by Elodie Colt
I scratch at the label on my water bottle, keeping my gaze down.
“Shit,” Skyla says. “Is it a family business? Are your parents also working on the plantation? Or siblings?”
Even in my periphery, I can see that the smile he’s sending her doesn’t reach his eyes.
“My mom left with my sister when I was young. It’s only Dad and me now, but he’s counting his last days.”
The lump in my throat grows to the size of a tennis ball, and I almost cough when I try to gulp it down.
“I’m sorry…” comes from Ruby, at the same time Kendra utters a strained, “Oh, no.”
We listen to the birds chirping for a minute. I can tell Matthew has spaced out for the moment, nibbling on his water bottle absently, while I force myself to keep my hands off the thread on my bandage before nothing is left of it.
“What does Christina think about you working here the whole day?” Skyla asks, and our gazes swerve to the neighbor’s garden. Christina is spread out on a sun lounger, pretending to read a book, but we all know she’s keeping a close eye on Matthew.
“She tolerates it. Barely,” Matthew adds with a smirk.
“Understandable,” Kendra says. “Our hot blondie here has stolen all your attention since her hand kissed your cheek.”
My jaw drops as she clasps me on the back with a shit-eating grin on her face. The pointed are-you-high look I shoot her just earns me a cheeky wink. So that’s the way the cookie crumbles. My roomies have united behind my back to set me up with Matthew. Traitors.
The other girls snicker, but my focus is on the mumbled ‘That she did…’ coming from the guy heaving a sigh next to me before he pushes himself up to his feet.
“Alright, let’s get back to work.”
After all the pieces of my once beautiful tree lie in a high pile in my driveway, we start working on the broken part of my porch and help Matthew get rid of the demolished wooden planks.
“Be careful with these. They are full of rusty nails,” Matthew cautions, but of course, he jinxed it. The spiky end of a nail rips through my work glove, tearing open the bandage underneath.
“Ouch!” A hiss whizzes through my lips as an awful pain speeds up my hand. With my teeth, I yank off the glove. My cut is bleeding again. “Dammit.”
Matthew is by my side in a heartbeat. “Let me have a look.”
He peels my hand from where I’m pressing it against my chest, opening my fist to examine my palm. I yank it out of his grasp.
“It’s just a scratch. I’m fine.”
“It’s not. Let me—”
“I said I’m fine!” I snap, my defenses shooting up all at once.
The others freeze in their tracks. Four heads whip in my direction while I give Matthew an unblinking stare. For a second, hurt shimmers in his glassy eyes. That’s how you thank the guy for everything he’s done for you?
The pain now pounding in my hand shoos the guilty thoughts away, one that reaches exploding levels when Leo adds her two cents.
“Uhm, did you two have sex?” And in true Leo fashion, she sounds genuinely curious.
“No!” Matthew and I hurl back at her simultaneously.
Leo’s gaze ping-pongs between the two of us before she shrugs. “You definitely should.”
“Argh!” I cry out, loud enough to scare the birds nearby that all soar into the air to find themselves a quieter place. I wish they would take me with them.
Turning tail, I blaze past the girls and stomp into the house. I take the stairs two at a time, gunning for the bathroom on the first floor. Once there, I rip off the dirty bandage with shaky fingers. Blood dribbles into the basin, and I turn on the faucet to hold my hand underneath the cold water. With jerky movements, I snatch disinfectant and gauze from the medicine cabinet above and clumsily tend to my wound.
Footsteps resound from the hallway. I quickly lock the door. If Leo wants to tick me off with another one of her insultingly casual comments, I’m going to rip out her piercings one by one. However, the pounding footsteps don’t sound like Leo’s lazy shuffles when they come straight for the bathroom. Someone yanks at the handle, rattling it, before they slap a hand on the door.
“Sam, are you alright?” Matthew’s frustrated yet concerned voice seeps from behind the wood.
I keep my eyes on the strips I’m trying to apply to keep the new bandage in place. “Get out of my house.”
He ignores my order. “Let me in.”
Not into this room, not into my life, not into my heart. I bang the cabinet shut. “I said get out.”
There’s a huff on the other side before something starts to scratch on the door. My gaze snaps to the lock. Stunned, I watch the key turn before it’s pushed out and drops to the floor. Matthew slips in, his face hard as stone as he slams the door behind him. He picks up the key and locks the door once more.
I scoff, leering at him. “Daddy didn’t teach you to respect other people’s privacy, huh?”
He scrapes his hair back. A tiny leaf flutters to the floor that has been stuck in his strands. “You’re angry, I get it. I’m trying to apologize here, in case you haven’t noticed.”
“Apology not accepted,” I say with a vicious smirk before I shoulder past him, but he quickly snatches the key from the lock and tucks it into his pocket.
Gritting my teeth, I swivel around to shoot him a death glare. He jams one hand into his hip, the motion flapping his open flannel shirt over his black wife beater. His other hand rubs a finger over his lower lip.
“Tell me, Sam,” he starts slowly, his eyes on the floor, “did you know I was in the room?”
I just scoff, crossing my arms and shaking my head. His gaze drifts up to me as he takes a step closer.
“You heard me, didn’t you?” he presses. “The floorboards creaked when I approached.”
I continue to shake my head, retreating until my back hits the wall. “I didn’t. I—”
“You knew I was there, yet you didn’t stop.” He takes another step in my direction. The scent of sweat, wood, sun-kissed skin, and something erotic wafts up my nose as he flattens a hand above my head. His unrelenting stare almost peels the skin from my cheeks. “It turned you on, didn’t it? You wanted me to watch you. To see how you—”
“Why the fuck did you leave just like that?” I cut in before he can finish his sentence. Before he can get to the core of my vulnerability, rip it open, and let it all pour out at his feet. “A little weird, don’t you think? Kissing me and then just clearing off without another word?”
He blinks at me, his hand sliding from the wall and dropping at his side. “That’s why you’re mad? Because I didn’t stay?”
Yes. No. Fuck, what is this guy doing to me?
I blow out air through my nose, hitching up a shoulder. “You could have at least said something.”
“Like what? Thank you for letting me watch? Thank you for giving me the most erotic moment of my life? Thank you for being the first woman who nearly made me come without a single touch?”
My mouth slackens. Something deflates inside me, something I don’t want to lose. The part that wants to loathe him, hurt him, strip his soul bare just like he exposed mine.
He cusses under his breath, his hands curling into fists at his side. “I kissed you because I couldn’t stop myself, and it was only after your eyes found mine, looking up at me in sheer horror, that I realized my mistake. I left because if I’d stayed one second longer, I…” He trails off, swallowing down the words I so desperately want him to say. His eyes travel to my lips. “God, Sam, you’re making me crazy.”
Good. Then I’m not the only one who has to suffer.
A weird feeling unfurls in my stomach when his eyes roam between mine. The need to use his lowered defenses to rebuild mine. The need to get under his skin, to the rawness underneath.
The need for… payback.
Apparently, the switch flipping inside my brain also triggers something in my eyes, because he slopes his head, squ
inting at me. Or maybe he can hear my heart thumping in my chest, or my lungs squeaking with labored breaths as my hand vanishes underneath the waistband of my sweatpants.
He follows the movement with comically wary eyes before his gaze snaps back up to me, his head jerking back a little.
“What are you doing?” he asks in alarm.
I wet my lips, sending him a wicked smile. Today, I’m pulling the strings. I’m the one in control.
Today, he’s at my mercy.
Matthew clocks my moves with laser-precise focus as my white panties come into view. Not the sexiest pair I own, but hell, I’m not Kendra wearing ass-scratching thongs for dirty work. He can only see half of my hand, but my fingers swirling in circles underneath the fabric don’t leave much to the imagination of what I’m doing.
The sexual tension grows until the waves of heat lick at my skin. I utter a moan as the first drops wet my fingers, flopping my head back against the wall while keeping my challenging stare at him.
His breathing grows faster, his exploring gaze sweeping between my eyes, my lips, and my hand, unable to decide where to put his focus on.
“What are you going to do now, huh?” My voice is not my own. Deep, croaky, and thick with the film of pleasure coating my tongue. “Are you going to stop me?” I jerk my head to the key in his jeans. “Are you going to leave me?”
His jaw locks, eyes straying between mine as he tries to make up his mind. Whatever is holding him back dissipates as his gaze drops to my lips. He leans in, raising his hands, ready to cup my face.
“No,” I snarl, my voice harsh, mostly because I’m dying to feel his lips on mine again. But that’s the price you pay for retaliation. For the other to suffer, you have to suffer, too. “You have no right to touch me.”
A deep rumble comes from his chest, close to a growl. His shoulders cave, cracking under a weight I can’t see before his palms find support on the wall, on both sides of my head.
This game we’re playing is dangerous. Thrilling and riveting but with the potential to do serious damage. A tiny, harmless weapon nicking into my fragile paper heart. Scissors I’m currently holding in my hand.
“This is how you want to torture me?” he purrs, so fucking close to my lips, I can taste the desperation on his tongue. He throws a pointed look at the horizontal mast growing in his jeans and almost drilling through the teeth of his zipper. “Congrats. You ruined any chance of me ever getting you out of my fucking head.”
Something between a hissing moan and a mischievous snicker tumbles out of me. Screw the consequences. Bringing this guy to his knees is worth cutting an origami into my chest.
I grin seductively, biting my lip as I lift one leg to put my foot on the drawer behind him. My knee almost touches his hip, but I keep an inch of space between us. My back arcs, and he groans when I push a finger deep into myself.
“Fuck, Sam, don’t…”
Whatever he wanted to say—‘don’t stop’ or ‘don’t do this to me’ or ‘don’t you dare’—gets stuck in his throat when my mouth pops open, my chest jutting out with a hard jerk. The orgasm bangs into me out of nowhere, coming from a blind spot I haven’t had in my periphery. I fumble for something to hold on to, feeling the faucet next to me and accidentally turning it on as I grip the nob. The gushing water drowns my moan, my knee vibrating against his hip as I ride the waves of ecstasy.
And all this time, his eyes are on me. Eyes glistening with a sheen of agony because I didn’t take him with me. Because I left him behind and went on my naughty trip without him.
I regain my composure before the last aftershock wrecks through me, pull out my finger, and lift it in the air. His gaze zones in on the glistening juice, following it all the way inside my mouth as I suck my finger without breaking eye contact.
His hands slide from the wall, and he shuts his eyes for a moment as he gruffs out, “I’m in actual, physical pain right now.”
We both look down at the tent in his jeans. The fabric moves with the throbs in his boxers.
I adjust my sweatpants, clearing my throat. “Then ease the pain. Right here. Right now.”
His eyebrows arc up to his hairline when I nod to his junk. “What?”
“You heard me.”
“I can’t jerk off in front of you.”
“Why not?”
“It’s a guy thing.”
“A pity. Let’s get back to work then.” I snatch the keys from his pocket, using his dazed state to my advantage.
“What? Wait… Can I get a minute to—”
“Tug your shit in my bathroom?” I hustle him toward the door, smirking. “I don’t think so.”
“No, just a second to—”
“Get out of here.” I shut the door behind us, pushing him into motion with both hands on his back. Just before we join the others outside, I whisper with another nod to his full-mast boner, “I hope your neighbors have bad eyesight.”
Thirteen
Matthew
For the rest of this strikingly eventful afternoon, my boner and I are the punchline of every joke. Kendra uses every chance to make my cock the center of the conversation, and it takes the fucker half an hour to back down and shrivel to its normal size.
I take it all in stride, let the girls have their fun. At least the atmosphere between Sam and me has shifted from pitch-black to muddy gray. Every jab about how I don’t need a second hammer to punch in a nail into the planks is worth the triumphant smirks she’s throwing my way.
Not to mention the live porn show she gave me. Fuck. Me. Never thought the sweet girl next door had so much fire in her.
And damn, did I burn my fingers today. And I didn’t even touch her.
The second her hand vanished beneath her pants, she set my iron will ablaze and reduced my resolution to ashes. Here I was, waving the white flag in hopes of earning her forgiveness and moving on, and what did she do? Stabbed me in the back, locked me in a cage, shackled my fucking soul, and ruined every hope I’d had to get her out of my head.
A bright future or a dirty weekend adventure?
Christina’s voice continues to boomerang inside my head when I finish my work for today and hop under the shower. Holding onto the last thread of my willpower, I refuse to curl a fist around my cock.
“No,” I growl down to my twitching friend. “Behave, man. We’re not fourteen anymore, dammit.”
Finally, he hangs his head, but not before I’ve poisoned his blood vessels with a few sips of cognac.
I spend the rest of the evening going through unanswered emails and checking in with Sofia. She tells me that Dad is fine—calmer since yesterday and not as irascible. I plaster a smile onto my face she can’t see and tell her that’s good news, although we both know it isn’t. Dad is slowly reaching the scope of quiet deterioration. The state that handcuffs him to a bed, shatters the last crumbs of his memory, and makes him shit into diapers for the rest of his wretched days.
“Patrick said he’d quit,” Sofia informs me in a bleak tone. “He promised to repair the wind breakers on the east side, but if we can’t pay him by the end of the month…”
She lets the sentence hang on the line.
My lips flatline. “I’m on it, Sofia. Tell him he’ll get his money in time. Just hold on for a few more days. I’ll come back this weekend, and we’ll work this out, okay?”
“Yes,” she says with a confidence we both don’t feel. “Take care, boy.”
“You, too. Bye.”
I toss my phone onto the bed and drag both hands down my face. Christina promised to pay me the first 3K by tomorrow, so this might buy me some time. Time I should use to make my move with Jillian, she reminded me with a wink and a not so subtle nod to her daughter this morning.
I stand up and glance out the window. Jillian’s fancy Porsche is parked in the driveway, so she’s home. An opportunity to get the ball rolling and spend the evening with my maybe-future bride. But just as I leave my room, ready to knock on her door, agitated voices bou
nce up from downstairs.
“… only hired him to play match-maker again. Don’t sell me for stupid, Mom,” Jillian spits.
“I hired him because I needed a gardener,” Christina argues.
“A gardener who’s sleeping in the guest room, which just so happens to be next to mine?” She scoffs. “I don’t remember you doing your last gardeners the same favor. In fact, they weren’t even allowed to enter the house without your permission.”
“Matthew is the son of an old friend of mine. He’s not a stranger.”
“Are you kidding me? How old was he when you last saw him? Five?”
“Don’t play coy, Jillian,” Christina drones, her tone challenging. “I saw you last week when he brought you home. You scrambled onto his lap the second he killed the engine.”
A moment of loaded silence follows, and I can practically see Jillian’s jaw unhinging.
“Seriously? You spied on me? You fucking spied on me?”
“Oh, please… That boy’s truck is louder than a tractor.” Yes, it’s about a million decibels above her Tesla copy, but she’s clearly never heard a tractor. No surprise. “He woke up the entire neighborhood when he stopped in front of the house.”
Keys jingle before Jillian seethes, “You disgust me.”
And three seconds later, the entrance door slams shut. I walk back to the window and glance out just as Jillian’s blue Porsche speeds out of the driveway with screeching tires.
For a moment, I fight the urge to rush downstairs and shake Christina until her hairspray has vaporized. If she just backed the fuck off for once and let us work it out on our own, we wouldn’t still be tip-toeing around each other like shy teenagers afraid to hold hands.
My phone pings, and I pick it up. Something flutters in my stomach when I look at the screen.
Samantha Kent: Just saw Jillian and Christina butting horns again. If you need an escape, I’m in my tree house.
I peer through the curtains, craning my neck. The lights in Sam’s tree house are on. Biting my lip, I glance back to where Jillian’s Porsche stood a minute ago.