Seven Books for Seven Lovers

by Molly Harper, Stephanie Haefner, Liora Blake, Gabra Zackman, Andrea Laurence, Colette Auclair

  I’m already a little too far gone and might not be able to stop. We’ve driven far enough that I start to see the neighbors’ houses along the side of the road. I know just a few more movements of my fingers and I’ll be writhing in the seat, coming apart at the seams. Suddenly, Trevor reaches over and grabs my hand.

  “Stop. I told you not to come.”

  “But I’m so close.”

  “I know. You think I can’t tell when you’re on the edge?” He pulls my hand out and draws it to his mouth, drawing my taste over his lips, then kissing the tips of my fingers. “I know every little tell of your body. The way your breath gets raspy, the way your lips part, the way you move your hips in tight little circles. I’ve memorized every single thing you do before you shatter into a million wet, screaming pieces when you come.”

  When I finally stop staring at him, comprehending the intimacy of his words, I realize we’re in the driveway. He shuts off the car and places my hand back in my lap, then gets out. I watch him walk in front of the car, where the headlights are still shining, as they do for a few minutes before they will shut off on their own.

  After he opens my door, I don’t know what to do. I’m stuck, disarmed his words and by how deeply we’re connected. More than the sex, more than the laughter, more even than saying that we love each other. Under all of those things, there is an entirely new measure of intimacy building between us.

  “Are you going to get out?”

  He’s looking at me from around the car door. I hear the headlights click and then see them shut off. Stepping out gingerly, I’m dazed and so aroused that my legs aren’t as stable as I wish they were. My dress is still tugged up too high, so I stop to pull it down.

  “Don’t bother.” He brushes my hands away and takes them in his to start toward the house. Before we make it to the door, he stops and pushes me to the wall along the walkway. Pressing against me, he pulls my arms above my head and pins them there with one of his hands, using the other to run his finger along the tops of my breasts.

  “I want you right here.”

  Looking directly at me, his eyes dart a little across mine, searching them for an answer. I nod my head and a thrilling panic runs through my body. Only a miniscule amount of hesitation enters my brain, but he can see it in my eyes.

  “No one can see,” he assures me.

  “I know.”

  Letting go of my hands, he pulls the top of my dress down so that my breasts spill out, and I watch him lower his head to suckle the skin at the top. Once he lays enough moist kisses across my breasts to make the outside air feel cold against the skin, he pushes his entire body against me and begins to kiss me frantically. Diving my hands down to unbutton his pants, I shove a little roughly until he fills my palm. I want to drop to my knees, but the way he has me pinned against the wall, I can’t find a sliver of room to move.

  Running his hands down my sides, he grabs one of my legs at the knee and jerks it up forcefully. When I hitch my knee against his hip, it falls into place so that I can wrap my leg around his waist. I drop my weight to the wall, leaning back and thinking he’ll move inside me now, until he takes an unexpected step back from my body. He holds my leg in place around his waist, but stops.

  “I don’t want you to go.” He shakes his head, resigned, and draws his hands over my breasts again. “The idea of being away from you, not waking up with you, not having you near me, I hate it.”

  “Don’t.” I grit my teeth so that my voice doesn’t crack. “We still have fifteen hours.”

  The pain leaves his face and he summons some kind of drive to replace the apprehensive sadness with a look of tethered control covering everything. With that, he draws his hand to tease between my legs for a few strokes and then bends his knees to slip inside me in one, almost rough, shove. The sudden fullness makes me lose my breath for a moment. Before I can even find it again, he starts to move, driving into me like a man possessed.

  I pull his head into me, grasping him against my neck so that all of him is as close to me as possible. Slowing his thrusts, his mouth is at my ear, his voice ragged and a little winded.

  “I can’t be away from you, I can’t get enough. God, you’re the fucking best I’ve ever had.”

  “I just told you, fifteen more hours together, so use me up until then.”

  My voice is husky, lower than I’ve ever heard it out of my mouth. All I want is him inside me and to feel us together. I pull my leg tighter against his waist and dive into an incensed kiss that I refuse to let him break from. When he starts to push in and out even harder, I keep the pressure of my leg against him so that with every move, he bounds against me, across my nipples and against my clit. I let all of it take me as I come apart, the way we feel together, the way it feels too awful to think that in the morning I have to leave him here and find my way home alone.

  When he cries out, I’m not sure if he’s coming or if something is paining him. Choked in a tone I’ve never heard from him before, the noise is higher pitched, and laced with tension instead of relief. He quiets and slumps against me, refusing to look at my face until I nudge him to meet my gaze. In his eyes, all I see is anguish. I hate it.

  When the alarm clock bleats out early the next morning, he’s gone from the bed. I’m lying quietly on the sheets, listening for him in the room or in the house somewhere. I desperately want to hear him tinkering with the stupid espresso machine, making it hiss and growl so that he will eventually saunter in and bring me a hot coffee in bed. Nothing.

  I want to hear him in the bathroom, brushing his teeth and spitting into the sink, so that he will emerge and crawl over me with minty breath against my neck. Nothing.

  I want to hear him in the shower, the sound of water falling over his beautiful body, cascading over his shoulders, down his back, over his ass and his legs. Nothing.

  Without question, he pulled away last night. He held his heart away from mine just enough that I wanted to weep as every orgasm washed over us. Even over the hours of holding each other, touching each other, forcing each other to cry out, each moment felt like it was shearing us apart instead of fusing us together.

  I trudge out of bed, slipping my body into the black silk robe I got yesterday, and pad down the wood floor to the kitchen. He’s been here, I can tell—an empty coffee mug sits on the counter, and half of a banana is next to it. After just a few weeks playing house, I know he’s almost physically incapable of putting anything in the dishwasher. I’ve rolled my eyes for the last three weeks at the habit he has of putting every dirty dish on the counter, maybe in the sink if I’m lucky. I also know that he ate half of the banana before he trotted down the stairs to surf, leaving the other half for me to eat on my cereal or to throw into a smoothie. A tiny gesture that makes my insides swell with angst looking at it today.

  I know that in a few minutes, he’ll come up the stairs from the beach, his wet suit unzipped to his waist, and lean his board against the house. As if on cue to the dialogue in my brain, I see him, running up the beach. When he hits the deck, he walks over to the small outdoor shower and rinses off the salt water, stripping off his wet suit.

  Him standing there under the water, his face into the spray, eyes clenched shut—just that scene makes me want to stay forever. If I don’t, something inside me says I might lose him. If I go back home, the home where I thought I belonged until the past few weeks, he will wonder where my heart is.

  Leaning against the kitchen counter, I lock eyes with him when he walks in. For the first time ever, he looks away from my gaze. Pausing for a moment, he pulls himself together and comes to me.

  “Hey.” He leans around me and grabs the coffee mug, setting it in the sink. Like that even helps at all.

  “Why did you leave so early? I wanted to wake up with you next to me.” I look down. “I needed that.”

  “I couldn’t sleep. I was awake at four, so I just got up.” Stepping away, he rests his body against the opposite counter and finally looks at me. “What ti
me do you want to leave for the airport?”

  I’ve never felt this from him, the icy shutout. Where did the man who said he couldn’t get enough of me go? It feels like he wants me out of here as quickly as possible. Maybe he finally got enough. Hit the wall on consuming me and now he’s over it.

  “I need to be there by noon.” He nods his head at me. There is nothing in his eyes. Just empty caverns devoid of the tenderness I need. The warmth I want more than ever. “Why are you being like this?”

  He pushes up from the counter and starts to walk away.

  “Because it hurts.”

  Even though he’s trying to get away, to walk down the hall away from me, I run ahead and shove into the doorway to the bedroom, bracing my arms against the doorjamb.

  “Just tell me how to make it better, Trevor.”

  His shoulders drop and I see his chest cavity fill with a large inhale. He holds it in for too long before exhaling.

  “Tell me when you’re coming back to me. I said I want us to be together and you’ve said nothing. Last night, it hit me when you kept saying we had fifteen more hours. Like this is it. You haven’t even said if you’ll be back.”

  “What? You want an exact date?”

  “Yes.”

  “I can’t give you that. I don’t know. I have a life in Crowell; what do you expect from me?”

  “You want to know the difference between us, Kate? I don’t have a life anymore without you. Not here, not in Crowell, not anywhere. If we aren’t together, it isn’t a life.”

  He pulls my arms down from the doorjamb and rests them against my body, wrapping his arms around me, laying one small kiss against my temple. Then he walks away and I hear the shower water start. Slumping to the floor, I rest my head in my hands and press my palms to my eye sockets.

  The shower door squeaks and the water changes cadence as it washes over him. Before I can think straight, I jump up and find my phone. Scrolling through, I count the days.

  In the bathroom, it’s full of steam and he’s standing under a stream of water so hot it must be painful. Holding my phone up to the glass, my calendar is open on the display. I’ve entered it there. “Back home to Trevor,” it says.

  “The twenty-ninth.”

  Trevor wipes his eyes and opens them. “Huh?”

  “The twenty-ninth. I’ll come back on the twenty-ninth. Today’s the second. That gives me enough time to tie up loose ends with Herm and figure out how to make my place suitable for being a vacation home. I’m sure we’ll need to tweak some things as we go along. But I can get the critical stuff handled by then.”

  He pulls his palm up to the shower glass and stares at me. A tired, relieved smile crosses his face, but it isn’t enough, because my eyes start to prick with tears.

  “You shouldn’t push me away, Trevor. This is hard for me, too. You aren’t the only one hurting here.” Before the tears start in earnest, he steps to the shower door and shoves it open, holding his hand out to me. When I step near enough, he takes the sash of my robe in his fingers and gives it a pull so that it falls open to my naked body.

  “I’m not trying to push you away, I’m trying to protect myself. Come in here with me. Get close so I can hold you.”

  When I step into the steam, the water stings against my skin. When he wraps his arms around my body and presses my head to his chest, it stings just the same.

  25

  Sitting in Herm’s office several days later, he’s looking at me with his little cheater glasses perched on the end of his nose and pushing out a labored breath. I’m stuck to the seat across from his desk, grasping the arms of the chair a bit too tightly. Finally, he pulls the bifocals off and lets them drop to his chest on the metal chain around his neck.

  “I knew this day was probably coming, but it’s still a surprise.”

  “I’m sorry.” My voice cracks and sounds too small in the room.

  “Why in the world would you apologize for falling in love, KitKat?” Slumping back into his chair, he smiles at me softly. “It will be so strange, not having a Mosely in this office. I don’t know what I’ll do.”

  “Maybe Lacey can come by and annoy you. But I’ll be back. We’re going to keep my house and Trevor wants to buy the Pearson place.” I roll my eyes and grin. “I told him not to get his hopes up, since Pearson may take one look at him and call the sheriff to have him removed from the property.”

  “How long do I have you for?”

  “Another couple of weeks.”

  “That boy better treat you right. He better know what a good thing he managed to get his hands on. James knew, that’s for sure, so this one better be clear on it or I’ll do what Duke always said. Remember?” Herm turns up one corner of his mouth in a grin. I nod and we say it together. “Take him out on a deserted country road and introduce him to my friend Ruger.”

  While I’m walking back to my office, my phone chimes.

  I didn’t think it was possible, but Dax may miss you more than I do. We’ve been fighting over your pillow.

  There’s a photo attached of Dax zonked out on the bed, his drooling mouth hanging open on my pillow. If I didn’t know who was waiting for me on the other side, it would make leaving my old life behind so much harder. This man, his heart, even his goofy dog, is enough to have it all make sense.

  Don’t tell him, but I miss you more. While he may be an excellent cuddler, you have a much stronger skill set in other areas.

  Hurry up and come back to me, Mosely. I’m lonely and those naughty nurses just aren’t the same.

  What a dirty boy. I consider sending him something sexy to ease the time away, but remind myself that those kinds of images inevitably end up where you don’t want them. I toss my phone onto the desk and admonish myself when I stare at it longingly. Just a few more weeks and we can do all sorts of things in person.

  Connor’s Deli is busy for a late Friday afternoon, but since it’s the only deli in town, if you want a sandwich for lunch this is it. I’ve been home for a week and want to get in all of the quintessential Crowell experiences that I can, taking nothing for granted about the little details of life in our town.

  I order a ham sandwich, lean against the wall, and wait. It isn’t a quick joint, the way fast-food places are, always taking at least twenty minutes—twice as long if the line gets stacked up. Barb and her husband, Dean, run the place with military precision, but it is just the two of them, so they only have so many hands between them. When Barb looks up and sees me, she waves the sandwich in the air, and I walk to the register, grabbing a bag of chips on the way. Barb rings up the total and looks at me in a funny way as I sift through my wallet, digging out small bills to pay.

  When I hand her the money, she hesitates. “I’m real sorry about what that magazine said about you. I can’t believe what they’ll print these days.”

  I look up at her quizzically. “Sorry?”

  “Reveal magazine? The story on you and that famous guy? All that stuff they said about you and James?”

  “I guess I haven’t seen it.” My heart drops down into my lungs and perches there like a weighted carcass.

  “Don’t bother, it’s just a bunch of lies anyway. I just wanted you to know that no one believes a word. We know what you’re really like.”

  “I’m sure. The good and the bad, right?” I stammer out the half joke and smile, trying to keep my face from going pasty white in panic.

  When I get out of the store, into the street, I suddenly feel like everyone is looking at me. When I stop by the post office, two people smile at me and nod before scurrying away. When I run by the grocery store to pick up some laundry detergent, the cashier actually says, “How are you?” in the tone I haven’t heard in years. The loaded question, the syrupy voices, all the pitiful sympathy. These were the reasons I rarely left the house after James died, because people always wanted to know how I was “doing.” It was insufferable. Something is making them do the same thing now.

  I try to ignore it, tell m
yself I’m being paranoid and that it can’t be all that bad. I stop myself from running to the nearest drugstore and picking up a copy of the magazine, insisting it doesn’t matter even as the feeling of dread in my stomach grows larger. But when Cale Johnson from the feed store corners me at Deaton’s Café to give me a hug, I know it must be a doozy. Cale does not hug. Cale was born to make gruff noises that sound like a brown bear rubbing against a pine tree and to shake hands so hard you think your finger bones will disintegrate. He does not hug, smile, or joke.

  I dial up my sister. She has to know, and why she hasn’t told me in the first place is suspect, now that I think about it.

  “It’s a gorgeous day at The Beauty Barn, this is Lacey.”

  “Lacey, what’s going on?”

  “Nothing, it’s really dead around here.”

  “Do you have the new issue of Reveal magazine?”

  “Why?”

  “I want to borrow it.”

  “Who told you?”

  “Not you, obviously. Thanks for having my back, by the way.”

  “Kate. I was trying to protect you.”

  “Whatever. I’m driving to Langston today to drop some of James’s clothes and stuff at Goodwill. Leave the magazine on my porch and I’ll look at it when I get back.”

  “It’s crap, Kate. You shouldn’t. It’s really, really bad.”

  The tone in her voice is nervous, and I know then that she has been trying to protect me. If it’s so bad it inspired sisterly shielding, then I probably need to see it.

  After I drop a truckload of things at Goodwill, things we won’t need if my Crowell place is our vacation house, I drive home leisurely. The air is starting to get chilly, but I drive with the window down, needing as many lungfuls of fresh air as I can get before the smog of LA invades my body and takes over. Whether it’s letting go of things at Goodwill or the inspiration of a new life with Trevor, I feel lighter than I have in years despite what I know will be waiting on my doorstep for me when I get home.