As we lay in my bed panting after our third session of sexual acrobatics, I opened my big mouth. “I’ve had such a great day with you, Lily.”
“Me too,” she said, kissing me on the chest.
“I love how you don’t hold back; you give your body so freely to me.”
“Thank you. I quite enjoyed myself, in case you hadn’t noticed.”
“Oh I noticed. You were quite vocal.”
“Woops.”
“Don’t apologize. I loved it. And the windows are closed. So who cares what the neighbors think.”
She grinned.
“What I don’t understand is how you can give your body so freely to me, but when it comes to something developing between us, you’re so restrained.”
She didn’t move, but I felt her body tighten next to me.
“Nico, please don’t.
I knew I was sticking my foot in my mouth, but I couldn’t help it. “I don’t understand it and it’s driving me crazy. Can you just tell me why?”
“Why can’t you just leave it?”
“Did some guy hurt you? Is that why you’re so gun-shy?”
“No, that’s not it.”
“Then what is it?”
“I can’t tell you! You’d never understand!”
“Last night in your sleep, you said something about the moon. Not again or something. What’s that about?”
Her face froze. Then she climbed out of bed and looked for her clothes. “I have to go.”
“Lily, don’t be ridiculous. I’m sorry if I was pushing too hard. It’s just—the contradiction confuses me. But I’ll lay off, okay?”
“No. I never should have stayed. I’m so sorry if I’ve been leading you on. Trust me, Nico, when I say you’d never understand certain things about me, I mean you’d never understand them. But that’s why I can’t be with you the way you want.” She paused to put on her clothes. “If you’re looking for a relationship, I don’t want to hold you back from one. You should find someone else.”
“Oh come on, Lil. Don’t go.” I climbed out of bed and put my boxers on.
“I have to.”
She grabbed her belongings.
I touched her arm. “Let me drive you home.”
“No thanks. I’ll get a cab.”
She closed the door behind her. I fought the urge to punch a hole in the wall.
Did you have to be so pushy? Idiot.
Chapter Six
Lily
I should have known better than to get too close. We’d only spent two days together and one very hot night, but already I found myself thinking about him.
Back in my condo, I paced through my living room, debating what just happened.
You obviously like this guy. More than any other lover you’ve had. I mean, really—when was the last time you spent the whole weekend with a guy? You always specified boundaries.
For good reason.
What the hell do I do now? I’m trying to do the right thing by being straight with him. Well, not completely straight. But honest about how far we can go. Why isn’t it enough for him?
Why isn’t it enough for me?
When he called an hour later, he said, “I just wanted to make sure you got home okay.”
Hearing the concern in his voice—concern for me—made me want to hop back in a cab and go over there. “Yes, I’m fine. Thanks.”
“I was worried. You left here in quite a state.”
“Yeah, I know. Sorry if that was a little overdramatic. You hit a nerve.”
“I did? I didn’t mean to. Sorry.”
“It’s just me. I’m a freak about certain things. Like privacy.”
“I get that. I didn’t mean to pry. I’ll back off with the questions, okay?”
“Okay. Thanks. I know I’m a pain in the ass. I wonder what you see in me to put up with it.”
“I think you’re phenomenal, Lily. Everything about you has mesmerized me since we first met. Not only are you beautiful, but so talented, driven. I could go on.”
“Please do!” I teased.
“Only if you come back to my place. Or I come over to yours.”
Ooh yes! More of Nico’s sexy hands on me. The touch that set me on fire. The way he intuitively knew exactly what my body wanted, before I was even aware of it myself. The feel of him inside me…
“I’d love to. But we shouldn’t. Let’s slow things down.”
“If you insist.”
“Besides, we both have to work tomorrow.”
“Fine. How about we get together after work this week.”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Dinner, movie, whatever you want.”
“Has anyone ever told you you’re pushy?”
“Pushy? You get to choose what we do.”
“Fine. I’ll talk to you later.”
“Good night, Lily. I’ll be thinking of you when I’m all alone in my bed tonight.”
“I’m sure you could find someone to keep you warm if you were lonely.”
“You’re such as smart-arse.”
“Arse? What does that mean, Brit Boy? We don’t have arses in America.”
“Funny. Fine, you’re a smart-ass.”
“Ah, now I understand. Good night, Nico. I’ll call you.”
Over the next two days, Nico tormented my mind. My feelings for him had crept under my skin, writhing around and consuming me. I started to think it was toxic because I thought about him all the time, far too much. What was he doing? Was he thinking about me? When will I see him again? As a woman who prided herself on being independent, on not relying on a man for happiness or as a provider, a part of me loathed the way he consumed my thoughts.
This wasn’t healthy. This wasn’t love, was it? It felt more like obsession.
How do you know the difference between one and the other? When you loved someone, you thought about them all the time. When you were obsessed with someone, you thought about them all the time.
What did I know? I’d never been in love.
Maybe there was a difference between the two. The difference was stalking. If I started to drive by his place, haunt his shows, stalk him online, well then I knew I had a real problem. An addiction I’d have to quit.
What to do? What to do?
A voice inside me said, Get away, get some distance.
Yes, good idea. Some distance would be how I could gain perspective.
I looked online to find someplace far enough so that I put some distance between us, but close enough that I could drive there and back over a weekend before returning to work on Monday morning. Where could I find plenty of distraction?
Of course—New York City. I would just take one of the buses that left from Boston on the hour. No planes, no driving, no booking. Perfect. I’d leave on Saturday morning.
Work went by slowly as I was still consumed by thoughts of Nico. I copped out on calling him since I knew it would be more difficult to stay away. I sent him a text on Thursday.
Going out of town for the weekend. Will talk to you when I return.
His reply:
Looking forward to it. Have a safe trip.
Double-checking the website for the departure times and the station, I then packed a bag for the weekend. When I looked for a book to read on the bus ride, I saw the book he had bought me. Definitely not grabbing it no matter how much I wanted to read what happens next. I didn’t need anything else to remind me of him. And no romances for obvious reasons. I found a thriller that would probably be full of cliffhangers and hopefully little romance. Then I walked to the commuter rail to go down into Boston.
An hour and a half later, I was on the bus leaving Boston. I used an app on my phone to book a room near Central Park. Maybe I’d even get a run in while I was there. Pleased with myself for pulling together a plan to deal with my Nico situation so easily, I opened my book. Within a few pages, I was dozing off. As I drifted into sleep, I pictured his face. I thought about spending last weekend with h
im and how I enjoyed every single moment until the end. How I wanted to spend this weekend in his arms as well.
It was no use. Look how deep in I was already. Was I destined for heartbreak? This was exactly why I had to get away.
One thing about New York City was how perfect it was for distraction. Although I kept myself occupied with a run through Central Park and stops at cafés and shops, Nico still penetrated the recesses of my mind.
When I entered a bookstore, I saw a display for the books he recommended. Figures they had to be bestsellers that were everywhere so every time I saw them, I thought about the time we met at the bookstore in Salem.
Walking through SoHo and Greenwich Village, I looked for signs for places to go tonight. I’d be going out-out as Ally would say. What was I in the mood for? Dancing? Live music? Jazz? Blues. No, definitely not blues. No more blues.
Hmm, there were signs for dance clubs and bands playing, but I didn’t recognize any of them. Then I froze. There it was. The Velvet Cocks logo.
Damn it. Did he have to creep into my head everywhere? Why was it so hard to forget the guy? With a mixture of reluctance and curiosity, I read the poster. They were playing in New York City at what looked like a dive rock ’n‘ roll club next weekend.
Close call. What if it had been tonight?
Realizing I’d been holding my breath, I exhaled loudly. Then I spent several moments trying to regulate my breathing before I walked away from the poster. I grabbed a Village Voice newspaper and headed to an Italian restaurant for dinner. Then I found a jazz band playing nearby. As I sat alone at a table watching the band play, I focused on the singer and couldn’t help comparing him to Nico as Leggy Bones. Although the singer had a good voice, he didn’t have whatever spark it was that Nico had that had commanded the crowd. He didn’t have the voice that had captivated me before I even saw what he looked like.
He wasn’t Nico.
On the bus back to Massachusetts, I realized the distance didn’t help me one bit since I still thought about him constantly and my body yearned to be near him again. I wouldn’t be able to make any decisions until I saw him again.
Nico
Lily called me when she came back from New York. Unfortunately it was the weekend before VC had shows there. We had a show in Portland, Maine, while she was in New York. We were still hungry enough that we played whenever we got a gig.
I didn’t know what was going on with her. She never mentioned why she went to New York and I didn’t pry, having learned my lesson, but I imagined it had to be business. A part of me wondered if she was blowing me off. Since that day in Bearskin Neck, her body language had said she wanted to be with me, although with her words she put up the barriers. What drove me crazy was trying to understand why.
When I heard from her that week and she asked if we could get together on Friday night, I tried to keep the excitement out of my voice. After all, I’d been chasing her almost since we met. Something she clearly didn’t want. Apparently I couldn’t play it that cool. Because I knew I was crazy about her. The more she pulled away, the more I wanted her. It would be almost two weeks since I last saw her, not that I was keeping count (guilty), and I couldn’t believe how much the anticipation to see her again built up so much so that every nerve in my body was pulled taut.
“You look stunning as always,” I said when I picked her up. She was wearing a dress with the colors of a sunset blended together and the hues brought out the gold of her eyes.
“Thank you.” She examined me. “You look pretty great yourself,” she said.
I wish I could say I threw my outfit together like guys usually do, but I had carefully checked out how these black jeans and dark-green button-up shirt fit, thinking of whether Lily would like them.
“Shall we head into Cambridge? Get a bite in Harvard Square?”
“That sounds great,” she said, throwing me a look with a twinkle in her eye. “Maybe you can even get a sexy stage outfit while you’re there.”
“I doubt any of those stores will still be open by the time we get in. Besides I’m more interested in you rather than outfits tonight.”
Stay cool, Nico. Don’t push.
The doubts that had crept into my mind about whether Lily was interested disappeared during the drive down to Cambridge.
“How have you been?” I asked.
“Fine. Same old. Work, play, the usual. You?”
“We had a great show in Portland. You ever go up there?”
“Not for a while.”
“I love the old port area. Perhaps we’ll go there sometime.”
So much for keeping cool, Nico.
I sensed her tense beside me. Just as quick, the tension was gone and she said, “Maybe.”
We ordered a variety of Middle Eastern plates to share at Cafe Algiers on Brattle Street. We sat at an octagonal-shaped table upstairs and admired all the carved wood architecture and hookahs that gave the place an ambiance that stood out among chain coffee shops, which I loathed. Around us, we had a slice of Cambridge life. A couple of guys played chess, another discussed current events, one man sat all alone scrawling what appeared to be math problems or formulas on scraps of paper, a few teenagers with hair dyed multi-hues sat in the corner, and two couples appeared to be on a date.
“How was New York?”
“Refreshing,” she said. “Sometimes I just need to get away. Either lose myself in the quiet of the mountains or the anonymity of a city.”
“It wasn’t for work?”
“No. Play.”
For some reason, this pierced right through me. She could have called me, we could have spent some time together over the weekend, but instead she chose to go off by herself?
“Are you always such a solitary person?”
She nodded slowly before answering. “Yes. I’m afraid I am.”
At least she was honest. “I’m glad you took a break from your isolated lifestyle to come out with me tonight.”
She smiled seductively, which made me think of her naked at my place.
“You’re cute, which makes it hard to resist you.”
After sharing baklava and some strong Arabian coffee, we went outside and downstairs to the Brattle Theatre, an old movie house that often played independent films and classics. During a viewing of an old Alfred Hitchcock film, I held her hand. A gentle handholding led to a caress. Simply running my fingers over her skin shot electricity through my body. Luckily I’d seen the movie years ago. Because sitting so close to her—so close that I wanted to touch her, but limiting myself just to her hand—put me through an agony I didn’t know was possible. I barely kept track of what was going on up on the screen.
After the movie, we walked through Harvard Square, catching more of the quirky characters who made it their home. A guy juggled various objects, a woman posed as a marionette, artists sold paintings laid out on blankets on the sidewalk, religious zealots warned us the end is near, chess masters sat outside Au Bon Pain and challenged players to beat them, and then there were the Harvard students, couples, families and dozens of young people in quirky clothing who vied for attention through their outfits screaming, “I’m different. Look at me!”
On the way back to the car, we cut through some narrow alleys between office buildings. Unable to wait any longer, I grabbed Lily’s head and kissed her with a drive I didn’t know I had in me. Passion, almost a blinding, violent lust, took over as I claimed her, pushing her against a building. My erection strained through my jeans as I pressed my body against her, trying to get closer still.
“God, Nico, you don’t know how badly I want you right now.”
“Trust me, I do.” I sighed. “It’s painful.”
I kissed her neck while my hands explored from her breasts down to cup her ass. Pulling one leg up, I reached under her dress to feel her warmth. I cursed the fact it was still cold enough that she wore stockings. If only her legs were bare and I had unrestricted access to touch her.
She moaned softly, enc
ouraging me to go on despite my frustration with the clothing.
Then she said, “We can’t, Nico. Not here.”
“Why not?” I reluctantly pulled away from her neck to look around. “There’s nobody around.”
“Look up.” She pointed to the security cameras mounted on the buildings.
“Fuck.”
“Let’s go someplace else.”
“All right.”
We walked down Brattle Street where my car was parked, passing the multimillion dollar homes and the sign noting this street was known as Tory Row back during the era of the American Revolution. Before we reached my car, Lily pulled my arm. “Come in here.” She indicated a small park I hadn’t noticed.
“Where are you going?”
“Just looking for someplace private.”
“Here?”
“I can’t wait to get to your place. Can you?”
“Hell no.”
“Look—the perfect spot.”
She led me under some kind of weeping willow tree. The snows had melted but the night air was still cool, not that I felt the bite of it with how much we’d heated up. I reached under her dress again and pulled her stockings down over her legs, reaching into her panties and feeling how wet she was.
“Now. Don’t wait,” she directed.
Not needing any more encouragement, I pulled off her boots, stockings and panties. Then I quickly pulled my pants down past my knees.
“Crap, I don’t think I have a condom.”
“My purse.” She bent down and fumbled for a moment until she found one. “Let me put it on.”
Her delicate hands smoothed the condom over my shaft and I moaned when her fingers touched me there.
“It’s on. Now fuck me. Please.”
With one hand on her shoulder and the other directing my way, I eased her back against the tree and maneuvered my cock against her warm slickness. In two strokes, I was fully in and she gasped.
While I fucked her against the tree, I used one hand to touch her clit.
“Yeah, right there,” she said, grinding against me harder. Not long after, she said, “Oh God, Nico, I’m right there,” and then exploded around me. She yelped out, but then bit my shoulder to stifle the sound. The combination of her warmth spreading over me with the pain of her teeth sent me over the edge with her. In three more thrusts, I buried myself into her, collapsing against her.
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