“Aww. How can you say no to that face?”
He runs his hands down my back. “It’s easy when I haven’t had a woman in my bed in years.”
I stifle a chuckle, amused by his playfulness. I thought he didn’t know how to joke. Without sarcasm, anyway.
When it vanishes from his eyes, he lifts me up and lays us on the bed, our lips welded.
“Holt—” I whimper into his mouth.
“Let me have you, a touch, a kiss, a taste. I’ll take as much as you’re willing to give, but please don’t deny me of you.”
His eyes plead, but it isn’t pushy. I see the want in them. I feel the want in me.
“Touch me, Holt.”
He buries his face in my neck, massaging my breast over my nightgown with a rough hand. My body responds to him, reaching for his touch, squirming when he kisses me right, begging for more of him. A kiss becomes a desperate dance of our lips. A touch becomes a greedy frenzy of hands. An insatiable hunger overcomes us for more than a taste could satisfy. Articles of clothing disappear in a frenetic flurry of hands and mouths, each part exposed thoroughly kissed and attended to. All that’s left between us is the thin material of my panties and his boxers.
I’m thankful the only light comes from across the room. I’m unaccustomed to showing my body to a man.
His fingers dip beneath the band, grazing the dusting of pubic hair, pushing it low on my hips, stopping shy of too far.
Like my first night in his bed, a bolt of lightning strikes. But it isn’t outside, it’s within me, a storm of arousal rolling over my body. I squirm under him. My skin actually aches. My need is maddening. I’ve never felt such a strong urge to sleep with a man.
Tilting my face to his until they’re within a breath of each other, his reddish-gold eyes search mine intensely. At this proximity, I’m able to really study them, noting how beautifully detailed the irises truly are, a mingling of smudged amber and ruby. I could never paint anything as incredible and deep as his eyes. I wouldn’t be able to do them justice. They’re fiery puddles of autumn in New Hampshire, when the leaves set the forest on fire.
Holding my gaze, he brushes his lips against mine and whispers, “You’re so beautiful, Evie, I forget to function.”
I moan into his open mouth and pull him into me, my fingertips touching the uneven skin of the scar on his back. When I move them across it, he jumps off me.
“What’s wrong?” I pant, leveraging my upper body up on my elbows.
“It’s nothing.” He paces at the foot of the bed, rubbing his hands over his face. “Maybe we’re moving this along faster than I’m comfortable with.”
I’d never say I knew this man. I don’t. Not really. I know he’s lying, though. Perhaps there is honesty in his statement. Perhaps he’s right.
“Is it because of your scar?” I sit up. “It doesn’t bother me if you’re worried it does.”
He peers down at me.
“It bothers me.”
I crawl to the brass footboard and kneel, taking his hand in mine.
“Would you like to tell me how you got it?”
His face drops with—shame?
“No.”
Well, that’s that.
“I should leave,” I state, dropping his hand and gathering my nightgown from the floor. I clutch it to my naked torso, trying to hide my body and my humiliation. I haul ass for the stairs. My toes touch the first step when his work-worn hand clasps my shoulder. I stop mid-step and glimpse at it, saddened. It makes me feel safe, wanted, needed.
His silence weighs down on the air.
I’m thankful for my long, thick hair. I lose myself in it. I’d give anything to hide from this moment. His hand disappears under the mess of brown toppling down my back and breasts, pushing it off my neck and over my other shoulder.
A whimper seeps between my lips when his mouth closes over the curve of my neck.
“Stay with me tonight.” His warm breath tickles my skin.
“We already tried that.”
“No sex,” he whispers, his fingers running along my arms. “I enjoy when you sleep beside me.”
“Alright.”
He takes my hand and leads me back to his welcoming bed, the sheets crumpled and warm from our almost lovemaking. I start to put my nightgown back on, but he stops me.
“Let me feel your body against mine.”
I drop it on the floor, climbing in under the sheets he holds back for me. He covers us and draws me into him, his arms winding around me like morning glory.
The next morning, I sit out on the back porch swing with a cup of lemon tea, admiring the temperate weather and thinking about last night with Holt.
“Evie,” my mother says softly, apprehension on her face.
“What’s up?”
She sits beside me on the swing.
“We need to discuss whatever’s going on with you and Holt.”
Damn.
“What do you think is going on between him and me, exactly?”
“That’s what I’m here to find out.”
I’d love to figure it out myself.
Our encounter in the attic didn’t lend to my confusion about what’s evolving between him and me.
“We’re friends,” I answer, because it’s the truth. That much I’m sure of. In the month I’ve been back, we’ve developed a bond. “Aren’t you happy we’ve been getting along? I thought that’s what you wanted.”
“It is. I am. But you need to understand something before you allow anything to happen.” Too late. She sips on her lemonade, likely to give herself a pause to figure out the right words before speaking again. “Holt is a nice young man. But—he’s troubled.”
“Troubled, how?”
“He’s sad.”
I’m familiar with it. I saw it when our eyes connected that first time and every time since.
“Why do you think he’s like that?”
“I honestly couldn’t say.” She considers my question, staring out into the backyard. “He never volunteered to tell me, and I thought it would overstep a boundary if I asked. But something happened to that poor boy that caused him to live like a nomad. He’s running from something or someone. I guess that’s why I took him in, because I felt for him. Maybe he’ll feel comfortable enough to tell you eventually. He seems to have taken a liking to you recently.”
“Yeah, we’ve been getting along.”
Really well.
“That’s what concerns me,” she says, as if she hears my inner thoughts.
“You wanted me to make friends with him.”
“I don’t want you getting too attached to him either, Evie. It’s just—he probably isn’t planning on sticking around too much longer. When he leaves, I don’t want to see you get your heart broken again. You already have such little faith in men. I would hate for this to ruin you completely.”
“Mom, when have I ever gotten too attached to anyone?” She laughs. “Besides, you seem to be forgetting, I’m not planning on sticking around much longer either.”
I don’t need her getting the wrong idea about us and kicking him out. Funny, considering not long ago, I would’ve done anything to get him out of my hair and my attic.
“I’m happy if you two get to know one another on a friendly basis. He needs a friend, and it wouldn’t hurt you either. Just—promise me you’ll stay away from him emotionally, okay?”
“Yes, Mama,” I promise without batting an eyelash. Since I’m moving away in early fall, I have no intentions of starting an epic summertime romance with anyone—not even Aidan. Plus, she didn’t say anything about physically, so I don’t see it as lying.
“Good, baby.”
She stands to go back into the house.
“Mama?”
“Yeah, baby?” she responds, stopping to acknowledge me with her hand on the screen door.
“Do you know where he got the scar on his back?”
She shrugs her shoulders, a saddened expression wrenching her fa
ce. She walks into the house, leaving me with my thoughts of Holt.
What is he hiding?
Is he running from?
Or is he searching for?
area between the fore and
background, the focal point
I’ve been sneaking around with Holt since our almost night together a few weeks before, stealing kisses and gropes when we can spare a second during the day, sleeping in his bed together every night. We haven’t gone beyond heavy petting, but things have certainly become heated. I’m glad he hasn’t advanced it further. The last time I gave myself to a man, it ended with me heartbroken and pregnant. I wish my body agreed with my head and heart.
Friday, I work a full shift at the pet shelter, having lunch with Taylor. We park down by the river’s edge and eat the homemade turkey sandwiches she brought on the hood of my car, watching the water drift mildly along the path nature intended.
“How have things been at the house with Holt?”
“We’ve been—good.”
“Yeah?” She sounds surprised. “Since when?”
I shift my gaze down the river, trying to hide the blush on my cheeks. “Since he kissed me at the barbeque.”
“Holy shit, Evie.” She hits my shoulder and turns toward me. “How was he?”
“There were certainly fireworks.”
I bite into my sandwich.
“He looks like he knows what he’s doing.” Her head does a quick tilt to the side.
“Yeah, he does. Seemingly between the sheets as well.”
“Violet Jane Hathaway,” she exclaims, shoving me in the shoulder with her own, “you tell me everything!”
“There isn’t much to tell.” I pick at the corner crust of my sandwich and flick it into the river. A trout pops up and sucks the soggy bread into its mouth. “We’ve fooled around.”
“Even still, you haven’t been with anyone since—” Her voice dies off.
“Aidan.” I release a decompressing sigh. “It’s complicated things.”
“Does he know?”
“I could write a book with everything he doesn’t know.” I shake my head swiftly, as if to jolt the stomach-tying thoughts out of my brain. “I’ve been dreading telling him. I’ll have to, right? I can’t do this to him.” I stare over the river. “I wasn’t expecting any of this.”
“You’re overanalyzing. You aren’t attached to either of them, yeah?”
“Truth.”
“Then neither has a claim on you until it’s made official.”
A warm breeze picks up and blows through the leaves of the tree shading us, a chunk of my hair wafting across my eyes. I sweep it away.
“And what makes it official?”
“When you actually have the relationship conversation and one or both of you choose to make it exclusive. Have you done that with either?”
“I tried to talk with Holt about what’s been going on between us.”
“Didn’t go as you hoped, I’m guessing.”
“He shut down. He seems to have a hard time communicating his thoughts and feelings. Or he doesn’t want to. When I tried confronting him again, he invited me to his room.”
I fidget when a flash of Holt’s body over mine replays behind my eyes.
“Men,” she says with a shrug.
“He’s great at expressing himself physically.”
“What does that tell you?”
“He wants me.”
“Do you want him?”
“Yes,” I murmur.
That’s the first time I’ve admitted it to myself.
“Aidan is the emotional. Holt is the physical. Between them, you have the ideal man.”
“That’s it, though. Holt is more than what he lets you see. He’s deep, smart, and compassionate.”
“Sounds like you’ve made up your mind.”
I consider this, entranced by the river, my thoughts flowing like its ever-moving waters.
“I’m not sure about that,” I mutter, partially to myself, picking at the bread of my sandwich. “I like who I am when I’m around him.”
“Of course you do, babe.” She takes a bite of her sandwich and gazes out over the river. “Have you thought about telling him?”
She isn’t talking about my affair with Holt anymore.
“It’s certainly crossed my mind.”
“What do you think Christina would do if you did?”
“Kill me.”
“She definitely has a murderous look about her.”
We laugh, but it’s forced.
“I know I promised her I wouldn’t, but seeing him, spending time with him, it feels impossible. It was easy when he wasn’t around. I could convince myself I was doing the right thing by him and—”
“It’s okay, Evie. I understand.”
“Maybe it’s pointless. It won’t change the past or what I gave up.”
“I was mad at him for years,” Tay confesses. “It wasn’t really his fault, but if he had been there for you, to protect you from his mother, things would’ve been different for you.”
“Yeah.” I stare down at my sandwich. It isn’t particularly interesting, but I can’t bear to look into her eyes right now. I might cry. “I’d have my child.”
She hangs her arm around my shoulder, setting her cheek next to mine.
After lunch, I lose myself at work. It’s bath day today, so it got messy. Sprayed by dogs violently shaking off or splashed with gushes of soapy fur water when they fought me in their tubs. But it was also loads of fun. By the time I leave, I’m soaked, furry, and reek of wet mutt, but very happy. Not just from an honest day of work, but the fact I get to go home with Holt there to greet me.
And does he welcome a girl properly.
He drives me against the door, sampling my mouth with penetrating prods of his tongue. He pulls away gradually, his eyes sealed shut, as if he’s savoring the memory of my lips on his.
“Welcome home, little flower,” he speaks tenderly.
“Welcome indeed.” I’m so taken by his aggressive need, I forget we may not be alone. “Where’s my mother?” I ask with a breathy voice.
“She’s gone the whole weekend.” His lips play over mine. “I have you all to myself.” He glimpses down at my wet, fuzzy clothes. “Ruff day at work?”
I giggle.
“Was that a funny? Did you pun?”
“It doesn’t happen often, but every dog has its day.”
I giggle again, my face slumping into his chest, his warmth and masculine scent saturated into the soft cotton fibers of his shirt. His torso jerks with noiseless laughter. Keeping my body close, I lift my face to his. I stop laughing when I recognize the look in his eyes, the same one from the woods, the same one that seems to overtake his gaze a lot recently.
He leans his weight into me, pressing me back into the door, and plucks the knot at the bottom of my plaid shirt loose.
“I think we need to get you cleaned up immediately.”
I unfasten the buttons one by one, my fingers fumbling a bit, until my cleavage peeks out.
“Your skin is so soft and warm.” He runs his fingers across my lower stomach, above the waistband of my cutoffs.
“It’s yours if you want it,” I purr under his touch.
His eyes jump to mine, every muscle in his body motionless, as if my vision is based on movement. My gaze falls to his fingers tightening on the mound of my hip.
“I’ve got an idea,” he says, snatching my hand and directing me to the back of the house and out the door. He crosses the yard with long strides. As we advance on the lake, I catch his drift and strip off my shirt, my shorts, my shoes, while continually moving down the dock.
I push past him with a giddy shriek and cannonball into the cleansing water, the muck of the day washing away. When I break the surface again, Holt’s laughing at me from the edge of the landing.
“What are you waiting for?” I ask, splashing water at him.
He sheds his shirt, his muscles flexing as h
e works it over his head, and then his jeans, peeling the fly open so the root of his virility peers out. I watch him pull them down and step out of them, drinking him in with an unblinking focus. In a snap, he’s undressed and jumping into the lake, dousing me in a wave of water. I push large swells back at him. He lunges at me, catching my arm and wrenching me into him. I scream and fight him playfully. He laughs loudly and places his strong, calloused hand behind my head, smashing my mouth to his. It doesn’t start slow, gradually building itself into an urgency. It’s all throttle, leaving me without the use of basic human functions.
He isn’t holding back any longer.
We wetly trudge back to the house to make dinner and relax. He’s very attentive. He feeds me little bits of edible heaven or stands behind me as I prep, his breath on my neck distracting me. Once we have dinner on the stove, we start on dessert, strawberry pie. He cleans and slices the red fruit in fours while I make the crust. I’m using a rolling pin to flatten and spread the dough when he brings a strawberry dusted in sugar to my lips. I part them to let him place the tip between and bite it off. It’s exactly what I imagine summer tastes like—if it had a flavor. He kisses me hard, his tongue tasting the sugar from my lips.
“Strawberries and peaches.”
My lower gut tenses.
I’m beginning to like what his words do to me, even when he’s listing off fruit.
Crap.
We’re lounging on opposite ends of the couch in the sitting room while everything cooks, our legs tangled, reading our respective books. Just when I’m getting into my reading material, he reaches out and grasps my ankles, spreading me out underneath him.
“What are you doing?”
“What do you think?” he murmurs before baring down on my mouth. His hands navigate my curves over my clothes, fondling the mounds and dips downward to the waistband of my shorts. I wriggle for him, my body moving into his touch. I’m swept up in the sensation of his heavy body above mine, in his calloused hands grazing against the softness of my skin, in his pheromones mixed with the sweet scent of earth. I’m lost in us, on the verge of tearing his clothes off, when there’s a—Tap, tap, tap.
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