Read Out of My Element for Free Online Page B

haven’t exactly known each other for that
long.” Her eyes were watching me closely.
    “I understand completely.” I
grinned. Everything was always so effortless with her.
    “Do you?” She smiled back at me.
    “Yeah. I’ve never had a friend like
you before. I mean, I have Trevor and Tom, but I can honestly say that I have
never had a female friend before. I like it; I like you.”
    “Me too. Hey, just a suggestion,
but if you don’t want to give people the wrong impression about us, you might
want to let go of my hand.” She giggled.
    Holy hell! I didn’t even realize I
was still holding her hand. I pulled my hand back quickly and sat up straight.
“Sorry,” I said. It had actually felt nice to hold her hand. Too nice. It
seemed to fit perfectly in my hand. I was becoming a total girl.
    “When is your next game?” Chelsea
crumbled up her napkin and set it next to her plate before grabbing her beer
and sitting back, obviously ready for a change of topic.
     
    ***
    As Chelsea drove me home, I
couldn’t help but think about her earlier confession, clearly given by
accident. How does someone like Chelsea make it through her whole life without
having sex? How is that even possible? It’s not like she wasn’t attractive.
Well I could tell you one thing; I was going to make damn sure my soccer
buddies didn’t take advantage of her. 
    “Do you want to come up?” Chelsea
pulled up to the curb outside of my building.
    “I don’t think so. I’m tired, and I
… we have to be up early,” she stressed.
    “Ugh, don’t remind me. Six miles,
right?” I groaned. “Chelsea, do you know CPR?”
    “Yes, why?”
    “I just wanted to make sure you
could save me if I collapsed from your brutal workouts.”  I chuckled. “Are you
sure you know how to do it? We could practice mouth to mouth. Just to be safe,
of course.”
    “Goodnight Nick.” She laughed as I
got out of the car.
    I leaned in before closing the
door. “Goodnight Chelsea, and thanks for hanging out with me. Hey, if you
change your mind, I’m in apartment # 630.” I grinned.
    “See you in the morning.” She
smiled a gentle smile that I felt right in my chest. I almost wanted to wrap
her in my arms and just hold her. Damn, I seriously needed to get laid.

Chapter 9
     
    Chelsea
    He’s going to kill me, not the
other way around , I thought as I pulled away from his place. I was finding
it harder to not cross those platonic lines with him. Shit, I can’t believe
that I went and blurted out that I was still a virgin. I was such an idiot.
    Nick had not reacted how I would’ve
expected him to. I could totally see him giving me a hard time about that
little morsel of information, but instead he had been so kind. My stomach
fluttered as I thought about the way he hugged me after the game. And how he
had held my hand at dinner as if it was so natural, before I opened my big
mouth and basically told him to let it go.
    I loved being with Nick, sometimes
too much. Although the kiss that initially brought us together was earth
shattering, what we had built since that night was so much better. He was my
friend, and I had found that as an adult, it was sometimes hard to find true
friends—people you could truly count on to listen or make you laugh—to
basically accept you for who you are. That is what I had with Nick in just the
short time we’d known each other.
    ***
    It took me several minutes to
register what I was seeing after I turned the corner. The flashing lights were
everywhere. Two fire trucks lined the street right in front of my building.
Three ambulances were parked and appeared to be giving attention to several
people.
    I heard the knock on my window.
“Ma’am, you’re going to have to turn around.” A tall policeman pointed back the
way I’d come, as I rolled down the window.
    “No, wait! That’s my building. What
the hell happened?” I couldn’t wrap my head around the entire scene.
    “I’m sorry, ma’am. If you want to
park