Operation Resolution

by Sky Corgan

  My heart stuck in my chest in a way that was just embarrassing. I would never admit it to anyone, but there was a part of me that wanted her to be right. Resolution or not, there was still a part of me that wanted to believe that not all men were crap, that some of them had honest to God feelings and wouldn’t just leave a girl high and dry the first chance they got.

  The problem was, I had seen no evidence to the contrary. Even my own father had cheated on my mother with his secretary and left us on our own. Mom had made it clear from that time on that women had expiration dates. We were like goods on a shelf, and after a while, we got put into the discount bin. And that was only if we were lucky enough to be the kind of merchandise men were interested in purchasing in the first place. I had seen plenty of examples of how men could be shitty and almost none of what Maggie was always trying to convince me they could be.

  The small amount of excitement and hope I felt while I opened the email from Matt made me sick to my stomach, and I vowed to renew my commitment to my resolution right then and there.

  “So?” Maggie asked impatiently, her voice taking on an ever so slightly smug tone, “What does it say?”

  “Nothing, really,” I answered nonchalantly, no idea how to take what I was reading.

  “Don’t play coy with me. Tell me what it says, lady!”

  “Says work is boring, can’t stop thinking about me, blah blah blah. Says he wants to see me again. Wants to take me out tonight.”

  “No freaking way you get to act that blasé! He wants to see you again, and that means I was right! He is so, totally interested in you. I win, and you lose. Now we have to plan for your date!”

  CHAPTER SIX

  BELLA

  I briefly toyed with the idea of refusing the invitation. This was for a multitude of reasons, but there were two that stood out the most. First was that Matt had assumed I would have nothing better to do than see him that night. In all honesty, I didn't have any plans, nothing beyond my couch and a long bout of Netflix binging, but Matt didn't know that. He had no right to assume I would be able to drop everything and see him on a whim.

  The second thing was my resolution. That resolution had been made for a reason, and it wasn't one I was ready to forget just because a hot rich guy asked me out on a second date. It wasn't like I hadn't been asked on second dates before. I had been, plenty of times, as well as third and fourth dates. Guys could be so stealthy about the way they ghosted you. All of the times I'd gotten my hopes up only to be fantastically, cataclysmically let down were still fresh in my memory, and that meant that my resolution wasn't going anywhere.

  The reasons for my emailing Matt back with an acceptance instead of using the opportunity to execute my very own ghosting (something that would have been a first for me) were two-fold as well. The first was, of course, Maggie. Before I even mentioned the possibility of turning Matt down, Maggie was hounding me. She could be painfully convincing when she wanted to be, and I was too tired to put up much of a fight.

  The second reason was the resolution itself. I needed to prove to myself that I could have sex like a guy, meaning have sex and bail, and that hadn’t happened yet. I already knew from the night before that Matt was pretty fantastic in the fooling around department. If the way his fingers worked were any indication, he was going to be exactly the kind of guy I wanted to break in my new way of doing things.

  And so, I made up my mind to go, putting any thoughts that it might be because I wanted to get to know Matt far in the back of my head where they couldn’t bother me. I got ready, pouring myself into the pair of jeans that always made me feel like I could have been a porn star in another life, and put on a killer pair of heels. After a quick glance in the mirror, during which I determined that I looked good enough to tempt most men out there, I hopped in a cab.

  I had made a point of taking my own transportation this time despite Matt’s insistence that he would prefer coming to pick me up again. He’d tried pulling the southern gentleman card, but all I had to do was remember the way his fingers had slid inside of me to know there was nothing gentlemanly about him. Even thinking about the things he’d done to my body made my face flush hot.

  “This the place you were looking for, miss?”

  “Huh? I’m sorry?” I glanced at the cab driver with my far away eyes, struggling to get out of my own head and into the present.

  “I said, is this the place you wanted to go? You’ve just been sitting there, lady, and I’m trying to figure out if this is it or if you need me to take you someplace else. The meter’s running, so I guess you can sit here all night if you want. It’s your dime. I’m just wondering what I’m in for. Like should I grab a magazine or something.”

  “No,” I said in as icy a voice as I could muster under the slightly embarrassing circumstances, “no need for a magazine. Is this Plush?”

  “Sure is, lady.”

  Without saying anything else, I paid the guy, making sure to leave a decent tip despite his attitude for putting up with my crazy.

  My heart thudded in my temples as I did my best catwalk stomp through the large metal door of Plush, my stomach doing uncomfortable somersaults even though my internal voice insisted that I didn’t really give a damn how this thing went. This, not a date. When I caught a glimpse of Matt, those somersaults went into double-time, my personal metronome going so wonky I thought I might throw up. I knew he was hot, had seen him just last night, for God’s sake, but tonight he seemed to be on a whole other level. Tonight, he was so gorgeous it was borderline painful to look at him, and when he smiled his perfectly white grin at me, my heart hid in my throat.

  “Bella, you look fantastic!”

  “Just jeans and a shirt, you know? No big deal.”

  “I don’t care what kind of a deal it is. You look great. Here, take a seat. I took the liberty of ordering you an Old Fashioned. I swear to God, this place makes the best in the city.”

  I sat as gracefully as possible in the highly polished stool, more than a little worried that I would slide right back off of its extremely glossy finish. Matt slid a drink in my direction and then turned the stool to face him, sitting down with enviable ease and putting both of his palms squarely on my thighs. The skin underneath his fingers burned, and my head went straight back to the night before when his fingers had so easily whipped me into submission. I was doing my best to play it cool, but my body had other ideas. It was working with a memory, and all it wanted was more of what it had already gotten. I cleared my throat and did my best to focus on Matt, who was looking at me with a glint in his eyes as he spoke.

  “I’m really glad you met me here.”

  “Sure, no big deal,” I lied through my teeth as if I hadn’t spent a good portion of my day weighing the pros and cons of showing up, “my other plans fell through.”

  “Lucky me. I wasn’t sure you would come after last night. Things didn’t end the way I wanted them to.”

  “Like I said, no big deal. No point in dwelling on it. Let’s just have a good time, all right? Just see what happens.”

  “Sure, great. That sounds really great, Bella. I want to get to know you better.”

  I eyed Matt closely, only one step above suspiciously. Those were the kind of words every girl wanted to hear from a guy. It was the kind of thing I would have given anything to have a guy say to me and mean it before the New Year’s Eve debacle. But I wasn’t who I had been then, even such a short time ago, and I didn’t believe for one second that his words were spoken without an ulterior motive. I kept my mouth shut, though. The only point of me being here was to follow through on the original mission. I needed to prove to myself that I could do this, that I could sleep with him, feel nothing, and move right along.

  “What’s the matter?” He asked with a slight downturn to his voice, a sound indicating concern I didn’t believe for one minute he actually felt, “Did I say something wrong?”

  “Nope!”

  “You kind of got a look on your face. Maybe I�
�m just imagining things.”

  “Just enjoying this drink!” I took a long sip, swallowing two-thirds of the cup’s contents, and did my best to keep my eyes from watering as the booze hit my throat.

  Matt was watching me, and I wanted to make it clear that I was a badass, which drove me to finish the drink in the next sip I took. He whistled and then winced a little. “Wow, really happy to see me, huh?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Nothing. Just, you seem a little on edge.”

  “No, not on edge. Just enjoying myself. That’s why we’re here, right?”

  “I hope so. That and to get to know each other. There’s something about you I can’t quite shake.”

  “I don’t want to disappoint you, but there’s really not a whole lot to get to know.”

  “Aw, I don’t believe that.”

  “You should. I’m just out to have some fun, you know. Just like you, I imagine.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  I had been busy ordering and then accepting my second Old Fashioned from the bitchy looking bartender, but the way his voice sounded when he asked that question made me glance up. His entire body was facing me, his hands still on my legs, but there was something in his face that seemed almost angry. It caught me off guard in a big way, but I bit my tongue, determined not to show anything.

  I didn’t know what kind of game he was trying to play, but I was sure he was playing one. Guys like him always were. The seductive way his thumbs ran up and down the inside inseam of my jeans was a solid reminder of that.

  “Nothing. You’re reading too much into what I’m saying. I just think that’s the point of things like this, right? Just having a good time.”

  “Sure. Okay, that’s true. So, in the spirit of fun, why don’t we play a little game?”

  “Um, okay. What did you have in mind?”

  “How about we play Twenty Questions. My version.”

  “What does your version look like?”

  “I’m so glad you asked,” he answered with a devilish grin that made my insides tingle. “It goes a little like this. I ask you a question, you answer.”

  “That kind of sounds like an interview to me.”

  “Nah. It’ll be fun. Let’s start with an easy one. Where were you born?”

  “Right here,” I answered, dimly aware that in the thirty or so minutes since I’d been sitting with him, I had already lost way more control of the date than I was comfortable with. “I was born in Austin.”

  “And you stayed here? I mean, you never lived anywhere but this city?”

  “I spent a year in London when I was still in college. It was a study abroad thing.”

  “That’s fantastic! I love that city. One of my favorite cities. It’s the perfect kind of place for people to get to know each other. Pity we aren’t there. Maybe we should go.”

  “Right.” I laughed uneasily. “Let’s just hop on a plane and go, right?”

  “Don’t tempt me. I might do it.” He smiled a heartbreakingly beautiful smile that made me want to melt. “And what about your parents? Do they live in Austin? Are they still together?”

  “These questions are getting a bit personal. I don’t even understand what you’re trying to do.” I took another deep sip of my drink, welcoming the burn this time. My eyes watered, and suddenly, I was furious that he was clearly trying to play a game with my heart like every guy before him.

  “I’m not trying to do anything but get to know you, Bella,” he answered softly, the vaguely hurt tone of his voice only pissing me off more. “That’s all I want to do. Why is that such a bad thing? What is it you’re afraid of? You seemed like you were having a pretty good time last night. I don’t get it.”

  “This was a mistake. I shouldn’t have come here.” I was up and off of my stool before I knew it, stumbling a little in my heels from the rapidity of my movement.

  I could hear Matt’s stool scraping, knew he was getting up as well, and righted myself in a hurry. I had no idea why I was so pissed, why I was completely losing my cool in front of this uber swanky bar full of people. All I knew was that I needed to get out. I needed to get the hell out of here and away from Matt, back to the safety of my apartment. I could figure out why I had once again failed at what I had set out to do once I got home.

  I pushed the door open wide, hardly noticing when it banged into the brick wall and got me an admonishing comment from the snob of a bartender. I whipped around the building’s corner, grateful for how dark it was outside and the fact that everyone was inside of the bars instead of on the street. I ducked into the alleyway and leaned against the wall, my head tilted back and eyes shut tight.

  I felt a hot hand on my shoulder, drawing my attention back to Matt.

  “What the hell was that, Bella? Why’d you leave?”

  “I told you,” I snapped into his angry, handsome face, “this was a mistake.”

  "Because I want to get to know you? Are you fucking serious?"

  “I don’t want to talk about it, Matt. Can’t you understand that? Do you just not get it?”

  “No, I get it. I get it really well. It’s not that you don’t want to answer my questions, is it? It’s that you don’t want to talk at all. So fine, let’s not talk. Let’s do what you want to do.”

  He took my hand and marched me further down the alley, far enough that it felt like we were in a different place than the rest of the world at large. I wanted to ask him what the hell he thought he was doing, but before I got the chance, his mouth was on mine. Gone was any trace of the tenderness from the previous night. His tongue pushed past my lips, plunging inside of me. With one hand, he unsnapped my jeans and began to pull them down while his other hand roamed over my breasts, tweaking my rock-hard nipples.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” I half asked, half moaned.

  I had never been much of a public display of affection kind of person, and this was taking that concept to a whole new level. I should have been mortified, but instead, I was more turned on than I had ever been in my life. When he pulled back from me and got down on his knees, I almost came right then and there.

  “Don’t ask stupid questions, Bella,” he growled, all evidence of the guy from inside of the bar completely gone, “don’t ask things you already know the answer to.”

  “But—”

  I never got my weak excuse for a protest out. Before I could even try, Matt had my jeans and my thong down around my knees, his face buried in the part of me that burned for him the most. I’d been sure that his fingers were pure magic, but his tongue was on a level all its own. The feeling of it against my skin made me instantly wet, and my hands flew down to the top of his head, my fingers plunging into his hair and pulling. I kept telling myself I had to stop him, that I needed to be pulling him back up on his feet, but instead, I was pushing him closer. His tongue lapped against my clit, moving in sure circles that drove me beyond crazy.

  The moans I heard didn’t sound like me. Nothing about this sounded like me, and I briefly considered that this must be a dream, but then his tongue moved inside me, and the pleasure I felt brought me back to reality in a hurry.

  My eyes opened, still turned up to the sky, and all I could see was stars. There were so many of them, so beautiful, and I wanted to tell Matt to take a look, but I couldn’t even speak. His tongue was still working against me, those perfect circles, and the heat inside of me built up fast and with a ferocity I never had any chance of controlling.

  My eyes snapped shut again, and my insides exploded, my head rocking back and forth and the moan strangled but still there. I still saw the stars, only now they were in my head, painted on the inside of my closed lids as I rode the orgasm dealt to me helplessly.

  Then it was over, just as quickly as it had begun. My eyes remained closed, but now it was because I didn’t want to see. I heard Matt’s knees pop as he got back to his feet, even imagined that I could hear the sound of my jeans sliding against my ski
n as he pulled them back up and snapped them shut again. He cleared his throat, and I couldn’t help it. My eyes opened seemingly of their own volition, and when I looked at Matt’s face, my insides lurched uncomfortably.

  “Matt—”

  “You’re sexy as hell, Bella, you know that? You’re under my skin.”

  “Matt, I don’t—”

  “I’m going to go. I need to go now. I hope I see you again, Bella. I hope to Christ I do, but I can’t say I’m sure. Maybe I will. Maybe I’ll see you around.”

  Hot and heavy one minute, gone the next. It was exactly what I had been going for. Nothing of substance. No real meaning. Wham, bam, and all of that was exactly what I had come here for, so why did I feel so awful watching him go? I felt so horrible that I couldn’t force myself to utter one single sound to make him stay.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  MATT

  Another night spent tossing and turning. I’d only known Bella for a couple of days, and I had hardly gotten any sleep during any of them.

  When I closed my eyes, I could see her face looking at me in that dim alley. I was pretty sure I could still taste her. I didn’t want to be able to taste her. I didn’t want that to have happened at all. I was trying to have better control over myself than that.

  “Shit. Shit!”

  I had told Bella last night that she was under my skin. The bitch of it was that I wasn’t messing with her. She believed I was—was doing a truly terrible job of hiding it—but I wasn’t. I was telling her the truth about wanting to get to know her. But wanting to get to know her the way I did came from wanting her, and I didn’t know how to want somebody without taking them to bed. I wanted to fuck her and for the two of us not to leave my bed for a minimum of a week. I wanted her, and being a good boy was getting pretty damn hard.

  “Shit.”

  Shit was just about all I had said this Sunday morning, but this was the first one that didn’t come from my feelings about Bella. The phone sitting on my table next to my third cup of coffee was ringing, and like an idiot, I’d looked at it with the hope that it would be Bella calling. She had me feeling like a teenager, for Christ’s sake.