Her eyes dart to mine, and her affect changes abruptly as if she woke up from a drugged stupor and realized she’s being held against her will by a madman.
She gives several rapid-fire blinks. “So where’s that access trail to the beach?”
We head out, and I take her down the old wooden steps that lead to the sand. Aspen kicks off her heels and hitches them with her thumb as we walk into the balmy ocean haze. The salt licks at our hair, our skin, clinging to our lips, demanding we taste the day.
“I used to love the beach. It brings back so many memories,” she says, pulling the hair away from her face in thick, dark shards as we edge closer to the waterline. “Like when I was a kid—my mom and I lived on the sand.”
I thought she might qualify that with something else. Aspen and I spent all our time at the beach—all our nights lying in the sand counting stars—something you can only do with any success in L.A. Always hoping for shooting stars, and then we’d pretend to ride out their tails across the Pacific. But I broke her heart on the beach, took a sledgehammer to all of those good memories we shared and turned them into broken glass, useless as the stardust we watched burn to the earth.
“You head to the beach much anymore?” I know for a fact that pale, flaccid husband of hers lives like a hermit. Aspen wades into the water holding her skirt to her knees as the waves rush around us. She doesn’t answer the question, so I’m guessing it’s a solid no. “We’ll come down here often.”
She looks to me with her frightened eyes. The infamous we is off the table, and here I’ve defiled the day with the mention of us partaking in something so breathtaking as heading to the beach together.
She treads in a little too far, and an errant wave douses her right over the back. Aspen lets out a curdled scream as her body launches right into mine from sheer force. Nature just shoved her into my arms, and I can’t help but laugh a little.
“Shit!” She holds out her hands letting the remainder of her skirt fall into the water, limp.
Another wave comes up and slaps over the two of us like an unexpected baptism. This time it’s me letting out a roar. The water races back into the sea, pulling us off balance just enough to send Aspen crashing into me again.
I laugh, catching her in my arms as another wave violently thrashes against us.
“Carter!” She screams with laughter, burying her face in my chest as I struggle to pull us to the shoreline. A dull laugh ripples through us as we collapse to the sand, pinning Aspen’s body beneath mine. I fall to my elbows, caging her in, my panting breath mingling with hers. The water rides up just under her back, and the whitewash fans out around her hair like wings.
“God, you’re beautiful.” My body tenses waiting for her harsh rebuttal, for her knee in my balls, anything that says get off me.
Her chest pulsates into mine—I’d like to think from the thrill of being so close to me, but in reality it’s most likely the heart-stopping ice water we’ve just had dumped over us. It was Mother Nature telling us both to wake the fuck up. That we were perfect for each other, still are. Henry blinks through my mind with his maniacal smile, and I blink him right back out.
Aspen’s lips part expectantly. Her hand reaches up to my cheek as she conforms her palm to me. Aspen swallows hard, her powerful gaze never leaving mine.
Here it is. A moment pulled out of the ordinary for something as pie in the sky as a kiss. Aspen leans her head up just enough to let me know she wants it. And as much as I’m bleeding on the inside to devour her, I can’t seem to initiate that one simple move.
A hard, cold slap of water crashes over my back landing my cheek to hers.
Aspen’s body bucks with a laugh, and I soon follow. I’m not sure what we’re finding funny as hell other than the fact the ocean has all but sealed us together. I turn my face just enough and land my lips over her cool hair, her ear, eager to feel the unexpected warmth of her skin.
“Aspen.” Her name expires from me like a love song. My hand finds hers, and I interlace our fingers just enough to make sure she can’t let go. This, right here, her body tensing to mine, her beautiful lips just inches away for the taking, is what I’ve dreamed of for so long. Poetry in motion. Aspen and me making wild love on the beach in the brazen light of day—my body fights to make this happen, to take her.
“I’d better get home to change.” She pants into my neck, and I’d swear on my life I just felt her lips bless me with a kiss.
I help her up, trying not to admire too deeply the way her gossamer dress has suctioned to her perfect form.
We stagger our way to my truck, and I help her in. Her hand touches mine once again, and I drink it in, flesh to flesh like gulping down air.
I drive her all the way home, brazenly dropping her off at her front gate. Take that, Henry. You may have her in your bed, welded to your ring finger, but I had her in the sand, her breath melting against my skin, and I’m feeling rather fine. I glance up to their door. So fuck you.
“If you want I can pick you up in the morning,” I offer. “We can hit breakfast before work.” She left her car at Jinx. I offered to drive her back, but she didn’t want to get the interior loaded with sand. For a brief second I envision Henry backhanding her over it.
“No, I got this. Stevie owes me breakfast, but thanks for the offer.” She gets out and lingers a moment with her hair still slicked back, her makeup slightly smudged. She looks younger, less hardened by life, hardened by me. “I had a nice day. Thank you for that.”
My heart thumps at the idea of Aspen softening to me, Aspen being nice to me.
I can give you a nice night, I want to say, but I seal my lips shut because that’s not what this is about. Hell, I don’t know what this is about other than Aspen coming back into my life—but not as someone else’s wife. My heart wrenches because that was never the plan.
“What the hell?” Henry bellows from the balcony. “You better fucking hose off. I don’t want any of that shit tracking in the house.”
Her face deepens an intense cherry red, and I resist the urge to pull her back into the truck with me. Who in the hell talks that way to their wife? Henry should be kissing the soles of her feet over the fact she graces his bed night after night.
“Goodbye, Carter.” She slams the door and runs up the stairs. I pull away from the curb slowly and catch Henry giving me the stink eye. I fake a smile and offer up a friendly wave, but I give him the finger as soon as I hit the end of the street.
Aspen says she’s safe with him, that he treats her well.
It’s pretty clear she has low expectations when it comes to being safe and treated well. Henry is an asshole.
Everybody sees this.
Why can’t she?
* * *
I shower and change and watch the sun dip into the water. I once told Abby it was God dipping his cookie before taking a bite, and she laughed. Of course, I gently grazed her cheek because Abby is my cookie. That’s my pet name for her. It’s fitting because she’s cute and sweet as can be. But I don’t have Abby tonight. It’s not my week. And like most Abby-free weeks, I’m far too restless for my own good. Instead of heading back to Jinx, I hit the bookstore and pick up a leather bound copy of Romeo and Juliet. Afterwards, I take a turn toward the Hollywood Highland condos and park up the street from where I dropped Aspen off just a few short hours ago. In the stealth of the night I head over, book in hand, and make a nighttime deposit to her lending library. A smile comes and goes as I peruse the offerings, a few thin Clifford paperbacks, several versions of the Berenstain Bears, all of them big, flat squares. A few romance novels, and a copy of The Philodendron Conundrum, A Landscaper’s Guide to Yard Staging. And now I’ve added Romeo and Juliet to the collection. I’m not sure what I’m doing. I’m not sure if I’m gunning hard to have an affair with her or if I just want to throw all my feelings on the table for once and hope they settle in good places. Aspen is married, I remind myself as I stride back to my car. But something about Henry’s tone tod
ay set me off, and, now, I feel as though I have the right to conduct surveillance on their lives. I set up shop and watch her condo in the event law enforcement decides to show up.
When Aspen ran up those stairs today, I couldn’t help but feel like she was running into a burning building. Henry might be her husband, but judging by the way he barked at her, he won’t be for long. I’ll admit it. I’m rooting for him to implode. Back in the day when Henry was a rush at Delta, he made it a point to bang his way through the Greek Alphabet. If you needed something disgusting done on a dare, Henry was your dolt. He once lapped up a bowl of slop the girls threw together, garbage from discarded plates mixed with beers and sodas dug up from the trash. He licked it up like a dog in exchange for the promise of pussy. Henry would disembowel himself if a beautiful woman promised to open her legs for him. He was a playboy, a man whore, an idiot with a wandering dick. But, apparently, Aspen has cured him.
I finish up my burger and am about to call it a night when my phone goes off. I’m half afraid it’s Aspen wondering what the fuck I’m doing staking out her home like some homicidal maniac. In truth, I’m just hoping to protect her from one. The best-case scenario is that she doesn’t need protection. The worst-case scenario for me would be that Henry is a decent guy. That he treats Aspen like the queen she is, and, in no way, does she need rescuing from that burning building. I should have rescued us both four years ago and never started the damn fire to begin with.
It’s Carson. Dinner?
I text back. Sorry sweet cheeks just finished.
Aspen’s garage door opens, and a Porsche rolls out. I can make out Henry’s pinhead in the driver’s seat. He’s taking off—probably on his way to buy her lobster and caviar. He’s gone from wife beater to husband of the year in a single bound. I so badly rooted for him to be a monster that the alternative makes me want to hurl. It’s hard for me to believe there is anyone out there that fits better with Aspen than I do. Aspen was hardened from her father’s inattention, and I was weakened from my mother’s disappearance. Our traumas dovetailed into one another, and somehow we made each other whole.
I wait until Henry is past the second stop sign before taking off after him. My mind wanders a million miles an hour at where he might be off to. Probably to Whole Foods to pick up the aforementioned delicacies. I’d do that. Just one request is all she’d have to make, and I’d be out the door. I give a quick glance to that lending library of hers filled with mostly children’s books. A thought hits me in the face like a bookend. What if she’s pregnant? What if she’s had a sudden craving for ice cream, and Henry is the one manning up and heading to the nearest frozen section to satisfy that craving.
My stomach lurches as I follow him several city blocks right onto the freeway, 405 North. That’s home for me. Maybe I’ll just keep going and let old Henry be. He gets off on Nickson, and I can’t help but follow. Kinx is down this way, the nightclub my brothers and I kicked off last fall. Henry shoots down that direction, and just when I’m convinced he’s headed there (in my fantasy scenario he’s looking for me, to bash my brains in for getting my hard-on a little too close to his wife), he keeps going another few blocks into a seedier neighborhood laden with titty bars and hookah shops. Henry pulls into the valet parking for Juicy Gurlz.
“Holy shit.” I pull into vacant meter parking and pick up my phone.
At Juicy Gurlz. Care to join me? I send the text out to both Carson and Cash. I’m sure at least one of them is already on their way to join me. I know for a fact they’ve both racked up frequent flier miles here.
I give it a good ten minutes before heading inside.
Carson meets me at the door just as I’m about to slip in.
“What’s up?” He pulls me into a half hug. “You ready to jump back into the game? Tits first.” He nods toward the establishment. “That’s the way to do it.” His biceps bulge right out of his T-shirt. Carson has been lifting weights like he has a championship on the line. He’s got fresh tats running up and down both arms—the only Cannon to ink himself as of yet.
“What’s going on?” Cash comes up looking like Carson’s twin. It’s strange that my mother produced so many clones. I fill them in on my day with Aspen, on the fact I followed Henry here.
“You followed her husband? What the hell’s gotten into you?” Cash slaps his hand over my shoulder as we head inside. It’s dark, save for an alternating pink and electric blue glow that keeps aggressive rhythm to the music. A couple of women gyrate their hips on the elongated stage that spreads out like a tongue down the middle of the establishment. I spot Henry front and center, and we duck to the left and take a table near the back instead.
There he is, Aspen’s husband of the year, salivating like a dog as a topless woman grinds her bikini bottom in his face.
“I should take a picture,” I say manufacturing my outrage. Inwardly I’m beaming and want to jump on the table and shout for joy. I want to scream, Drinks are on me! I was right! Henry the ass has never changed. His insatiable need for pussy has finally brought his marriage to the brink.
“No pictures,” Carson scolds. “It’s the number one rule in places like this. There’s security everywhere. They’ll confiscate your phone and slam your head into a wall at the same time.” He claps up a storm as the girls dance their way off stage. A set of buxom blondes take their place.
Henry signals for a beer, his eyes never leaving the heavy titted girls.
“Okay, so now what?” I’m excited. Hopped up and ready to draw out a game plan on the nearest napkin. “She obviously wouldn’t approve. I can tell her I just so happened to be here when Henry stumbled in. Nail him by defacto.”
“No can do, big bro.” Cash calls a waitress over and orders us each a beer. He slips a couple of bills into her cleavage achingly slow, and she giggles up a storm before taking off.
“All right. I won’t say anything. Besides, I don’t want Aspen to think I frequent these types of places when all I’m doing is following the asswipe she’s leashed herself to.”
Henry doesn’t know what he has at home. He has no clue how lucky he is, what I wouldn’t do to trade places. Just the thought of sharing a bed freely with Aspen makes me want to weep. A surge of anger pulsates through me, and the urge to weep is swiftly replaced with the urge to kill.
Fucking Henry. I’m thrilled he doesn’t know how good he has it. Maybe he’ll lose her, and, by some miracle, Aspen and I can get back what we had—what deep down I don’t believe we’ve ever lost.
“One of you will tell her.” I nod to my brothers, and they shake their heads dismissively.
Carson’s cheek twitches as if he were entertaining the idea. “We’re staying the hell out of it.”
The music shifts again, and the girls are replaced with another set—belly dancers. A petite brunette shakes her hips right over to Henry as if he were her intended target all along. He stands to greet her, riding his tongue up her thigh before she slinks away.
Carson smacks me. “I wouldn’t worry too much about telling her. Guys like this don’t last too long in iron shackles. Let things run their natural course. You don’t want to be a home wrecker.”
Home wrecker? Is he kidding?
“Don’t you see that it’s all going to work brilliantly for you if you just shut the fuck up?” Carson is not amused. He once had a girlfriend who left him out of the blue, slept with half the basketball team that he was on before handing him his balls on a platter. His heart was bruised for weeks. I would think that he, out of all people, would advocate for Aspen to be free from this moron.
Cash smacks me as the girl Henry tongued bares us her tits. Her entire face squints to nothing as she smiles. She’s plain as toast in comparison to Aspen, even with all the war paint on. She has a snaggle-tooth up front, and I try to focus in on that instead of her nipples.
“You see that?” Cash leans into me. “Bet if you toss her a twenty, you’ll end up with a blow job.”
“No thanks.” That girl has
the appeal of a kitchen mouse. Hell, I’d rather get a blow job from a kitchen mouse than anything Henry has licked. Then it hits me like a raw steak to the face. He’s licked Aspen. Most likely in delicate places. I bat the thought away. “That girl doesn’t even give me a semi.” The only girl that gives me anything is the one I can’t have. But I don’t just want Aspen because she’s forbidden fruit. She was mine long before she was anybody else’s. Much to Henry’s thigh-licking chagrin, Aspen will always be mine.
“You just need to get laid.” Cash is determined to make this happen. “You’re wound too fucking tight. You need to get that chick out of your head. Just for a night. Alleviate some pressure. I know a few girls I could have over to our place by midnight. Two on one, you’ll be in heaven till sun up. Come morning you’ll realize your obsession with this girl was just a fluke magnified by a dry spell. Happens all the time.” He knocks back his beer and makes a sour face as if he’s speaking from experience. Cash has been bi-coastal for so long, I’m not sure what or whom he’s got going on in New York. Maybe he’s been burned a time or two himself.
“Don’t go giving out my address. I have a daughter. I don’t need any of those kinds of girls knocking down my door.”
“You’re alone for the week.” Cash flexes a grin. “You’re out of excuses, buddy.”
Henry gets up from his seat and slinks off to the corner. It’s dark, smoky from all the cigarettes they allow in this California-zoned smoke-free palace of perversion. The belly dancer with the delicious thighs follows him over and offers up a lap dance. If Cash is right, Henry will whip out a twenty and get that blow job I all but forfeited.
“I think they’re kissing.” Carson leans in. “Mmm… Scratch that. I think they’re fucking.”
Her body rides up and down over his lap. Her head writhes over her neck, and I’m stunned at what I might be witness to. Licking a Juicy Gurl was bad enough but taking her so brazenly?
“They can’t be fucking,” I growl in disbelief. Even the elated part of me is stunned. “It’s illegal. You can’t do shit like that in here.”
A Thousand Starry Nights Page 9