Unfriended(Love in New Highland Book 1)(4)

We were friends when we met up again my first year in college.

And we've been besties almost as long as I've been dating Aura.

Our friendship may not be based on passion, on attraction, but it's special, dammit.

Aura doesn't know the meaning of being there for somebody. The closer we've gotten, the more she's taken.

As far as she's concerned, she's the center of a Ptolemaic universe that revolves around her.

It was now completely clear to me that this shit wouldn't end until I was as broken as my girlfriend was.

So you can see that by now I'd worked myself up to painting Aura Renaldi  as a succubus, a Gorgon, a siren … go on and pick any classic female  monster lethal to men and I'll knock fists with that.

Point is, I blew up … and burned the last bridge.





CHAPTER 4





Three Years Ago-The Reconnect



Charis: No. Way.

Asher: Hey! Hey, it's you.

Charis: You have to be kidding me. Asher Norrell, is that really you?

Asher: Hey, girl.

Charis: I can't believe it! Whoa, that's some hug. Look at you. Muscles!  All grown up and looking good, Ash. What have you been doing? What are  you doing here?

Asher: What do you think, Sloane? I'm enrolled.

Charis: Me too, I am too. I can't believe it. Although I guess I should  have expected you'd pick MCU. Why go all the way to Cali or Boston when  we have our very own tech school right here in-state? What are you, a  chem major?

Asher: Not sure yet. Engineering, probably. And you're in … grad school, right?

Charis: Yep, sure am. Just started this year. You knew I was here?

Asher: Mm, I heard. Still gonna be a professor one day?

Charis: Uh-huh, that's the plan. I've got a long way to go, though. Wow. Just … wow. Uh, so. How is everyone? How's Mel?

Asher: They're great. We missed you at the Labor Day picnic. And the Fourth. And my graduation. And Memorial Day. And-

Charis: Yes, well, I do grown-up stuff now. You know how it is. Oh, wait a minute, no you don't. You're just a baby.

Asher: Oh, yeah? Do I look like a baby to you?

Charis: Weeeelll, I'll take the fifth on that. No, seriously, I've been  hearing about some of the amazing things you've done. I'm impressed.

Asher: Yeah, I've done all right. Nice hat.

Charis. Thanks. Want some pistachios?

Asher: No. Look, I'm late, but give me your phone. Let's not lose touch again.

Charis: Definitely.

Asher: Good to see you. Really good to see you.

Charis: Yeah. Good. To see. You.



Asher



AFTERWARDS, I KEPT MY SAVOIR FAIRE. I was in a strangely calm mood,  given that I'd just flushed my longest ever relationship down the  toilet.

I took a long nap. I shaved. I got down to studying. It was surprisingly easy.

It was only when night fell that reality sank in. That I discovered the huge fucking void in my life.                       
       
           



       

There was no more warm, soft little body to turn to when I craved some loving. No more stray red hairs in my shower.

Damn. Despite everything, it hadn't been out of the realm of possibility  that I'd marry Aura one day. You never knew. It could happen.

And down to the crunch here: I needed a woman to warm my bed. Needed. I  literally could not do without one, not with my cock out of control.  Sometimes it was so bad I had the urge to jump on whichever female was  handy.

Take Charis. My purely platonic friend. Sometimes I was afraid I might …

I stopped the thought. I've stopped a lot of thoughts about Charis over the years.

Ah, fuckit.

All right, it has to be said. I haven't lied to you. Not so much as an  innuendo has passed between me and Charis even once. But I'm gonna come  clean here. I did have a thing for Sloane, once upon a time, way back  when in the days of yore.

Let's call it what it was, a mega-crush.

Picture me at thirteen, before the corrective eye surgery, with the big,  thick glasses, my nose always buried in something electronic, my hair  unruly, my shirts plaid, and not the trendy kind, we're talking  hand-me-downs from a color-blind cousin, complete with clashing colors,  buttoned to the throat. Seeing it?

Charis used to come over to our house to spend time with my sister. I  didn't care that she was this boyish, gangly creature, with her short  brown crop of hair and her plain sweaters and unfashionable jeans that  screamed geek girl.

To me she was funny, lively, and smoking hot, not to mention an Older  Woman. So one summer day under our fir tree, I knocked her ice cream  cone from her hand and tried to kiss her.

Charis set me straight immediately. There was no way a  seventeen-year-old girl was hooking up with a thirteen-year-old boy. I  might have looked and sounded older than my age, but Charis treated me  like the spitball kid I was and let me down gently but firmly.

If she'd been another kind of person, everything would have been awkward  after that. But she was cool. She joked around just the same as ever.  Eventually she went off to college. And whenever I did see her, she  acted like she'd forgotten the incident … and so did I.

I actually hadn't.

But I did this thing where I made myself forget. I'm focused, I can do that.

Point is, I moved on. I steered my cock in other, more age-appropriate directions.

End of story.

So, yeah, sure, I've been thinking about her a lot lately. Once I woke  up from a dream where we were recording a parody song together in the  style of Weird Al Yankovic.

See? Not sexy. No sex dreams about Charis Sloane were had by me-not for years.

Not that I remembered, anyway.

Well, not with any great clarity.

I told myself it wasn't about Charis. It was about hard-ons. Hard-ons  happen. And when they do, I need a woman. Aura had been perfect for  that. And I'd let her go.

Crap. Now I'd begun to doubt, and that angered me.

Action I can deal with. Decisions are necessary. Self-reflection can go fuck itself.

I'd already wasted too much time on Aura.

The solution was simple. I'd have to arrange some casual hookups to tide  me over. Much as that lacked appeal, I had to have pussy in my life.

In the meantime, I knew what I needed. Who I needed.

Charis. Immediately.

My phone was already in my hand when I saw the text from Karl.

Good news. Alice problem solved. You'll be interested. Details to come.

Okay, that was weird enough to give me pause.

Our straitlaced great grandmother Alice had had this thing for my oldest  brother-who was inked, worked in a coffee shop, and liked to walk  around in his underwear. For some reason they'd always hit it off. She  died last summer at a hundred and four, no lie, and left Karl everything  in her will.

Since it amounted to a hill of beans, we all thought it hilarious.  Especially the conditions of her will-that he buy a suit and get married  before his thirtieth birthday. I'd forgotten he was turning thirty next  month.

The text lifted me out of my funk, but not enough. I still needed Charis.

I didn't question it, didn't hesitate. I sent a text. Sorry I've been a  lameass last few months. Coming over now. Bringing whiskey. Need  anything?

Breezy as I sounded, I had no expectations. Ever since my exile with  Aura, we'd been out of touch. Not a word, not a call, not a text-a vast,  humorless wasteland, my life without this girl.

And it was late on a Sunday night. She'd say go fuck yourself, she had  class tomorrow, she had a date, she wasn't in the mood. I'd have to  humble myself and beg (which I would do. Yes, this was worth going down  on my knees for).

I paced until I got the return text from her.

Pick up some Old Whisker's Blake for me dude.



AT TEN TWENTY, I KNOCKED ON Charis's door with a bottle of port and another of Hudson Bay Bourbon I reserved for serious need.

I leaned on the door post, gazing at the empty hallway with its plush  gold carpet. Her apartment building was just off the original MCU  campus, having been used as a dormitory way back when, before the  university sold it and built fancy new residence halls closer to the  quad. Now it just had somewhat pricey studios.                       
       
           



       

I happened to know Charis's parents funded her rent; she was piss-poor  at getting money, didn't care about her digs, and if it were up to her,  she'd live in somebody's basement.

Hell, if her parents ever fell through, she'd probably hit me up. I'd  pay for her rent, too, no questions asked. Sometimes she whined about  her parents so much, I wished she would ask.

The door swung open and I was greeted with a yawn that turned into a  broad smile. "Well hey, there, handsome stranger. What's up? It's late. I  thought you'd be studying for exams."

I looked into Charis's eyes. They weren't big, green and wide like  Aura's. They were squinty, early Renee Zellweger eyes, the irises a  light brown, with laughter lines already forming under them. Friendly  eyes, warm and welcoming.

I looked her up and down. She wore a humongous black night shirt, a tee  that came down to just above her knees. I couldn't tell if she was  wearing a bra. I wasn't even sure she wore the things. She was, in her  own words, a boobless freak.