Bare Pleasures

by Lindsay Evans

  Lex couldn’t let her think that. “Please, don’t—” He reached out, but she jerked away from him.

  “I don’t want any more lies.” Then she turned and walked away from his doorstep, heading down the drive. Through the thunder of his swiftly pounding heart, Lex noticed the grimy bottoms of her feet, the empty driveway.

  “Did you walk here?”

  But she just kept walking, back straight, shoes swinging viciously in her tight grip. It was too late for her to be walking alone.

  “Let me take you home,” he said to her back. “It’s not safe.”

  She swung to face him and snarled, the illusion of calm gone. Fresh tears lined the hollows of her eyes. “The idea of being trapped in a car with you makes me sick.”

  Her words kicked him in the stomach, and it was only his tight grip on the edges of the door frame that kept him from running after her, begging her forgiveness, offering an explanation. But what explanation was there other than that he’d messed up?

  “Let me...let me at least call you a taxi.” He squeezed the words past his tight throat. “I’ll pay the fare.”

  But she kept walking, and Lex watched her and the future he’d wanted with her disappear around the bend in his driveway while every sense told him to stop her any way he could. Not just because of the things he wanted very, very badly, but because it just wasn’t safe.

  What if something happened to her out there alone?

  Worse than what you’ve done? an inner voice taunted.

  Lex bit off a curse. In the kitchen, he quickly grabbed his keys and phone, shoved his feet into flip-flops by the door and chased after Noelle. Hurrying down the brightly lit drive, he used his phone to request an Uber pickup, glancing between the phone and his path to make sure he didn’t bump into anything. It wasn’t long before he got close enough to see her dark dress and hair, illuminated under streetlights and moving steadily away from him.

  The street was empty, most cars long asleep in his quiet corner of suburbia. Noelle walked in the right direction toward her house, but, at this rate, she wouldn’t get there until sunrise. Lex silently followed.

  Minutes later, a silver Prius pulled up behind him the same time his phone rang.

  “Hey, is this you walking up Miami Place?” A feminine voice, alert and cheerful for so late at night, chirped through the phone.

  “Yeah, but the ride is not for me.”

  The glow of a cell phone in the Prius showed the driver, a youngish woman with short hair, peering through the windshield at him. Lex walked the short distance to the car, still talking with her on the phone. The woman eyed him with suspicion and it somehow made him feel better to see a Taser sitting in her passenger seat, her hand not very far from it.

  Standing a few feet away from the car to make sure the woman felt safe, he gestured toward Noelle and hung up his phone. “Pick her up and take her to the address I gave or wherever she wants to go.” He slipped the driver a few bills and took a quick photo of her just to be safe. Up ahead, Noelle looked over her shoulder at them but kept walking.

  “I can do that.” The driver put the money in her pocket, nodded and then eased the car toward Noelle.

  Lex clenched his fists in his pockets and held his breath, hoping she wouldn’t refuse the ride. But after a quick discussion he couldn’t hear, Noelle got into the car. The Prius slowly drove away, leaving him with all his good intentions crumbled to dust in his clenched fists.

  Lex released a breath through parted lips and turned to walk back home. With the taillights of the Prius only an afterimage and Noelle relatively safe, he couldn’t stop thinking of other things. Like the chances he’d been given time and time again to make things right with Noelle. His wildness as a youth that had ultimately led him to this place.

  When she’d left him at the pizza parlor, he had been in shock at how suddenly their paradise had withered. Just the night before, she’d bucked like a wild thing beneath him, clawing his back for release while desperate, needful noises vibrated in her throat. He had wanted to explain, to confess. But in the aftermath of his revealed past, he had felt the gates crash down between them.

  In the morning, Lex had promised himself, he would tell her everything.

  Now he would never get the chance.

  Lex pulled out his phone and dialed a number he wished he’d never used. Margot picked up on the first ring. He had to swallow past the lump in his throat before he could talk. “Did you talk to Noelle?” he asked.

  “Yes!” Margot sounded frantic, and that alone tightened the feeling of dread in his stomach. “She left my place hours ago. Did she call you? I’ve been driving around all night looking for her.”

  “Relax,” Lex said, although he was one to talk. It felt like his pulse was about to punch its way through his neck. He wanted to chase after Noelle, beg her forgiveness, sit outside her house until she came outside and talked to him. “She came to see me at home.”

  “Thank God! Wait—she walked all that way?”

  “Seems like it. I called for a car to take her home.”

  The silence on the other end of the phone was worse than Margot cursing. Then she said, “You were right. What I asked you to do wasn’t...wasn’t well thought-out. I should’ve stopped this long before it got to this point.” The sound of unshed tears threaded through her voice. “She ran out of here two hours ago without her purse. Her car is still downstairs. She doesn’t even have the keys to her house. I... I have to go...go let her into the house.”

  “She might not want to see you,” Lex said, though part of him knew Noelle would more easily forgive Margot than him. Margot was family, while he was...nobody. Just another man who’d lied to her.

  “Well, sometimes we don’t always get what we want.” Margot’s voice grew firm. “I’ll talk with you later.” Then she hung up.

  * * *

  For once, Lex tried to be patient. He waited an entire week before doing what he had wanted to do the moment the silver Prius disappeared with her in the backseat. His mother said patience was never his strong suit, but he willing to try it on for Noelle. She was right though—after a week of waiting he realized again what he had always known. Patience wasn’t for him. A big part of strategy, he thought as he parked his car near Noelle’s house late Tuesday night while she was at her dance class, was knowing when waiting was a losing game.

  He walked the rest of the way to her front gate, mentally rehearsing what he would say. Wearing all black, Lex paced the length of her front yard and then the back, periodically checking his watch. This was about time for Noelle to have drinks with Malia and Ruby after their dance class. That gave him about a half hour to go over what he would tell Noelle to convince her not to throw him off her property. Lex closed the backyard gate, preparing himself to wait on the front porch when he heard the sound of cars pulling into the driveway. He froze.

  Damn.

  A tall, flowering bush mostly hid him from view, but it was only a matter of time before someone noticed him. He took a breath and walked fully into sight. Noelle stepped out of her car first, gym bag over her shoulder and talking with Malia who climbed from the passenger side of the little Honda. “It’s just cheaper,” she was saying as Ruby came out of her own car. Ruby noticed him first, surprise registering on her face and then anger. “I can make drinks here and—” Noelle stopped when she noticed her friend gawking past her. She turned. Her hiss of surprise, the crack of pain across her face jerked Lex’s spine upright.

  He was very aware of how it looked. A liar dressed all in black, looking ready to do some more damage to the woman he’d deceived for the better part of three months. Acting on the nonchalance he did not feel, he shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans and faced Noelle head-on.

  “I didn’t expect you back so soon,” he said.

  “Are you serious right now?
” Ruby pushed past Noelle to confront him, pulling out her cell phone at the same time. Lex winced as she took a photo of him. “Trespassing is a crime,” she hissed. “I’m damn sure she didn’t give you permission to come here.”

  “You have a big set of brass ones on you,” Malia said. She hid Noelle behind her, a protective mother hen of the type Margot never was, while Noelle stared at him like she was seeing a ghost.

  Her mouth opened and then closed a few times before she spoke. “Get out of here!” she all but shouted, the sound of her voice like an open wound.

  Lex didn’t think he could feel any worse, but he was wrong. “I just want to talk with you for a few minutes,” he told her softly, hating himself.

  “That’s why you’re in my yard uninvited? To tell me more lies?” Even though she was taller, Noelle huddled behind Malia, looking small and defenseless.

  “I’m calling the cops.” Ruby practically spat the words in his face.

  Lex turned to Ruby, who was already furiously pressing buttons on her phone. “Don’t do that.” Noelle’s pain, naked on her face, throbbed so deeply that he felt it like it was his own. “Please,” he said to her. “Just listen. No more half-truths.”

  “Give me one damn reason why I shouldn’t call!” Ruby waved her phone in his face, looking mad enough to actually call the cops and then hit him in the face with it once she was done.

  But Lex kept his attention focused on Noelle. She was the one he needed to see more than anyone else. As he looked at her now, her face seemed drawn and worried, but for those few moments while she’d stood talking with her friends in the sun and before they saw him, she had actually looked if not happy, then at least okay. Like she wasn’t going to break apart. As he was in danger of doing.

  “What I did for Margot was stupid. But the things I said and did with you weren’t lies.” Lex held the next words in his mouth for a moment and then carefully released them. “I want you in my life for real, Noelle. If you’ll have me.”

  “That’s not a good enough reason,” Ruby said, her fingers still on her phone.

  “Girls, girls...” Noelle sounded tired. Done. “It’s okay. I—” She gripped the strap of her gym bag tightly enough to show flexing bones and tendons just under the skin. “Lex, go get up under Margot, not me. You’ve done enough here. Please, just leave.” Noelle moved toward the front door. She was walking away from him again.

  “I love you.”

  All oxygen felt like it was suddenly sucked from the air. The three women stared at Lex while he squirmed, wishing he could take back his hastily spoken truth. Finally, Ruby was the one who spoke.

  “This is the route you’re going?” She jammed her phone into the pocket of her purse. “This woman trusted you with her healing self and with her body, but you still decided to trick and bamboozle her? Now you think you can fix everything with some cheesy rom-com declaration? Boy, get the hell outta here.”

  But Noelle stood frozen near the door leading to the sanctuary of her home. “How can that be true after what you’ve done?” she asked.

  “I should’ve told you about my agreement with Margot long before this.”

  “How about you shouldn’t have agreed to do that crap at all?” Ruby’s gaze was pure anger. Lex had a strong feeling it was only Noelle’s wounded expression that kept her from calling the police. But her wounds were his too. He’d done this thing to both of them and was ready to make it up to her any way he could.

  “Noelle, can we just talk?” he asked, pitching his voice low to reveal some of the agony he felt. He hadn’t been sleeping. His work suffered. Even Adisa was worried about him. “Please?”

  Just steps away from her front door and escape from him, Noelle curled her hands around herself, rubbed her shoulders like she was cold. But there was something other than dismissal in her eyes. “You aren’t too proud to beg?”

  Lex nearly sagged with relief. “That wouldn’t be my choice of words just now, but the sentiment is the same.” If she was open enough to joke with him, then maybe he had a sliver of a chance.

  “I can already see where this is going.” Malia looked from Noelle to Lex and shook her head. “Ruby, we’re about to be SOL with those margaritas.”

  Ruby clicked her tongue in disapproval the same moment Noelle stepped toward Lex. “Girls, can you give us a little time alone, please?”

  “I want to go on record as saying this is not a good idea,” Malia said.

  Noelle bit her lip. “I know...but please understand.”

  Lex didn’t know how the two women resisted that look of hers. Eyes wide, mouth vaguely trembling. Arms around herself like she needed protection and he was the only one who could provide it for her.

  “All right, honey. If that’s what you want.” Ruby gave Noelle a quick hug and whispered something in her ear.

  Malia glared at Lex with a viciousness he knew was meant to frighten, but it only made him glad Noelle had such loyal and protective friends. She put her hands on Noelle’s shoulders. “Ruby and I will be at the gas station down the street. If you need us, just call. Okay?”

  Noelle hugged her friends and thanked them, her voice a soft apology for breaking the plans they’d made.

  “Get it together, Private Dancer,” Ruby muttered to Lex as she passed him. “I was rooting for you. Don’t mess up again and make me look like Boo Boo the Fool.”

  The two women climbed into Ruby’s car and, after waiting a longer time than Lex thought was necessary, they drove off. Then he and Noelle were alone.

  With a slow hiss, Lex released the breath he’d been holding. “Thanks for not kicking me out,” he said.

  “Yet.”

  “Yet.” Lex nodded and wet his lips, watched her warily, just as she watched him.

  After a thoughtful pause, Noelle opened the front door and invited him in with a brusque wave. “Say what you have to, Lex. I need to shower.”

  He brushed close to her as he stepped into the house.

  “You already showered,” he said. He could smell her, the orange-blossom sweetness of the Caress soap she used mingled with after-bath shea butter and her own natural perfume. He remembered too well the entwined scents where they lay intimately against her skin, in the crook of her elbow, the back of her neck, between her thighs.

  Noelle dipped her head, a subtle flush rising in her cheeks as if she knew where his mind had gone, as if her own mind roamed the same path. She dropped her gym bag by the front door and then backed away to perch at the entrance to the hallway leading to her bedroom and that shower she didn’t need.

  Lex took a mental step back. If he lingered any more on what she smelled like, their discussion would be over before it properly started. He cleared his throat. “I never faked what I feel for you.”

  He allowed the present tense to seep into her, into him. This was damn near the first time he fully admitted it to himself. The more-than-lust he felt for Noelle. Wanting her was effortless. What surprised him were the ropes of affection that began tying him to her not long after their first day together. Feelings that had nothing to do with a booty call and everything to do with a woman he could see in his life for a very long time.

  “I don’t want to believe that,” Noelle said. “Not after everything.” She hovered near the hallway still, uncommitted. Her body was in the room with him but ready to flee if he said the wrong thing. “You made me think you and I wanted the same things. You built such an ache in me that I couldn’t feel the breeze on my skin without wanting to touch you. You made me think you were for me.” She confronted him with her eyes and the naked pain in them.

  For me.

  Those were the words that caught him and held him brutally accountable. Nothing would change the fact that he’d allowed himself to be used as a puppet and a weapon against her. Even if the intent hadn’t been malicious. Once,
she’d thought he was the only thing in her life that her sister hadn’t deliberately manipulated into it. Once. Now, only complete truth gave him any chance of rescuing his future with her.

  “When I saw you that night at the gallery, I wanted you.”

  Noelle blinked and swung her gaze to him, his new tack unexpected to them both. But since it felt right, Lex continued on.

  “The celibacy thing was new to me. And when I saw you, not five seconds after I had told my brother I’d sworn off sex for a while, I wanted to kiss you.

  “I wanted to follow you around the room and give you my number, convince you to come home with me and let me worship your body all night. But I said the stupid thing about being celibate and my brother was right there.” He drew a deep breath and brought himself back from the past. “I was yours then, and I’m yours now.”

  The room’s silence felt heavy after his confession died away, and Lex felt his stomach drop. Had he said the wrong thing? But the air near him shifted and Noelle moved past him to sit on the couch with her hands clasped in her lap. He took the armchair across from her.

  With her head bowed, she nibbled the corner of her lip for long moments before meeting his eyes. “I’m telling you this for the last time,” she said. “I don’t like games.”

  A breath of relief left his lips with a huff. “I know.”

  “I couldn’t take it if you—”

  “I know. I won’t.”

  Noelle nodded. “Okay then.”

  And Lex felt for the first time that miracles actually existed. Like wings had sprung from somewhere and saved him from his own foolhardy step off a high cliff. He felt breathless. Dizzy with happiness. Even though fifteen feet of space separated him from Noelle, they were finally together in the way they were meant to be. A grin split his face wide and made him feel like a clown. He sang the opening bars of “Up Where We Belong” in a falsetto that was nothing like Jennifer Warnes’s voice. A pillow flew across the room and hit him in the face.