by Nicki Elson
He huffed. “How did I lie?”
“By omission.”
“Oh, please. If either one of us deserves to be mad, it’s me. Maybe I watched the show without you but only because you were out with another guy.”
“Out with a business partner who happens to be a guy.”
He kept his eyes downcast as he pulled back the covers on his bed. The corners of his mouth curved downward.
Lyssa’s irritation with him softened. “Come on, you can’t be jealous. I told him I had a boyfriend, and he’s not interested anyhow. It’s only business. Besides…” She brought her voice down to a purr. “You’re the one I thought about later that night.” Sliding onto the bed, she arched a suggestive eyebrow and patted the sheets next to her.
“Yeah?” His rancor seemed to disintegrate as he climbed in next to her. Running a hand along the curve of her hip, he asked, “Did you finally decide which kind of superpower you’d choose if you could only pick one?”
“Mmm, narrowed it down to three, but you know that’s not the way I was thinking about you.”
“What way then?”
“This way.” She crushed her mouth to his and leaned into him. When he was on his back, she straddled him, lifting her mouth and holding her lips inches away from his while she rocked her pelvis against him. The evidence of his redirected attention pressed into her through the cotton layers of his boxers and her panties.
With his hands rubbing along her backside, guiding her rhythm, he asked in a thick voice, “How did the thinking about me start?”
She let out a throaty laugh and sat up. “First, I thought about your delicious lips tickling me from my jaw, down my throat, and then nipping at my breasts.” She traced her fingertips over each of her body parts as she mentioned them. “You kneaded them, teased them until they were so hard…and then I felt you biting into them.”
“Were you wearing anything?”
“Nope.” She took his cue and peeled off her shirt, baring her chest while she concentrated on keeping her balance as Keith’s thrusts grew more eager.
He lifted his hands and took over the kneading. “Keep going,” he huffed.
She fell forward, bracing her hands on either side of his head, her hips grinding into him from the new angle. “And then I thought of your hard, pulsing, glorious manhood, and I put Vibrizzio on full throttle, and—”
“Who?” Keith pinched her breasts, making her wince.
“My travel vibrator.”
“You named it?” he asked, continuing his pulsing rhythm against her.
“I guess so.” She planted her hot lips on his, and he opened wide, practically swallowing her as he tilted his body and pushed her over until she was on her back.
They shimmied out of their undies, and his fingers slithered over and into her, circling and driving her into an excited frenzy. Abruptly, his enticing motion stopped. “Wait—you have a travel vibrator?”
“Keith!” She slapped his skinny bum, and the action seemed to put battery-operated devices out of his mind for the moment. He rolled over and drove himself fully into her, putting them out of her mind, too.
The following week, however, the topic was back on full throttle. This time Lyssa and Keith were at her place. A game of Scrabble had turned naughty, and now the tiles lay scattered on the wood floor while the couple groped each other on the area rug.
“Hold on a sec,” Lyssa whispered, reaching to open the side-table drawer and pull out her favorite toy.
“What’s that, your house vibrator?” Keith angled his torso up, leaning on his elbows.
“What?”
“You have a travel vibrator, so I assume you call this one your house vibrator. Store one in your dashboard for a car vibrator, too? What about your desk at work? And do they each have their own name, or is it like George Foreman’s kids—Vibrizzio one, Vibrizzio two…”
“Very funny.” She kneeled next to him and clicked the on switch to check the level of battery power.
“Seriously. I thought we were done with these.”
Lyssa scrunched her face. She’d never thought any such thing. He was sensitive about her fondness for bedroom accessories, but she figured it wouldn’t be a problem as long as they didn’t make it an every-time thing.
“I didn’t need one the other night to make you moan my name.” He wrapped his long fingers around the back of her neck. Sitting up and bringing himself closer to her level, he kissed the side of her throat and then bit down and began sucking. Lyssa closed her eyes, enjoying the forceful pulsing of his wet mouth against her flesh. She hadn’t noticed that the vibrator was still humming until she felt Keith’s fingertips skim over her palm to click it off.
When he began to slide it out of her hand, her instinct was to clutch it tighter. He grazed his teeth back and forth over her skin and gave the vibrator a swift yank. But she held firm, her arm jerking forward with his pull. She yanked it back to her side. He responded with another tug, and now it was game on. Lyssa didn’t know how many times the instrument jerked between their unrelenting grips, but the tug-of-war ended when Keith finally wrenched it out of her hand, His arm flew backward, and his mouth broke suction with her neck.
His triumphant expression pinched into a wince as he looked down at his hand. “You scratched me.”
“Well, what in the hell were you doing?”
He kept hold of the prize but rubbed his other thumb over the meaty part of his hand where Lyssa’s nails had dug in. “Why couldn’t you listen to me?”
“Listen to what? You being jealous of a piece of plastic?”
“I’m not jealous.”
“Then what is it?”
“It’s…I don’t like sharing you. I don’t like the way you give it more attention than me, and I don’t like the fact that you went on a rendezvous with him…with it…in Boston. Why’d you even bring it?”
She cursed herself for telling him what she’d done in her hotel room. “Keith, honey, it sorta sounds like jealousy.”
He huffed and threw “it” onto the folded futon before he pushed himself up to stand. His lanky form hovered above her. “Maybe I am jealous, but can you blame me? You’ve been basically cheating on me with that—” he gestured toward the innocent purple device “—and God knows how many of its brethren, and it ends today.”
“Brethren?” She’d rarely seen her boyfriend so worked up. The only other time he’d come close was when he’d been outraged by what he’d called “gross mischaracterizations” in the latest cinematic interpretation of Star Trek.
He took a deep, calming breath and fixed his green eyes on her. His wide mouth pressed into a slight frown. “I’ve been thinking about this for a couple of weeks now, and it’s time for you to make a choice, Lyssa. Me or that.”
She busted out laughing, relieved that he was reasonable enough to make a joke of it.
“I’m not kidding.”
Her laughter died. “You mean…are you saying you’re actually on the verge of breaking up with me…because of a vibrator?”
“Are we on the verge of breaking up? That’s entirely up to you.” His features stayed steady, not giving the slightest twitch or any other hint of mirth.
“You can’t be serious!” Lyssa jumped up to stand in front of him. “I know you assume I’ll chuck that thing aside and choose you, but what if I don’t? What if I tell you, yes, I enjoy the sensations it gives me, but I love you, and we’ll figure out a way for the three of us to be very happy together?”
“Stop taking this so lightly.”
“I…” Her gaze wandered up until she was staring at a fine crack in her ceiling. She took a moment to collect her thoughts, trying to put herself into her boyfriend’s mindset. Then she lowered her eyes to him. “I honestly don’t know any other way to take it. You’d leave me over something like this? Really?” She hated the tears that suddenly rushed too close to her surface.
He folded his arms over his chest, and the hardness in his expression didn’t wave
r an inch. “Make your choice.”
Chapter 5
“YOU CHOSE THE VIBRATOR?” The olive was still perfectly visible in Trish’s gaping mouth.
“No. I chose my dignity.”
“By choosing a vibrator?” Perched on a high stool at a small round table, Trish pointed her tiny plastic sword at Lyssa.
“By letting him know I won’t play the ultimatum game. I mean, come on, you can’t tell me you think it was a fair choice he was asking me to make. And wait a minute—you were never a big fan of Keith, so why are you defending him?”
“I’m not defending him, sweetie. It’s just that the situation is so…”
“Absurd? Irrational? Ridiculous?”
“All of the above. You guys really broke up over this?”
Lyssa shrugged and nodded at the waiter when he motioned from the nearby bar to see if they wanted another round. She’d purposely suggested the Gold Coast hotel lounge because she knew it’d be lightly populated. “I went to bed that night thinking it was only an argument and we’d get past it, but he hasn’t called. Or e-mailed or texted.” She frowned and gulped the last of her martini.
“How long has it been?”
“Almost a full week.”
“He’s probably waiting for you to get in touch.”
“I thought of that.”
“And…”
“And I’m not so sure I want to get back with him. A single night of stewing over something so trivial is one thing, but a whole week? I’m tired of always being the one who has to smooth things over, you know?” She gave the waiter a weak smile as he set down their new drinks.
Trish held her fresh glass forward to clink the edge of Lyssa’s. “Good for you. You don’t need him.”
Lyssa nodded, attempting to reassure herself. “Hey, at least this way I’m no longer in the socially awkward position of having a boyfriend who’s skinnier than me.”
“There’s some lemonade for ya. Oh shit! Isn’t your mom coming into town this weekend?”
“Yup.”
“She adores Keith, doesn’t she?”
Lyssa sucked on her olive and shook her head. “It isn’t so much that she adores him as she adored the fact that I had a boyfriend with a good job. Somehow that’s a one-up on the other mothers.”
“Right. Well, good luck breaking the news to her. What are you going to do about a date for Chuck and Amy’s wedding?”
Lyssa blew out a gust of air. Their friends’ wedding was less than a month away. “Why did I think talking to you about this was going to make me feel better?”
“It certainly wasn’t based on experience.” Trish laughed and slid her hand across the small table to squeeze her friend’s hand. Her smile softened from amusement to compassion. “You don’t need him. And at the wedding, you’ll be sitting at the head table with the rest of the wedding party. You can whoop it up with your friends without worrying about entertaining a date.”
Lyssa’s shoulders sank with the full realization that singletude was once again officially upon her. “Will you loan Kurt to me for a couple of dances?”
“Sure.”
Penny Bates’s round, cheery face beamed at her daughter over the tiered tray of tea sandwiches. The two women sat amid the cavernous elegance of The Drake’s Palm Court. A harpist played in the background as they nestled into upholstered seating that curved around a small table for two. Lyssa’s mother visited Chicago exactly twice each year. She and Lyssa’s father had relocated from the Chicago suburbs to Tennessee during Lyssa’s last semester of college.
“Keith was welcome to join us, you know,” Penny said.
Lyssa had a simple plan to deal with the Keith situation. “This is a little posh for his tastes. He’s more of a Weiner’s Circle kind of guy.” Avoidance and subterfuge.
“Well, I do hope to get to see him at some point during this trip.”
Lyssa smiled noncommittally and moved a miniature egg salad sandwich from the server to her plate. She only had to make it through the weekend. In two days, when her mother was hundreds of miles away, she’d inform her of the breakup by e-mail. “How are Jessica and the kids?”
Penny’s ensuing grin told her youngest daughter she’d hit on the right subject to distract. Both of Lyssa’s parents had just been to visit their eldest child’s family in southern Illinois. Penny had taken a train from there to Chicago while her husband drove back to Tennessee. “They’re an absolute joy. Jessica has that house running like a finely-tuned army regiment.” She said it like that was a good thing.
“And Sam—or should I say Mister Jessica? Is he obeying orders?” Lyssa asked.
Penny’s eyes narrowed ever so slightly. “He’s properly grateful for his blessings.”
“Good. So no Doug on this trip?” Lyssa already knew the answer to this question. Her older brother had sent a text that morning that simply said:
Show no fear, little one. We’ll double-team her at Christmas.
Lyssa felt guilty for throwing him under the bus for the sake of conversation, but a distraction was a distraction.
Her mother exhaled sharply. “Apparently your brother’s schedule is too full to accommodate a drive down from Michigan to visit his mother. I’m sure his wife’s behind that.”
“That’s not fair, Mom. Doug is a big boy and hardly lets his wife push him around.” Unlike Sam, she congratulated herself for not adding.
“So you’re saying Doug simply doesn’t want to see me?”
“No! He really is busy—being a big shot attorney requires putting in an ungodly amount of hours, you know. I’ve been buried at work lately, too, so I totally get it.” She paused, giving her mother a chance to ask about her job, but the opportunity wasn’t taken, so she stayed on Doug. “He and Karin are coming at Christmas, right?”
“So he says.” The sag in Penny’s jowls became more pronounced when she frowned, and Lyssa suddenly realized why conversations with her mother were so exhausting—all the scrambles for subject changes wore her out. And so she wasn’t on her toes when her mother said, “I do hope you make Keith’s mother feel more welcome in her son’s life.”
“Not really going to be an issue anymore.”
“What?” Penny’s cup clinked onto its saucer.
“Huh?”
“Why won’t it be a problem anymore? Is she sick? Is it serious?”
Lyssa saw the clear path to salvaging plan Avoidance & Subterfuge, but she had limits and wouldn’t fake Keith’s mother’s death to delay a painful conversation with her mother. “No, she’s fine…as far as I know. Keith and I broke up.”
It was good Penny had already set down her teacup; otherwise, stained water would’ve gone flying with the dramatic rush of her hand to her chest. She gasped loudly enough that the diners in the immediate vicinity glanced in her direction.
“It’s just a breakup, Mom. Calm down.”
“Well, do you think you’ll be getting back together?”
“I…I don’t know. I don’t think so. Look, I know you really liked him, but it became clear that he and I didn’t understand each other, so it seemed best to split.”
Penny nodded and her hand slowly made its way down to the table, where she absently ran her fingertips along the rim of her saucer. “When you say you didn’t understand each other, do you mean sexually?”
Pressing her lips together with pressure so fierce it could form diamonds, Lyssa gave a curt shake of her head. “It was a lot of things, Mom.”
“Oh.” It was one those ohs that came packed with layers of meaning—none of which merely meant oh.
Let it go, Lyssa told herself. Talk about the tea or talk about the weather. Maybe encourage her to go on for an hour about Jessica’s homemaking prowess, but do not give in to her bait. It was a battle Lyssa rarely won. “Why did you automatically assume that sex was the problem?”
Penny’s eyes went wide with feigned innocence. “It was only a question. No need to get shrill.”
Was she shrill? Lyssa
looked down and saw her fingers bent like talons, holding her balled-up napkin in a death grip. Willing herself to relax, she released the napkin and spread it across her lap. “I’m sorry, but…why did you immediately go there?”
“No reason.” Penny lifted her porcelain cup to her lips. Before taking a long sip, she murmured, “It’s just that you’ve always been a bit of a prude.”
Lyssa’s fingers choked the napkin again. Had any other woman in the entire history of everything ever been accused of being a prude by her own mother? She decided to meet blunt with blunter. “So you’re still disappointed I wouldn’t go with Jess and the other seniors to the suck-off-the-football-team parties?” For effect, she lifted her wrinkled napkin and dabbed at the corners of her mouth.
“That is not what was going on, and maybe if you’d been more social, you would’ve been asked to a prom.”
“You wanted me to social myself out for a date to prom?”
Penny tilted her head in the way that said she’d have none of her daughter’s nonsense. “What I want to express is that I understand what it’s like to be uptight in the bedroom. Your father and I…”
Oh, dear God.
“…but once I loosened up and agreed to some of the things he’d been asking me to try…”
Oh, God, no! These weren’t random words popping into Lyssa’s mind—she was actually praying. Please, make it stop.
It wasn’t stopping. Lyssa did her best to block her mother’s words and focus on something—anything—else in the vast room. Her eyes darted about, failing to find purchase anywhere. The distinct syllables that formed the word “testicles” in her mother’s nasally voice cut through the rising panic. Her eyes stopped on the gleaming flatware resting conveniently on the white linen tablecloth. She momentarily considered stabbing forks into her eardrums, but that’d only stop the noise; she’d still be able to read those lips that didn’t stop moving.
“…and there’s something very gratifying about causing a man to lose control like that…”
Lyssa instantly decided on the ultimate superpower Keith had always wanted her to choose. She’d pick telekinesis, and she’d use it to snap off one of the harp strings and levitate it over. Then she’d wrap it around her mother’s throat and squeeze. Squeeze until Mommy turned blue. Squeeze until that larynx could never again spew its torturous revelations. Judging by the sour expressions that were now being cast in her mother’s direction, Lyssa felt certain the other tea room patrons would thank her.