Aleck didn’t come back for another ten minutes, claiming he had taken a call from his father. It all seemed plausible, so nobody questioned it. And me and Aleck? We barely looked at each other for the rest of the night. Well, I barely looked at him, and when I did, his aloof stare was in place like the bathroom never happened.

Then when we all got back to our suite, we laughed and told stories like we all had been friends our entire lives. Something about it all felt so natural and so… fun. But even then, Aleck smiled at me and spoke to me the same way he did with Sondra, Dottie, or Keith. No sly glances or loaded smirks.

Dottie and Keith stayed briefly, then went back to their room. Sondra and Preston sat around the island with us, finishing a few glasses of water, then retired to my room, leaving Aleck and me alone. He grabbed some things from his room, then made a bed on the couch with the bedding he had ordered from room service. And I don’t know where the confident girl from the restroom had gone, but she wasn’t present, not anymore. She wondered if Aleck was over her now that she had finally gotten him off.

“Good night, Winter,” was all he said before he kissed my temple and slipped out of the room, leaving me to go to bed alone.

I didn’t push anything or ask him to stay. Why would I? He’s said it before, he doesn’t sleep in beds with women. And I wasn’t about to ask him to relieve the tension between my legs. Not with Sondra and Preston down the hall. So, we slept in different rooms, awkwardly, after I gave him a blowjob in a public restroom.

Part of me was hoping he would slip back into my room, demanding that he needed more of me, but he never did. Needless to say, I fell asleep feeling pathetic for wanting Aleck to be like a normal human with emotions.

That’s what I get, I guess.

* * *

Preston and Sondra got up early and left to get a jumpstart on the morning traffic. To say the hole I feel in my chest in the wake of Sondra’s absence hurts would be an understatement. I crave Sondra-time. I want to tell her what Aleck and I are doing. I want to tell her how I feel about it. How I feel about him. But she’s got so much on her plate, that would be selfish.

I pad through the hallway with bare feet into the kitchen, the room heavy with the scent of Aleck’s sweat, testosterone, and my future bad choices. My stomach tightens, and my will to compose my lust for him weakens. With my hair still wet from my shower, I run my fingers through it to give my hands something to do.

“Morning,” I say, opening the refrigerator to pull out the orange juice. “How was your run?”