Kristen Ashley - The Promise

Some of them he sensed were good, like the one she just gave him.

The others he sensed were not good. So not good they were bad.

“Come on, baby,” he urged when she didn’t move.

She seemed to force herself out of whatever thoughts she was having and swiveled to the computer, saying, “I gotta turn this off.”

At that, Benny walked into the room, bent to the outlet, and yanked the computer plug out.

He straightened, looked at her, and said, “Now it’s off. Let’s go.”

Her mouth moved like she was fighting a smile before she pressed her hands into the arms of the chair and carefully folded out.

Ben didn’t like seeing her move like that. She was always a bundle of energy. Electric. Francesca Concetti saw no reason to walk up stairs when she could jog up them or, more frequently, skip. Frankie Concetti went to the gym. She did spin classes, Pilates, Zumba. Frankie Concetti didn’t cook; she cooked, swaying around the kitchen while she did it. Even sitting down or lazing around, she seemed charged. Mostly because you knew when she got up, it wouldn’t just be getting up. It would be bursting.

Not like she just got out of his father’s chair.

Seeing that energy shut down made him want to relive that day in the woods and do it over. In other words, not aim at Daniel Hart’s middle, where he shot Frankie and where Benny shot him. But instead, aim higher, like Cal did, and take the motherfucker’s head clean off.

He stopped thinking this when Frankie started moving. He moved after her, following her to his room. She went to his bed and climbed up on the covers.

He headed to the other side and angled in beside her.

She immediately started, “Ben—”

“Quiet,” he ordered, twisting and leaning across her, to which she pressed herself into the pillows to keep well away, a move that made him grin to himself.

He nabbed the remote, laid back, flicked on the TV, then multitasked, maneuvering through the guide as he shoved an arm under her and maneuvered her closer.

“Ben!” she snapped.

“You rest on your back and fall asleep, you’ll snore and I won’t be able to hear the TV. Tucked up to me, you don’t snore,” he told the TV as explanation to the protest he didn’t let her voice.

“Then I’ll rest on my side not tucked up to you and I won’t snore. But if I did, you wouldn’t hear me anyway because you’ll be downstairs watching TV.”

He ignored that, found there was nothing on they both might like, and hit the buttons to get to Netflix.

“Benny,” she prompted, putting minor pressure on his stomach to push away.

He looked down at her. “Quiet and settle.”

She gave him squinty eyes. “I’ll be quiet and settle when you aren’t in bed with me.”

“We gonna have this conversation every time I’m in bed with you? That is, until you come to terms with the fact I’m gonna be in bed with you a lot?”

Her eyes got squintier and she didn’t hesitate with her response. “No, since that day is never gonna happen and this day and the ones close to it, you’re gonna stop climbin’ into bed with me.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Yes, you are.”

“You do know I’m in this for the long haul.” She opened her mouth to speak, but he kept going. “And, just sayin’, I get a kick out of it. It makes my dick twitch in a way I like, squabblin’ with you, that attitude of yours. So, baby, you gotta know, I’m happy with you keepin’ on with that for as long as you like.”

That did it. She clamped her mouth shut.

He looked back at the TV and smiled.

Then he asked, “You seen The Expendables 2?”

She said nothing.

Back to the silent treatment.

He could work with that too, seeing as he hadn’t seen that movie, had been meaning to, and Francesca shutting her trap meant he could see to that. So he hit the button to fire up the movie.

He felt her attitude clog the air in the room as the movie started to roll and he kept feeling it until she fell asleep.

When she did, he curled her closer.

He did this because he liked her closer.

He also did it because, when he did, he could hear those sexy-as-fuck noises she made when she was sleeping a fuckuva lot better.

They didn’t come often.

But when they did, Benny liked every one.

The doorbell rang and Benny’s eyes opened.

He instantly felt the kinks in his body from sleeping on the couch.

He moved when he slept, which was why he’d bought a king-sized bed the instant he moved out of his parents’ house five months after he graduated high school. He’d had a tiny apartment and that bed took up nearly the whole bedroom, but he didn’t give a fuck. At his folks’ house, he’d had a twin and that shit was torture with the way Benny slept.

He forced himself to sitting and reached out to grab his jeans. He got up, stretching to get the kinks out, tugged them on, and nabbed his tee on the way to the door.

Frankie was out by nine the night before, so even though the kitchen took last orders at nine thirty, he went in to take over from Pop in order to supervise closing. He also went in to talk any of his kids down from quitting, seeing as his father was a drill sergeant in the kitchen and his kids weren’t used to that shit. This meant he didn’t get home until near on midnight.

He’d done the same the night before.

He was used to the late nights.

He was not used to that fucking couch.

He just hoped he could sort things with Frankie in a way so he wouldn’t have to get used to it.

He was pulling down his shirt at his stomach when he looked through the window at the top of the door and saw Frankie’s girl out there.

He unlocked it, opened it, and greeted, “Hey.”

“Hey,” she greeted back, her eyes traveling the length of him, catching on his crotch and staying there too long. They jerked up and he could swear he saw pink tinge the chocolate skin of her cheeks.

Used to that from women (without the blush, and the blush was cute), he bit back a grin and stepped out of the way, inviting her inside nonverbally but saying, “I’ll go wake her. Then I’ll make coffee and bring you both a cup.”

She was in by the time he was done speaking, so she turned to him, offering, “I’ll make coffee.”

He gave her a nod. “Have at it. Kitchen’s in the back. Make yourself at home.”

She dipped her chin and made a move to the back hall.

Benny closed the door and made his own move to the stairs.

“Uh…Benny?” she called when he had a foot on the first step.

He stopped and looked at her standing halfway down the hall. “Yeah?”

Her eyes went to the ceiling, then to him. “Figure you’re the kind who isn’t real big on interference, but…” She jerked her head toward the ceiling. “You know what you’re doin’ with her?”

She was right. He wasn’t the kind who was big on interference. Further, he didn’t know her and he was really not the kind who was big on interference from someone he didn’t know.

What he did know was that she was up early on a Saturday to come and hang when her girl was taking a shower. Same with her bein’ late to work the day before. So he didn’t know her, but he respected that.

He also knew from her question that Frankie had shared.

Not surprising. Women did that and that was a big part of what he didn’t understand about them. Why they would talk to their girls about their men in an attempt to understand their men when their girls were fucking girls and couldn’t begin to understand how a man’s mind worked, he did not get. Or, more to the point, get the concept that a man’s mind didn’t work at shit. Most men did what they did and that was it.

Trying to explain that to a woman was like slamming your head repeatedly into a wall.

But since Frankie shared and this woman had Frankie’s back, he was forced to do what he normally would not do with respect to the last.

“I know what I’m doin’,” he assured her.

“Frankie’s not right,” she told him.

“Yeah,” he agreed quietly. “She just got shot. That shit’ll shake you.”

“That’s not why she’s not right.”

He knew she was not wrong.

But he didn’t agree with her. He just stated “I’m seein’ to her” in a way he hoped didn’t invite further discourse but didn’t do it in a way where he came off sounding like a dick.

She held his eyes, and while she did, he had to give her more respect. This coming from the fact that it was clear she gave more than a passing shit about Frankie and he already knew she did that just from her going out of her way to take care of their girl.

So he gave her more.

“I have not done right by her. I’m rectifyin’ that.”

She nodded and he had a feeling she wanted to say more, but she didn’t. Her ending their conversation indicated she was showing him respect, and with that, he respected her more.

She moved back to the kitchen.

Benny moved up the stairs.

When he hit his bedroom, he saw Frankie on her back, covers resting at her hips, one leg slightly hitched at the side under the sheets, one hand resting low on her belly, her other arm cocked on the bed at her side, her mass of dark hair everywhere.

Beauty sleeping alone in his bed.

Fuck.

She was not snoring, which was surprising.

Another surprise: he hated snoring. His pop snored and did it so loud, it filled their house at night growing up. That shit would wake Benny, and hearing it constant, he wouldn’t be able to get to sleep.