by Maggie Marr
Amanda nodded. “Then the big, bad real world.” She opened her bag and plucked her lip gloss from her purse.
Amanda pulled down the visor on the passenger side and opened the mirror. “Was it hard leaving your family for the summer?”
My heart plucked and the tiny knot that seemed to always be somewhere in my belly tightened. The most innocent of questions could cause this black box of pain I seemed to always carry to tilt over and spill its usually hidden contents. I was always unsure how much to tell or what to tell. I didn’t want to make light of the fact that I had no family—none—because that broke my heart. There were moments when the sheer enormity of my aloneness terrified me and seared through me with a blinding pain.
“I don’t really…” My words drifted into the night air. Was it too soon to tell my newfound friend about my mom? “My mom died last year.” I twisted the sapphire ring that she’d always worn and had given to me. My gaze slid toward Amanda, who paused, her hand in midair. “And it was just the two of us, so it wasn’t hard to leave.”
Amanda blinked. Her glossed lips softened and her eyes held a pain, a pain that seemed familiar to me. “My mom died when I was fourteen.” Her lips pressed into a thin line and the corners of her mouth turned down. “It’s so hard,” she whispered. “I’m sorry.”
The heat behind my eyes spiked and big, bold tears filled them. I pressed my lips tight, willing back into submission the pain that threatened to swamp me and send me reeling into the abyss of gut-wrenching, rib-thrashing sobs and tears.
I pressed my fingertips to the corners of my eyes. Amanda threw her arm around my shoulders. She tilted her head so the side of hers rested against the side of mine.
“It sucks” was all she said.
We sat for a couple of minutes, both of us lost in the memories of the women we loved and would spend the rest of our lives without. Tears dripped down my face.
“Here.” She passed me an In-N-Out napkin.
I wiped my eyes and blew my nose.
“Now we’ve bonded over cheeseburgers and moms.”
“Sorry,” I said and swiped under my nose again.
“Don’t be,” Amanda said. “I still cry about my mom. I always will.”
My heart ached with the idea that I knew what Amanda said was true. I had loved my mom so deeply and we had always been together—just the two of us—her and me against the world. I knew that this loss would never heal, that the grief, the slicing sadness, the aloneness, might fade but that the feeling of loss would be lifelong.
“How do you like working for Dillon?” Amanda asked, changing the subject.
I glanced at her and I could see it was a purposeful attempt to pull us back, away from the moments of pain.
I looked down at my half-empty order of fries. “He has good taste. He listens to what I have to say about scripts.” My gaze met Amanda’s.
“You’re not his typical type.”
Typical type? Was there a type of reader that Dillon always chose? “Choo took pity on me.”
“Pity?” She cocked her eyebrows.
“I was jobless, homeless, and completely broke.” I told her the story of how CTA had given away my summer job as well as my confusion over it being an unpaid internship versus a paid summer gig. “So actually I ended up winning. I get paid, I have a place to live, and if I make it through the whole summer, I’ll have a job after I graduate next spring.”
“Plus the other perks,” Amanda said.
I wasn’t sure exactly what she meant. Maybe she liked dogs?
“You should come to the premiere of Mission Range with me,” Amanda said.
“I’ve never been to a premiere, but I’ve always wanted to go.”
“Premieres are kind of strange,” Amanda said, “but then again nearly everything in this town is incredibly weird.”
Chapter 15
Dillon
Lane was out and I didn’t know where. Choo had mentioned Amanda Legend. Even with that tidbit of information, I was close to losing my mind. Since I’d cornered her in the elevator, I’d avoided Lane, but I always knew where she was. I had to know where she was and who she was with. I wanted her with me, but I couldn’t let myself have her. My life wouldn’t be fair to her, wouldn’t be good for her.
I lay on the leather couch in the rec room and tried to lose myself and these thoughts in the Dodgers game. Her voice tugged at my soul. Her lips, her eyes, they were right there in front of me, in my mind, and I wanted them. I wanted her. That kiss had seared its way into me and I couldn’t seem to break free. My phone beeped—it was Webber.
“Dude, what’s up?” Webber said. His voice sounded half happy and half not.
“Watching the game.”
“If you want, the agency has box seats—next game we go.”
“Yeah, sure,” I said and muted the sound. Not even the idea of box seats behind home plate could yank my mind away from wondering about Lane.
“I got some news,” Webber said. His tone sounded cautious, as though he didn’t want to have to tell me whatever the news was. “I got a letter from your dad.”
I pulled myself up from lying on the couch. My shoulders tensed. “Why are you getting letters from my dad?”
“Maybe because you took out a restraining order on him?”
“He threatened to have my brother abducted and deprogrammed again.” My chest tightened and my heart started to pound. “Like being gay is some sort of disease.”
“Look, man, I get it. He’s a whack job. All I’m asking is do you want the letter or should I forward it to your attorney to deal with?”
I rubbed the hard knot of muscle now pulled tight in my neck. My dad was a zealot, a nut, a threat to both Choo and my sanity. He’d flipped a biscuit when I dropped out of college to model. He’d completely gone off the rails when Choo came out—like that was a surprise? It just proved how deep into denial about my little brother my dad had been. Choo had been playing with Barbies since he was five. My dad treated my kid brother like Choo was some sort of diseased creature. He’d shipped him off to some religious camp in the middle of Utah to teach Choo how to be straight. I would never let that happen again. I wouldn’t let my dad close to my little brother. He wasn’t going to hurt him or me again.
“Forward me the letter,” I said.
I didn’t want to read the letter and I didn’t want my dad to have contact with my brother, but I wanted to know what was on the nutball’s mind. I might better be able to protect Choo if I knew what kind of hate my dad was spewing right now.
“You got it,” Webber said. “So, dude, I found you another reader.”
“Another reader? I’m not looking for another reader.” I stood and walked toward the stairs.
“After last week at Area, when you nearly flipped? With that chick Lois, Lala—”
“Lane.” I climbed the staircase to the second floor.
“Whatevs. You can’t keep her as a reader if you’re banging her. You’ve tried that before—”
I turned the corner into Lane’s room. All four dogs were piled on her bed. They were always with her. The dogs always wanted her. Smart dogs. The room smelled like her, fresh and warm, with hints of flowers.
“I’m not sleeping with her,” I said. “Don’t talk about her like that.”
“Seriously?”
Webber was more surprised that I told him not to talk about Lane than he was about me not sleeping with her.
“Yeah, seriously.” I sat on Lane’s bed beside Kong. “She’s not like that.”
“Well, whatever she’s like, you nearly lost it and I don’t need you losing it in front of a camera, right? Seriously, you are about to get hit with some heavy shit. Already you’re scheduled for an interview and photo spread for next week. Did Boom Boom get a hold of you?”
“Yeah.”
I wasn’t looking forward to the photo shoot or the interview. I didn’t like people digging into my life. I wanted some sort of privacy, but I was pretty sure that
any privacy I had was about to evaporate. “She did.”
Scorsese rolled over onto his back and put his head on my thigh. I loved these guys. And they loved me. I’d saved them all. But now they loved Lane more.
“No new reader,” Webber said. He sounded pissed.
Too bad. I couldn’t date Lane because of the image that Webber and Boom Boom and even I had spent a ton of time developing, but I could have her here for the summer. I could keep her close for a while. Keep her as my reader.
“Nope,” I replied.
“Not even an ugly-ass guy?”
“Not even an ugly-ass guy.”
“Dude, watch yourself. I see something coming for you. You don’t usually get attached to anything in a skirt.”
“Later.”
No, I didn’t usually get attached to anything in a skirt, but there was nothing in a skirt that had looked like or acted like Lane, nobody I wanted like Lane. I flopped back onto Lane’s bed. Bernie stood up and resettled closer beside me with his head on my neck. Spielberg snuggled in beside me and Kong actually curled up on my chest. They were like a giant dog snuggly.
*
“What are you doing on my bed?”
My eyes fluttered open. Her voice brought me out of a dream. Darkness seeped through the windows. Kong was still on my chest but now he stood and wagged his tail at Lane.
I slowly sat up on her bed, making certain that the dogs weren’t on my body. “Nothing, uh, I just…” I looked around at the pack. Traitors. They’d all abandoned me and now stood beside Lane. They wore the same look on their faces as Lane. A look that seemed to yell “what the hell are you doing on her bed?”
“I was lonely downstairs and came to find these guys, and well, I started petting them and I must have fallen asleep.” I hadn’t spoken to Lane since last week. “How was your night?”
“Good.” Her lips were tight and she had crossed her arms over her chest.
She didn’t look at me. I guessed that she didn’t want to look at me. Her gaze darted past me and then back to Kong. I can’t say that I blamed her. I mean, I had humiliated her, and then kissed her, and then ignored her, and then… I looked into her turquoise eyes. There were so many questions, questions that I wanted to answer but couldn’t. A hard tightness squeezed through my chest with her look, that uncertain look filled with questions and self-doubt. She was too beautiful to look that way, too good, too kind. I had put that look on her face.
I closed my eyes. I wanted to tell her, I wanted her to know why and how and that it wasn’t her, it was me and my messed-up life. That I couldn’t be with her, not now, and it wouldn’t be fair not to her and I knew… a voice, a feeling, something deep inside me knew that if I was with Lane—actually with her—I wouldn’t want to pull away. Lane would ruin me for anyone else. She needed someone better, someone who could give her a life that she deserved.
“Lane.” The need scraped over my throat and out of my mouth. Her name was like a prayer on my lips. I reached out to her arm.
She turned to me, her face so soft, so open, so beautiful. My fingertips smoothed over her cheekbone. She was so close, so near, and suddenly… suddenly her lips were on mine.
Lane
I wanted this. I wanted Dillon to kiss me. I wanted the low moan that came from his throat. I stepped closer to him and wrapped my arms around his neck. My fingertips wove through his hair.
His lips pressed against mine, at first soft, almost like he was surprised that we were standing in the middle of my room with his lips on mine. I pressed forward. I wanted more; I needed more. I could no longer fight the heat that coursed through me when I was near Dillon. I couldn’t deny this deep ache. Heat swept through me. He grasped the back of my head and his lips grew impatient as he pressed harder and his tongue slipped past my lips and entangled with mine.
His hand rushed up over my body and touched the underside of my breast through the fabric of my shirt and a moan escaped over my lips. His body tightened with the sound. And he pressed harder. He lifted me and turned me to the bed. I lay back and he lay beside me. His fingertips were on my jaw and then my thigh, at the edge of my skirt, and a hot thrill raced through me. I could feel the clutching in my belly, the tingling between my thighs, the spot that begged to be touched, that had never been touched by any man. His lips descended to my neck and heat seared through me. Then to my chest. His hand slipped under my shirt and his hot fingertips traced up over my ribs and paused beneath my breast. Then his fingertips danced over the lace of my bra, slipping over my tight, pert nipple. My hips arched upward into him.
“Lane,” he growled.
My hips rocked against his hardness. The sound of my name on his lips ignited a deep heat. I pressed harder against him, the throbbing between my legs needing the hard pressure from him.
“Lane, you’re going to drive me over the edge.” He pulled at my shirt and pulled it off my body. He unsnapped my bra and my breasts sprang free.
I gasped. I’d never been so exposed to any man.
Dillon stopped. The heat in his eyes was laced with worry. “Lane,” he said, his voice ragged and his breathing shallow, “are you okay with this?”
I nodded. I wanted to feel his body rocking against mine. I wanted his touch, his kiss, all of him. His eyes locked with mine—that bright spellbinding blue—and then he ducked his head. He slipped a taut nipple into his mouth, and his tongue laved around it. A white-hot heat seared through me. A whimper I couldn’t contain pressed over my lips. I watched his mouth suckle me. I pressed upward into him and sought the hardness between his legs. I sought the pleasure of him pressing into the spot that throbbed between my legs. I watched his mouth and tongue lick over me. My hips wouldn’t stop moving.
He pulled his mouth from my nipple and his eyes looked into mine. “God,” he whispered out, his voice ragged and deep. “You’re beautiful, Lane.” His hands caressed my bare skin and his eyes swept over my body as though he were eating me with his eyes. “You’re the most beautiful person I know.”
My heart exploded and with it a deep, hot need. His lips pressed to mine. I grappled with his T-shirt and he arched forward and ripped it over his head. I wanted his skin, I needed to touch his body, which I’d seen and dreamed about—his muscled abs, his tattoo that whispered around his arm and down his back. My hands found his chest and I clutched his shoulders as his lips pressed between my breasts. Hot, lingering kisses moved slowly across my skin. My hips arched forward, aching, aching for more from him. His fingertips traced up my thigh and under the edge of my skirt. They slid along the edge of the lace of my panties. My breath clutched in my chest. I couldn’t breathe. All I could feel was the hot trails along my skin. Explosion upon explosion of want, of need. One finger slipped under the fabric. He pressed between my folds, which were hot and swollen and aching for his touch.
“Lane, you’re so hot. Baby, you’re so wet.”
His fingertip paused at the entrance of me. I pushed forward. I wanted him to fill me, to be inside me. His fingers danced upward and pushed against that hot spot that ached between my legs. My whole body convulsed with the tiniest touch and his name rushed over my lips.
“Oh my God, Lane. I can’t, baby, you’re driving me over the edge.”
His lips were on me and I felt the stroke of his fingers on my swollen nub. I pressed into him, grabbing for that wave of feeling that I wanted to climb into, that heat.
“Lane, come for me,” Dillon whispered.
My eyes fluttered open with his words. Embarrassment would have pulsed through me if I wasn’t abandoned to the desire that throbbed through my body. Dillon watched my face and he brushed his finger over my nub again with a harder, more insistent pressure. A wave of pleasure crashed over me again and grasped the edges of me.
“Dillon,” I yelled in a raspy voice I’d never heard come from me. “Oh, Dillon!”
The pressure clutched me and my entire body shook with pleasure. I grabbed his shoulders. My nails dug into his tattoo. I he
ld onto him and reached for that feeling. His fingers slipped inside me as he continued to pulse on my nub.
“Oh, Dillon,” I moaned out around the pleasure.
“Come for me, baby. Come for me, Lane.”
I clutched tight around him and my hips bucked upward into his fingers, and pleasure pulled me over into the edge where I shattered again, and again, and again.
Dillon
She was a virgin. I’d known it from the first kiss. The soft moan. The response to my touch. The open wonder in her eyes. I probably knew of her innocence since the first time I saw her.
Lane lay limp in my arms with her face nestled into my neck. I didn’t deserve her. I would never deserve her, but I’d had to have her, and now that I had, she was mine. My chest filled with a dark need. A possession. No one would touch her but me. No one could ever touch her but me. No one could see the grip of passion on her face, watch her hips roll upward and hear the tremble of pleasure in her voice. Those pleasures were mine now. I pulled my arm tighter around her. Pulled her closer to my side. I was still hard. A deep, throbbing uncomfortableness that wouldn’t release. I’d watched her face as she came and nearly unloaded, but I hadn’t and I ached.
“Lane, you okay?” I put my hand under her chin and tilted her head upward to me.
She nodded but wouldn’t meet my eyes.
“Lane, baby, what’s wrong?”
She shook her head no and then those beautiful blue eyes, the ones I would give my soul to spend a lifetime looking into, met my gaze. She was embarrassed and scared. I watched her emotions glide through her eyes. I pressed my arm tighter around her and pulled her in closer to me. She molded to my side and I could feel the heat and press of her body against mine.
“I’m…” Her words drifted off and her gaze left mine and again she looked down, away from me. “I’ve just never done anything like that before.”
A thick heat coiled deep in my belly. It circled tight around a need to protect, a need to possess. I throbbed with the idea of pushing into a hot and wet Lane, still tight with innocence. A feeling of power coursed through me. A feeling I didn’t deserve Lane, but alongside the power was the deep possession that Lane was now mine.