Friends with Benefits - Nicole Blanchard Page 0,50

in such a long time. I’m glad you stayed.”

“Me, too, but I better get my ass to practice, or it’ll belong to Coach.”

“When can I see you again?” she asked. “I have to work tomorrow, but maybe the day after? You could come after the twins fall asleep.”

I punctuated my promise with a kiss. “Looking forward to it.”

She went out first, herding the twins back to their room to get dressed, while I snuck out the front door to go back to my apartment.

I was already thinking about when I’d get to see her again.

Chapter Nineteen

Ember

It was April.

If there was ever an end date for my relationship with Tripp, it was the end of the school year, when he’d go off to play professional ball, and we’d have to go back to being friends. I didn’t want to think about it, but there was no denying the date on the calendar.

“One more month!” the twins screamed while running around in circles. “One more month!”

I winced and stared at the coffee maker, hoping it would sputter out it’s steaming brew more quickly.

“What’s all the yelling about?” Tripp asked, coming down the hallway in a pair of low-slung basketball shorts and a tank-top still wrinkled from where I’d thrown it on the floor the night before.

“ONE MORE MONTH!”

“Let me guess. One more month until they go deaf from all the screaming?” he asked as he pulled coffee cups down from the cabinet for the both of us. He was always doing thoughtful things like that. Making me a bath after a long shift at work. Doing the girl’s bedtime routine with them without them having to beg. Cooking for all of us, even after day-long practices.

And that didn’t include everything he did for me in bed.

I’d never in my life been with anyone so flat-out generous in all ways. He was mine for a short while longer, and I was going to keep him satisfied while I had him.

“Until they’re done with school. They’re excited to stay with your mom during the summer while I’m at work. I heard a rumor she was getting passes to the public pool for the three of them.”

The twins changed their shouted chorus to, “Pool! Pool! Pool!” as they laughed and screeched around the dining room table.

It didn’t even phase Tripp, who was pouring us both a cup of coffee, adding more sugar than should be humanly possible to consume to mine and drinking his with a touch of vanilla creamer. He passed my cup to me and leaned forward to give me a kiss. I let him because the girls had long since caught us making out from time-to-time. They liked to tease us and pretend to be grossed out, but I knew they liked Tripp almost as much as I did. Probably more than they liked me, if I was being honest.

“I’ll tell you who is really excited. My dad. He can’t stop talking my ear off about how much free time he has to do all the projects he loves now that mom isn’t occupying every spare minute with her honey-do list. I swear, if he weren’t head-over-heels for her, he’d kiss you for it.”

I made eyes at him over the rim of my steaming coffee cup. “You’re kidding.”

“Well, maybe about the kissing part. But he might build you a really nice spice rack or something as a thanks. I think he really loves it when the girls come over, though. They love it when he does his magic tricks for them.”

“How did your parents make it together so long?” The concept—a happy marriage—was so foreign to me. The example I’d seen for so long told me the only happy relationship was the one in the rearview mirror. Was that why I’d clung to Chris for so long? Was I afraid of turning out like my parents, so I had stayed in an unhappy relationship? Which had ended up becoming like theirs in the end, anyway.

We took our coffee to the living room, sitting on the new couch I’d bought from the online classifieds. It was well-worn and smelled faintly like fish sticks, but at least it wasn’t riddled with cigarette burns and stale beer stains. Tripp pulled me into his side, and I settled there, content. The girls had finally calmed down long enough to inhale a banana and a Pop-Tart each before they dashed off to pick out their clothes for school.

“I’ve never really thought about it. They’ve always sort of