by Lark O'Neal
It’s funny how a whole city can change like that from an earthquake or a flood or economic problems. Think about Detroit. Sometimes I want to go there and see what it looks like with all those empty buildings. The pictures are amazing.
Gotta go, sweet Kiwi. Love to hear more travelogues. Do you know where else you’re filming? Guessing it’s not all Queenstown. Maybe Milford Sound? That’s a big one, but it takes forever to get there.
I’m thinking of you tons, Jess. Glad you’re enjoying everything so much.
Xoxox
Tyler
I can’t lie—the photo sends a jolt right through my chest, even with Kaleb sitting practically on my feet. Tyler’s eyes are haunted and beautiful, and the goatee is very hot. He looks sunburned and happy. What’s he up to?
As I’m sitting there, the iPad dings. It’s so unexpected that I jump nearly a foot. It’s Tyler.
Jess, I’m up. Can you Skype?
I glance over at Kaleb, who’s listening to his headphones as if I’m not there, and it feels strange but fair to talk to them both at the same time. Like maybe everybody is on the same page that way.
Or maybe I’m just reckless because I’ve had plenty of beer.
Yes! Let’s try it! We’re at a lodge (fancy pants) and the internet is good. Two seconds.
I bring up the Skype app and dial his number. It rings a few times, and I worry that wherever he is it won’t work. Then he’s there, sitting in some nondescript place with light cascading over his face in a way that catches all the hard angles and the sharpness of his nose.
“Hi!” I cry.
“Hey.” His voice is soft. “It’s so good to see your face.”
“Tyler, I love the goatee!” I say, and lean in without thinking to kiss the camera. I run my fingers over the screen and see that he has a pretty significant black eye. Not fighting? “What’d you do to your eye?”
He touches it self-consciously. “Kinda bad this morning, right? Training mishap,” and for some reason I think he’s telling a lie. Maybe he was fighting again. The thought gives me a pinch of worry and disappointment in my chest. He adds, “Mountain biking.”
“It looks like it hurt.”
He shrugs. “Did I ever tell you about the time I fell off my mountain bike and looked up to see a cougar staring down at me from a rock?”
“Really?” I lean in, thinking he’s trying to distract me, but I’m intrigued anyway. Intrigued by his face, by the memories flooding into me now that my guard is down. I’m engulfed in a swirl of images, all me and Tyler—his bedroom green-lit from the trees all around it, the way he kissed me, his haunted face as he sketched me, over and over and over, tearing the paper away and throwing it on the floor. Leaning forward into the intensity of his clear eyes now, I imagine him lying on the ground, staring up at a mountain lion. “Were you scared?”
“He was beautiful, Jess. These amazing eyes and paws and—”
Over my shoulder, Darcy suddenly appears, and bends into the camera, waving. “Hi, Tyler,” she says, and I lean sideways to let her have access. “I’m Darcy. We’ve heard all about you.” She peers at him. “You’re hot!”
“Thanks.” He chuckles. “Nice to meet you.”
I take over the computer. “Don’t mind Darce. We’ve been out drinking. It’s practically a blizzard here and we can’t do the shots we were supposed to, so we have a day off tomorrow.” I widen my eyes and can see in the little selfie in the corner that they’re bloodshot. “I’m gonna sleep all day tomorrow, I swear.”
“Poor baby,” he says, smiling. “I have a day like that here, too. Rest day. I’m going to just read. I was thinking about getting some art supplies, but I’m not sure I can find any.”
“Where are you, Mr. Mysterious? Are you still not going to tell me? I’m so curious!”
“Not yet,” he says, but I feel some hesitation. “It was court-ordered. That’s hint number 3.”
“Hmmm. The hints don’t add up, you know.”
“That’s the point.”
I shift, leaning back on the long leather couch. Behind me, the party is continuing, somebody making up shots with vodka and whatever they can find in the fridge.
Tyler frowns over my shoulder. “What’s going on? Doesn’t the Internet work in your room?”
“It’s not private there, either,” I say with a sigh. “We’re a pack. That’s what we do, move in a group like a school of fish.”
“Pod of dolphins,” Kaleb says, loudly.
“That’s Kaleb,” I say, and click the icon so the front camera focuses on him.
He raises his chin, calm. “Hey, mate.”
“Hey, Kaleb.”
I give Kaleb a narrow-eyed look and click the camera to face me again. For a moment Tyler and I just look at each other, then I say, “Queenstown is my favorite so far. It’s so beautiful in the snow. The lake is amazing, right?”
“It is. Did you run into a lot of Aussies?”
I frown a little. “I might not pick up the differences yet?”
“Ah, of course.”
“Tell me something about you, Tyler. Anything.” I touch the screen, wishing I could be somewhere private, that somehow things had not gone so wrong that I would be ten thousand miles away, wondering if our relationship can survive.
Kaleb finally gets up and walks away. I don’t watch him leave.
“Um…” Tyler says, tapping a pen on his leg in that restless way he has. “Ok. I ran into some old friends and had some beers last night. Riders.”
“That’s snowboarders, right?”
He grins. “Yeah. Bunch of guys were in town, on their way to Wanaka to train, actually.”
“Yeah, somebody said there are a bunch of people here training.” I frown. “So did you train for the 2010 Olympics, or just the 2006?”
The pen tapping goes a little faster. “Both. Shattered my hip before 2006. I was out a solid year and a half, but I was training for the 2010 when I got in trouble.”
“That’s when you went to jail?”
He ducks his head. “Not my best moment.”
“Things would have made a lot more sense if you’d told me about all that, you know.”
“Uh, could we not talk about this with an audience?”
“Kaleb left.” I look around. “They’re all partying.” I flip the camera again and pan around the room. “This is about as alone as I can get unless I go into a closet or something.”
“So…?”
“No. I’ll just sit right here. What did you do today?”
“Just got up, actually. I’m having a quiet day, like I said. It’s Sunday. Kick back, read, let my body have a day off. I plan to enjoy every minute, and you do the same tomorrow, okay?”
I nod, and a yawn suddenly overtakes me. “I’m not getting out of bed until noon.”
“Whoa!”
I smile. I’m usually an early riser, so sleeping until noon is radical. “I’m so glad to see you, Tyler.” My eyes are grainy and I’m honestly half asleep just sitting here. “I’m falling asleep, ‘kay?”
“Okay.” He puts his hand over his heart and I do the same. “Bye.”
He blows me a kiss. “Bye.”
I click off the app and fall back against the couch, closing my eyes.
Where is the line between truth and privacy? Where is my line?
Chapter SIXTEEN
When I wake up, my mouth is dead dry and I have a headache right across the top of my eyebrows. For a long moment I look up at the ceiling far above me, heavy wooden rafters and slats going to a cathedral point, and I can’t get my bearings. Which town are we in? And where am I?
Then it comes back to me. Queenstown. The lodge. The light is muted, and I turn my head, realizing I’m still on the couch in the great room. Someone covered me with a warm blanket and pulled off my shoes, and my iPad is on the coffee table. In a way, it’s a relief. I don’t have to look at Kaleb in another bed in the same room with me and try to de
cide what’s going on.
Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, snow is falling in thick flakes. The room is cluttered with the party debris of the night before—bottles and glasses and games that have been haphazardly put away, shoes and coats and trays of dead food. I move past it all to the kitchen and fill the kettle. I’m thinking I’ll just use the toilet on this level, but my teeth are disgusting and I have to brush them. I’ll have to risk it. As quietly as possible, I slip into the room. Kaleb is asleep by himself, sprawled across the double bed, flat on his back, shirtless, his hand on his chest. Trying to avoid the luscious sight of all that bare, buttery skin against the white sheets, I close the bathroom door without a sound and brush my teeth with the faintest trickle of water.
When I come back out he’s still asleep, and something in me is a little deflated. Maybe I wanted him to wake up. Maybe I would like to lie down beside him, like I did in Christchurch, and feel his body all around me.
Moving soundlessly, I head for the door. I’m almost there when his hand captures my wrist. “Jess,” he says in a voice still raspy with sleep, and the sound is like a purr, deep and pleased. He tugs, and I allow myself to be pulled down to the bed, into the warmth and power of his body.
He tumbles me backward on the bed, and pins my hands on either side of my head as he moves his body over mine and looks down, his black hair falling around his face. Holding my gaze, he bends to kiss me, once, twice, three times, lightly. The last time, he nips my lower lip ever so slightly and it sends a wild arc of heat zigzagging through me, zapping my nipples and my crotch. I make a noise of protest and hunger, rising almost without thought to press myself against his erection. His eyelids are sleepy as he rolls his hips against me, but he doesn’t let me go.
My heart races a little as I look at his mouth, his throat. This is not the easy-going Kaleb. Something has been lit in him, something dark and uncontrollable, and it sends me right over the edge. I leverage my body and fling him off me, but instead of running away, I straddle him and kiss him hard, my hands in his hair, on his face. He rises up into a sitting position, and I hold on, sucking and diving into his hot, lush mouth, hunger flaring in every cell of my body.
He hauls me hard against his cock, hands fierce against my ass, then pulls up the hem of my shirt. I raise my hands, and he pulls it over my head, leaving me in my bra, and then that’s gone, too, and he bends his head to my breasts, hands tight against my back. When he takes one nipple into his mouth I clutch his shoulders, dizzily watching his lips closing around my flesh. He sucks hard, then takes a sharp tiny bite, and again it raises a violence in me. I bend in and bite his shoulder, hard.
It’s crazy, but it feels right, and he hauls my hands behind my back and sucks my nipple into his mouth again, slow and soft, then hard and soft, drawing circles with his tongue, and then that crazy nip that makes everything in my body blaze so hot. So fucking hot. I yank my hands away and shove him backward, lean down to suck his mouth, his lips, and lick his nipples, his neck. His hands slide over my skin, over my jeans, over my thighs. I pull at the drawstring waistband of his pants, and he stops me with a hard hand to my wrist. “Not yet.”
He pulls my pants off, leaving my panties on, and hauls me into him again, my legs sprawled on either side of him. It feels good, and it feels even better when he digs his big hands into my ass and starts torturing me again with his mouth, kissing my throat and shoulders and chin, then laying tongue and teeth on my nipples. It’s my major weakness, and I can feel an orgasm building as he plays and plays, at one point holding completely still, his mouth tight on my breast, only the tip of his tongue moving over the engorged edge of my nipple.
Quivering, I say, “Kaleb, wait, I think I—”
He raises his head, and those amber eyes are like dragon eyes, full of fire. “Only think?” he says in a low, rumbling voice, and his thumb slides between my legs from behind, beneath my panties, and slides right inside. He’s still looking at me as he leans in and takes another sharp nip, and I tumble right over the edge, rubbing hard against his dick, his big thumb inside of me, his mouth on my breast, and it lasts for ten years, wave after wave after wave, then he’s rolling me on my back, kissing me deep, pulling my hand into his pants. My fingers close around his thick, hard, hot cock, and he closes his hand over mine, kissing me, deeper and deeper, the two of us moving together until he, too, explodes. I’m dizzy with the feeling of it, the hot, violent pulsing and the way he guides me, showing me.
And then we’re collapsing together, bare chests slick with sweat, my head cradled into his shoulder, his arms around me. I close my eyes, smelling his notes and mine mingling into a perfume that’s unlike anything I’ve smelled before. His chest is smooth and muscular, and I run my hands over the terrain, tracing the very dark circle of a nipple, the edge of his ribs.
We don’t speak. He kisses my head, caresses my hair. I’m half-sated, but half-aroused, and I can tell he is, too, when he starts kissing me again, touching every inch of me. “I want to see your body,” I whisper, and he lies on his back, nodding.
I kneel, still clad in panties and my long braid, and tug at his waistband. He lifts his hips, and I pull the PJ bottoms off, down over his damp, still lively cock, and his dark legs with their scatterings of hair, and there is the tattoo. I turn him sideways, running my fingers over the shape, then I bend and taste it with my lips, my tongue, my breasts brushing his thigh.
“God, Jess,” he whispers.
“When I saw this tattoo after the earthquake, it made me so hot,” I say, and trace it again, and again, and I see that his cock is bobbing, getting taller, so I touch it, too.
“No, it’s sticky,” he whispers, reaching to pull me away.
I fling his hand away. “Sex is messy. I don’t care.” I circle his flesh with my palm and meet his eyes. “Do you?
“No.” But his hand falls on my wrist again. “I don’t have any condoms, Jess.”
I’ve been thinking of getting him inside me for the last half hour, wanting it in a way I can’t even fathom, and this deflates me. “Really?”
He smiles, a very sexy slow smile that makes my own flesh rise. “I’ll make it good anyway. Watch and see.” He pulls me to him, and we start exploring each other all over again, raising the temperature, my temperature, his, both of us writhing, moving, sucking, diving and—
The door flies open. We freeze, covering each other instinctively.
“Oh, hell!” Darcy says. “Sorry, sorry, sorry!”
She slams the door closed again. Through the door she says, “They decided to film today anyway. Gotta move now.”
We fall back on the bed, and Kaleb leans over me, hands on my face, and kisses me long and slow. “I’ll get condoms.”
My body is so aroused I’m not sure I can do anything, my limbs loose as spaghetti, my belly shivering, my lips raw. There’s a bite mark on his shoulder, and his curls ask for my fingers and his lips are parted ever so slightly. “I don’t want to go.”
“Me, either.”
I fall back into him, and we start kissing again, bare chests pressed hard together.
A knock at the door. “Sorry, guys. I really have to pee.”
Defeated, I let him go.
* * *
I have to gulp down some food and coffee from the tent while Mika is doing my face. She tsks over the bloating around my eyes. “Drink more water.”
“I was drinking beer last night.”
The snow is actually very pretty, and the mood is lively as we film around the town, drawing curious onlookers. Kaleb is practically sizzling with energy, our hands letting loose such a shock when we touch that it almost hurts. Our characters are playful in this one, along with Colin and then the middle-aged pair. I get the feeling that it’s all free form and laid back.
All I want is to get back to the lodge and finish what I started with Kaleb. I can’t think about anything else. His mouth draws my eyes whenever he speaks, and his curls blow in shiny black tangles, making me thin
k of the way he looked this morning when he was asleep. I want his hands on me, and I want mine on him.
But mid-afternoon I feel the familiar hot rush between my thighs and get into the loo to discover that I’ve got my period. It’s the right time, but I just kinda forgot about it in all the moving around.
I have nothing in my purse and the machine takes coins I don’t have, so I have to rig up some temporary protection and go find Mika, who offers me my choice of tampons. Then I have to trek back past the filming and into the bathroom again. It’s embarrassing, and I’m pretty sure everyone knows.
I wash my hands and stare in the mirror, feeling cheated and irritated and horny. In the mirror, my eyes are teary, which is stupid, but all at once everything just feels like too much. No sex and no anchors, and this wild thing I feel for Kaleb and the other crazy thing I feel for Tyler. I sink to my knees, hands on the sink, letting the tears fall. I know I’m being totally hormonal, but it also feels real. My phone is in my purse, but who would I call, anyway? This is not the kind of stuff a girl talks to her dad about, and Darcy isn’t at all a disinterested third party.
I wish for my friend Virginia, who was killed in a stupid accident just before I left. I think of Henry, but, again, a dad. The only person in the world I could talk to is Electra, and even that would be weird.
Or would it? I’m kind of losing it. What would it hurt to make a long-distance phone call? My dad won’t mind.
Mika comes in. “You about ready, love? They’re calling for you.”
“Can you tell them I need ten minutes?”
“Of course.”
When she goes out, I head for the tent and grab my purse, then tug on my coat, take out my phone and walk along the lake until I get four bars. In my mind I calculate time zones. It should be around eight in the evening if I have it right. She might be at work, but she might be at home.