery in Red Bank. 

 

“Please tell me there’s a chocolate almond croissant in here.” 

 

The bag was pushed into her hands with rolled eyes.  “Duh. If I’m going to storm the Bastille, of course I’m bringing croissants.  Butter, almond, chocolate and chocolate almond.  Carbs make you less cranky about gate crashers.”

 

Despite herself, Teddi grinned.  “You’re incredibly perceptive and tolerant of my idiosyncrasies.”

 

“Tolerance is easier when I want gossip.  Give me the scoop!”

 

“Coffee first,” Teddi insisted, waving her cousin toward the kitchen.  Jon liked almond cookies.  Perhaps an almond croissant would make him amenable to company this morning.

 

He’ll be more amenable than you are, even without the croissant.

 

The fact that it was Tori instead of someone else made it better, but the truth remained.  Jon was going to be gone for a few weeks, and Teddi preferred that the minutes they had together were spent alone. 

 

Then again, this reduced the opportunity for him to mention anything that happened last night.  Like the confession that he was everything to her.  He was, in the world encapsulated by this house.  But this house wasn’t reality.  Not for him.  His world was the size of the globe, and Teddi was only a tiny pin on the map.  A tiny, immobile pin.

 

“Hey!”  Impatient fingers snapped inches from her nose.  “Stop doing that thing where you pretend nobody else exists.  I exist, and I’m dying of curiosity.”

 

An automatic smile creased Teddi’s cheeks, and she placed the bag on the island.  “Sorry.  You make coffee while I get plates and cutlery.”

 

“I’ll make coffee, but nobody eats a croissant with a fork.  Get the plates and start talking.  I assume he either didn’t stay or has already left, since I didn’t see his car outside.”

 

Teddi removed a stack of three white saucers and a plate from the cabinet before opening a drawer for the same number of forks.  She used them, particularly when the croissants were filled with chocolate.  Adding napkins to the mix, she said, “He drank too much to drive.  A hired car brought us home from David’s.”

 

The hands sorting through coffee pods froze, and eyes widened to the size of corrective lenses. “Is that an indirect way of saying he’s still here?”

 

This time her smile was borne of genuine amusement as she opened the bakery bag.  “Yes.  He was still sleeping when I came downstairs.”

 

“Teddi.”  Her cousin’s hands fell to the marble counter so she could lean on it.  “Jon Bon Jovi is asleep in your bed.  I mean, logically, I know you guys are seeing each other, but damn.  HRH is drooling on your pillow.”

 

“I don’t drool,” a scratchy voice interjected as the slow pad of feet crossing hardwood became audible.  And his feet weren’t the only thing bare.  Jon was also shirtless when he arrived at the end of the island, scratching his chest with a frown.  “What’s ‘HRH’ mean?”

 

“Yes, Victoria.  What is that?”  Teddi couldn’t resist smirking at the blush creeping into the other woman’s cheeks before turning to him.  “Good morning.  How are you feeling?”

 

“Dehydrated.”

 

Abandoning the baked goods that were still in their bag, she went for a glass and filled it from the refrigerator.  He accepted it with murmured thanks and turned expectant eyes on Tori, who was apparently enamored by the selection of coffee pods.

 

Teddi snickered and went back to the sack of pastries, withdrawing one perfectly golden specimen at a time to go on the artfully arranged plate.  “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Tori.  We all know you aren’t bashful.  Tell him.”

 

“Fine.”  She huffed and jerked another cup from the mug tree to slide into the Keurig.  “HRH stands for ‘His Royal Hotness’, who should be wearing a frigging shirt.” 

 

Jon drained the water glass and laughed as it landed on the counter with a subtle thunk. 

 

“Shirt’s upstairs, but if my chest offends you, I can cover it up.” With that, he used Teddi as his cover-up, sliding up behind her and touching his lips to the neck exposed by up-twisted hair.  “Mornin’, baby.” 

 

She savored the weight of the palms encasing her hips and the bare feet snugged against the outside of hers.  Even more, her heart devoured his easy, open affection like a starving cat with a helping of cream. 

 

Lopsided amusement settled on her lips as she peeked at him from the corner of her eye.  “Tori brought croissants.  There’s almond.”

 

“Mm.”  The wrinkle of his nose was denial enough.  “They look great, but I’ll stick with coffee for now.”

 

Coaxing eyebrows were turned on her cousin, who hadn’t started the Keurig since putting the cup in place.  She’d gone from averting her eyes to staring with blatant interest that Teddi pretended not to notice. “He prefers the Colombian, if you’re still playing barista.”

 

The other woman didn’t jump to obey.  She just shook her head and flicked astounded eyes from Teddi to Jon and back again.  “Holy shit.  I know it’s Sunday, so ‘forgive me, Father’ and all that, but it’s the only thing I can come up with here.”

 

“What?  You wanted the Colombian?  French roast is cool, too.”  Jon’s smile was only lip service as his chest molded to the back of Teddi’s ivory t-shirt. 

 

He’d been disappointed to find her gone from the bed when he awoke.  Those final Gypsy minutes had been stolen from him, and as expected, when he arrived in the kitchen, it was to find she’d been replaced with that politely neutral identity.  What he hadn’t expected was to find her on the defensive – even if mildly – at Tori’s hand. 

 

Tori was fine.  He liked her, but this morning, Jon was on Team Seclusion and wishing for alone-time with his girl.

 

The girl who was comfortably snugging shoulders against his pecs as though it was the most natural thing in the world.  Considering that she’d done no more than hold his hand and accept a couple of chaste kisses at David’s yesterday, this micro display of trust fired up his protectiveness.  He laid a shielding forearm over the waistband of her khakis. 

 

With the odd energy radiating from the vicinity of the coffeemaker, he had a feeling that whatever came next would fall into Teddi’s imaginary “judgment” column.  The arm and his remark about French roast remark were lame efforts to deflect it, but they were the best his muzzy brain could muster with a hangover.

 

But it turned out that his protection was unnecessary.

 

It wasn’t judgment clouding Tori’s eyes.  She pushed a hand under her glasses with one hand, simultaneously pinching the bridge of her nose and pressing against leaky tear ducts.  “Fifteen years you were married to Truman, and I never once saw you lean on him that way.  He definitely never gave off that ‘don’t fuck with my woman’ vibe.  You’re killin’ me, Smalls. Both of you.”

 

“Victoria…”

 

“Shut it, Theodosia.”  The little woman gave an unladylike sniff and stabbed the button that would start the Keurig humming through its routine.  “The man wants Colombian, fine.  French roast is mine.  And save me the plain croissant.”

 

His vigilant stance relaxed, and Jon chuckled at Tori’s bad ass annoyance with her emotions, even as his ego absorbed the informational tidbit about Truman.  Maybe that gave Jon an edge when it came to fixing the anxiety the other man left to flourish.  Only time would tell.

 

“Didn’t mean to interrupt your Sunday brunch.  I can take my coffee upstairs and have a shower.”  Without releasing his grip on the woman cutting into a croissant with a fork, he murmured, “Will you take me to get my car later?”

 

She twisted her neck, mouth apologetically contorted.  “I don’t drive.”

 

“You don’t have to vamoose on my account,” Tori inserted, scooting the filled and steaming cup across the marble toward him.  “I’m acclimating to the lack of clothes and bedhead.  After you shower away your eau de sex, I can probably even be trusted to chauffeur you to Colts Neck.”

 

Teddi squirmed against his arm and put her fork down, visibly uncomfortable at the candidness.  Because there was no denying that he reeked of sex.  “Not everyone is charmed by your outrageous honesty, including me.  Show a little decorum.”

 

After decades of traveling with the band, Tori’s outrageousness was nothing more than conversation in Jon’s book.  He let it roll off his back, more interested in the latest bit of Teddi trivia.  Craning his neck, he looked down at her and asked, “You don’t drive?”

 

“I’m from Boston.  There’s was no need.”

 

“I offered to teach her.”  Tori’s shrug came with a “what are you gonna do?” look.  “A woman her age, living in the ‘burbs should know how to drive, right?”

 

“Considering that I seldom leave the house, it would be a wasted skill.”

 

“Bet she’d change her mind if you offered her the wheel of that Chevelle.  Just saying.”

 

Jon looked back and forth between the two women while contemplating the suggestion.  Okay, so maybe he needed to reconsider that Team Seclusion stance this morning.  Having Tori around was pretty damn informative.  “You like the Chevelle, Cookie?”

 

“It’s nice.  It comes pre-equipped with the attitude I associate with you.”

 

Relaxing his arm, he eased to the right for a better look at the woman was fiddling with that fork.  Who used a fork with a croissant, anyway?  “What attitude?”

 

“I don’t have the proper word to describe it.”

 

“Don’t make me do it for you, Theodosia.”

 

She cut a glare at the cousin who was picking apart a flaky pastry with her fingers and licking crumbs from the tips.  “It has a swagger to it, I suppose.  I know it came years after the song, but it always reminds me of that lyric in ‘Never Say Goodbye’.”

 

Rememberin’ when we used to park
On Butler Street, out in the dark
Remember when we lost the keys and
You lost more than that in my backseat, baby

 

After running it through in his mind, Jon lifted an interested eyebrow.  “About the backseat?”

 

“Mm-hmm.”  A chunk of croissant was transferred from the fork to her mouth, providing the perfect excuse for not elaborating.

 

Well, well.  She wants to fuck in the backseat of my car.

 

While that sounded uncomfortable as hell, it was also intriguing.   If he could manage to forget that he hauled his kids around in that backseat, he’d be game to fool around.  Any hanky-panky outside the cauldron would be a step in the right direction.

 

“Well, I’ve taught three kids to drive so far.  I’d be willing to teach you.”

 

“In the fucking Chevelle?”

 

The question came from Tori, but Jon directed his answer to the woman who had stopped chewing to stare at him. 

 

“Sure.  Why not?”