The Girl On The Half Shell

by Susan Ward

  He laughs. “You must be from California. I thought my brother and I were the only ones here. Sandy is a promoter. He’s the idiot who dragged me here. But I can tell you are from California.”

  Now I’m intrigued and I smile. “OK, how can you tell?”

  He smiles. He points at my shoes. “Beyond the nice tan and the shorts? The UGG boots. Definitely a California thing.”

  “How very observant of you.”

  “I’m a writer. That’s my thing. Crowds, not so much. But people watching definitely my thing.”

  He says it in a silly, self-depreciating way that is kind of charming. I can tell he’s quiet and a little shy like me.

  “Have you written anything I might know?”

  “Maybe. I’m a reporter for the Los Angeles Times.”

  I tense and have a sudden urge to flee the kitchen. He notices. “I am off the record tonight, so relax. I’m just a guest here like you.”

  He extends his hand. “Jesse Harris.”

  “Chrissie.”

  “Good, now I’ve officially met one person and I can go home. That was the deal I had with my brother.”

  I laugh and pop open the top. I don’t bother to get a glass and take a sip from the can. I ease up on the butcher block table in the center of the room, to sit on the edge with my legs dangling.

  “So, who are you here with?” he asks.

  “Sort of a guy.”

  God, that came out stupid.

  Jesse laughs.

  “Just my luck. The cute ones are always with sort of a guy. So, why are you in the kitchen instead of with your sort of a guy?”

  I usually hate it when people make fun of me, but there is something just plain nice about Jesse Harris. He seems too nice to be a reporter.

  I shrug. “He’s dancing with an ex-girlfriend. I’m not sure what I should do.”

  He takes a sip of his beer. “I’m a writer. Give me your options. I’ll give you expert advice on the right option.”

  “You’re a reporter not a novelist. You’re the wrong kind of writer.”

  “I’m a reporter to pay for being a novelist. So give me a shot. Let’s see if I’m going to be a good novelist.”

  I laugh, and I am suddenly aware of some of the nicer changes in me since Alan. I am more confident. More comfortable in my skin.

  “Well, I was debating just going out there planting a big wet one on him and locking myself to his side like a Siamese twin.”

  “I can tell you right now that that one is definitely wrong.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because he’ll like that, and he was a jerk to leave you all alone ending up in the kitchen with me.”

  “Why do you say that? Is there something wrong with you that I should be worried about?”

  Those gorgeous hazel eyes lock on me. “I find you incredibly cute and I’d take you out of here in a heartbeat if I thought I had half a chance.”

  Whoa, where did that come from? Shy and yet direct. Interesting.

  I shake my head and push away that thought.

  He smiles. “What’s the other option you were thinking to do?”

  Boy, he is really good looking when he smiles. Why isn’t he out there enjoying the party?

  I take another sip of my Coke and say, “Just going out there, forgetting all about him, and having a good time at the party.”

  He holds up a hand, palm down and gives me the iffy wobble. “Better than option one, but not good.”

  I cross my legs at my ankles and make them swing a little more. “OK, since you’re the writer, what would be better?”

  Hazel eyes lock on me like a laser. “Leave with me.”

  Oh my, not what I expected. I’ve gone as far in this as I should. It was fun, for some reason Jesse hitting on me was fun, even though he’s right. He doesn’t have a chance. Three weeks ago, he would have. But not today.

  I pretend to give it serious thought. “Sorry, I don’t think I can do option three.”

  “Why not? I sort of had the feeling I was doing this better than I usually do. Why shoot me down now?”

  I start to laugh. “Because the guy I’m sort of with is Alan Manzone.”

  He gives me the oh-shit-good-one face. I push off the counter and go to the freezer. “Are you hungry? They have all this fancy food out there, but you know what I’d really like is some ice cream.”

  I rummage through the cartons and pull one out. “Häagen-Dazs, Swiss Vanilla Almond.”

  I grab a spoon and ease up on the counter next to Jesse. I pull off the lid, take a bite, and offer him the spoon.

  “Why are you really hiding in the kitchen?” I ask.

  Jesse takes a spoonful and then laughs. “I’m not hiding. I’m exhausted. I flew in from Afghanistan wanting only a hot shower and sleep, but Sandy dragged me here. I’ve been covering the aftereffects of the Soviet withdrawal.”

  I haven’t a clue what he’s talking about. “Sounds interesting,” I say, filling my mouth with ice cream.

  Jesse laughs. “No, it doesn’t. Most Americans don’t even know where Afghanistan is or what the hell the Russians did there.”

  My cheeks warm, their color betrays me. “I’m not political. My father, extreme ’60s radical. It’s made me not political, but I’m sure lots of people find your work interesting.”

  “Thanks for the encouragement.” Jesse laughs. “So, what are you then? A model?”

  I kick him with a leg. “No, a cellist.” I frown, shake my head, and take another bite. “Well, sort of, or maybe I should say, used to be. I’m kind of confused about that part of myself right now.”

  Those divine eyes lock on me. “So, tell me one thing about yourself that you are not confused about.”

  “That she already has a date for the evening.”

  The voice I hear is not the one in my head.

  I look up, startled, to find Alan in the kitchen doorway. He crosses the kitchen, planting his hands on either side of me, and gives me a kiss that would have embarrassed me if we’d been alone in the bedroom: wide open mouth, full tongue, hard, fast and sexual.

  I force my body not to respond and when he finally pulls back, his black eyes are burning and probing. “You’ve been back for two hours. Where have you been?”

  So, he does know when I got back. Why didn’t he look for me? And why is he angry with me?

  I shrug. “I called Jack. Had daiquiris in the bedroom with Linda. And I’ve opted to eat ice cream with my new friend, who wants to take me home with him.”

  Shit, what made me say that last part? Not smart, Chrissie. Not smart to say something that might set Alan off. Ian and Vince rise as vivid warnings in my head, and on top of that, it was a really shitty thing to do to Jesse.

  I shift my gaze to find Jesse watching uncomfortably from his perch beside me.

  Those black eyes burn into me. “I hope you said no.”

  “Nope, I said maybe. He thinks you’re a jerk for leaving me alone at a party.”

  I wait.

  Alan tosses a terse smile at Jesse. “Hi,” he says in a tight, clipped way. Jesse doesn’t bother to respond, he just sits there watching, and then I realize he’s trapped just like me, with Alan’s body between the counter and the door.

  “You’re pissed,” Alan accuses.

  I look away from him. “I’m not pissed.”

  He runs a hand through his hair in a jerky, irritated way. “I’m sorry about the party. Will you leave the kitchen with me now?”

  “No. I hate parties. I never go to parties. You didn’t even ask me if I wanted to go to a party tonight. I come back and pouf there’s two hundred people here.”

  “This has been on the calendar for weeks. I forgot about it,” he explains in heavy frustration. “This is work. Part of what I do. Everyone important is here, giving me the once-over, making sure I’m worth the investment. It’s part of the business. Seeing if I’m sound before they put up the money.”

  I lift a brow. “I understan
d the business. You don’t have to lecture me on that. I just don’t like parties, OK?”

  “Not even with me?” He gives me that smile with the slightly downturned corners of his lips; not happy, not sad, just in-between and endearing.

  My eyes round. “No. Especially not with you.”

  He nods and is a little more friendly when he looks at Jesse. “You’re right. I am a jerk. I’m lucky she stayed.”

  “Very lucky!” Jesse says in that affable way he has.

  That annoys Alan. “Very lucky,” he amends.

  Alan takes my spoon and scoops out a generous bite of ice cream. “So, how is Jack?”

  “I don’t want to talk about Jack.”

  “OK.” Alan takes another scoop. “Are you going to stay in the kitchen all night?”

  “No. At some point I’ll probably go to bed.”

  Alan frowns. “You are not going to bed. There are people out there you really should meet.”

  I ignore trying to figure out why he would say that. “There are too many people out there I already know,” I exclaim with heavy meaning.

  His jaw clenches. “Fuck, is that it? Ian was here, Chrissie. Half of New York knows by now we’re sleeping together. There is no way to keep it private. You are going to have to deal with it. Learn to deal with the bullshit.”

  My entire body burns deep red. I really hate this habit of Alan’s, of letting loose any thought in his head whether we’re alone or not. “God, you are an asshole sometimes.”

  Alan rolls his eyes. “So how do we fix this?”

  “I think you were right about not being able to change you. You are pretty much stuck being an asshole.”

  Alan laughs. “Maybe, but I am not spending my entire night going to the kitchen if I want to see you.”

  He lifts my chin, lightly brushing my cheeks with his thumbs and gazes down at me, his expression unfathomable. “Why don’t you marry me? We’ll get married tomorrow. Then it won’t matter what anyone writes, what anyone thinks, what Jack thinks, and we’ll both know exactly what the hell we’re doing.”

  I shove him away. “Very funny. God, you’re obnoxious tonight. Are you loaded?”

  He lifts the glass he carried in off the counter behind him and holds it beneath my nose. In surprise, I realize it’s only soda in the cocktail glass. He leans in to kiss me softly, and when he pulls back his eyes are shimmering.

  “Marry me, Chrissie,” he whispers.

  I let out an aggravated growl. “If I thought you were serious, my answer would be no. Since you’re not serious, my answer is: I should have warned you that Jesse is a reporter with the Los Angeles Times.”

  Jesse holds up a hand in a continental gesture. “Off the record tonight. I didn’t hear a thing and I’m a foreign correspondent. Our gossip columnist is the redhead out there with my brother.”

  As frustrating and awful as this has been, I start to laugh. My cute new friend is a dork, Alan is weird, and I am…oh golly, I don’t know if I want to try to put a label on myself right now.

  I smile up at Alan. “Will you go away? This is how I do parties. Will you just let me do what I do?”

  Alan brushes my lower lip with his thumb. Everything inside me shivers. “Come out to the party, Chrissie. Something terrible might happen. You might have fun.”

  I shake my head.

  “No?” He kisses my nose. “Do what you want to do, but I’ll miss you. Maybe you can leave the kitchen occasionally and pretend you’re not with me, so at least I can see you.”

  I give him a small, reluctant smile. “Maybe.”

  “That’ll have to do. Give us a kiss, love. I’ve got to get back. I’ve not completely charmed everyone yet.”

  He eases into me, and with the lightest touch presses his lips to mine. I melt into him on contact, dissolving into his warmth and wishing he’d take me in his arms.

  I watch Alan disappear through the door and I feel stupid for not having gone with him. I slap the lid on the Häagen-Dazs, grab the spoon, and slip from the counter.

  I put the carton back into the freezer.

  “He was serious, you know,” Jesse says quietly.

  I shut the door and turn. “Excuse me?”

  Jesse’s eyes bore into me gravely. “He was serious when he asked you to marry him, and you shot him down like it was a joke.”

  All my nerve endings tingle from my quickly rising embarrassment. “It was a joke. That’s just Alan. He’s theatrical and it’s the way he talks to me.”

  Jesse shakes his head and takes a sip of his beer.

  I give a small, frustrated laugh that makes my shoulders lift. “Really. You are completely wrong about this.”

  Jesse smiles. “Do you want some advice? Go out there and apologize to him. You did a really crummy thing a few minutes ago. Why are you in the kitchen with me?”

  The color on my face is no longer a pleasant feeling flush, but the burn of humiliation. I look up at him, ready to be defensive, but his expression stops me.

  “Do you want to go dance with me?” I ask. “Just kind of ease me into the party so I can go apologize.”

  Jesse’s eyes widen.

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea. You probably missed it, but the entire time in the kitchen he looked like he wanted to put a fist through my face.”

  “Please,” I urge. “That part about me not liking parties is true. But it’s worse than that. I do parties really badly. And even though you’re wrong, he wasn’t serious, I was pretty rotten to him.”

  He searches my face, then exhales heavily, and takes my hand.

  The great room is a smothering cluster of people, and I try to spot Alan as we make our way through the throng to the dance floor. Beyond the glass, I see that he’s returned to the terrace and he’s got quite a circle around him of the who’s who of music. Those black eyes touch on me, empty and fleeting, and I can tell by how he tosses down his drink that there is alcohol in the cocktail glass now.

  A slow song starts and I step into Jesse’s arms, silent, my hand a tense curl on his shoulder.

  We dance in silence for what seems like ages. “Are you OK?” Jesse asks me quietly.

  I look up at him and nod.

  He shakes his head. “Why don’t you go over there? Act like everything is normal. Guys hate conflict. He’ll act like everything is normal too.”

  I don’t go out onto the terrace. Instead, I curl into Jesse and continue to dance. The dance is almost over. Somehow Alan has moved without me seeing. He is standing beside me, staring down with only partially leashed anger. I can feel heavy stares from every direction in the room, the kind that warns that you’re in the midst of what will soon be a scene.

  Jesse steps back from me.

  “I can’t believe you fucking did that,” he says in a tight, clipped way. “It was a joke. A fucking joke. And you’ve reduced me to a fucking joke.”

  Oh shit, he is pissed. Why is he pissed?

  He regards me coolly for what seems like a century.

  “We might as well dance since we’ve been seen together,” he says, almost inflectionless.

  Alan fills the space between Jesse and me, and he drags me up against him. There is scorching anger in his body and he molds me so intimately against him that I can feel every detail of him through his clothing. His fingers are a never-ending run on my back, making every inch of my flesh grow hot. He fills his palms with me, softly kneading, then he strokes, erotic and slow, until the pattern of my heart is an uneasy, altering flow between arousal and fear.

  I try to ease back from him, enough to see his face, but his hands flatten on my back and hold me in place.

  “Let me go, Alan. I don’t like this,” I whisper, cautious and unsure, but my voice is thick, feverish.

  “It’s working very well for me, love,” he says softly, biting my shoulder instead of kissing it. “What part isn’t working for you? I’ll change it.”

  My breath quickens. “All of it. If you keep this up, they’re g
oing to start tossing room keys at us.”

  I pull back and have a vague awareness that he is letting me. I raise my eyes slowly to his face and wish I hadn’t. His eyes harden and some marginal parameter of my brain warns that I have fucked up big time here.

  My heart turns into a confused, frantic pulse as he grabs my arm, steering me through the crowded apartment, mindless of the sharply fixed stares that follow his rapid trek. He pulls me into the bedroom, slams the door, and releases me.

  “It was a joke, Chrissie,” he yells harshly clipping each word.

  He leans against the door, running a hand through his hair, his eyes cuttingly black.

  “If you don’t like my out of bedroom manner,” he starts up again through gritted teeth, “or my public manner or my work manner, deal with it. The world isn’t only about Chrissie! Fucking learn to deal with something for a change. But don’t playact with me and don’t you ever pretend I am nothing to you again. Are we clear? Do you understand?”

  I stare up at him. There is no point in trying to understand him, he is just too angry, but I really don’t know what nerve I struck in him and I really never expected to be on the receiving end of anger like this. Oh no, not like this, never like this.

  I cross my arms and stare at the floor. “Maybe.”

  “Then get the fuck out.”

  My face snaps up. I feel shaky inside. My heart stops. How did we get here, a near break-up moment, from this strange, disconnected, angry sort of night we’ve had? Is he breaking up with me and tossing me out in the middle of a party?

  I don’t know how to deal with this. I don’t know what to say. “Do you know where my things are? Someone put them away.” It’s the only thing I can think to say.

  “So, is that it? You want to leave?”

  God, why are we doing this? How did we get here?

  And before I know if this is it, if we’re over, my shorts are on the floor and I am propped against the wall, and we are having sex. Really, really rough sex, standing up with me pinned against the door. I wrap myself around him, eagerly meeting the violent thrusts of his body, the aggressive joining of his flesh.

  Each thrust against the wall is painful, and I am drowning in the consuming fire of his anger. It is stormy, but it subsides quickly with a ragged climax and the abrupt retreat of his flesh from mine.