It Takes Two

by Jenny Holiday

  Something happened then. The fearsome litigator flinched. It surprised the hell out of him.

  And just like that, all the tension created by their argument disappeared like a battery losing its charge all at once.

  “Don’t listen to me.” She huffed a little sigh, and if he wasn’t mistaken, it was tinged with self-disgust. “I don’t know what I’m talking about. I’m just…”

  He waited a beat. She seemed to be struggling with some internal demon all of a sudden. In fact, she’d been kind of off all evening. Nothing overt, but just…not her usual bantery self. Quieter. More contemplative. But then prone to quick, sharp spikes of anger.

  He put his hand back on her arm. He probably shouldn’t have, given that she’d just shrugged off the same touch, but he couldn’t not. She was like a magnet.

  She looked down at his hand, and the fact that she didn’t do anything to try to dislodge it felt like a huge victory.

  “You’re just what?” he prompted.

  She raised her eyes to meet his and said, “I’m just jealous.” Gobsmacked, he sucked in a breath. Reflexively tightened his grip on her arm. “I’m afraid of losing Jane. I don’t have that many people left.”

  He was having trouble getting in step with the new direction this conversation had taken. Jesus Christ, if she did this in court, this kind of startling redirection, she was probably unstoppable.

  Except he was pretty sure this wasn’t a tactic. He could see the disquiet in her eyes. The vulnerability. This wasn’t a “startling redirection.” It was brutal honesty. His heart wrenched in protest. It didn’t want to see Wendy Lou Who hurting like this.

  “Wendy, sweetheart. Jane loves you. That’s never going to change.”

  “But it’s not going to be the same.”

  She was probably right. He had the utmost faith in his sister’s devotion to Wendy, but of course the addition of a husband was going to change the dynamics of their longstanding friendship. It was natural to be wary of it. And she was right about people leaving her. Not on purpose, of course, but her parents were dead and she’d been an only child. She was alone in a way that other people were not.

  He wanted to comfort her, but Wendy wasn’t the kind of woman who appreciated empty platitudes, so he said nothing, merely dipped his head in acknowledgement of the truth as she saw it.

  “Anyone with half a brain can see how happy Cameron makes her.” Wendy’s voice had gone scratchy. At the same time his heart ached for her, it was impossible not to be…affected by that voice. It was confusing. She was confusing.

  “Any problems I have with this wedding are on me,” she went on. “I don’t want Jane to know about them. Can we just forget what I said?”

  “Of course.” He slid his hand farther down her arm. He’d intended a sort of brisk, buoying rub before he let her go, but he got snagged at her wrist. Her pulse was beating out of control.

  It was like her erratic heartbeat was contagious, because it was getting harder to breathe. He sought out her throat with his gaze, suddenly compelled to study it for visible evidence of the pulse he was feeling.

  But something happened to his eyes. They slid over her graceful neck, and they kept going lower. She was wearing one of those dresses that managed to seem both casual and formal at the same time. A plain black wraparound style that closed like a robe, one side over the other, leaving exposed a long, thin triangle of bare skin. Wendy didn’t really have cleavage in the traditional sense. There was no deep V where breast met breast. There was, instead, a gentle sloping of flesh.

  It made him crazy.

  He wanted to put his mouth on that slope. To follow it to its peak.

  It was wildly inappropriate given how much she was hurting right now.

  And more to the point he didn’t do this—he didn’t do casual. And he certainly didn’t do casual with Wendy. There was no universe in which Noah Denning was going to be the “milk” Wendy Lou Who got for free.

  Goddamn. What was the matter with him?

  He closed his eyes a moment.

  Which was why he was taken utterly by surprise when she grabbed his T-shirt and pulled him toward her. Hard enough to startle his eyes open so he could catch the sight of her travel mug clattering to the ground and rolling into the trees. Hard enough that he stumbled forward.

  Not hard enough, his inner litigator forced himself to enter into the record, that anyone could reasonably say she “grabbed him and kissed him,” though that had clearly been her intent. She had grabbed him, yes, but for her to kiss him was physically impossible; the height differential between them was too great.

  So he had a choice, in that instant, as he teetered between shock and understanding.

  He chose to kiss her.

  Despite his previous angst over his attraction to her, it wasn’t a tough decision, ultimately. All he had to do was not stop himself. All he had to do was allow himself to keep moving forward in space.

  He let himself be pulled until she was flush against him. They didn’t match up—there was none of that romance novel stuff about them fitting together like their bodies were made for each other. Instead of her breasts being crushed against his chest, they were crushed against his upper belly. The point of her chin slotted into the soft spot just below his sternum.

  She’d gotten him as far as she could, and now it was his turn. So he bent over and, without ceremony, put his mouth on hers.

  For a moment, it was a civilized kiss, contained and only slightly investigative as his arms came around her.

  But just for a moment.

  Because when she let loose a little sigh and twined her arms around his neck, it lit off a string of fireworks inside him. He parted her lips with his tongue. When she started moving her head around, like she was trying to deepen the kiss but wasn’t quite succeeding, he grunted his displeasure. He wanted her to be still. So he took his hands from her waist and pressed his palms to her cheeks, tilted her head back a bit farther and feasted on her. Her restlessness quieted and for a moment, as their tongues tangled, it was enough. Pleasure radiated through him.

  But all too soon, she was on the move again, exerting pressure on his neck with her arms and bobbing up and down on her toes.

  “Stop moving,” he growled, tearing his mouth from hers only long enough to deliver his directive.

  She did not obey. No, that would be too easy. Wendy was a lot of things, but pliant wasn’t one of them. No, she just tightened her hold on his neck, gave a little hop and—

  Oh. Oh.

  Now that he understood what she’d been trying to do, he was all in. His arms understood before his brain did, moving to catch her under her bottom and bring her to him. In one fell swoop, she had corrected their height differential—or at least the lower body part of it—wrapping her legs around him so his cock was pressed right against her center.

  He took a step, looking over her shoulder for a hard surface he could use to brace them. There was nothing. They were surrounded by trees, but they were bullshit, miniature New York City trees, so he couldn’t even back her up against one of them.

  Well, fuck, he didn’t care. He’d just stand there forever holding her, letting her grind herself on him. So he planted his feet and without even consciously meaning to, gave a little thrust.

  She gasped and let her head fall back, which provided him with an extreme close-up of the slope of breast he’d been admiring before. He was just about to lower his mouth to the gentle gradient when a loud throat-clearing noise penetrated his consciousness.

  “Dudes, maybe get a room?”

  “Shit.” Wendy peeled her legs off him so fast he almost fell over from the sudden disequilibrium.

  Right. They were in a public park. It was late, but it was the middle of the summer and they were in New York City, where a person was never alone. He had anchored his feet for their epic make-out session right in the center of the path, effectively blocking anyone from getting past.

  Wendy slid down his body and buried
her face in his chest, presumably embarrassed.

  “Sorry,” he mumbled to the passersby as he steered Wendy to one side of the path and used his body to shield her from view.

  Wendy. Wendy Lou Who. Jane’s best friend. The girl he’d taken under his protection and watched grow up.

  The woman who lived in another country. The woman who was taking off on a trip around the world.

  As if any of that mattered anyway, because she was also, as she’d told him mere hours ago, uninterested in making time in her life for love.

  Not that this was love.

  God, no.

  This was…Wendy.

  Fucking hell.

  They remained still for a moment. He didn’t know how to disengage. How to be in this new world they had created. This was why he didn’t really do casual hookups. There was no way to escape this horrible, oppressive awkwardness. The panicky feeling that chaos was about to descend. That he’d let himself get so out of control that he’d acted against his own interests.

  They were back in that same position they’d started in, with their bodies flush against each other, except the heat had gone, the interruption having functioned as a metaphorical cold shower. Her chin was back resting on that tender spot below his sternum, but this time, there was something slightly menacing about the proximity. If she wanted to, she could retract her head and slam her chin into that spot, knock the breath right out of him, and leave him gasping in pain, defenseless.

  But he should say something. About the kiss. About what she’d revealed before the kiss about her wedding-related fears. He couldn’t just…not acknowledge these things.

  While he was trying to get his brain and his mouth to cooperate, she stepped back. Paused. Then took another step. Looked around. Her gaze landed on his fallen mug. She kept looking, as if she was trying to locate her own, but it was nowhere in sight. So she walked over to his, took the top off, tilted her head back, and chugged. He watched her throat undulate. When she was done, she used the back of her hand to wipe her mouth.

  “Okay, Noah, listen.”

  “Wendy, I—”

  “I know you’re freaking out—”

  “I’m not freaking out,” he said reflexively. But he totally was.

  “Okay.” She held up a palm. “Whatever. The point is, we’re done with…” She waved her hand back and forth between them. “This.” Then she raised her eyebrows as if she were daring him to contradict her. “Correct?”

  “Yes,” he said quickly, glad for the reprieve. They were most definitely done making out. But he should still acknowledge what she’d said earlier, about Jane, right? Reassure her?

  Except she didn’t seem to need it. She was back to her usual unsinkable self.

  “This”—she kept doing the waving thing—“was a mistake. This was some kind of bizarre New York vacation aberration thing.” She narrowed her eyes. “What happens in New York stays in New York, right?”

  He was coming back to himself, too, as the forces of chaos receded. On the one hand, it felt wrong to just pretend the whole thing had never happened, but on the other, shouldn’t he just follow her lead?

  Some sort of bizarre New York vacation aberration thing.

  And he was glad to be off the hook. He was. He just needed his body to catch up with that fact. “Yes. Absolutely. I don’t…” He mimicked her motion from earlier, waving his hand back and forth between them. “I don’t do this.”

  Her brow furrowed. “You don’t do what?”

  “I don’t, uh, get the milk for free, generally speaking.”

  Wait. That had come out wrong—all slut-shamey. He had no moral objection to casual sex, it just wasn’t his deal. It introduced too many unknown variables. Required him to cede more control than he was comfortable with.

  He expected her to get defensive. To yell at him. He would deserve it—after all, he’d lost his mind as much as she had just then.

  But she merely shot him a quizzical look. “Why not? Was Bennett right, back at the bar, when he said you’re too much of a control freak to sleep around?”

  How to explain without making himself seem like an uptight prude? But then, she’d revealed something about herself just now when she’d confessed her fears about Jane’s marriage. Maybe he could do the same. “I suppose he was. I just would rather…know what I’m getting into. Have some control over how things are going to unfold. I find that’s harder to do when you’ve just met a person. When you don’t yet know if you can trust her.”

  She nodded, like that accorded with her image of him.

  Then she spun on her heel and started speed walking away. “Keep up, old man.”

  Chapter Eight

  How is Josh?

  Wendy eyed the text from Noah as the opening swells of “All I Ask of You” caused everyone in Madison Square Garden—except her—to shriek in ecstasy.

  She almost didn’t answer. Not answering would be the smart course of action. Because when you literally threw yourself at the only man you’d ever allowed to hurt you, what kind of sense did it make to follow that up with some casual texting?

  Why don’t you ask your sister?

  I did. She’s ignoring me.

  Wendy sighed and looked around.

  It kind of looks like Beatlemania 1964 around here, except instead of musical geniuses, everyone’s freaking out over a puffy-headed man-child (who, okay, has a surprisingly rich baritone) doing Phantom of the Opera songs.

  She watched the little bubbles that indicated that Noah was typing. Then they stopped. She ordered herself to put her phone away.

  But then the bubbles came back.

  Then they went away again for a full thirty seconds.

  She threw her head back in frustration. “Arg!”

  Jane shot her a questioning glance, and when Wendy mouthed, “Sorry,” the glance turned censuring. God forbid she should interrupt all the emoting going on, both onstage and in the audience.

  She heaved a sigh that turned into a yawn. Damn, was she exhausted. She and Jane and Noah had spent the day tromping around the city—they’d gone all the way downtown for brunch, then taken a ferry to Greenpoint and shopped and caffeinated their way through Brooklyn. It hadn’t been all the walking that had tired her out, though. No, it was the enervating, on-edge feeling proximity to Noah inspired. The supreme weirdness of having him touch her in normal ways, like to steady her as she stepped onto the boat. The infuriating fact that even that kind of casual touch—he did the same steadying thing for his sister, for God’s sake—sent her pulse revving like the boat’s engine beneath their feet.

  There had been no reason for it. He’d acted totally normal all day. In fact, he’d acted totally normal the night before, on the long cab ride home from the High Line, talking baseball—talking about the stupid Yankees—with the driver and then placidly bidding her good night as he made up the sofa for himself.

  All day, she’d wanted to shout at him: “Dude, we made out yesterday!”

  But why? She was the one who’d insisted they not talk about it. All he was doing was heeding her directive. Clearly, it wasn’t eating him up inside—it wasn’t even nibbling at him—so she would be well served to take a cue from him and get the hell over it. Yes, she’d dry-humped her high school crush in public yesterday, but that was yesterday. Today: moving on.

  Her phone buzzed in her hand, and she jumped a little.

  LOL.

  What? It took him five minutes to type LOL? And LOL? From Noah? The control-freak Manhattan prosecutor?

  But then there was more.

  I’m lying in my bed (don’t worry, I’m on top of the duvet so I won’t get any cooties on it) watching the Yankees game, so guess who is having more fun?

  P.S. They’re playing the Blue Jays.

  She groaned audibly. Well, it would have been audible if not for Josh proclaiming that he can’t regret what he did for love (you lucky bastard, Josh). She would much rather be watching baseball than the concert.

  And
that’s exactly what she needed, Noah rolling around in the bed she had to sleep in tonight, pollinating it with even more of that spicy pine scent of his. Noah’s only TV was a small one on the dresser in his bedroom, so she couldn’t credibly object to him being there, but damn. She was pretty sure a part of her current exhaustion was attributable to the fact that she’d tossed and turned most of last night, going over and over their evening. She had taken comfort in the fact that by morning, the pine had receded. But now he was in there tainting it all over again like a dog marking its territory.

  Why does your bed smell like pine?

  Huh?

  Of course, what she was really asking him was why he smelled like pine, but she wasn’t about to admit that.

  Christmas trees. Your bed smells like Christmas trees.

  Christmas trees mixed with sexy man, but she didn’t say that part.

  I think my aftershave is kind of piney.

  You *think*?

  Well, it comes in a bottle shaped like a pine tree, so that’s probably it.

  She snorted. Oh my God, he was so adorably clueless. Another text arrived.

  My sister gave me some aftershave when I was sixteen. She said it was a good generic man smell, so I just kept buying the same stuff. I never really thought about it.

  Wendy glanced at Jane, who was belting out the words to some endless song. Something about kissing the day good-bye (if only, Josh) as Noah kept texting.

  It’s eleven dollars at the drugstore. I should probably graduate to something else.

  No! Wendy felt the objection like a visceral thing, a creature inside her getting to its feet and preparing for battle.

  Eh, it’s fine.

  Anyway, I’ll change the sheets before you get home.

  No! The objection-creature took off running, weapons brandished.

  Nah, don’t bother. Total waste of water. Anyway, I like pine.