"Yoga."

My eyes narrow this time. "It's a couple's class."

"The lady at the counter told me that after I paid."

"You're not meeting someone?" I ask.

"You? What are the chances we'd run into each other in Manhattan, what does this make? Four times since I got back?"

"Strange coincidence."

"Fortuitous." There's that damn smirk again.

Katya and the yoga teacher would probably say it has some higher, universal reason, like I need to truly let go of the past. I suddenly sense a presence behind me, like a shadow punctuating this as truth. "Hi, Navy," Spencer says. "I hope you haven't been waiting long."

In the narrow hall, with Carrick on one side and Spencer on the other I'm the mushy filling of a hot man sandwich. I don't know where to look or what to say. Hands, ceiling, chests, lips. You'd think the countless hours I spend reading about situations like this I'd at least know how to handle myself.

My breath is a choppy mess.

Spencer extends his hand and introduces himself to Carrick. They're both as cool as a pair of cucumbers. Which makes me think of other, similarly shaped, ahem, things. My cheeks turn a shade pinker, and I stare at my bare feet wondering if I'm headed toward a full body blush.

The two guys are talking about a golf tournament where their fathers competed for charity-how they made that connection in the two minutes we've been standing here, I have no idea-the moneyed and renowned have radar for each other.

Thankfully, the yoga teacher calls us in to start. I'm on my mat between Carrick and Spencer. I don't envy the hippie guy and his two women. Not that that's what this is, but my palms sweat, my head sweats, my butt, for goodness sakes, is sweating as we move from downward dog, to chatturanga, to upward dog for the millionth time.

I push myself into another plank, mostly because the instructor has enviable biceps, but so does Carrick, to my right, and Spencer to my left.

At last, when the teacher has the good grace to move us into the final resting pose, splayed on our backs, I chant inner peace, inner peace, just so I don't fall asleep, or fart. I feel eyes on me. Like when you're in a car and look over at the passing vehicle and the driver happens to be looking at you-it's like a sixth sense. I blink open an eye.

Carrick's blue eyes are dark in the low light. My heart thunders in my chest even though we've long since done the cooldown. He stretches his hand toward mine, squeezes, and then gets up and leaves.

The pinky side of my right hand tingles. It's like he tattooed his name there.

It's a dot that connects to my lips where his met mine.

To a dot on my arm where he touched it.

To a dot on my waist when he lassoed me from imminent peril involving ice and a bus.

My hand still tingles when we press our palms together and say Namaste. It still tingles after I get dressed. It tingles when I stuff it in a mitten and Spencer and I are out on the street. When we reach the restaurant, my hand distracts me while I browse the menu attached to a cedar plank.

Focus, Navy. I read Spencer's lips, his voice making sounds like truffle butter, asiago, and sirloin, but I forget what it all means.

My attention only gels when he says my name. "Navy, tell me what you do."

"You go first," I hedge.

"It'll bore you out of your mind." Nonetheless, he gives me an overview of his job at an investment firm and highlights his quarterly trips to tropical islands to hook the whales-wealthy captains of industry, not the mammals-until our drinks come.

"I work for a PR firm. Albright, Douche, Carlotta, and associates."

Spencer practically chokes on his drink. "Douche?"

"Bouche. I meant, Bouche," I say, fighting between laughter, embarrassment, and the vision of Carrick's lips mouthing the word.

I revert the conversation back to his trips overseas, island life, extravagance, and opulence. It's fun to live in his world for the space of an hour while we dine and sip wine. The greens, whites, and browns in the rustic, farm to table restaurant take on a rosy hue.

"Now I know what you do, tell me what you like to do." This time my cheeks turn red. That can go down in the books as one of the worst lines ever. I actually groan as I try to recover my dignity. "I mean, in your spare time," I say.

He swirls the remainder of his oak-aged whisky. "I think we both know what I like to do in my spare time." His eyebrow follows the angle of the corner of his lip, his dark eyes burn into mine, sending a flare through my center that practically splits me in two. "Shall we?" he asks.

And that's that. I'm drunk. I'm going to get laid. If only life was always this easy.

He's a perfect gentleman, insisting on paying the dinner bill, opening the door for me on the cab ride back to our building, and making sweetly engaging conversation as we chat on the elevator.

It's not until we're behind the locked door of his apartment that he turns into a sex-crazed animal. He tears at my blouse, tosses his own shirt over his shoulder, and I'm nearly in his room and out of my clothes, when curiosity about what his apartment looks like distracts me. What does a person with this amount of confidence and appetite live like? Is it as described in books and movies? Masculine and cold? Angular and symmetrical? I glance over my shoulder at moody grays and stainless steel, but before I can get further confirmation, he reels me into his room and tosses me on the bed.

He's on all fours, hovering over me, planting a hungry kiss here, a lusty kiss there. He strokes and rubs in all of the right places. He caresses and licks. He's dominant, in control, fully aware of what he likes and more importantly, what women like-what I don't even realize I like until he does it.

He's prepared with condoms and I admire the ease and speed with which he puts it on. He slides into me and thrusts a few times. I groan. I call out his name. I am in heaven. My hands claw his back. The one on the right, in the place close to the pinky, tingles.

Carrick's image pops into mind just as I explode with the first full bodied, scream out loud orgasm I've had in years.

Chapter 10.

Carrick Damn. All I can think about is that fucking dimple when she smiles. How she used to always smile before my sister, half the school, and I humiliated her by not letting her know that my asshole best friend- her boyfriend-was cheating on her, a lot.

I've carried the regret of not looking back to boot camp, brought it in the bedroom, overseas, to war, back home, and even now with every beat of my determined heart.

I have her number. When she changed it, all I had to do was ask her mom for the new one. I don't know if Mrs. Carrington knew everything that happened between us. But she must have known my intentions were honest otherwise she wouldn't have given it to me. I've nearly pressed dial a thousand times over the years.

I can't erase the disappointment in her eyes, in the way she faded into her armor, into anger and hurt. The letters she sent that I never returned revealed her feelings. She was brave. I was a coward, even as I fought for our country.

When I saw her the other day, I almost didn't recognize her shadowed, sad face, but then she flashed that dimple. I knew I had to fix things. It was there right before I placed my lips on hers. It appeared when I squeezed her hand. She needs to know she didn't do anything wrong. It was all me. All fucking idiot, asshole me.

I don't expect her to forgive me, but I'll damn well try. Saying a lame, "I'm sorry" for the hundredth time won't do it. Even if she's happy with the investment banker, she deserves to be free of the burden we share. However, I know guys and he seems to be more the business and pleasure type than to have and to hold.

And if I know Navy Catherine Carrington and I do, or at least did, then I know she wants to be loved and adored. She deserves to be. She should be treated like a princess and a queen. She's smart, beautiful, creative, and everything assholes like Zach and I don't deserve.

Spencer seems like a member of my old crew: the players, bastards, dogs. I never had a long-term girlfriend in high school or college and that was to distract me from who I couldn't have. Meaningless sex was easier than to long for the girl who could never be mine.

While I was in Europe, I used up all the piss and fire from my youth and now prefer a quiet night in, a bottle of wine, a warm fire, maybe a movie, a game of cards, poetry...

If any of my brothers or buddies caught me right now, sitting alone in a cafe, daydreaming like this, they'd have the laugh of their lives. Likely, they're off the south coast of France, in the Caribbean, or on the slopes, waiting for a snow bunny or two.

And it's all because of a girl named Navy won my heart.

What I want more than anything is to help rid her of the shadows in hers. She has one foot in the past-I've known her most of my life and saying she's stubborn is an understatement. And a good thing too. She wouldn't let us go swimming during a lightning storm one summer. Three trees caught fire that could have been three Kennely boys. She petitioned and picketed when developers wanted to build a brand new high school, demolishing the historic one for condos. It turns out it was attached to a Native American burial site and she saved a beautiful old building and sacred land. Despite everything that happened during her senior year, she offered the most beautiful and moving words at my sister's funeral.

It's time she live her life, without pain and guilt-and me, but first I have to make it right.

She's probably still on her date. She's probably screwing the guy. If so, he's damn lucky. I've dreamt and fantasized about her more times than is decent. Yes, even when she dated my best friend, which makes me just as guilty as him. Yes, I imagine the feel of her skin under my fingers, her lips on mine. It's always her.

But. And it's a big but, not hers-though I do appreciate her backside, especially in those skinny jeans she used to wear-she hates me.

I don't blame her. I'm not a good person.

Over the years when it comes up in conversation, people try to explain it away, she was just mad at the time. It was a lot to deal with. Overwhelming tragedy and so on.

They don't know the full story. I know without a doubt, that she hates me. But what I learned during my time in the Marines, reinforced by my recent yoga practice-helps settle my mind-, and in the wisdom passed along to me from Grandma Kennely before she passed away, is that hate only hurts the person who hates.

I don't like the fact that she despises me, but more than anything, it's taking away from her happiness. Sucking away her energy and keeping that dimpled smile from her face. I want her not to feel that way. I don't mean to sound arrogant. She doesn't have to love me or like me even, but I want her to have closure. To know that I was stupid, not her. She wasn't at fault even though I know she carries the burden of guilt. I don't want her to avoid holiday gatherings back home because of me. Or the clambakes in the summer when she visits her parents.

I click on my phone with my thumb hovering over the call button. I've come this close so many times. I have to man up. We're in the same city. We've run into each other repeatedly...

Without making the call, I walk back to the Airbnb I'm renting while in town for meetings. I'm making it my mission to help relieve Navy of the things that keep her from smiling that amazing, fucking dimpled smile.

After grabbing a container of leftovers from the fridge, I turn on Sports Center, glancing at my phone every few minutes.

I move my sorry ass from the couch to the bed, laying on the crisp sheets with my thoughts whirling with what ifs, maybes, and that brief kiss and the brave moment when I squeezed her hand before leaving the yoga class early to spare us further embarrassment when she and her date left together.

She doesn't have a Facebook page, never has. She dropped out of touch with my brothers and the people we knew back in high school. At family get-togethers, my mother has gleaned from hers that she's still single, much to Mrs. Carrington's disappointment.

Once more, my finger hovers over the call button. I can't bring myself to do it. I don't want to ruin her night, inspire more anger, or keep her from sleeping.

Instead, I lay there in bed, sad, alone, and awake.

Chapter 11.

Blogs and Sausages I've never taken the walk of shame before, but thankfully, my first jaunt from a man's apartment with messy hair, smudged makeup, and clothes askew is short. Nineteen steps door to door to be precise and it's not even midnight.

Katya is a notoriously sound sleeper. In college, the dorm had to evacuate because of a fire alarm. If I hadn't woken her, saving her life, she would have slept right through it. I didn't really save her life because it turned out not to be a fire. Some idiot on the fifth floor thought it would be funny to see all of the girls in their pajamas at three a.m.

Nonetheless, I turn the doorknob like a cat burglar, creep across the old wooden floor-the creaks are loudest in the hallway-and into my room without incident. Not only do I not want to wake her, I need some time to process what just happened before I give her the play-by-play she's sure to demand.

I sink onto my bed and toss my bag and heels in the corner by the closet. I glimpse myself in the mirror and a smile spreads across my lips, lighting up my dark eyes. I just had sex with Spencer. I don't even know his last name. Well, technically I do, it's Davis, because his mailbox is next to ours and it's labeled, but in the course of general conversation, names, birthdates, background details weren't exchanged, which if you're me, is pretty darn scandalous. Groundbreaking. Earth shattering. It feels kind of badass. My smile turns into a Kat-like smirk and I feel just a little bit powerful.

My dress puddles on the floor and I replace it with a sweatshirt and leggings. I instantly feel more like myself and less like an empowered woman in charge of her domain. I sigh. But when I knot my hair on top of my head, that spark still shines behind my eyes. Nope, I've still got it, sweats and all.

I'm too wired to sleep so I don't bother trying. I try to find a book to read to settle my mind, but recounting my recent reality is far more intriguing. Hungry kissing, fingers trailing skin, discarded underwear. I imagine Spencer has a collection because the way he carelessly threw my clothes around makes me wonder how many women leave fully dressed.

How many women? I swallow. How many has he been with? I've seen two and we only moved in last weekend. That makes me the third, at least, this week. I push the gathering crowd of women from my mind, assured by the fact that we used protection, and return to the blissful moments of our bodies moving together. There was oral. There were fingers. There was a noteworthy member of the male anatomy involved that I've rarely seen the likes of in real life. I close my eyes, recalling the feeling. The bursting of light through the darkness feeling. The explosion. The deep calm afterward.

And Carrick's face, appearing at that precise moment. I could analyze the significance, but one of my best skills not noted on my resume is avoidance, so I push him from my mind, returning to Spencer's lips on mine, his strong jawline, his capable hands... The recent memory creates an exciting tingling below my belly. A smile pushes its way onto my face as I recount those blissful moments-then Carrick shows up again. I feel the spark when his lips grazed mine. The buzz of his touch during the yoga class on my hand. Can't a girl revel in her sexiness for a minute without the ghosts of the past? An attractive ghost, but a nuisance nonetheless. I list the reasons why my head won't cooperate: Sensory overload.

Exhaustion.

Too much wine.

A date for the first time in years!

These are all reasonable explanations why my brain is a bit confused, right? The solution: sleep. I tuck under my covers, close my eyes, and once more return to Spencer's king sized bed, cool and crisp in my memory. The dappled nighttime glow of the city casted him in shadow and light. His strong arms wrapped confidently around me, his pelvis pressed against mine, and...

Fucking Carrick.

No, not fucking fucking. Fucking Carrick ruins it again. His chiseled jawline, the perfect balance of rugged and polished good looks. That fucking sly smile. I groan in frustration. If only I could erase his face from the whiteboard of my mind. If I could delete everything that happened. A wave goodbye-see you never. But to do that would require the use of my lips and my hand and it's like he marked me with his touch.

I rally. Me, Navy Catherine Carrington, just did the deed with my hot neighbor, who-though my experience is minimal-was by all accounts a sex god. I need to celebrate this accomplishment and not think of stupid Carrick a minute longer.

I open the box of high school memories and dig around for my yearbooks. I find the one from junior year, when Carrick graduated and flip to the Ks. With a permanent marker, I black out a few of his teeth, give him an eyepatch, draw some stink lines, and add some warts to the end of his nose. Then for good measure, I circle his photo and then draw a line through it.

"That's better," I huff and toss the book back toward the box, but it glances off the side. As I reconfigure the contents, the wire end of The Boyfriend Book stabs my finger.

"Figures."

Memories of Claire pinch the corners of my eyes. She went a little boy crazy and dragged me along for the ride. I flip open to the first page. She was head over heels for this kid Mike. He needed to floss. Then it was Adam. He fell asleep during Mrs. Smythe's health lecture and started drooling. After that, she moved onto Noah and he broke it off when a senior asked him to the prom. Turned out to be a joke. Claire's boyfriend is dead too.

I wipe my eyes. I didn't have my first kiss until eighth grade and that was with my best friend's brother during an ill-advised game of truth or dare. Yes, Carrick was my first kiss. My first of many things. Maybe I should go a little boy crazy and really take up Kat's dare.

In a rush of exhausted frustration and determination, I open my laptop. The Boyfriend Book Blog. Yes, I'll recount the experience of date number one, etching it in digital ink with the hope that it will delete Carrick's presence.

After a tutorial and a few false starts, I create a blog.

Worthy of a scene from one of my favorite novels, I recount how Spencer rolled me over in one swift motion, how he licked and lapped, and how I recommend yoga for optimal flexibility in advance of an experience like the one I had with him because there's no way my leg would have gone overhead otherwise. This brings me back to the couple's class and Carrick on his mat next to me.

"Go," I say. "Get lost."

Something silky soft brushes my ankle followed by a meow. "Not you, Mew," I say, picking up the cat and scratching behind his ears. "I was talking to this stupid guy I've had a crush on since I was old enough to know what a crush was. You know what? He turned out to be not so great. I've heard him belch. I've watched him scratch his junk, pig out on nachos, talk with his mouth full. I've seen him sick, sad, tired. I practically grew up with him. I've seen enough to know that he's an asshole. Mew, never, ever date an asshole."

When I realize I'm talking to the cat, I turn back to the computer. Then I make a list. I'm a world-class, A+ list maker. But mine aren't ordinary, bullet point lists; they're detailed with pros, cons, intricacies that assist in decision making, doing, and getting results. Sometimes they involve a Venn diagram. I should probably make one to find a replacement for my current employment situation. (Note to self.) I open The Boyfriend Book and copy down a system Claire made to assess our crushes. I type up the ABCs: appearance, behavior, and connection. It turns into more of a summary, not entirely unlike the dating profiles Kat showed me earlier.

#1 The Hottie in 7G (name changed for privacy) Appearance: fit, tan, chiseled features, brown hair, and a drool-inducing physique usually covered up in a three-piece suit and tie befitting his investment banker status, damn near perfect.

Behavior: charming, confident, respectful, engaging conversationalist.

Connection: in the bedroom, most definitely, but he's most likely a player, which obviously won't work for me long term. It's been observed by professionals in the field that I am a swan not a peacock/hen.