“Hey, Derek. Let’s not get into this, okay? I’m sorry about what happened, but…” Nick tried to walk by him, but Derek moved to block him.
“Look, Nick. I still love Carly and I intend to fight for her.”
Nick stood there, not knowing what to say to that.
“Okay…”
“I just wanted to let you know, that’s all.” Derek moved aside so Nick could pass. Nick walked by him, moved towards the door and then stopped and turned around.
“So, let me get this straight. You were fucking Carly’s best friend for the past month or longer, but now you want to fight for her?”
Derek stared at him and thought, Man, this guy’s got some balls. Not a lot of people talked to him that way.
“I’m just saying, Derek, I mean, you want her all of a sudden now that she’s with me?” Nick pushed the issue further. He liked Derek, but he was starting to piss him off.
“Nick, I like you, man, but you better watch it. You don’t know what you’re talking about. I was nice enough to give you a head’s up. I didn’t have to do that.” Derek said, angrily.
“Yeah, I know, but I just don’t get it, man.” Nick said.
“Well, I don’t have to explain myself to you.” Derek spat at him.
“You’re right, you don’t. See ya.” Nick turned around and started to walk towards the door again.
“So, I guess you heard about me and Rinda from Carly?”
Nick turned around again.
“Yeah.”
“That bitch…” Derek said under his breath.
“What?”
“Oh, nothing. So, what’s the deal with you guys? Are you just fucking or is it more than that?”
“It’s none of your fuckin’ business, man.” Nick said, not wanting to have this conversation.
“It is my fuckin’ business. Carly and I own this house together; we’ve been together two years—there’s history there. Hey, you wanted to know what my intentions were…”
“What I don’t get is why you didn’t appreciate her before you hooked up with Rinda. She’s probably the best thing that ever happened to you and you threw it all away. At least I appreciate her.” Nick replied coldly. This was getting old fast. He was out of here. He started for the front door again.
“Hey, Nick…” Derek said and just as Nick turned around, Derek’s fist met with his face.
At that exact moment, Carly walked into the room.
“Oh my God, Derek! What are you doing?!” Carly asked. Nick felt his face and winced in pain. He was going to have a helluva black eye tomorrow. In anger, Nick lunged at Derek and his fist connected with his jaw; just barely though because Derek saw it coming and managed to get out the way almost completely.
“Stop it, you guys! This is ridiculous!” Carly yelled and got between them. Derek felt the sting on his jaw and rubbed it.
“Don’t worry, we’re done!” Derek flung out. “Get the hell out!”
“Gladly, dude.” Nick said and walked out the door with Carly running after him.
“Don’t say a word.” Nick warned Carly as they made a beeline to his car and drove off.
“Oh, Nick…” Carly said when she saw how red the right side of his face was. “Does it hurt?”
Nick glared at her. “What do you think?”
Carly was quiet for a minute. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault. Things just got out of hand.”
“I guess. I was just in the bathroom a couple of minutes!”
“Well, it didn’t take long for him to confront me.”
“What did he say?”
“You know what, I don’t really want to talk about it right now. My fuckin’ eye hurts really bad right now and I just want to drop you off and then put something frozen on it.” He said icily. The conversation and physical confrontation with Derek had put him in a foul mood.
Carly sat there quietly. She thought it was probably a good idea to just leave it alone—for now anyway.
Five minutes later they were at the restaurant parking lot and Nick pulled up alongside her car.
“Well, I hope your eye feels better.” Carly said and got out of his car. She unlocked her car door and got inside feeling like crying.
Nick leaned out of his window and said, “I’ll call you later.” And drove off.
Carly’s tears turned to anger and she headed back to her house. Just as she pulled up, Derek was walking out of the house towards his car.
“Derek, wait, I want to talk to you.” She said, getting out of her car.
“I can’t. I’ve got to go.” He said, trying to brush her off. He knew what she wanted to talk about and he was all talked out.
Carly walked over to him. “Too bad. I have something to say.”
Derek sighed, closed his car door and leaned against it, crossing his arms across his chest.
“Go ahead.”
“First of all, we’re over, so get over it. And second of all, I love Nick so you’re going to have to just get used to him being around some of the time, at least until we can figure out what we’re going to do about the house. Okay?”
“Okay.” He said quietly.
“Really?” She couldn’t believe he was giving up that easily.
“Yeah, what else can I do?” He sighed.
“Oh. Well, then, thanks, I guess.” She said, feeling guilty for hurting him now.
“I wish you guys well. Can I get a hug?” He said.
“Sure.” She said. They hugged and then Derek reached up and kissed her. The kiss began to deepen, his tongue finding hers, his hands cupping her face between his hands. Carly lost herself in the heat of the moment. It did feel good to kiss him again; he was always a good kisser. But then again, so was Nick.
“No, Derek! Stop!” She cried out, pushing him away from her. “So much for trust.” She flung at him.
“I’m sorry. I had to play my last card.” He said.
“Yeah, well, you dealt me a bad hand.”
Derek smiled at her. “You’re beautiful when you’re mad.”
“Shut up!” She punched him in the arm.
“Alright. I’ll stop pursuing you, but you have to admit that you liked the kiss.”
“Of course, I did. That was never an issue with us, but it’s still over between us. Can you accept that?”
Long pause, then heavy sigh. “Yeah, I guess.”
“You promise?” She looked at him to see if he was telling the truth this time.
Derek held up his hands in surrender and then let them fall back down to his sides in defeat. “Yeah, I promise.”
“Okay, good.” She sighed. “Just one more thing. Please don’t hit my boyfriend again, okay?”
Derek laughed. “He deserved it.”
“And so did you.” She said and reached up and rubbed his swollen jaw.
“Hey, that hurts.” He pulled away.
“Good.” She smiled. “Do you think we can be friends?”
“I don’t know, Car, that’s asking a lot.” He said truthfully.
“Well, I hope so. Anyway, I’ll let you go.” She started to walk towards the front of the house.
“Carly?”
She turned to look at him.
“Hey, I’m sorry I was such a dick to you. You didn’t deserve me screwing around on you like I did, especially with your best friend. I really am sorry.”
She looked into his eyes and knew that deep down he really was. She smiled at him, tears forming in her eyes.
“Thanks for that. I’m sorry, too.” She walked up the steps to the front door, opened it and closed it. She heard Derek start his car and drive off.
Carly looked around. She loved this house. They had only owned it a few weeks and now what would happen? She was pretty sure Derek would let her have it if she wanted it, but she couldn’t afford it without him contributing to the mortgage each month. She thought about Nick. Well, Nick wouldn’t want to live there—his life was in Hollywood, LA, Florida and all over the world when they were on tour. It was safe to assume that La Verne wasn’t a part of his agenda, even though it was where she lived—for now anyway.
She sighed. They would have to sell it unless Derek wanted to keep it, but she doubted he could on a cop’s salary alone. Anyway, things were about to change and she was a little scared of what the future held.
Where would she live now? The guys were halfway done with the album so a tour was imminent in a few months’ time. What then? Would she go on tour with Nick? She smiled. The thought of it thrilled her. She would love to, but it would be up to Nick and the guys. She suspected that Leighanne and Kristin might be going with Brian and Kevin, but she didn’t know for sure.
Oh, God and what about her job? It would be too awkward to continue to work with Derek and besides, if she were moving to LA to be near Nick, it would be too far of a drive anyway. She sighed. All these decisions that would have to be made and she hadn’t even talked to Nick about marriage and kids yet. She shook her head. Well, today was definitely not the day to do that. He seemed pretty mad at her or at least mad in general when he dropped her off at her car today. She didn’t blame him; Derek could be a little harsh when provoked so she could only imagine what he had said to Nick.
Okay, Carly, just think about the here and now, she told herself as she walked into her bedroom and undressed. She needed a shower after the stress of the morning. She stood in front of the mirror in the bathroom. She was looking good, glowing even. She smiled. Nick was having a good affect on her; well, that and the sex was incredible. She laughed and then entered the shower stall. She let the hot water pour over her, rinsing her troubles away and relaxing her entire body.
Nick was trying to let the affects of his fight with Derek wear off on him. He drove back to his house in LA, grabbed a frozen bag of vegetables out of the freezer, laid down on his couch and pressed the bag to his eye. “Ouch!” he said, wincing. Goddamn it, that hurt. It was going to be a gorgeous shade of black by tomorrow he was certain. Right now it was a beautiful tinge of yellow.
Lying there, Nick turned on the TV and watched some old reruns of “I Love Lucy”. He smiled when he thought about how he and Lucille Ball were both born in the same hospital. He laughed a little at her antics and let it occupy his mind for awhile until there was a scene with a policeman and it made him think of Derek and then Carly. He flicked off the boob tube and laid back, letting the fake compress ease his pain. But the pain in his heart was still very real. He loved Carly; he was sure of it, but he was concerned over her relationship with Derek. He believed her when she had told him that she had told Derek that they were over, but like Derek had so clearly pointed out, they had been together for two years and they had a history together. What if that history evoked old feelings of love from Carly when she was alone with him again? Derek had told him that he was going to fight for Carly. What did that entail? Would he try to kiss her, try to make love to her, wine and dine her, send her e-mails, letters, phone calls—what? Nick wondered. He sighed. It was no use worrying about it; he couldn’t do anything about it anyway; at least not now. Besides, he hadn’t left Carly on the best of terms. He was sorry about the way he had treated her; it wasn’t her fault her ex-boyfriend was such a prick. Well, that wasn’t exactly true because he actually still liked Derek. Yeah, he put on this macho, overbearing front sometimes, but in the scheme of things, he seemed like a pretty cool guy and like Nick had thought when he had first met him, under different circumstances, they would probably be good friends.
Nick sighed and then thought about Carly. He closed his eyes and let his mind wander. She was a vision; beautiful; lovely—all the glorious adjectives he could think of rolled into one incredible woman. A woman he wanted to keep; a woman he wanted to be with for a very long time. But for how long, Carter? He thought. Well, he didn’t see himself wanting to let her go anytime soon; he loved the fact that she was now his girlfriend and that they would be seeing each other; dating on a regular basis. It was funny that they were already to this stage and they had hardly dated at all. He intended to date her as much as possible before the tour started. Luckily, he had a few weeks until that happened, but there was always busy BSB stuff concerning the album, promotional stuff and tour discussions to contend with and of course the media; always the media. He had dealt with all of that before with past girlfriends, but they were usually already in the biz so they were used to it and knew what it entailed. Carly might be in for a rude awakening; but he felt she could handle it all. She was a trooper and he was confident she would get through it all with flying colors.
Nick turned over onto his side on the couch, clutching the wet bag to his eye. He let his mind wander to their lovemaking sessions; especially their most recent one this morning. Ahh… the sex was so good… it had to be one of the best, if not the best sexual experiences he had; they were so in sync when they made love; their bodies coupling in perfect rhythm and harmony. He laughed. It sounded like a poem or lyrics. Hmm, maybe he could write a song about how beautiful it all was with her. He smiled, maybe someday if he did another solo album. Right now he wanted to drift off to sleep dreaming of her lovely hands moving over his body, her mouth pressing against his own and their bodies rubbing against one another when all they could feel was the beating of each other’s hearts… beating out sexual impulses; beating out love…
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Chapter 11
