by S. Celi
“Don’t be a jerk.”
“Well.” I struggled to find some other way to put it. “It just doesn’t go with your outfit.”
She shrugged. “So what? You gave it to me; I like it. So I’m going to wear it. I’m always going to wear it.”
“Really? I’m flattered.”
“You have good taste. But don’t let that go to your head,” she teased.
“I won’t.” I laughed. “And this is it, right?”
I pulled the Volvo up in front of a brick building with condos that had city skyline views. During a recent gentrification of the city, some developer had seen the appeal of this spot and transformed it from an old warehouse into a place where it cost $500K for a one-bedroom space. I suspected, though, that this party wouldn’t take place in a one-bedroom condo. Not if I knew this town.
“Yeah,” she said. “Julie and Ryan’s place is on the top floor.”
“Julie and Ryan.”
“Remington. I think Ryan works at P&G.” Avery shrugged. “He does something. Or he has a lot of money on his own, I don’t know. They’ve been around for a while.”
“A while? They weren’t around when I left for South Africa.” I parked the car in the front of the building and flipped off the engine.
“Well, she’s everywhere. She knows everyone.”
“Everyone?” I said, still skeptical.
“She’s nice.” Avery took off her seatbelt and opened the car door. “Give her a chance, Spencer. Be nice to her.”
“Do I have to?” I said with a smile.
“Do it for me.”
“Hmm.” I paused for dramatic effect. “Maybe I don’t want to.”
She pouted, and her lacquered bottom lip jutted out from her beautiful face. “Please?”
“Maybe.”
She still pouted at me. Damn, she knew how to get her way.
“Okay, Avery. For you. I’ll be nice and uphold the Chadwick reputation just for you.”
“Good.” Avery stepped out of the car. “And that reminds me, I wanted to tell you something.”
“What?” I unhooked my own seatbelt and cracked open my car door.
“You look really nice tonight.” She paused and her eyed held my gaze. “Not just nice. Hot.”
I looked at my dark jeans, black summer blazer and gray T-shirt. “Really? Good.”
“I mean it.” She paused and I just stared at her. “Super hot.”
“You sound like Grant,” I said. She rolled her eyes, but I could tell she got the joke. “And I aim to please.”
She just laughed again and shut the car door.
THE REMINGTONS MIGHT have thought they did things differently when it came to entertaining, but they didn’t. Not in my opinion. From their penthouse condo, they hosted one of the most typical parties I had ever attended. When we walked in, I knew it would be this way.
Don’t get me wrong. The party had all of the requirements: a bartender ready to serve Sake and mixed drinks from an ample stash of high-end liquor, mood music piping through a sound system, a spread of sushi and small bites mixed on a table piled with red lanterns and Japanese carnations, a violinist from the symphony ready to entertain the guests at pre-determined periods throughout the night, and of course a photographer to document it all. I knew plenty of people in attendance that night would have a fun time.
I just didn’t.
I did the normal things, of course. I met the hostess, Julie, a skinny woman who’d had too much Botox and spoke in a raspy voice that bordered on shrill. I greeted the usual array of city socialites and inquired about their latest trips to NYC and Naples, FL, and Palm Beach. I drank some of the Sake, but not too much, since Avery expected me to drive her home. In my head, I cursed the fact that I couldn’t get drunk just to make the party more interesting and to help me forget her presence.
Nothing I tried helped. Not flirting with other women. Not circulating for the sake of the Chadwick name. Not small talk about downtown development. Not even when Grant showed up, and we laughed about the usual stuff and planned a trip to another upcoming Reds game.
Part of me hated myself for letting my attraction to Avery take over everything.
Once we’d stepped off the elevator and walked into the party, she had tossed me a knowing look and disappeared into a crowd that celebrated her arrival. I’d watched her hug girls who wanted to call her a friend, exclaim with them about fashion finds and talk about the latest guys some of them dated. Soon, she had a large glass of wine in one hand and a crowd at the tip of her other. Avery, as usual, cast a magnetic spell over everything and everyone. This might have been a party at the Remingtons’ home, but Avery commanded more natural attention than the hostess ever could, or ever would.
Avery worked parties like this with a confident ease that no one else I knew came close to emulating.
Soon, though, watching her became too much. The Remingtons had a large contemporary place, but it didn’t have enough room for the two of us and the attraction that had me wishing I could take her into one of their bedrooms and fuck her until she screamed in ecstasy. I ran a hand through my hair and tried to shake it off. No luck.
“Dude, what’s wrong with you?” Grant asked me after my second round at the food table.
“I’m fine.” I bit into a piece of California roll. “Nothing’s wrong.”
“Whatever.” He shook his head at me. “You’ve been in this stupid-ass funk ever since you came home from South Africa.”
“I’m not in a funk.”
“The other night at Ovation you were.”
“No way.” I wrinkled my nose at the memory. Ovation. The one-night stand. Avery overhearing everything. The strange way that piece of information turned me on. Not good. “That girl didn’t think I was in a funk.”
“You mean Anna?”
“Yeah. Anna.”
“Saw her the other night.” Grant gulped some Sake. “Said hello.”
“Listen, Grant, about that.”
“I get it.” He chuckled. “I think she got it, too.”
I ate another piece of sushi. “Good.”
“Besides,” Grant said after a beat, “I think you’re interested in other things.” He grinned. “Other people.”
“Other people?” I put the plate of half-eaten food on a side table next to one of the Remingtons’ large leather couches. “Like who?”
“Don’t fuck around with me,” Grant said, his words loaded with innuendo. “We’ve been friends long enough. I see it.”
“See what?”
“The way you look at her.” He glanced behind his shoulder to make sure no one stood close to us. “The way you look at Avery.”
I sucked in sharp breath, the mindless chatter of this party faded away, and my heart beat in my ears. “Which is what?”
“Like you want to devour her. Like you want to make sure no one else touches her.”
I blinked at him. As the party had flowed around us, I had made extra effort to stay away from Avery. We hadn’t talked. We hadn’t exchanged glances after we walked off the elevator. I hadn’t followed her around or cock-blocked the guys who wanted to talk to her, guys with designer names and upwardly mobile careers. I’d stayed on the opposite end of the party and away from her. Hadn’t it worked?
Didn’t I know how to control myself?
Goddamn it, Spencer.
“I don’t look that way at Avery,” I said in the calmest voice I could find. “I don’t.” Then my eyes scanned the party guests closest to us to make sure that hadn’t been heard, either. No reaction from them.
Good.
“You do look at her that way,” Grant said. “When you’re not thinking about it, you do.”
I shook my head. “No way, man. You’ve got that wrong.”
“I don’t. You’re one of my best friends. I know these things.”
“You do have it wrong.” My stomach tightened in annoyance.
“I don’t, Spencer. I know what I saw.”
&
nbsp; “You didn’t see it.”
“Yes I did,” he said, and took one step closer to me. “You want her, don’t you? You want a piece of that tight ass, and you want it bad.”
I shook my head no. And then I wanted to punch him for calling Avery a piece of ass. He could be a crass dickhead sometimes. Too bad we were in someone’s home, or I wouldn’t have hesitated to throw a punch.
“Just watch it, okay?” Grant frowned. “It’s not normal. And you know how people talk in this town.”
“I know,” I said. “But there’s nothing to talk about. Nothing at all.”
That time, the lie didn’t convince me or Grant. I knew it didn’t because of the look he shot me—a cold, firm stare behind a tightened jaw. Whatever Grant thought he saw had made him decide he’d seen too much.
HOURS LATER, WHEN we left the birthday party at 21c Hotel, and long after the party at the Remington’s condo, Avery still had a blush of satisfaction on her cheeks. She always came so alive whenever she went to parties, as if she were made for them.
“Glad you had fun,” I told her as we both got into the car. The valet nodded at me and helped her close her door. “Really.”
“It was fun. Good night.”
She grinned at me, and I pushed my foot on the accelerator, pulling the car into the late-night traffic of the city. She’d been grinning since we’d arrived at 21c. When we had walked up to a back table of fifteen people, every one of them had called out to Avery, not bothering to hide their excitement that she had arrived. Ever the good party guest, she’d walked right up to the birthday girl and pulled out a small box from Tiffany’s wrapped in light blue paper. It turned out to be another charm for that girl’s charm bracelet. I couldn’t remember her name, but she loved Avery’s gift. Not that it surprised me at all.
Avery always gave good gifts.
“Worth it to see you having so much fun,” I said as I turned the car onto 5th street and we drove past P&G headquarters. Soon, we’d turn on to I-71 and pull away from the city again.
“Did you have fun?” Avery opened a small favor bag her friend had given her when she’d left the party.
“Yeah. Yeah, I did.”
“See, being social isn’t so bad.” She pulled something from the bag and held it to the window to see it better under the passing highway lights. “Oh this is nice. Chap Stick from L’Occitane.”
“What’s that?”
She laughed. “It’s expensive.”
“Perfect. I hope my favor bag has some, too.”
“If it does, it’s mine.” She opened the tube and sniffed it. “It’s also French.”
“Whoa. French? That is the good stuff.”
“I know.” She put the Chap Stick back in the favor bag and dug around in it again. “That’s why you’re going to give me yours.”
“What if I don’t want to give it to you? What if I want to wear it?”
“That’s fine.” She pulled something else out of the bag. “If you want your lips to smell like passion fruit, that’s on you. I’m sure women all over town will love it.”
“Of course they will. Now, what’s in the rest of the bag?”
“This is Lilly Pulitzer coin purse. Nice.” She tossed it back in the bag. “So that one in your bag is mine, too.”
“Wow. I can tell this friend of yours . . .”
“Meghan.”
“Meghan. She really expected a lot of guys at her party, didn’t she?”
Avery laughed. “Meghan’s funny. You’d like her if you spent more time with her.”
“I’m sure I would,” I said as I changed lanes on the highway. When I did, my glance over at the car’s blind spot gave me a better view of Avery. I also got a view of the way her dress rode up her legs as she sat in the seat. Shit. She had such gorgeous legs, from years of private tennis lessons. I sucked in a long breath and tried to clear my head. Not much luck. Not much luck at all.
I was really going to have to take another fucking cold shower later.
“I’m glad you came tonight,” she said.
“Me, too,” I said, and I meant it.
She didn’t say anything else until I stopped the car at a light just off our usual highway exit. “You know, there aren’t a whole lot of great guys in this town.”
“You mean of the guys that you’ve met.”
She shook her head. “Most guys in this town suck.”
“What about Mitchell?”
Right away I regretted bringing up his name, but I didn’t know what else to say to her. Conversations about her love life made me nervous and confused. It had been that way for a while. Too long, if I wanted to be honest with myself, since before I left for South Africa, at least.
“He’s fine.” She sounded bored, resigned. “Just typical. He’s hot . . . but . . .”
“But what?”
I looked over at her in time to see her bite her bottom lip. Her eyes met mine, and our gazes locked on each other until the light changed. Even then, I didn’t break the stare or drive the car again until the driver behind us honked the horn.
“But what?”
“It’s nothing.”
“Avery. It’s something.” I turned off the radio. Maybe the silence would get her to talk. “I know when you’re hiding something.”
“It’s just that—”
“What?” I turned the car down another road. Two streets left before we arrived home.
“He’s fine. Hot. Rich. He likes me.” She sighed. “But he’s not what I want.”
One street left. I paused the car at a stop sign. “What do you want?”
“Something else.” Then I watched her bite her bottom lip.
Damn, how much I wanted to bite that lip, too.
“Something else?” I said. “Or someone else?”
In the space of less than two minutes, the air around us had changed. Charged. Tightened. Filled with tension, but not the bad kind, the good kind. The kind that let me know we might be going somewhere we hadn’t been before.
“I’ll ask you again,” I said as I turned the Volvo onto the long driveway for Chadwick Gardens. “If you don’t want Mitchell, who do you want?”
“Spencer, I don’t know.”
“Tell me,” I said. “You can tell me. You know that. You can tell me anything.”
“But maybe I can’t tell you this.”
“Now you have to tell me.”
We’d reach the garage soon. Sometimes Henry stayed late doing odd jobs in obscure parts of the house, like dusting the large stained-glass windows in the library. He liked to do deep cleaning at night, and I didn’t want Henry overhearing something he shouldn’t, whether it came from my mouth or Avery’s.
“If you don’t tell me, AJ, I’m going to get upset with you.”
A beat passed.
“Tell me.”
Another few seconds. The car reached the end of the drive. We were home.
“Now,” I said. “Tell me now.”
I parked the Volvo in front of the garage. She drew in a long, deep breath.
“I want you,” she said. “That’s what I want. I want to be with you.”
After two unsteady breaths, I turned off the engine. I considered asking her to repeat herself, but then I didn’t. I’d heard her. No doubt. She’d made sure I didn’t miss it. And she’d just said the words I wanted so badly to hear. But they were also words she should have never spoken.
“Me. You want to be with me.”
“Yes.” She grabbed my arm and pulled on it so that it forced me to look over at her. When I did, I saw my stepsister chewing on her bottom lip again, her eyes wide, with deep, anxious breaths forcing themselves in and out her lungs. “You.”
“Me? Really? You’re sure you meant that?”
“I want you, and this, more than I’ve ever wanted anything.”
I gulped.
“I meant it. I never thought I’d be able to say that.” She rubbed her hand over her face. “But, yeah, it’s the truth.
I want to be with you, Spencer. Not anyone else. Just you.”
Four words. I wanted to say four small words back to her: I want you, too. They lay on the tip of my tongue, and I could have said them in a nanosecond. It would have been so easy, and felt good, to find the courage to say them. Just four words. Four little syllables. So simple, but also so complicated. They would alter everything forever, and I wasn’t ready for that. Those words had ramifications beyond the walls of the car, and I had to be the older, more mature sibling. I had to make the right choice. That was on me.
“You don’t mean that, AJ,” I said, searching for any kind of response that would make sense. “You’ve had too much to drink.”
“No, I haven’t.”
“Yes, you have,” I said, and let out a long sigh. “Come on, you don’t mean this at all.”
“I haven’t had any alcohol in, like, two hours. I’m not drunk, and that’s not fair.” I heard the hurt and the pain in every word she said. “I know exactly what I just said.”
“But you’re not thinking clearly. You can’t be.”
“Yes, I am.”
“You don’t mean this. This is more than just a game. This isn’t just something you say.”
“Don’t you hear me? Spencer, I want to be with you. I do.” She leaned closer to me. “I know you feel the same way. You do. I know you do. You have to. After everything that we’ve been through together. All of it.”
“Avery, this doesn’t,” I broke off, exasperated and unable to figure out how to respond.
She seized the opportunity. “I see it every time you look at me. You can’t hide it.”
“You’re seeing things.”
Maybe I could make her believe that. Maybe I could make myself believe that.
She hooked my chin in between the thumb and forefinger of her right hand. “I’m not seeing things at all.”
God, she needed to let up on this topic, and fast. The more she argued with me, the harder it got for me to argue back. I didn’t want to tell her that she didn’t get it, or lie to her about my feelings, or tell her she had made a mistake. I wanted to grab her right then and there, then drag her into the backseat and fuck her brains out. I wanted to know every part of her body. I wanted to taste every part of her, and the last three minutes in the car had just told me she wouldn’t stop me once I’d made a move to do it.