What Happened After

Chapter 26

Chapter 26.

          It wasn’t that Taryn was a bad kisser—if I had been a willing participant, he actually would have been really good. It was the fact that he did it without asking, without making sure I wanted it too; that was what left me thrashing my arms around, attempting to get him off of me. He had backed me up against the far wall, hands on either side of my head, trapping me with his mouth on mine. He wasn’t rough. In fact, he was extremely gentle, as if he wasn’t quite sure he had my permission to go further.

          He didn’t.

          “Taryn, what the hell!” I exclaimed, finally able to push him off of me. He stared back at me with wide eyes, like he hadn’t realized what was happening until just now. Hadn’t realized what he had just done.

          “Oh my God,” he whispered. “Rayn. I am so, so sorry. I don’t know what happened, I just—I wanted to do that for so long that I—I had to…I’m sorry.”

          He was babbling and I could tell he was flustered, so I reached out a hand and touched his face, in hopes of calming him down. “Taryn…” I started.

          “No. Don’t do that,” he murmured.

          “Don’t do what?”

          “Don’t pretend like you don’t care that I just kissed you. I freaked you out; I know I did. I freaked myself out even, so don’t you dare try to tell me that was okay. It wasn’t.” He looked to be on the verge of tears, and I felt incredibly sorry for him.

          I moved my hand to the back of his head and pulled him toward me into a hug. “Shh, Taryn. It’s okay, alright? I forgive you, and I’m okay.”

          He pulled back, staring at me. “Are you sure? Because seriously, I can get Antoine to fix the schedule so we never have to work together. You never have to see me again, just say the word—“

          I shushed him by placing two fingers over his lips. He moved his eyes downward to stare at them, and I quickly pulled them back. “You don’t have to do that.”

          Taryn looked around the room—anywhere but at me—and then sighed. “Are we good?”

          I smiled. “We’re good. Just—if you can help it…don’t do that again, okay? And if you absolutely have to, just make sure you ask me first, because I’m gonna be honest, it threw me off a little. I didn’t know you…I didn’t know you felt that way.”

          Taryn chuckled. “Yeah well…I didn’t exactly make it very obvious for you. Or, well, maybe I did, but you were too distracted.”

          “By what?” I asked, confused.

          Smirking, he replied, “You know what by. Tall, insane green eyes that literally can’t be real, walks with a sort of pimp swagger—“

          “Okay, no. I was not, nor will I ever be, distracted by Ruesso Van Avery.”

          “Could’ve fooled me. How’s he doing, by the way?”

          “I told you this morning, I haven’t talked to him recently.”

          “Yeah?”

          “Yeah.”

 

          Taryn smirked again, and said matter-of-factly, “Good.”

~~~~~~~~~~

          I went home shortly after that, and I was so thankful to get out of there. The last thing I needed was to constantly uncomfortable at my own place of business. The conversation never got further than Taryn’s “are we good?” comment, and to be honest, I was a little relieved it didn’t. If there was one thing I needed, it wasn’t to have that conversation with him.