'90s Playlist (Romance Rewind #1)

by Anthology

  I take forever in the bathroom. No one’s banging down the door, so I figure I might as well. Even the stream of the shower is bizarrely perfect when compared to the pounding lava stream of my shared shower in Berkeley. Once I’m done and polished, I pull the robe back on because I don’t have any other clothes. I know I should go through Door Number One, which is solid wood and closed, but the billowing white curtains draw my attention.

  As soon as I step through and see him, the pieces of my night come together in a crash. Passing out. Being carried out of the party. His concern and my not caring. I had given him my address, I know I had. I even had a hazy memory of sitting on the edge of my own bed and looking up at him while he lectured me.

  So how had I ended up in this room?

  Tom was sitting at a small table with coffee and a basket of baked goodies at his elbow. He folds the newspaper, then tucks it under his arm as he stands.

  My cheeks heat. My fingertips twine in the soft linen of the curtains. I can’t remember the last time anyone stood just because I came into a room. “I didn’t put you out of your bed, did I?”

  “It’s a suite,” he says, putting to rest my questions about apartment versus hotel. That voice of his is just as mesmerizing as it’s ever been. I want to listen to him say dirty things in the dark of night. The way his mouth quirks says he wants the same thing.

  At least, I hope that’s what it says. I finger the edge of my robe instead of the curtain, but his gaze stays locked on my eyes. Gentlemen can be assholes when they don’t do what you want. “You didn’t have to bring me here,” I demur.

  “You were really far gone.”

  There’s more heat across the back of my neck, but it’s an entirely different kind this time. Embarrassment, pure and simple. I look at the tile of the balcony. “I don’t normally…I mean, I do normally, but not that much. It was liquid, and I was given a little too much.”

  “And you bought it from Corey.” That quirk of his mouth evaporates and his lips crease into flatness. “He gave you too much.”

  “I opened my mouth and said ah.”

  “Help me find him.” He steps toward me. He’s wearing finely cut trousers but he’s barefoot beneath them. One hand lifts toward me, I think in an unconscious motion. “You don’t understand, Veronica.”

  “No one calls me Veronica.”

  His eyebrows lift. “Would you like me to stop?”

  I shake my head. “I like it. Makes me feel special.” I don’t keep my mouth shut very well. It’s something about my personality. A supreme inclination to shove my foot in my mouth at the first opportunity.

  “Everyone should feel special now and then,” he says, and I realize he’s somehow gotten close enough to rub a lock of my damp hair between two fingers. He wraps the long dark coil around his finger.

  “Why is Skittles avoiding you?”

  “Corey is avoiding the family. Not me in particular.”

  I move away from him. The view beyond the railing is stunning. San Francisco sprawls beneath us, naked of her usual blanket of fog. “The bridges are pretty but it’s always the boats that catch my eye.” They’re tiny and winking away on their busy routes.

  “Boats are excellent for getting away. Just ask Corey.”

  I know he’s standing behind me. I can feel him there. If I jumped, would he try to catch me? It’s not that I want to die or anything like that. I just want to know if I can fall. I’ve been drifting for so long. “If I asked him, what would he say he was running from?”

  “Remember how I said we were half brothers?”

  I hear pain in his voice, a tightness that’s enticing, which probably points out how fucked up I am. I couldn’t be with anyone regular. Anyone not messed up. I’m the poster child for social dysfunction, after all.

  “I remember.”

  “My mom left our mutual dad. She had family money and she could afford to hire good lawyers. She got custody sewn up tight. I grew up with her, alternating between New York and London mostly. I still had to visit Paul sometimes, but…”

  I start to turn around, but he catches me by the shoulders and holds me still. He doesn’t want me to look at him. I bite the inside of my lip and wonder if it’s because it’s a painful subject to talk about or if it’s because it’s always easier to lie when you’re not looking at someone.

  “I assume things weren’t peaches and roses with Paul?”

  “No. Even after he remarried and Corey was born.” His grip on my shoulder tightens. “Abusive assholes remain abusive assholes.”

  “The trust fund…is it from your dad?” I’m not sure what prompted me to ask. Maybe instinct. Maybe only wanting some kind of confirmation that it was okay to feel the way I did about Tom.

  “No. I set it up when I reached the age of majority and came into the bulk of my mother’s estate.”

  “How old are you?” He seemed light years away from me, and yet like we could have gone to school together.

  “Twenty-six.”

  “I’m twenty.”

  “I’m relieved.”

  It’s then that he turns me around. I don’t even feel like I have a choice in it, but I know that I do. The sky above us is that perfect California blue, darker than his eyes by at least four shades. Even before his mouth comes down on mine, I know I’m never going to forget this moment.

  And I don’t. Even there, with his lips on mine. With the way he steals my breath and turns it inside out. I know it’s all new, even though it’s not.

  His hold sears me through the thin silk of the robe sleeves. I push in, offering myself. Everything I have. I know that’s not much. He outstrips me with every move. I let him press me back and back against the railing.

  My shoulders are above the fall. I could drop.

  I think I’m dropping anyway.

  I wind my arms around his neck and scratch into his hair. I don’t care if it hurts. I want to have control.

  He doesn’t let me, though. The next thing I know, he’s swinging my legs up into the air and scooping me up. The curtains drag over my head and shoulders as he carries me into the bedroom.

  I bounce when he drops me to the bed. My stomach is doing flips. I don’t care. None of this is too much. I’ve given more for less return.

  He’s beautiful. I press my palms to his flat stomach. Even behind the expensive button-down I can feel how firm and taut he is. He gets even more so when he draws in a slow breath. He cups the back of my head and I think I know what he wants.

  I tell myself it’s easier this way, but the lovely kind of flipping my stomach had been doing turns into something else. I hold my smile even as I attack his belt and slip his trousers free.

  “Jesus, Roni,” he mutters. His mouth is a work of art.

  Well, so is mine. I push his pants and underwear down. His cock is pretty. The slight pink flush makes his swollen shaft seem even more enthusiastic. I hold him in both hands. The first lick is salty. Proof of how much he wants me is beading on his tip.

  This, this makes me grin again. A real one.

  He halts me though. His hand under my chin, he tilts my face back up toward him. “What are you doing?”

  I give him my best saucy smile, then look at him through my lashes. “Tell me you don’t want me to. I won’t believe you.”

  “Bloody hell, do I want you to.” My insides are lead, but he has a smile tucking up one side of his mouth. “But that’s not the only thing I want. With the ferocity with which you’re attacking me, I think I’d be done in no time.”

  I bite my lip. I don’t know what to say. How to save my embarrassment from spilling over. I’ve never been in this position before, with my hands around a man’s cock and my mouth being rejected. There’s no way I can see to gracefully extract myself.

  I’ve never been a particularly graceful person.

  Tom is though. He saves me. He strips his shirt and drops it to the floor. Light fingertips on my shoulders push me flat on the bed. He unties the robe with particular d
eliberation. I think he’s teasing me with each brush on purpose.

  The world is beautiful and I’m a feather and I’m floating.

  It only gets better when I’m bare. “You’re beautiful,” he says, smoothing his palm over my ribs. I suck in a deep breath, but not because I’m scared. Because I want to get closer to him. I want to occupy more of the space between us, so there’s less distance.

  He bows his head. I watch him come closer. My mouth is dry. He kisses the dipping plane of my stomach. Then the rise of my hipbone.

  My hands find his soft hair. Not quite curls, definitely not straight. They’re like silk under me. “You don’t have to.”

  “I know I don’t.” This time he’s the one looking up at me through lashes. “That’s half the fun.”

  I don’t know what to do. His first lick isn’t on my pussy. It’s the inside of my thigh. I’ve never liked this before. It always feels so awkward. I don’t understand how guys like it. I look up at the recessed ceiling, prepared to do my duty and moan when he goes in for the always oddly enthusiastic kill.

  But I’m surprised when he keeps kissing the inside of my thighs. The crease between my body and my legs. He nuzzles my trimmed hair, his bottom lip just barely grazing my seam. Other guys have always grabbed onto my ass as if I’m likely to run away and they’re holding me down. Not Tom. He’s touching. And not just petting. It feels like he wants to learn every inch of me. His hands stroke from the curve of my waist to my breasts. He cups me and it’s when his thumbs rub over my nipples that my head draws back.

  I don’t gasp, but my mouth opens. There’s a straight line of sensation lit up between his thumbs and the way his mouth hovers over me, puffing humid breaths across my skin.

  He takes his time, kissing the inside of my thighs and the line where my pussy and leg meet. By the time he licks into my seam, I’m not exactly begging for it. But my air isn’t caught in the top of my throat either. I twist the coverlet under my slightly sweaty hands. Such a classy girl.

  He’s patient. More patient than I’ve ever been with a man. His head bobs and he kisses me gently from the inside out. His tongue does amazing things. I can’t track them all. There’s lips and teeth and more of that tongue.

  My hips start to shift. I think I’m trying to slide farther up the bed, but it’s hard to tell because I can’t think of anything but his mouth. He throws his forearm across my lower stomach. God, it’s embarrassing but I think I’m sweating a little bit. I gulp for breath.

  He says something soothing against the inside of my thigh. His lips are wet with me. Seeing that makes my blood rush and the backs of my knees tingle.

  I swallow. “What?”

  “I can’t decide.”

  I pet his hair. It slips like silk through my hands, and I get bold enough to touch the tops of his shoulders. My fingertips are half numb but it doesn’t matter. He’s lean. Here and there, I can feel bone, like at the line of his collarbone. But he’s padded with whipcord strength too. I want to know what he does to work out. How he keeps in shape. I want to know everything about him.

  “Decide what?”

  “If I should make you come on my face or my cock.”

  I laugh. I’ve heard that kind of bragging from other guys, but he’s the only one who’s had even half a chance. “If you want to go for novelty, you should go back to licking me.”

  His blue eyes gleam. “No one’s ever managed that before?”

  I don’t tell him that it’s one of the few firsts I can offer him. Instead I nod and realize that there’s the heat of a blush in my cheeks. It’s because I know what he’s going to do even before he rubs a fingertip over my clit.

  He traces my gate with the tip of his tongue. My head falls back to the bed.

  It’s all over then.

  It takes me a little bit to get back in the right headspace, but he’s patient. He keeps me on edge. Until I’m not dancing on a blade anymore, I’m falling.

  I’m coming.

  I’m still panting when he sheathes himself in a condom and surges into me. The way my body is clenching in orgasm is balanced by how wet he’s made me. Every stroke he takes feels like he’s getting a little deeper into my soul. Especially because he’s looking me straight in the eyes.

  His hand finds its way to the pillow beside my head, but he doesn’t stay there. His fingers trace across my neck, my upper shoulder. I should be nervous, but I’m not. I’m not anything around him but exactly what he wants me to be.

  I fly. He keeps going and I keep going and there’s nothing in between us except the fine air of respectability that clings to him even now. Even when he’s sweaty at the temples. I think it’s in the way he smells like fine cologne.

  I let my hands skate down his back to the beautiful swells of his ass. Feeling his clenches under my palms makes them reverberate through me. I’m going to come again. Not right away, and maybe not easily, but he’s going to see it through. I can tell from the tightening at the corners of his eyes.

  His determination is shining on me and I don’t know why.

  Instead of basking in its light, I bury my face against his shoulder. Letting my eyes close makes it easier to open my mouth on his skin. I’ve already had him between my lips but this feels like more. It feels like something a girlfriend would do, to open my teeth and test the resilience of his skin.

  I don’t bite though.

  I’m sure the girls Tom is normally with wouldn’t even think of it. So I hold back just a little bit. Just enough, I think.

  He pulls out of me, but not for good. I shiver when long fingers wrap around my hips and he flips me over. He pulls me up on my knees, but he doesn’t have to try very hard. I go willingly. Then he’s taking me from behind. Hard enough that I feel washes of pleasure rock through me. All the way down to my toes, even.

  I bury my face in the lush duvet. I know what’s happening here. Guys do this move when they don’t want to think about me anymore. When I become an accessory. I already came once; I ought to be happy for that.

  I’m an ungrateful person at the heart of it.

  Tom feels something though. Knows something is wrong with me. He loops his forearms around my shoulders and my ribs, beneath my breasts, and hauls me upward so that I’m kneeling but still leaning back against his chest. His mouth nuzzles the soft spot behind my ear. Shivers work through me all over again, as if his cock isn’t buried hilt-deep in me.

  “What’s wrong?”

  I sigh but it comes out like something near a helpless laugh. “Nothing. Absolutely nothing.”

  “I don’t like being lied to.” His hand finds the flat place above my breasts and beneath my throat. My sternum, I guess. He’s so steady.

  “Nothing anymore,” I amend. “Can we leave it at that?”

  “Good enough.” His hips nudged against my ass. “Tell me what you need.”

  I shake my head, because that’s part of the problem. He knows exactly what I need. What I need is for him to keep knowing it.

  I know that he grins, because I feel it in the air. It doesn’t make any sense, but there it is. “I didn’t peg you for the silent type. Maybe I just haven’t tried hard enough yet.”

  I hold my hand flat over his, layering over top of my chest. Like I’m holding still in the middle of a storm. His bones are strong, the crisp hair dusted across his wrist and hand. I know this moment. Everyone else talks about it, that place where you’re both together in the middle of sex. Where you’re not two separate people. It’s sparkly and shiny with novelty.

  Tom starts moving within me again, but he never pushes me down to rest on my hands. He keeps holding me up. The hardness of him against my back is enough to make my eyes close with pleasure. I know before it actually happens that I’m going to come again. I think maybe I come just from the very realization that it could happen. He’s put that much effort into what we’re making.

  I feel so good, with so many gorgeous tingles running through my legs and my stomach and where we’re
joined, that I forget to hold still when he starts to come. His strokes turn hard and then harder, but then he slips out of me because I’m being too pliant. I reach down to help and the condom is slick with my wetness. The head of his cock is still fervently red covered by the nearly clear silicone. Then it’s not. He grunts, his hand closes more tightly on my hip and whiteness fills the condom.

  I touch him then. Hold him closer to my body. I wish he could have come inside me. Even with the barrier, I feel like it would have been something good. Special.

  His forehead rests on my shoulder as he catches his breath. I drop my head back and look up at the ceiling. I am still holding him to me, but we’re getting cold and slightly sticky.

  “Here,” he says, gently disengaging. He takes some tissues from a discreetly covered box on the nightstand and hands a few to me. “Wait right here.”

  He disappears into the bathroom long enough to clean up.

  I flop back to the bed with my arms spread. I have a silly smile on my face when he comes back. I must, because he grows one in response. “Yeah?”

  He slides onto the bed. “Yeah.”

  I’m not even sure what we’re agreeing to. It probably doesn’t matter. He could go away in a puff of smoke right now, never calling or writing, and I’d still thank him for coming into my life. For proving that it’s not me who’s been broken all these years. It was those other guys.

  I could walk outside right now and tight rope across the Bay Bridge and be just fine. I’m a rockstar. For now.

  We spend some time in bed, doing those things that new couples do. Play with the sizes of our hands and laughing at the way his fingertips can fold over mine. We talk about our favorite bands, and I’m relieved that he doesn’t mention Mariah Carey or Phil Collins. Compare who had the worst prom date, though I think he might have been humoring me. I don’t understand how Tom could have ended up with his mother’s best friend’s daughter, who forgot to take out a curler at the back of her hairdo.

  Unless he has a soft spot in his heart for rejects. For those of us who slide underneath the surface and try not to make waves.