by Amy Sparling
I sit next to her on the bench. She’s half slumped over, but tries to push herself up into a sitting position. The air smells like puke, but throwing up seems to have sobered her a little bit. She brushes her messy hair out of her face and stares at me.
It takes a few seconds for her to register my face. “Bree!” she says, as if I just arrived and she hasn’t seen me in months. Her face splits into a big grin. “I missed you.”
“You’re the one who called me over here,” I say. “You’re drunk. We need to get you home.”
Behind us, country music blares through the bar, but it’s real music from a famous artist. I guess that shitty cover band finally took a break and the bar put on some house music.
I brush Mia’s hair behind her ears and take her face in my hands. “Look at me.”
Her eyes are bloodshot and glassy, but she looks at me. “Where are your car keys?” I ask. I have to keep my voice calm and direct or she starts giggling or changing the subject. I’ve dealt with her enough times now to know what to do.
“I don’t wanna go home,” she slurs.
I roll my eyes. “We’re not going home,” I lie. “We just have to pick up a new outfit and then we’ll come back.”
Drunk people are stupid because they believe anything you say. Her face lights up. “Okay! Good idea!”
“So where are your keys?” I ask. “I’ll drive us.”
The bar is a mile away from my house, and since I don’t want Mia leaving her car here overnight, I always just walk here and then drive her home in her own car. The walk from her apartments to my house is a little longer, but I can usually make it home in forty-five minutes. If my parents ever found out that I’m walking on the back roads late at night, they’d murder me before someone else could.
Mia reaches into her pocket and pulls out a keychain. I take them and tuck them into my own pocket. “Okay, let’s go.”
I stand up and hold out my hands to her. She’s twenty-five years old and about a foot taller than me, but our whole lives have felt like I’m the older more responsible one. Mia reaches out for me, but she doesn’t take my hands and stand up, like I’m hoping she will. Instead she starts wiggling her arms and swaying her hips although she’s sitting, and I realize she’s dancing to the new song that just came on.
“Mia, dammit!” I snap my fingers in front of her face, but it doesn’t get her attention. This is so damn annoying. Maybe I should call my parents, even though it’s late and they’re both sleeping and we all have work tomorrow. Maybe I should just have them take care of it instead of it all falling to me.
I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. I try to remember the good times with my cousin and all the fun sleepovers we had as a kid. I love her, and she’s just suffering right now.
“Come on,” I say. I lean down and wrap my arms around her and pull her into a standing position. Then I put her arm over my shoulder and I wrap mine around her waist and try to pull her along. She’s still shimmying to the music but she does walk with me toward her car.
I open the passenger door and she kind of falls into it, but at least she’s in there. I pick up her feet and put them in the car and then close the door, not bothering with her seatbelt. We don’t have to drive very far, and I’m just not in the mood to wrangle a seatbelt around her.
I get in her car and try to crank the engine, but it doesn’t turn over. This old Honda Accord has seen better days, but I didn’t think it would break down anytime soon. I try again, and again.
Then I notice the blinking red light on the dashboard. She’s out of gas.
“Mia,” I say, groaning in frustration.
The nearest gas station is entirely too far to walk to.
I look over at my cousin, and she’s already asleep. She’s even snoring softly, her head lolled to the side. I sit here a little while longer and try to think of a plan. I guess I could walk back to my house, borrow Mom’s car, drive to the nearest gas station that’s still open this late, and get gas and then bring it back here. I look over at Mia. Can I just leave her here sleeping? I could roll down the windows…
No, I can’t. If I leave her here alone, drunk, and asleep, I’m just asking for one of those drunken men to stumble out here and take advantage of her. I couldn’t live with myself if anything happened to her.
I lower my forehead to the steering wheel and close my eyes. What the hell am I going to do?
A tap on the window startles the hell out of me. I bolt upright and see Zach standing there, his knuckles pressed to the glass. He gives me a little wave.
“You okay?”
I am so close to telling him to fuck off, but I’m also close to tears. As much as I don’t want anything to do with this player, maybe he can help.
I open the door and get out of the car that’s starting to smell like body odor, liquor, and puke.
“The car is out of gas,” I say, staring at the car instead of Zach. “She must have driven here on fumes before she got too damn drunk to take care of herself.”
I sigh.
“That’s okay,” Zach says. “I’ll drive her home.”
I shake my head. “I don’t want to leave her car here. I just need gas for it.”
He shrugs. “I’ll get it towed back. Get some gas put in it, too.”
I bite my lower lip. His offer is exactly what I need, but why did it have to come from him? And why is he even here? He should be off in big cities at fancy hotels hooking up with party girls. That’s what his entire Instagram is about, and he seems really good at it.
He shouldn’t be here, looking sexy as hell in the moonlight, that black t-shirt hugging all his muscles in all the right ways, making me want him like I’ve never wanted anyone else.
As much as I need his help, I can’t stand the thought of being close to him for any longer. He makes my insides all warm and tingly, and his very presence is a constant reminder that I’ll never get a guy as hot as him. I’m about to make up an excuse for why I don’t need his help, but then he leaves.
No—he walks over to Mia’s side of the car and opens the door and lifts her out of the seat effortlessly.
I follow him across the parking lot to a black Chevy truck because it’s not like I have any choice now. He opens the back door and sets my cousin down in the backseat. She mumbles something but then settles down quietly.
God, I hope she doesn’t puke in his truck.
“Get in,” Zach says. He tosses me his keys. “Start the engine so ya’ll can cool off. I’m gonna get some buddies to help me tow her car.”
It’s too late to refuse his help now. I get into his lifted truck and slide over the seat to start the engine. This truck is massive and roomy, not at all like my dad’s small pickup.
The leather seats smell amazing. I turn on the AC and then slide back over to the passenger seat which feels so far away from the driver’s side. Good. I need as much space as I can get between Zach and me.
A few minutes later, Zach returns and gets in the truck.
“Her name’s Mia, right?” he asks.
I nod. “Mia Grayson.”
“Cool,” he says. “My buddy Tommy said he knows her and he’ll tow her car back home tonight and put some gas in it.”
“You know little Tom?” I ask.
He grins. “Yep. He’s a good guy. You can trust him with her car.”
I nod. “I know.”
“Westfall Apartments?” he asks.
I guess little Tom told him that information, too. I nod and he starts driving there.
My cousin is passed out in the back seat, and although the radio plays softly in the background, it feels unbearably quiet in here. I want to talk to him—hell, who am I kidding—I want to do way more than talk to him. But my body freezes up and I can’t seem to do anything but sit here, quietly admiring his good looks while he drives.
The trip is way too short and soon we’re here. I direct him to her building and he parks right in front of it. Then he carries my cousin all t
he way to her front door, up two flights of stairs.
I’m about as turned on as you can get while I watch him do all of this work without even getting winded. If he’s strong enough to carry a girl up two flights of stairs, what could he do in bed?
Stop it, Bree. Stop thinking about him like that.
I unlock her door and we tuck Mia into bed. I put a glass of water and two Aspirin on her nightstand and then we leave her to sleep off the booze.
“Thank you,” I say as we descend the stairs together.
“It’s not a problem.”
We reach the bottom stair and Zach bumps into me with his arm. When I look at him, he’s giving me a playful grin. “Thanks for letting me help you.”
I look away. “It’s not like I had a choice.”
“You did. You could have told me to fuck off again.”
“I’ve never told you to fuck off,” I say.
He chuckles. “Not in those exact words, but—the implication was there.”
He’s being playful and I can’t help but smile. He opens the truck door for me and I climb inside. Sitting in the passenger seat, I’m about eye level with him. He looks like he wants to say something, but instead he winks and then closes the door.
It’s the sexiest wink in the history of the world.
We drive in silence from Mia’s apartment to the track. I don’t have to tell him where I live, so I guess he already knows. That means he figured out who I am. I wonder if he remembers me from way back when.
I think about asking, but I can’t. It’s too hard to talk around him. He smells just like his bedroom did, and it’s a struggle to sit here and act normal when I’d rather close my eyes and breathe in the sexy scent of his cologne until my ovaries burst. Everything about him is sexy as hell.
This is torture. Being so close to a guy I can never have.
Sure, I bet he’d sleep with me because he’s a man whore. But I’m not that type of girl. Part of me wishes I was that type of girl. Then I could have him and finally know if my daydreams were right about what it would be like to sleep with him.
I have to take a deep breath to calm myself down.
Zach pulls into the side driveway that leads to our house. You can also get there from the track’s main entrance but since it’s the middle of the night, the track is closed and so is the large gate on the main entrance.
He turns off his headlights and coasts to a stop.
“You’re more fun to hang out with than my buddies,” he says.
I roll my eyes. “We didn’t even talk much.”
“And yet you’re still better company,” he says with a grin. “Maybe it’s because you’re much prettier and smell a hell of a lot better than my friends.”
I’m glad it’s dark in here and he can’t see me blush. I have no idea what comes over me right now, but my insides are throbbing with heat and desire. Zach will probably go back to Nashville any day now and I’ll be all out of chances to do something I’ve only ever fantasized about.
I can’t believe I’m going to do this… I look him dead in the eyes, and I say, “Want to come inside?”
Chapter 9
There are times in a man’s life where he must choose between what he should do and what he wants to do. I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life, and I’m still paying for some of them. You think I would have learned my lesson by now. And yet, here I am, staring into Bree’s dark brown eyes as she watches me eagerly from the passenger side of my truck, and I know I am about to make another mistake. She’s spent days avoiding me and yet, in a complete one-eighty, she just invited me to come inside.
I think she’s making a mistake too.
“Yeah,” I say, shutting off the truck. I pull out my keys and step outside before she can change her mind.
I watch her bite her bottom lip as she slowly walks up to the front porch of her trailer. I follow quietly, admiring her backside under the glow of the moonlight. She’s wearing black leggings and a purple tank top that shows off her bikini tan line on her shoulders. I want to trace that tan line with my tongue.
That’ll be the first thing I do.
At the front door, Bree turns around to face me. The wooden porch is small and the planks creak under my weight. I give her a little smile, hoping she’s not about to change her mind.
“My parents are home,” she says in a whisper. “So be quiet.”
I nod once, not taking my gaze off hers. Maybe it’s the moonlight, or all my pent up sexual energy, but she’s gorgeous as hell right now and it’s turning me on.
She opens the front door and puts her finger to her lips, reminding me to be quiet. We enter into a dark living room and Bree reaches for my hand. Her skin is soft and warm and my dick hardens just thinking about having those hands holding onto me in other ways.
She leads me down a narrow hallway and into a bedroom at the very end of the trailer. Once we’re inside, she drops my hand and my chest aches because of it. She closes the bedroom door and then turns on a small lamp in the corner. The room lights up with a soft yellow glow and I make a point of looking around the tiny bedroom.
She has a larger bed than I do, and it’s made up with a black comforter that has white roses printed on it. There’s a mountain of pillows all arranged in a neat order. Her furniture is black and the décor seems to be purposely black and white. She has a large bookshelf against one wall, next to her desk with a laptop on it. Everything is neat and tidy and it confirms that she’s exactly the kind of girl I thought she was.
A girl that’s too good for me.
“Someone likes books,” I say, giving her a playful grin.
“Books are the best.” She puts her hands on her hips as if challenging me to disagree.
I shrug. “Books are okay.”
She rolls her eyes and glances at her bookshelf. “Most of those are from college. Only that small collection on the top shelf are the books I actually enjoy reading.”
“What’d you study in college?” I ask. I’d just like to point out that I’m trying very hard here. Trying to be friendly and polite, instead of following my true desires of throwing her on the bed and having my way with her.
She says something and—dammit—I don’t even hear it. I’m staring at her lips, how they’re pouty and perfect and how I only just now realized that the front of her is just as sexy as the back of her. Bree Grayson is the whole package.
I shove my hands in my pockets in an attempt to hide what I’ve got going on here. I don’t want her to see my massive erection and change her mind about inviting me inside. Or maybe I do. I don’t even know what I want right now.
I know that I want her so bad, but that taking her would be the very opposite of what I came to Hopewell to do this summer. I should turn right around and leave and keep the promise I made to myself. But of course, I don’t do that.
“Well?” Bree says. Her hands are on her hips and she’s looking at me from across the room.
Shit, I have no idea what she was talking about. “Well,” I say back to her, tilting my head a little like I’m just playing with her. Hopefully she won’t realize that I wasn’t listening to whatever she’d said because I was too busy checking her out.
“Come on, Zach,” she says. Her shoulders fall and she looks so vulnerable right now. “Don’t make me do it.”
“Make you do what?” I ask.
Her eyes flash at me for a second, like she thinks I’m a total idiot. “You know why I invited you over here,” she says, somewhat sheepishly. “Don’t make me make the first move. I mean, that’s kind of your specialty, right?”
Oh fuck.
I swallow. Her words are music to my ears. My heartbeat quickens. “Are you sure?”
She leans over and twists the lock on the doorknob. “I’m sure.”
I wet my lips with the anticipation of kissing her, and I cross the room in two strides. Now we’re closer than we ever have been, and she smells like an angel. She looks like one too, with those big innocent eyes
staring up at me expectantly.
My heart thunders in my chest. I’ve never felt this way before. Usually the first kiss is the easiest part, a very forgettable part, of hooking up. But this feels different. I reach out and place my hands on her hips. She inches forward, her toes curling on the carpet. I gaze into her eyes and then I can’t take it anymore. I lower my lips to hers.
She kisses me back with an eagerness I didn’t quite expect. Soon, her hands are moving up my back and I’m pulling her closer, sliding my tongue between her lips. She gasps as I rock her hips against mine, then her hands tangle in my hair as she kisses me deeper.
My hands roam her body, over the soft flimsy fabric of those black leggings and back up to her breasts. My pants tighten even more when I realize she’s not wearing a bra. There’s just one thin layer of clothing separating me from her body. I trail kisses from her ear down her neck, reveling in the way she grips me tighter with each one. I kiss her collarbone and then slide my tongue up to just behind her ear. I breathe out softly and feel her skin turn to gooseflesh beneath my lips.
While we kiss, I slide my hand up her tank top, slowly, until my fingers flit over her breast. I grab her nipple and squeeze it gently. She breathes harder, her hand tangling in my hair.
“Still time to back out,” I whisper against her ear.
She shakes her head. “Not happening.”
I scoop her up and place her on the bed, right on top of all the decorative pillows. Her hair cascades all around her, making her even more beautiful. Her eyes sparkle even in the dim lighting. I lower myself on top of her and kiss her softly. She tugs at my shirt, and I sit up and let her take it off. I want her clothing gone too, but even in the heat of passion something is telling me to take it slow. Girls like Bree deserve to be treated like the queen that they are.
Her gaze roams down my chest, making me extra appreciative of all the working out I did this week.
She puts her hands on my shoulders and leans up, kissing my neck.