Forget Me Not, Books I, II and III

Axis and Allies

The next morning, Teddi awoke with a smile on her face and the smell of coffee at her nose. Coffee? Coffee meant someone else was there, and she had a pretty good idea of who that someone would be. "Calvin," she muttered between a yawn and stretched her arms above her head. "Calvin!" She bolted up and began untangling the covers from around her body.

"That's my name."

She extracted herself from her sheets, relieved only partially that his voice was coming from the living room and not the bedroom of her suite.

She threw on her robe and tied it tighter than it needed to be before pushing open the door.

The boy she'd fought so hard to keep and so hard to push away sat near the room's picture window, pastries and steaming coffee on a service tray beside him, wearing the same clothes he had on last night. "Please tell me you haven't been here all night."

Calvin waggled his eyebrows in such an irritating and horrifying manner that if Teddi had been standing any closer to the tray of pastries she would have belted him with a muffin.

"What are you still doing here? You can't be here."

Calvin's eyebrows jumped high on his forehead. "Why not?"

"Why not?" Teddi thumped across the room, waving her arms. "Why not? Because it'll look like we... we...." Feeling embarrassed, she tightened the belt on her robe and looked away.

"We what?"

"Calvin!"

"Is that any way to talk to me after last night?"

Teddi's jaw hung low for a moment. She then snapped it up and folded her arms. "Nothing happened last night."

"I seem to recall a lot happening." Calvin crossed the room to her.

"Calvin," she warned, torn between taking a step back or a step forward. He still smelled good after sleeping in his clothes all night. How could that be? What was he trying to do to her? Her decision was made for her when Calvin moved closer and bent down to her ear.

"A lot happened, Teddi. Quite embarrassing, really. We danced. I should have been playing you Glenn Miller all along. Then we danced some more at another joint."

She glared at him.

He went on, "We talked. You got jealous--"

"I did not--"

"And that kiss," he whispered, brushing his nose along her ear, his lips hovering near her neck. "That kiss was amazing."

Teddi swallowed and forced herself to move away, a hot flush warming her skin. "Then what happened?" she asked cautiously.

"The piano bar downstairs. Don't you remember?"

"I remember going there. I remember the music was really nice. We had drinks, I think. That's all I remember. Did I drink too much? Please tell me we didn't--"

Calvin went on as if she hadn't spoken. "The way you snuggled up against me and ... fell asleep in my arms," he finished with a laugh. "It was a bear trying to get you up to your room quietly."

"So nothing happened."

"You snored a lot."

"No one saw us?"

"No one who cared."

"Are you sure?"

"We're not in Brookhurst." Calvin chuckled, making Teddi flush. Surely, he'd been in situations like this before. Probably with that Blue woman.