by Amelia Wilde
In my head, I don’t go home with Carly. Instead, I go home with Sawyer. I don’t know where he lives or what kind of place it is, but I picture somewhere spare and rough, a bed against one wall, but the furniture is the least of my concerns. With those arms, he could lift me easily, put me down on the bed easily, spread my legs with no effort, hold me in place while he planted hot kisses on my breasts, licked down toward my navel and then lower, lower…
I’m soaking wet by the time I bring the vibrator into the mix, replacing my fingers with its silicone surface on my clit, and it’s so much more that I have to stuff my fingers in my mouth to keep from screaming. Pleasure builds and builds, and at the last moment I tease myself, taking it away from my clit.
I let out a groan, but I’m too far gone to be a harsh mistress about this, and my next move is to slide the vibrator into my pussy.
It’s not huge, maybe six inches long and a couple of inches wide, but I haven’t had sex in a while, and at first it seems to stretch me, but then my muscles clamp down on it. My toes curl into the sheets. I’m digging my heels in hard, and my hips rise off the surface of the bed. I’m fucking myself with a vibrator, and it’s all because I want to be fucking Sawyer. The thought is so out of character, so dirty, that it makes me gasp, and then it makes me come hard, stifling my moans with my hand, hips rising up and down in spasms as I go over the edge and fall, fall, fall.
When it’s over, I stop the hum of the vibrator and lay there.
Something has to change.
I don’t feel quite as desperate as I did at the library, but now my heart beats fast in my chest. A man like Sawyer would be a risk, just like Eric was.
I push the thought of his name out of my head. The bottom line is that something has to change. Something has to give. I can’t keep living in my parents’ basement apartment like this, going about my daily routine, on and on until infinity.
Suddenly, the room is closing in on me, the pastel-painted walls drawing together.
I need some fresh air.
But first—
I dart into the bathroom, jump into the shower, and am back out in four minutes flat, counting the time it takes to rinse the vibrator.
At my dresser, I put it back in its place, then open the bottom drawers with quick motions, pulling out my favorite pair of yoga pants, a tank top, and a long-sleeve shirt that will be perfect for the cooling May evening.
Above me, the front door of the house opens and closes. The text from my mom comes in a few seconds later.
Are you home?
I don’t know why she has to confirm when she can see my car parked in the driveway, but I just take a deep breath and let it out.
Going out for a walk. Be back later.
How much later, I don’t know.
Chapter 12
Sawyer
I finish breakfast, but before I can think of an excuse not to go visit my dad right this very fucking second, Aunt Linda thinks of one for me.
“I’m behind on my flower beds.” I’m standing at the sink, rinsing my plate and the pan she used to cook the eggs for the dishwasher, and she’s looking out the back window. She’s got flowers planted in front of the house and in back.
I set the dishes in the dishwasher, close it, and go to stand beside her. Nothing is blooming in the back, which strikes me as strange.
“You didn’t plant…wait, don’t you have to plant this stuff in the fall?”
Gardening is not one of my hobbies, but I was here enough as a teenager to remember a few things about it.
“No,” she says, wrinkling her brow. “Last spring got away from me, and then when it came time to plant in the fall…” A sideways glance, and then her gaze is back out the window. Something must have been happening with my dad then, too. I vaguely remember some kind of hospital trip, but I don’t remember whose call I got—Jem’s or my aunt’s. I had work to do making people’s lives miserable, and I dismissed the news.
“Oh.”
“I could use a hand getting them back into shape.”
I look at her full-on then, and my aunt turns and looks back, unblinking.
I wait.
“What?” She takes another sip of her coffee.
“Aren’t you going to tell me that I should be visiting my dad right now?”
She raises one shoulder an inch, then casually drops it back down. “You’re a grown man.”
That’s her way of saying that she can’t make me do anything. She’s said it to me a million times before, but this time it seems different.
Linda narrows her eyes at me, then sets her coffee cup on the counter. “You probably didn’t bring gardening gloves with you. Let me find a pair of Jerry’s.”
We have a late lunch—hamburgers on the grill—and my gut finally feels a hundred percent back to normal after last night’s…whatever that was. Once all the dishes are cleared away, I shrug on my coat.
“I’m going out for a walk.”
“Enjoy the weather.” Aunt Linda keeps her voice casual. She settles back into her armchair with her book, but I see her shoulders rising toward her ears.
“See you.”
“Bye, Sawyer.”
Outside, the early evening smells fresh and hopeful in a way the city never does. There’s always some stink wherever you go, so even if you don’t have any plans and can just stroll around whenever you fucking please, it’s nothing like it is here.
As much as I think the suburbs are shitty in their own ways, they have the city beat on this.
I look to the left and right on the main sidewalk. There are houses in each direction. I resist the urge to look back at my aunt’s window. If I did, I bet I’d see her face peeking out from behind the front curtains, watching to see which way I go.
Because my dad’s house is well within walking distance.
In fact, if I turn left, there are two houses, then the house on the corner. One block up from that is the next road, and my dad’s house is the third house in. If it wasn’t for the high hedges in the back of Aunt Linda’s yard, you could just cut across her backyard and be in the middle of his. That’s what I did so many times as a kid that I’ve lost count, but she’s long since repaired the gap in the fence that I used to slip through.
Just to throw her off the scent, I turn right and start walking.
I go two blocks past, then turn right, go up one block, and start walking in the direction of my dad’s house.
I’m guessing, based on Jem’s appearance this morning, that he’s been discharged from the hospital and is back in his house.
With every step that I take, my pace slows, and my heart beats harder. My jaw clenches tight and I can’t stop my hands from balling up into fists.
I haven’t been to his house in five years, not since the day I turned eighteen and walked out.
The closer I get, the more memories that come flooding back into my mind. My dad screaming at me, drunk, for some shit I didn’t do and couldn’t have done. The blows landing on my arms, on my jaw, on my back, when I turned to try to protect myself. The way my heart had been in my throat the day I left, even though he wasn’t awake yet and wouldn’t be for hours.
I can’t fucking do it.
He might be dying. I get the sense that when things are really dire, he comes and stays in the downstairs guest bedroom at Linda’s. But he’s not there now, so—
It doesn’t matter what excuse I make. I just can’t.
I come level with his house and keep walking. As soon as I’m at the corner, my jaw loosens and the pulse that’s been threatening to burst my veins calms.
I take a right.
I keep walking.
For ten steps, and then I come to a dead halt.
There’s a woman standing on the corner, looking left, then right, like she can’t decide which way to go.
And I’ll be damned, because when she turns her head in my direction, her mouth goes into a little O of surprise and her eyes go wide. I can see the expression from half
a block away, and the change in her face is what spurs me on, makes me start walking again, straight toward her.
My heart pounds again, thuds, and a strange grin comes to my face, because I know who it is. I know her by the curves of her body underneath those sleek black yoga pants and a fitted top. I know her by the blonde hair that’s gathered up into a bun, still wet, like she’s just stepped out of the shower and didn’t bother to blow-dry her hair. I know it from her eyes, which are vivid even from this distance in the evening.
“Sawyer?” The tone in her voice is disbelieving, hopeful, but it’s obvious she knows who I am, obvious she’s just looking for some confirmation that the man barreling down on her is, in fact, me.
I’ll be damned.
It’s Zelda.
Chapter 13
Zelda
“Yeah,” he says with a crooked grin that sets every inch of me aflame. He struggles to keep it up, too—his lips seem to settle automatically back into a thin line, like he’s concentrating on looking hard, but it’s like he can’t help himself. “It’s me.” Then he leans in, narrowing his eyes a little bit. “Zelda, right?”
I giggle nervously, hating the sound of it as it comes out of my mouth. “Right. I’d be surprised if you forgot. It’s kind of a weird name. I don’t know why—”
His grin widens, and I stop talking. I don’t know what the hell has come over me. Maybe it’s just the fact that we’re in broad daylight, and I never expected to see Sawyer again for the rest of my life, that’s turning me into a babbling idiot.
“So, Sawyer.” I straighten my back and try my best to look him in the eye. It takes two seconds to discover that it’s going to be harder to look away—he’s got unbelievably gorgeous eyes, the color of the sea at noon, like those pictures you see on the internet taken from high above a tropical island. My stomach does a slow flip. “What are you doing here?”
Some other emotion flickers across his face, but then he shrugs and looks around nonchalantly. “Anybody can go for a walk, can’t they?”
“I mean, what are you doing here? We’re less than a block from my house.” At that moment an uncomfortable possibility comes to me. He could be stalking me. Maybe it was a damn foolish thing to do, going out with Carly. Maybe I should stop fantasizing about men like Sawyer, men I don’t even know. My heart thumps heavily in my chest. I don’t know him well, and this is the kind of thing that can spiral quickly out of control.
There’s a humming in my fingertips that goes all the way up to my shoulders. Maybe I want to be a little out of control. Maybe it felt good to have his eyes on me like that in the club.
But—
My thoughts are running away with me, so I force myself to come back to this moment, dragging myself bodily out of the past. Sawyer is looking at me with the type of half-smile that could light damp wood on fire, and his blue eyes are dancing in the afternoon sun. It’s all I can do not to get swept away in my imagination. Between my legs, my pussy is still sensitive from getting off, but when my eyes fall to his hands, the heat in my center increases.
I don’t know him at all. But I want to know what it would feel like for him to put those big, strong hands underneath my ass and lift me up onto a counter, onto a bed, spread me wide, and—
“Less than a block from your house? You’re a little far from home, aren’t you?”
At first, I don’t know what he’s talking about. Then it comes to me, and I feel my face flame red. I just asked him what he was doing here, and then promptly started fantasizing about him.
I thrust my thumb over my shoulder. “A few houses down.” I regret the thrusting motion immediately, along with the lie, because my parents have the corner lot and we’re standing right in front of it. Realistically I should have been even more vague about where I live, just in case he is a stalker—but he doesn’t seem like one, I don’t think, and my body has an entirely different set of ideas from those popping up in my rational mind. The one that thinks I should absolutely not be…
Be doing what? Having a conversation with the sexiest man I’ve ever seen, in broad daylight, on the same block as my parents’ house?
“Are you—?” This conversation is a train wreck. It’s so awkward, and it’s all because I can’t get my head out of the gutter. I don’t know what it is with me lately, but everywhere seems better than here, more exciting, more adventurous…
Sawyer seems exciting and adventurous, and all we’re doing is standing and chatting on the corner.
“Are you from here? Do you—do you live around here?” I can’t get the words out of my mouth with his eyes trained on me like they are. I have got to get it together.
Something darkens in his eyes, and then his expression straightens out, goes firm. “I grew up in the neighborhood.”
I open my mouth to ask him why we never ran into each other here, but the answer comes into my mind before I can form the words. Because I didn’t grow up in this neighborhood, even if it seems like I’ve been here forever. My parents bought this house during my second year of college, and then had the basement renovated into a guest apartment. I grew up on the other side of Greenville and attended a private school just outside of town, directly on the way to my dad’s offices. He makes even more money now, but my parents preferred to limit their splurging to my education.
I want to hear Sawyer’s voice, which is smooth with an edge. “Visiting?”
“For a while.” His mouth settles into a thin line. “You’re obviously not headed home. Do you want some company?”
A thrill goes down my spine. Yes. Yes, I absolutely do. “I would love—”
My phone buzzes in my pocket. I take it out automatically, glancing down at the screen as I do.
It’s a message from my mom. How’s the walk? You’ve been gone a while!
The exclamation point at the end is cheery, but my chest twists with irritation. My mom’s check-ins, even these relatively unobtrusive texts, are chafing at my nerves. I’m twenty-three, not thirteen, and I get that after what happened—
I shake my head, shoving my phone back into my pocket. I’ll text her in a little while.
“I wasn’t heading anywhere in particular,” I tell Sawyer, who’s been watching me the entire time with curious eyes. The last thing I’m going to tell him right now is that my mom is checking up on me. It makes me feel like I’m back in high school, back with Eric, and thinking about that makes my mouth go dry.
I shove the feeling down hard. This isn’t that situation. Nothing is going to happen if I just go for a walk with Sawyer. I take a deep breath and let it out, then look up into his seductive eyes with a smile.
For another few moments, it’s like he’s looking right through me, but then that half smile, half smirk reappears on his face. “I know a place we can go.” He pivots and takes a few steps down the sidewalk, then stops and turns his head, glancing back over his shoulder in my direction. “What are you waiting for, Zelda? Let’s go!”
Chapter 14
Sawyer
Zelda slides into the booth across from me, her eyes wide. She doesn’t come to places like this often, and it’s making her anxious as hell.
I still can’t believe she agreed to go anywhere with me. She’s so damn nervous that the pink spots on her cheeks still haven’t faded, and we’ve been walking for four blocks. In the dim light of the club, with her friend at her side, she played it cool, but now it seems like a struggle.
She catches me watching her again and gives me a smile, folding her hands together on the surface of the table.
“Here.” I grab two menus from the wire container at the side of the booth and push one across to her. “If you’re hungry.”
“Are you?” She opens the menu and looks at me over the top of it, her green eyes burrowing into mine.
I’m fucking starving, but not for food. It was all I could do not to ask her to walk in front of me on the way here. The yoga pants she’s wearing hug her pert ass in a way I’ve never seen on another woman
. Not that I’ve been paying much attention.
I think about peeling the pants down over her hips and tossing them aside, revealing the panties she’s wearing underneath, and then peeling those off, too.
“They have good fries.”
She frowns a little, scanning over the menu.
The waitress makes her first appearance, tattoos running down both of her arms. She’s got more than I have, and Zelda almost does a double-take when she sees them.
“What can I get you two to drink?” The waitress follows it up with a toothy smile at Zelda, but her expression turns into something else when she sees me.
“Beer.”
“We’ve got a few on tap, and if you’re interested—”
“Just pick one for me.” I give her the hint of a smile.
“What about you, miss?”
“Just a Coke.”
The waitress disappears, and Zelda’s eyes focus back on me. She carefully puts the menu down onto the table, then folds her arms over it and leans forward a little. It has the extremely fucking pleasant effect of pressing her breasts together so that her cleavage peeks out over the curved neckline of her top. Every time she breathes, the view gets better.
I drag my eyes back up to hers, and my breath catches in my throat. She has a killer body. Absolutely fucking killer. But her eyes are something else.
Zelda rearranges her face, taking one last big breath in and blowing it out, taking on a determined expression. “Do you always come here when you visit?”
That puts a wry smile on my face. “If I ever visited, I’d come here. I haven’t been here in at least five years.”
She nods, taking another look around at the place. Bernie’s is a bar that’s more of a diner in the daytime. There are worn booths and tables dotted around the room, and a big bar is positioned in the center of the place. It’s tucked inside a rounded rectangle, with space inside it for the bartenders to polish glasses, lean up against the bar top, and generally waste time until evening comes when the drinking crowd shows up. I used to come here in high school if I had a few extra bucks for a burger, or I was sick of my aunt’s house. It wasn’t a place for the popular crowd, which was at least half the reason I liked it.