“You can ask me anything you want, but don’t get mad when I tell you the truth.” I figured that was enough for tonight. I didn’t think I could stomach anymore.
“Can you unwrap the cheesecake for me?”
“Sure,” Justin chuckled. He’d probably expected a flurry of questions about his sexual exploits and the cheesecake thing threw him.
As soon as Justin wadded up the foil, the lights went out. The lawn was completely black. I laughed so hard I thought I would pee. We were in the bushes in complete darkness.
He had just split the last of the wine between our glasses. I wasn’t sure I needed anymore, but whatever.
“What do we do with this? I don’t want to waste it. I know it had to be expensive,” I said.
“It was very expensive, so you’re going to chug it.”
“Wine is meant to be sipped, beer is chugged.”
“Thank you for clearing that up, Ms. Manners.”
“Anytime.” I smiled, appreciative of his gratitude, although it was sarcastic. “You carry the basket and I’ll carry the wine.”
I took his glass and steadied them both as we made our way back to our building, giggling most of the way.
While he was unlocking the door to our room, I flipped open one side of the picnic basket, quickly swiped my finger through the caramel sauce on the cheesecake, and clumsily stuck it into my mouth.
Justin snickered. “You couldn’t wait two seconds until we were inside to get into that?”
I flashed him a Cheshire smile. “Apparently not.”
Justin sat the basket on the table beside the door and began loosening the tie from around his neck.
“I’m surprised you were able to wait to take off that tie,” I told him.
“If it wasn’t for your tricks this afternoon I wouldn’t have had to wear it at all.”
“What’s that saying, again? Mess with the best, die like the rest?”
Justin laughed hard. “You’re quoting Hackers? Seriously, you’re cut off,” he said, and attempted to take my glass of wine away, but I put his glass in his hand instead, and whirled past him.
“I’m not drunk. I just feel good. This has been a really great day.” I smiled again, unable to help myself.
I sat my wine on the nightstand and hopped onto Justin’s bed, stretching my legs out in front of me. I crossed my ankles and sighed admiring my pretty shoes.
“What are you doing?”
“Looking at my shoes,” I breathed.
“When did you become such a girl?”
“I’m ignoring that,” I told him and clicked on the TV.
“I’m gonna go change,” he said, digging through his bag.
“No, not yet,” I protested.
“I think I’ve been in this chimp suit long enough,” he groaned
“Nuh-uh. I won the bet and I say you can’t turn back into a pumpkin until midnight. You have to wear those clothes for forty-five more minutes.” He looked so good that I wanted to enjoy it as long as I could.
“Whatever. The deal was that I take you to dinner and I only had to dress like this for dinner, which is over.” As he walked toward the bathroom I jumped up and darted in front of him, stretching my arms out to block the door. Like I could really keep him from getting past me. Justin laughed.
“Who’s the girl now? I taunted. “I’m in heels, and you had a head start and I still beat you here.”
“Come on, now. Move,” his tone attempted to be sharp, but he was starting to laugh again.
“I’m not moving.”
“You do realize that I could just pick you up and set you aside, right?”
“Just try it,” I threatened. “And see what happens.” When he moved to pick me up, I jumped up, wrapped my legs around him, and held on, my arms clenched tightly around his neck.
“What the hell are you doing?” We were both laughing so hard that we could barely get our words out.
“Forty-five more minutes.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“Annie.”
“Annie?” I questioned and moved to look at Justin’s face, my fingers interlaced against the back of his neck. “You must be mad, you called me Annie.”
“I’m not mad.”
“Then what is it, because I could count on one hand the number of times you’ve called me Annie in seven years.”
“Really, you’re hanging on me like a monkey because I didn’t call you by your last name.”
“Yes.”
“Okay, Reynolds. I want to change my clothes and for some stupid reason you won’t let me.”
“Oh, I’ll let you, just not until midnight.”
“Okay, then,” he said and began spinning around in circles.
“Stop,” I laughed, tightening my grip on him. “You’re going to smack us into the wall,” I squealed and snapped my eyes shut.
“That’s a good idea,” he said, and then I felt my back land lightly against the wall.
“Now what?” I asked, opening my eyes. I stopped giggling once our eyes met, after seeing the way he was looking at me.
The stillness and quiet made me hyper aware of how close we were; of how attracted I was to him, of how much I wanted to kiss him. “Okay, you win,” I conceded, my voice faint.
“Never took you for a quitter, Annie,” Justin whispered, staring back at me. It made me nervous, being that close to him, feeling the way I did. I loosened my grip and slid down his legs, but couldn’t go anywhere. I was still pinned between him and the wall and in these dang shoes I was only two inches shorter than him, so I was right in his face, our mouths mere inches apart.
“Don’t think of it as quitting. Just think of it as me letting you win.”
Justin smiled, curved his hands around my neck and part of my jaw. “Do I get a prize for winning?”
My entire body felt electric and I was suddenly so nervous that I was shaking. “Since it wasn’t an earned win, no.”
Justin looked like he wanted to say something else, but instead he inched the slightest bit forward, until his lips barely touched mine. They held still, paralyzed for a moment, until our mouths parted and our tongues met.
Justin’s fingers laced through mine as his body leaned against me, pressing us against the wall. I’d been thinking about kissing him so much lately that I only wanted to be in the moment, to feel his lips on mine, the delicate movements of his tongue, and how it made my skin flush.
When he gently broke the kiss and looked at me, I closed my eyes.
“What are you doing?” Justin murmured.
“Hiding,” I breathed.
“Don’t.”
He nuzzled his face in my hair; his staggered breath was hot against my neck. My heart pounded as I realized I was hearing my own breath. It was embarrassingly loud and awkward.
I felt a surge of anticipation burn through my body as Justin spoke to me. “I want this… you,” he murmured, pressing his mouth against the base of my neck.
Oh shit. “As beautiful as you look in that suit…”
“You think I’m beautiful?” he murmured, his blue eyes trained on mine.
“Painfully,” I groaned and realized I was licking my lips.
The corner of Justin’s mouth inched up. “I think you’re painfully beautiful, too.”
Before I could protest, Justin’s mouth was on mine again. I broke away from him, dizzy from the kiss. My breath deepened, and I shoved out the first words that came to mind. “We agreed before that we shouldn’t. We’d be risking everything.”
“It’s not life and death, Annie.”
“We could never take it back, never undo it.”
“I would never want to,” he whispered, causing a chill in my bones. “We’re not going to ruin our friendship.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know us,” he breathed, before kissing me again. He was so freaking good at it. It made me want to melt all over him. His hands released mine and moved to my hips whe
re he clutched the fabric of my dress in his fists before wrapping his arms around me and greedily pulling me closer to him.
I put my arms around his neck, slid my fingers into his hair, and impatiently kissed him back; taking in how good it felt, memorizing it, because we could never do it again.
I laid my head on his shoulder, still holding onto him. “I can’t. I’m sorry,” I whispered, full of regret.
“Because of Ryan?” he asked, pushing himself away from me.
“What happens between you and I has nothing to do with Ryan.”
“Everything always has to do with him.”
23
Justin
“Not this,” she whispered.
“What else could it be?”
“It’s about us, Justin! What will happen to me when you decide you don’t want me anymore?” she asked.
The words surprised me. “I’ll never not want you,” I said softly, touching her cheek.
“Ryan said the same thing to me. He made me all sorts of promises and broke every one of them.”
“Jesus Christ, Annie, I’m not him!” I yelled back. I couldn’t believe she was comparing us. “We are not the same!”
“I can’t have my heart broken again. If we couldn’t make it as a couple, I would lose you.”
I bowed my head, exasperated. I wanted to fight her over it, but if she had so little faith in me, there was nothing I could say to change her mind.
I would never hurt her. Never not want her. I ran my hands through my hair and looked at Annie. Her eyes were blurred with tears. “Losing you would be harder for me than it was to lose him. I need you in my life. You’re all I have left,” she said.
I wanted to tell her how I felt, and that she and I could withstand anything, but it wasn’t what she wanted to hear. I knew her hesitation had more to do with Ryan than what would happen to our friendship if we pursued a relationship, but I let the subject die.
I was sick of Ryan Mullins, and all the destruction he’d caused. He’d broken something in Annie besides her heart. Something I wasn’t sure could ever be fixed.
“Whatever you want,” I said, just like the last time we’d come this close. I picked up the clothes I’d planned to change into and went to the bathroom. I took my time. When I came back, the lights were off and Annie was in her bed, lying on her side facing away from me. This would make us more strained than before. The tension would be denser. She may have been wrong about sleeping together tearing us apart; not addressing our feelings was just as capable of ruining us.
I couldn’t sleep. Being so close to her was killing me. There wasn’t enough air in the room for me to breathe. I went down to the pool and lay in a lounge chair until the sun came up. Then I went for a swim and ran five miles in the resort gym trying to clear my head. Still, Annie was all I could think about.
She was sleeping when I came back to the room. I put on my uniform, sat in the chair next to her bed, and watched her. She looked so peaceful. How could she be at peace when I was such a mess?
“I was about to wake you,” I said, when her eyes opened.
“How much time do we have?”
“Half an hour.”
She threw the bed covers back and started to get up.
“I think we should go home after the game today,” I said.
“The season’s not over.”
“I need to go home.”
“Because of me?”
Yes. “No, because of me.”
“There’s a week left, Justin. You can’t leave.”
“I can do whatever I want,” I said.
“Yeah,” she muttered. “You know, I’m not feeling that great. You go ahead. I’ll catch up with you later.”
I didn’t argue with her. I snatched my hat from the dresser, grabbed my bat bag, and left without her, knowing she would be gone when I got back.
24
Annie
After I stopped crying, I packed my things and wrote Justin a note asking him to stay and finish the season. I knew he could use the time away from me.
We were almost three hours from home, and I wasn’t old enough to rent a car, so I took a bus. At the station, I got a taxi to take me to our apartment.
During the ride, I wondered if I’d made the right decision last night. Either way, I wasn’t ready, and it almost felt like we’d have slept together, not because we were in love, but because we were trying to get something out of the way. Still, saying no this time was way more painful than the last.
I felt in my bones that Justin would stay and finish the season. And I’d been right. I’d toyed with the idea of being gone so I wouldn’t have to deal with whatever was going to happen when he came home, but if I wanted to keep my relationship with Justin normal, I couldn’t avoid him or the conversation we would ultimately have to have. I had to act normal.
I made stew because I knew it would take a long time, and keep me occupied while waiting for Justin to arrive. He showed up around five in the afternoon. The sight of him took my breath. He was wearing his dirty ball cap and he’d cut his hair short, the way he’d kept it in high school. It looked like he hadn’t shaved since I left. He looked gut wrenchingly amazing, making my heart frantic.
“Hey,” I said. “How’d it go?”
“Good. We won the last two.” He looked everywhere but at me.
“Do you want me to move out?” The words flew from my mouth.
Justin laughed. “No, Reynolds. This place is as much yours as it is mine.”
“Are you mad at me?”
“No.” The way he looked at me hurt. He may not have been mad, but he was something.
“I’m gonna go get cleaned up.”
I didn’t want him to leave me yet. “Are you hungry? I made stew.”
“You get all domestic while I was gone?”
“No.” I smiled. “It’s the first thing I’ve cooked all week.”
“Is it safe for human consumption?’
“Hey!” I squealed.
He laughed. “You taste if first.”
“To prove it’s not poisonous?” I asked.
“Yep.”
And with that, we were normal again. Only I knew we’d never truly be the same. We hadn’t been since last Christmas, but I couldn’t help thinking that something disastrous would happen if we acted on our feelings.
25
Justin
After Annie left the resort to go home, I lay awake most nights thinking about what it’d felt like to kiss her—to be that close to her again. It drove me damn near crazy, but I couldn’t make her want me.
I told myself to forget that part of us and just be her friend, that it would be better than nothing, but the moment I saw her when I walked through the door of our apartment, I knew I’d never want to be just friends with her.
We were laughing about the poisonous stew Annie made when her phone rang. “It’s Lindsay,” she said, making a pouty face.
“Get it. I’m going to take a shower.”
“When Annie answered, I heard Lindsay’s voice across the room and stopped to listen. Annie held the phone away from her ear.
“Hey Annie! I’m having a party tonight. You should come!”
“Why are you shouting?” she asked.
“I’m in the shower. Shawn’s holding my phone.”
“Come around eight. And bring Justin!”
“I don’t know if Justin,” Annie started, sounding uncomfortable. “Bring him! I want to see you both! Don’t flake on me, either. I know where you live!”
Annie dropped her phone and shook her head.
“Are you going?” I asked.
“I guess I better,” she groaned. “You wanna come?” Of course I wanted to come. I wanted to do anything that would allow me to have more time with her.
26
Annie
Lindsay screeched my name when I walked into her and Shawn’s townhouse. She ran over and hugged me. Then she hugged Justin, which threw me.
; “What?” She shrugged. “We have an understanding.”
“When did that happen?” I asked.
“When you weren’t looking.” She grinned, then pointed to Justin. “You go get a beer with the guys out back. We need girl time.”
Lindsay pulled me into the kitchen and stood in front of the refrigerator. “You still on the meds?”she asked.
“The dosage is lower, but yes.”
“Beer for you, then.” She took a bottle from the fridge and popped the top.
“So, how was the trip?”
“Um, fine.”
“Did you hook up with Justin?”
“No,” I gasped.
“Yes, you did. You slut,” she whispered. “He’s gotten seriously hot in the last year. I mean, he’s always looked good, but damn. Those eyes and that unshaved face. Wow.”
“What the hell, Lindsay?”
“Don’t even try to pretend you haven’t noticed.”
“I’ve noticed,” I groaned.
“Have you two done anything?” she moaned.
I gaped at her. “You were alone in hotel rooms for a month. If nothing happened, then I’m committing you to a nunnery.”
“You can’t commit a person to a nunnery,” I complained.
“Is he a good kisser?” Her eyes widened awaiting my answer.
“I don’t want to talk about this.”
“Is he?” she asked again. “I know you at least kissed. You had to. I mean, look at those lips.”
“Yes,” I said a little louder than I should have. “We kissed.”
“What kept you from hooking up with him?”
“We’re friends.”
“You and I are friends, too, but if you looked like him, I’d be all over your ass,” she announced.
“What have you been drinking?”
“Some kind of punch Shawn made. Is Justin a good kisser or great kisser?”
“Great,” I answered to get it over with. I knew she wouldn’t let up until she got her way.
“Better than you-know-who?”
“That’s enough,” I said, and turned to walk away. Lindsay grabbed my arm to keep me still. “Sorry. I’m sorry. I just hate him so much. He’s a selfish pig and I want him to suck at everything.”
Breathe (Sway Part 2) Page 19