by Rose, Emery
Dylan snorted. “That’s for damn sure. I’m Sienna’s dirty little secret,” he mumbled. “Not good enough to use the front door. Or meet her parents.”
“That’s not… you know that’s not true, Dylan.”
I scrambled off the bed but not before downing the rest of my martini and slamming the glass on her bedside table.
“Babes—”
“No. We were supposed to be friends. I told you about Shane and all this time you’ve been keeping this from me? This is why I don’t trust people. Every time you let them in, let them get close, they screw you over.”
“Why do you think Daddy’s sending her to boarding school?” Dylan said, his voice bitter.
“Dylan, don’t. Please…”
“Please what? I never got a fucking vote, Sienna.” He laughed harshly. “But then, who would want another St. Clair bastard running around in the world, right?”
My eyes widened in shock. “What?”
Tears poured down Sienna’s cheeks. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I wanted to tell you. I was going to… I didn’t want to get in the middle of you and… Dyl—” She was crying so hard her words garbled. I crawled onto the bed and wrapped my arm around her shaking shoulders. Dylan was holding his head in his hands.
Save our souls.
13
Shane
Early Saturday morning in October, and conditions were perfect. We were on dawn patrol—me, Trav, Ryan, Cody Shaw was down from Huntington Beach, and even Oz was out here today. A gentle, steady offshore wind blew into the face of the wave and lifted it up. A big beautiful swell. And here we were, straddling our boards like a bunch of slackers, watching Remy zip across the wave and ride it all the way in. Like she owned the damn thing.
“Damn, but she’s hot,” Oz said, his head swiveling like an owl as he followed her every move. “She’s a honey trap.”
“Keep your eyes off her,” I growled.
Travis snickered. “You had plenty of time to think about the honey trap in Peniche.”
I punched his arm. He punched me back. Peniche was a sore subject. We’d just come back from an event in Portugal. It had been a shit show. My board had snapped in two when I rode a thick-lipped beast. The next day, the ocean was like a lake. I did my damnedest to get in a decent ride, but there was only so much you could do, and I didn’t even move on to the semi-finals. Which pissed me off. I’d had a fairly good season but nowhere as good as I’d hoped. That was the thing about surfing though. You couldn’t predict what the waves or the conditions were going to be like or prevent injuries. I’d come into the season with a sore shoulder, my rotator cuff—again—and even paddling out had been painful. But still. I’d take the bad with the good any day.
“We’re still the luckiest sons of bitches I know,” Trav said, echoing my thoughts.
“Damn straight. Beats working for a living.”
“I wouldn’t know,” Oz said.
We all laughed at that one as Firefly joined us in the lineup, a triumphant smile on her face. “You’re all proud of yourself, aren’t you?” I teased.
“Yep.”
“You should be. You’re extraordinary.”
“Extraordinary?” she asked, raising her dark brows.
“Extraordinary,” I said with a smile before I took off, paddling for the next wave. I rode the energy all the way in.
Win or lose, life was fucking good.
* * *
I leaned my shoulder against the doorframe and watched Remy as she studied the framed photos on my living room wall. Most of them had been taken by her. A photo of In-And-Out. Costa del Rey at dusk. The pier at sunset. She’d given them to me for my twenty-second birthday. There were other photos that she hadn’t taken. One of my mom. Another one of my parents together. And one of Remy that I took with my phone. She was sucking on a cherry-red lollipop, her lips wrapped around the round tip. Candy porn for my walls.
She hadn’t been aware that I was taking the photo until it was too late to stop me. The camera loved Remy, but she didn’t love it, unless she was behind the lens. Remy spun around and clasped her hands in front of her, her eyes roaming over my living room—the braided rug on the hardwood floor, the gray sectional, the glass coffee table. My apartment wasn’t anything fancy, just a place to sleep and hold my things between my travels. My dad kept telling me I needed to buy a place, invest in real estate instead of paying rent. But my rent was cheap, and I hadn’t gotten around to buying my own place yet.
“Why are you here, Firefly?”
“I missed you.”
“Really.” I pulled her down onto the sofa next to me. “What did you miss? Because I just saw you this morning.”
She swept her tongue across her lower lip, her eyes lowering. “Did you wear those gray sweatpants for me?”
I propped my bare feet on the coffee table. “You shouldn’t be looking at my gray sweatpants.”
“Then maybe you shouldn’t go commando.”
I pulled her into my lap, so she was straddling me, a risky move considering I was commando in gray sweatpants. Whenever she was near me, my dick stood up to attention. I was still trying to stay on the right side of that imaginary line I knew I shouldn’t cross. Kissing was okay. We couldn’t go past second base. Jesus. I sounded like a high school kid. Junior high, even. I was regressing.
She cradled my face in her hands. “Kiss me like it’s the end of the world. Kiss me like you’ll never see my face again.”
I didn’t want to live in a world where I’d never see her face again. My hands glided down her back and cupped her ass. “I don’t kiss on command.”
“How many girls have you kissed since you last kissed me?” She rolled her hips, grinding her body against my erection. My punishment for not giving her what she wanted.
“I didn’t keep count.” My hand tangled in her hair and I pulled her head down, nipping at her lips. She sunk her teeth into my lower lip and then she sucked on it.
“I hate you.”
“I know.” I smiled. “I hate you too.”
I groaned when she snuck her hand inside my sweatpants. Her warm hand wrapped around my cock and she squeezed.
“Remy.” My voice sounded strained and desperate. Begging for release but knowing I should stop this.
“Tonight, it’s my turn. This is allowed.”
We were making up the rules as we went. My turn. Her turn. This was allowed. No penetration. My hands made swift work of removing her flannel shirt and tank top, exposing her white lace bra. That was allowed. My T-shirt was tossed on the floor. That was allowed.
She returned her attention to my starving cock, and gripped the shaft, running her thumb over the wet head. I cursed when she squeezed, then began pumping, her hand so warm so perfect. My hands explored her curves and silky skin and it was all I could do not to come within the first few minutes. With each torturous tug, she rolled her hips, grinding her body against mine. Our breaths came out in little pants and my head fell back against the cushion, my vision blurring as my semen came out in hot spurts, covering my abs.
Since when did a hand job nearly have me blacking out? Remy cleaned me off with my T-shirt from the floor and wrapped her arms around my neck, kissing me hard on the lips. I flipped her onto her back and pulled down her leggings, my finger trailing over the wet spot on her white panties. Her body trembled under my touch, and a moan escaped her lips. Just my mouth and fingers. We weren’t crossing a line.
14
Shane
“Just think…” Travis said, his voice raised to be heard over the thumping bass as we weaved through the people crowding Cody Shaw’s living room. It smelled like sweat and beer. We stepped outside onto the deck and I took a fortifying breath of cold night air. “In three years and five months, Remy will be of legal drinking age. In five months, every guy at this party including me can legally—”
I punched his arm to stop him from finishing the sentence. Thinking about Remy with anyone who wasn’t me was…
well, unthinkable. “Shut up,” I growled, taking a pull of my beer.
Travis shook his head. “When it comes to her, you have zero chill.”
“Hey guys.” Two blondes greeted us, drinks in hand, big smiles on their faces. Once upon a time, they might have been my type. Now they looked too plastic fantastic, too perfect. Bland, like all their edges had been smoothed.
Cody hobbled up behind them and slung an arm around each of their shoulders. He was drunk off his ass, his leg still in a cast from when he fractured his left femur in a free surf in Oahu. “These are the guys I was telling you about. They’re legends. Fucking legends. My boy Shane is the eleventh best surfer in the whole fucking world, ladies. And Travis is trailing close behind at lucky number fourteen. Show ‘em some love, ladies.” Cody winked at us before he stumbled away, stripped naked and joined his girlfriend in the hot tub, hanging his leg over the side as she straddled him. It looked awkward as fuck, but they made it work.
“Trailing close behind,” Travis grumbled.
I wasn’t too thrilled about number eleven either. Eleven was not number one, not even close, but next year would be my year. “Told you you’d be chasing me.”
He punched my arm, payback for having done the same to him, and turned his attention to the girls.
They were talking about God knows what, their laughter telling me they were enjoying themselves or doing a good job of pretending. I checked my phone and read the text from Remy. It was only eleven o’clock. I wasn’t drunk. I was okay to drive. Decision made, I texted her back and pocketed my cell.
“Happy New Year. I’m out of here,” I told Travis, not waiting for his reply. He muttered something under his breath that sounded like ‘jailbait’ and ‘pussy whipped.’
I got in my Jeep and drove from Huntington Beach to Costa del Rey. At quarter to twelve, I was parked outside her friend Sienna’s enormous Tudor-style house, waiting.
She climbed into the passenger’s seat and smiled at me. “Hello lover.”
I winked. “Hello trouble. It’s you again.”
“Trouble follows you. Or maybe you seek it out.”
I was starting to think that was the case.
I drove to the beach and parked, grabbing towels, a blanket, an extra hoodie, and a flashlight from the back of my Jeep as if this had all been planned in advance rather than an impromptu New Year’s Eve visit. Remy didn’t seem surprised we’d ended up here. It felt right, somehow, like this was where we needed to be to ring in a new year. I tossed her the hoodie and she pulled it on over her black sweater. I draped my canvas jacket over her shoulders and she shrugged it off, handing it back to me. “You’ll need it. You’re only wearing a shirt.”
“I’m warm-blooded.”
“Why are you always so warm?”
“I have a big heart.”
She laughed.
I put the jacket back over her shoulders and we walked to the beach, the light of the flashlight guiding our way. When we stopped at the top of the staircase, she tucked her arm in mine, bracing against the wind coming off the ocean. The sky reeled with stars, the night cold and crystal-clear.
“Happy New Year, Remy.”
“Happy New Year, Shane.”
She wrapped her arms around my neck and kissed me. A slow, dirty kiss. Her lips were cold, her mouth warm. She tasted like lemonade. Like dirty secrets and hidden pleasures. There was a darkness inside Remy that I could taste on my tongue.
We spread the towels and blankets on the cold sand and she sat between my legs, her back leaning against my chest, my arms wrapped around her, so she wouldn’t feel the cold. It was slightly warmer down here on the beach, the bluffs protecting us from the bite of the wind.
“Tell me something good,” she said.
“Next year… this year, I’m going to be the world champion. Tell me something good.”
“This year I’m going to turn eighteen and then I can go anywhere and everywhere I want, taking pictures of all the beautiful and the ugly and interesting things.”
“You can come with me.” I said it half in jest, but the idea appealed to me.
“You can put me in your pocket and take me everywhere. Let’s never say goodbye, okay?” Her voice sounded small and sad, her words swallowed up by the night and the sound of the waves crashing against the shore.
I kissed the side of her neck and she cupped my jaw, turning her head to look straight into my eyes, searching for an answer, for some kind of forever.
Neither of us could make that kind of promise but I made it anyway. “We’ll never say goodbye.”
She turned around to face me and sat back on her heels in front of me, flattening the palms of her hands on her thighs. “I love you, Shane.”
I brushed a piece of hair off her face. In the moonlight, her skin glowed paler, like she was cut from marble. A beautiful face with perfect symmetry and flawless skin. But more than that, she was tough and strong and resilient. Funny, clever, brave. And I loved her.
“I love you too, Firefly.”
Her lips curved into a smile and without warning, she launched herself at me, her hands on my shoulders. My back hit the hard sand and her body landed on top of mine. She was laughing, although I had no idea why, and then she crushed her mouth to mine. My hands were everywhere. On her ass. Tangled in her hair. Brushing her thighs.
She was rocking against me, my cock lined up with her pussy, these little whimpers and moans coming from her lips as I nipped and sucked and bit those bee-stung lips. I released the lip I was sucking on and flipped us over, so she was underneath me. Which made everything so much worse and so much better, depending how you wanted to look at it.
I thrust into her between our clothes, dry-humping her on a freezing cold beach on New Year’s Eve. Her kisses were hungry. Open-mouthed and sloppy. There was no finesse in this at all. Her fingers trailed through my hair, her short nails scraping over my scalp, her legs wrapped around my waist. My dick was so hard and so erect, it was painful.
I needed to be inside her.
No. No, I didn’t. I couldn’t.
This was bad.
Fucking hell.
I pulled back, trying to slow it down and catch my breath. We were thirty seconds away from doing something we might regret. Our hot breaths came out in puffs of smoke, our chests heaving. Her eyes were heavy-lidded, lust-laden, her cheeks rosy from the cold but hot to the touch like she had a fever. My fingertips traced the curves of her face, her straight nose, her kiss-swollen lips, as she stared up at my face, her lips slightly parted.
“You’re beautiful, Remy St. Clair. So fucking beautiful.”
Her eyes filled with tears. They spilled down her cheeks. Silent, fat tears she didn’t try to wipe away. She averted her head and just let them fall and one by one, I kissed them away, catching each one on the tip of my tongue. Cupping her chin in my hand, I kissed her lips, her salty tears mingling with the sweet taste of her, my tongue delving into that darkness inside her.
“You taste like the ocean,” I said, my voice drugged with lust. Even her tears turned me on.
“You taste like home.” She threw her arms around my neck. “I want to drown in you.”
“SOS,” I muttered against her lips.
I was still lying on top of her, my hips between her thighs, still hard as a rock, my balls heavy and swollen with need. If it was cold out here, I didn’t notice. Like an addict who needed his next fix, I sought the warmth of her mouth again. Our tongues tangled in a dance, and there I went again, dry-humping her into oblivion. I was so close to shooting my load, it was pathetic.
One word fell from her lips. “Please.”
I squeezed my eyes shut and with all the restraint I could muster, I gritted out, “No.”
“Give me something to believe in.”
I pulled away and knelt over her. “This… isn’t what you need.”
She pushed herself up on her elbows. “It is though. Please, Shane.”
I didn’t know what it was.
The hope and the desperation in her voice. Her ocean eyes so trusting, like she actually believed I could make everything better for her. Or the fact that I was having trouble remembering why we weren’t supposed to cross these lines. The world she had been raised in was fucked up. What we had… what I felt for her… wasn’t.
Ask any man what his greatest weakness is, and if he’s being honest, he will tell you it’s a woman. Not just any woman. The one woman who is capable of bringing him to his knees. The one woman who has the power to destroy him. Rip his beating heart from his chest. Ruin him. I knew that Remy was capable of doing all those things.
My greatest weakness was, is, and always would be, her.
I wasn’t sure why I didn’t see the bright side of loving Remy. The sunshine and rainbows and unicorns. I just knew our love was never destined to be like that. And yet, here I was, an active participant in my own destruction.
“It’s cold. We’re on a beach.”
“Your big heart is keeping me warm. It’s perfect. We’re right where we need to be.”
Right where we need to be could get me arrested. It was reckless and careless and beyond stupid. But did that stop me? Nope. I was a thrill-seeker. An adrenaline junkie. I couldn’t do what I did for a living if I wasn’t willing to take risks, to push myself to the limits, and take a leap of faith.
But the prospect of sex with Remy was like going over the falls of a giant wave. The water pitches over the top with you in it. You’re weightless and it’s quiet for a while, but you know what’s coming and you think, oh shit. Next thing you know it’s like a grenade goes off right next to you. There’s a big bang and the water pressure squeezes you. You have no control over your own body. Arms and legs being pulled in all different directions. You’re tossed and turned and flipped around, all topsy-turvy. Then you hit bottom and you know which way is up and you swim toward the light and your head breaks through the surface and you try to breathe.