A Year of Love

by Anthology

  His brow quirks. “Alright then.”

  “Hey,” I snap back at Danny’s girlfriend. “I don’t care if you’re mad at my brother. That’s no reason to be rude to Nick.”

  Oh my God. I’m defending Nick? What have I become?

  I don’t miss the half-smile he gives me. He knows exactly what I’ve done.

  Danny, meanwhile, just looks tired as he starts the engine. He and Michelle go inside the moment we return to the house, and Nick and I don’t see them again. We pass the afternoon playing Scrabble, grill up hot dogs for lunch, and then retreat to our respective bedrooms to take naps.

  “Naps are always more fun in pairs,” Nick says enticingly at the top of the staircase.

  “Yeah, not happening.” And then I go to the blue room and he goes to the red one and that’s that.

  Sometime before dinner, I start hearing moans coming from the room next door. The yellow room where Danny and Michelle are sleeping. Great. Looks like they made up. And gross, because now I get to lie here and listen to my brother having sex. Or I can drag myself out of bed and get dinner ready. Which is clearly the better choice, sanity-wise.

  I’m chopping veggies to make steak skewers when Nick wanders downstairs ten minutes later. His hair is rumpled from his nap. He’s shirtless and his chest is just…ugh. Too perfect.

  “They’re fucking,” he says flatly.

  “Yeah, the sex noises woke me up too.” I sigh. “I really wish my brother had some balls.”

  “Oh, he’s got balls. Sounds like he’s using them right now.”

  “Eww. You know what I mean. She’s been treating him like garbage, not just today, but for years. And he’s so quick to say, okey-dokey, we’re all good, let’s have sex.”

  Nick shrugs. “Maybe it’s a good riddance bang.”

  “You’re a class act, Carmichael.”

  “Oh, come on. One last hurrah, you know? Everyone does it.”

  “I wouldn’t,” I say. “I mean, what if the sex is amazing and then it reminds you of the good times and you don’t break up?”

  “It’s a risk,” he agrees.

  I snort.

  He joins me at the kitchen island to help prep dinner, and as we get the skewers ready, he tells me about the football program at Southern and how much he’s enjoying it. Art might be my passion, but like I said, I grew up around sports, so it’s a subject I enjoy. By the time we take everything out to the grill, Michelle and Danny still haven’t come downstairs.

  I set the tray of skewers on the table by the deck railing. “You want to draw straws for who goes up to get them?” I ask Nick.

  “Fuck that.” He pales.

  So that’s how we end up having dinner alone. Sitting across from each other at a table overlooking the gorgeous lake, while the sun dips gracefully below the horizon line. It’s like we’re on a date. I mean, we’re watching the sunset together. This is stupidly romantic.

  “Feels like a date,” he says lightly, as if reading my mind.

  “Not a date,” I answer, flashing a cheery smile.

  That earns me an oddly weary sigh. “You know, you’re just as big of a ballbuster as Michelle.”

  I frown at him. “I am not.”

  “You are. Would it kill you to say one nice thing to me?” Nick shakes his head, averting his eyes. “I don’t think you have since the day we met.”

  “The day we met, you put a frog down my shirt!”

  “Yeah, I was twelve.”

  “And I was ten. Do you even realize how embarrassing it is to have to rip off your shirt when you’re ten years old, in front of two older boys, one of whom is your brother?” I glower at him.

  “Damn, when you put it that way.” Remorse fills his eyes. “I apologize for my twelve-year-old self. If it helps, I wouldn’t do that to a chick now.”

  “I would hope not.” I shudder at the memory. “God, I’ll never forget that day. Danny made fun of me for a full year after that. Any time anything even remotely scary happened, like, he’d see a spider or something, he’d shriek and rip off his shirt and whip it against the wall.”

  Nick’s mouth twitches as if he’s trying not to laugh.

  “It’s not funny,” I grumble. “It was humiliating. Almost as bad as—” I stop talking.

  Because we don’t speak of that night. He knows, though. He’s pressing his lips together even tighter, clearly battling another wave of laughter, and now I’m flashing back to another day. Or rather, another night, when I was fourteen years old and Nick was sixteen and at our house for a sleepover. I drank too much water before bed, waking up at three in the morning with my bladder about to burst. I dragged myself out of bed, out into the hall toward the bathroom Danny and I shared. I reached the door at the same time as Nick, who’d just emerged from Danny’s room. He was in boxers and a T-shirt. I was in a tank top and underwear.

  White panties with pink cartoon poodles all over them.

  And one word written on the front:

  POODLE!

  I cringe just thinking about it. I’d only recently started doing my own laundry back then, as one of my chores. And I was bad at it, always forgetting to run a load. So that weekend I was down to the last few pairs of panties in my drawer. The gag gifts and ill-fitting pairs, and, of course, the POODLE! underwear my grandmother got me for Christmas, because one time I’d made a passing comment to her that poodles were cute.

  “I didn’t think the nickname would stick,” Nick says when he notices my expression. His conveys remorse.

  “You made it stick,” I accuse. “You call me that more than anybody!”

  “Yeah, but…” His face flushes as he trails off. “I’m sorry,” he finishes.

  “Whatever. It’s clear you live to embarrass me,”

  “That’s not true. It’s just my way of, you know, dealing.”

  I wrinkle my forehead. “Dealing with what?”

  “With your total lack of interest.” He offers an awkward shrug. “I gave up on flirting a long time ago.”

  The crease in my forehead deepens. “What are you talking about right now?”

  Nick stares at me. “I used to flirt with you all the time, Kate. And you’d completely shoot me down.”

  I stare back. “I’m sorry—what?”

  7

  He’s messing with me. I’m ninety-eight percent certain of it. But the two percent that isn’t certain has me frozen in place. I sit there, staring at him, trying not to notice how hot he looks in his faded grey T-shirt that hugs his defined chest. Long fingers curled loosely around his beer bottle. The shadow of stubble dotting his strong jaw.

  “You’ve never flirted with me,” I finally say. My voice sounds shaky to my ears.

  “Sure I have.” He raises his beer to his lips, taking a quick sip. “I mean, it was awkward because I was sixteen and had no moves. And you were two years younger, so I was trying to be discreet about it.”

  “Discreet? You saw me in my underwear and started calling me Poodle.”

  “Yeah, that’s how sixteen-year-old boys flirt. You think we have any game?” He groans softly. “It was the first thing that popped out of my dumb mouth, but you went and took it to heart. All my other flirting attempts pretty much went the same way, and then, in senior year, before that graduation party? I came to grab Danny, but he was in that big fight with Michelle, remember? You and I went outside to wait for him, and we were sitting by the pool…”

  “Yeah, and?”

  “So I tried to kiss you that night.” He looks accusingly at me. “And you ran away.”

  “What the hell are you talking about? You never tried to kiss me.” I scan my brain, thinking about the night in question.

  I do remember the big fight, because it was a few days after senior prom and Michelle was still pissed at Danny for his epic corsage failure. I remember answering the door while eating an ice cream cone. Letting Nick in. The two of us walking out the back door to the patio, stepping onto the pool deck.

  “We sat
down and were talking,” I say slowly. “And then you made fun of me and told me I had chocolate all over my face. I was so embarrassed.”

  He growls in frustration. “You didn’t have chocolate on your face, dumbass. That was my move.”

  “What do you mean, that was your move? What kind of shitty move is that?” I exclaim.

  “It worked with other girls!” He rolls his eyes at me, that brash confidence returning. “You find an excuse to touch their mouth or lips and then you kind of lean in, and, you know, go for it. But when I started to lean in, you jumped up and ran off.”

  “Because I thought I had chocolate all over my face! Jeez, Nick. I’m sorry my sixteen-year-old self wasn’t well-informed about your little kissing tricks.”

  He starts to laugh, and the husky sound makes my pulse race. “God, you’re impossible.”

  “And you’re just messing with me.” I stand abruptly. “I don’t believe any of this.”

  “Really? You think I’m lying about flirting with you when I was a teenager and trying to kiss you?”

  “Yeah, I think you’re lying and I don’t know why. So let’s just forget about this and clean up.” I start gathering up our plates, avoiding his gaze the entire time. On stiff legs, I bring the leftovers inside and wrap everything for Danny and Michelle.

  Nick enters the kitchen a couple minutes later. He looks a bit wounded.

  “What?” I say, narrowing my eyes.

  “Nothing. I’m going upstairs to charge my phone.”

  “Are you mad?”

  “Nope.” Then he leaves.

  As I tidy up, I think about both incidents.

  On Poodle night, I remember bumping into him in the hall. His cheeks flushed. Gaze glued to my bare legs and underwear. If he had been flirting, or eyeing me with any sort of interest, I never would’ve noticed. My humiliation had been too great and nothing could have penetrated that haze of shame.

  The night of the graduation party I’d been equally self-conscious—ever since the Poodle incident, I’d taken to assuming that every time his gaze lingered on me a little too long, it was because he was gearing up to mock me. And now he’s telling me he was about to kiss me? There’s no way that can be true.

  What if it is?

  The question haunts me for the rest of the evening. Michelle and Danny eventually venture downstairs, and whatever they were doing in the yellow room doesn’t seem like a goodbye bang, because Michelle is glowing, smiling happily. They don’t last long, though. Halfway through a game of Scrabble, Michelle announces she’s bored and turns to my brother, chirping, “Want to turn in early?” She’s not at all discreet about her intentions. Her batting eyelashes and flirty tone are like a neon sign.

  It’s only ten o’clock. We usually go to bed late at the lake, and sleep in. But now that they’ve made up, I guess it’s a “couples thing” again. Danny gives us an apologetic look and follows her upstairs.

  Nick, who seemed a bit subdued during the game, gets up from the table. “I’m going down to the dock,” he says abruptly.

  “Okay.”

  Frowning, I watch him go. I think I hurt his feelings, but I still can’t wrap my head around everything he’d said earlier. About the flirting, the kissing attempt. My brain can’t comprehend it, because I’d truly never gotten the sense, not even once, that Nick was attracted to me.

  I put away the Scrabble tiles, then head upstairs to take a shower. Might as well turn in early too. And luckily I don’t hear any sex noises from the yellow room at the moment. Yet something drags me out of bed and pushes me back outside. Only a half hour has passed, but he’s still on the dock, sitting there nursing a beer. The moon is bright again, its light emphasizing Nick’s chiseled jawline.

  “May I join you?” I ask lightly.

  He gestures to the empty space beside him with his beer bottle.

  I sit down. Neither of us speaks for a minute. We stare out at the water, while the question continues to gnaw at me, poke at me, until finally I just blurt it out.

  “Were you actually going to kiss me that night?”

  He tips his head toward me. “Yes.” He sighs. “You seriously had no idea?”

  “None.”

  Now he’s nodding. Slowly. Pensive. “Okay… And let’s say you did know that’s what I wanted to do… What would you have done?”

  He watches me with those dark eyes. Searching.

  What would I have done?

  I bite my lip. Then I moisten it with my tongue and let out a nervous breath. “I think I would’ve kissed you back—”

  His mouth is on mine before I can utter the last syllable.

  It stuns me. Thrills me. Never in a million years did I think I’d be kissing Nick Carmichael. But here I am. Here we are.

  I deepen the kiss by slipping my tongue past the seam of his lips, and he makes a husky noise in response. When his tongue meets mine, it’s my turn to moan. I place one hand flat to his chest and his muscles quiver beneath my touch. I can feel his heart beating against my palm. The next thing I know, he tugs me into his lap.

  “Fuck,” he grunts.

  His hands wrap around my waist. Mine loop around his neck. As I kiss him back hungrily, I don’t miss the hard ridge pressed between my thighs. He’s…big. Hard and thick. His evident arousal fogs my brain. My judgment. I don’t know how long we sit there kissing in the darkness, while the water laps against the wood pillars of the dock.

  His fingers start dragging the hem of my tank top up, then stop. “Is this okay?” he asks.

  “Yes.” I sound breathless.

  He slides his hands beneath my top and cups my breasts. His thumbs sweep over my nipples, getting them hard.

  Pinpricks of pleasure dance along my skin. I lean into his touch, lowering my face to his so I can kiss him again. Keeping one hand on my breast, he brings the other between my legs, and a bolt of heat tears through me.

  “You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do this,” he whispers.

  I can’t believe those words are coming out of his mouth. This is surreal. All of it. He feels so strong and solid beneath me. He tastes like beer and mint. He smells like sunscreen and sandalwood. My senses are on overload.

  “Fuck, Kate.” He burrows his face in the crook of my neck and starts kissing my feverish skin. Meanwhile, his hand is stroking, rubbing, until the ache becomes unbearable and I start grinding against the heel of his palm.

  “Ah hell, that’s it,” Nick says. “Ride my hand.”

  Another moan slips out. Neither of the guys I’d been with had ever talked like this. Hot and dirty. I think I kinda like it. His mouth returns to mine, fingers skimming my breast, pinching my nipple. I grind harder and the pleasure rises and peaks before I can even process it. The orgasm catches me off-guard, making me gasp against Nick’s lips.

  “Are you coming?” He sounds startled.

  I whimper in response, my hips moving faster. My heartbeat careens wildly as the climax ripples through my body. When I’m able to catch my breath and open my eyelids, I find his eyes twinkling at me. Lips curved in a satisfied smile.

  “That was so fucking hot,” he mumbles.

  I still don’t have any words. I tend to get gooey after an orgasm. I rest my chin against his shoulder, and he strokes my hair until my heartbeat regulates.

  “That was…unexpected,” I finally say.

  We grin at each other, and then we’re kissing again, falling onto the hard cedar of the dock. It can’t be comfortable for Nick, but he settles on his back and pulls me close to his side. His breath hitches when my hand slides down his chest. Lower and lower.

  “You don’t have to,” he says.

  “I want to.” I unbutton his shorts and slip my hand inside. It’s as much for me as it is for him. I want to touch him. I want to feel him.

  His hard dick springs up and I curl my fingers around it, giving an exploratory stroke. His hips jerk up and he curses softly. When I peer up at his expression, his features are taut with desire. S
miling, I give another stroke, then shuffle down and take him in my mouth. His expletive is even more violent this time.

  I don’t spend a lot of time teasing him. I suck him deep while he groans his approval. One hand rests on my head, long fingers threading through my hair. “That’s it, Kate,” he mutters.

  Fueled by his response, I grip the base of him, using my hand and tongue to drive him crazy, quickening the pace as his hips grow restless. I can’t believe I’m blowing Nick. Not only that, but I’m loving it. I love every noise he makes. I love how he tastes in my mouth, how he moves. The way he throbs beneath my tongue.

  Breathing growing labored, he chokes out the words, “I’m gonna come.”

  I release him. He yanks his shirt up to his collarbone and I stroke him until he’s coming all over his abs. Afterward, he lies there with arms at his sides, his eyes closed, panting.

  I laugh at the spent sight of him. “You okay?” I tease.

  “No. You’ve killed me.”

  “What should we do about that?” I point to the mess on his stomach.

  He rises on his elbows, peers down, then sits up and removes his shirt, using it to wipe himself up.

  “Classy,” I remark.

  “I mean, the alternative was asking you to lick it off, so…” He smirks.

  Damned if that doesn’t make me want to do it all over again.

  As if sensing where my thoughts went, his expression heats up and then he’s tugging me toward him. His lips briefly meet mine. “Round two?” he asks.

  “Round two,” I echo before kissing him again.

  8

  When I open my eyes the next morning, my thoughts are just as jumbled as they’d been before I went to sleep. As I brush my teeth, wash up, get dressed, it’s impossible to concentrate on anything other than what Nick and I did last night. My flight back to Salt Lake City doesn’t leave until four o’clock, so I still have the morning and part of the afternoon to spend with everybody. Except now I don’t know how I’m supposed to behave. How to act around Nick.

  Fortunately, he makes it easy for me. When I walk into the kitchen ten minutes later, I find Nick and Danny there, cooking bacon and eggs.