“I don’t think I could ever imagine that without imagining the marriage, first.”
She smiled. “I’m slightly shocked you even believe in marriage.”
“Didn’t say I did. Hell, I dunno. The wine’s working.” He took an unsanctioned drink.
“Whose turn is it?” she asked.
“Yours.”
She tapped her lips with the rim of the cup. “Never have I ever made a sex tape. That I know about.”
Daniel didn’t drink. “Never have I ever...had sex with a woman I love.”
She frowned, feeling clouded. Feeling confused by that statement, disappointed, sad and strangely relieved. “You said you’ve been in love, though.”
He nodded.
“Oh. Was it unrequited then?”
He drank, seemingly in the affirmative.
She cocked her head. “Was it recent?”
The bottle stayed where it was.
“While ago... Ooh, was it high school?”
He brought the bottle to his lips.
“Oh, wow!”
“Jesus, calm down.”
“No way. Okay, let’s see... Was it someone in our class?”
Another drink, and the wine was nearly gone.
She dredged her memory for likely girls. Cool, tough ones that fit Daniel. “Was it Michelle Sobiari?”
Nothing.
“Was it one of the burnout girls? Like Amanda Duffy, or that one with the dreadlocks and the ear stretchers?”
More nothing.
“Was it one of the popular girls?”
He hesitated, but didn’t drink.
“So not totally unpopular. Right, who’s the exact opposite of you? Oh. Nicole Pelletier? Or the girl who won all the debate things, Jamie something. Or—”
“Jesus Christ, Carrie. Shut up already.”
She started, taken aback. He’d gone from nearly fun to mean again in a breath, eyes cold. Apparently drinking really did crank his jerk dial to eleven. She shivered.
“Fine. Sorry.” Annoyed, she drained her cup and left the bed to toss it in the little trash can next to the bureau. She crouched by the door to unzip her suitcase and dug for her toothbrush and paste.
A word she didn’t think she’d ever heard Daniel say drifted softly through the room behind her. “Sorry.”
“It’s not like you didn’t warn me.” She shut off the TV on her way to the bathroom. “I’m setting my alarm for six.”
“Carrie.”
She took a deep breath and then turned to meet his stare. What on earth had she expected? That they’d bond or something? “It’s fine. Sorry I upset you. I thought we were having fun...and you’re really hard to read.”
“I know.”
“Let’s just get some sleep. You want some water, so you don’t wake up totally hung over?”
A pause. “Sure. Please.”
She went into the bathroom and peeled the plastic off one of the cups by the taps. She filled it and padded back into the main room, finding Daniel sitting at the end of the bed, hands clasped between his knees. He accepted the cup. “Thanks.”
“Sure. My fault if you wake up feeling gross, really.”
She was about to step away when his warm, rough fingers circled her wrist. Her heart stopped. Limply, she tried to tug her hand away. “What?”
“I’m not sure if I’m drunk or not,” he said, holding her stare. “But I’m going to say I am and blame this on the wine.”
“Blame what on—”
“It was you. I was in love with you. In high school.”
A deep numbness consumed her body from soles to crown, chased by a hum of rushing chemicals—hormones or adrenaline, she couldn’t say which. “You what?”
He let go of her wrist. “You heard me.”
“I don’t care. Say it again.”
“I was in love with you.”
“But you hated me. Didn’t you?”
“I hated everything but you. And Matt,” he allowed, breaking their eye contact.
“Whoa.”
“Like I said, I’m probably drunk.”
“That’s...okay. I need to.... Excuse me.” She turned, marched to the bathroom and shut herself inside.
5
“IDIOT. IDIOT, IDIOT, IDIOT.” Daniel thumped his forehead with the butts of his fists. Rubbed his temples. Stared at his bare feet on the mangy carpet. Christ, if only he could leave. Except stranding Carrie in the middle of the Rogue Valley in an ice storm was definitely more of a jerk move than making her uncomfortable with the world’s most awkward love proclamation.
Past tense. He’d told her he’d loved her in high school. And that was true, right? He didn’t love her now. Drinking games aside, he didn’t know her now. So, how could he—
He froze, watching the bathroom door open and the light inside go dark. He stayed where he sat at the end of the bed, unable to move. She didn’t look at him, just walked to her side and tossed one of the hoarded pillows back to his.
“Sorry,” he offered, speaking mainly to the hot tub, perhaps the spider. He wasn’t brave enough to meet her eyes.
She said nothing at first, stoically folding her glasses and setting them on the nightstand. “That was ages ago... Though, tell me this. Was that why Matt left me? Did you tell him something awful to get him to dump me, thinking I’d run to you instead?”
He huffed a soft laugh. “Yeah. Like you would’ve ever left him for me.”
“What did you say to him, Daniel?”
He swallowed, throat aching. “I told him I thought I was in love with you.”
A pause. “And what did he say?”
“I don’t want to tell you.”
Her smile was dry. “Well, consider it the fine you owe me for making everything awkward.”
“At first...we fought. Almost physically. And I told him I knew you’d never want to be with me over him. That I’d only told him because it was eating away at my insides. I felt like, how could I feel all this for my best friend’s girlfriend? I’m such a shit. Maybe I wanted him to take a swing at me. I thought, maybe, that’d make going our separate ways after high school easier—him to college, me to whatever. If we ended it on a fight, I could tell myself I didn’t care.”
“So, why’d he dump me?”
His heart twisted, throat dry and sore, and he spoke to his hands. “He was going to dump you anyway after graduation. That’s what he told me after it happened, when I asked if I’d fucked it all up for you guys.”
“Oh.”
“We had that big blowup, and I guess maybe he felt shitty after, for dragging it out with you. Or maybe guilty, because what I felt for you... It had faded, for him. I don’t know. But it sure as hell wasn’t to free you up to date me. Neither of us believed for a second you’d ever want that.”
She was silent, and he found the nerve to turn and make eye contact. He couldn’t read her face, for once. Normally, it was easy. Whatever she felt was written right there. Happy, sad, angry, embarrassed. But the chalkboard was blank.
Whatever she’s feeling, it can’t be great.
He stood and skirted the bed, and stretched out on his side on top of the covers.
“You’ll be cold like that.”
He shrugged, shoulders swishing over cheap satin.
Carrie switched off the lamp, and they laid for ten minutes or more in a pathetic charade of sleep. He could hear her breathing as surely as she could hear him. Neither was anywhere close to relaxed. Didn’t help that he was all punchy from the sugar, head spinning slightly from the alcohol. Coherent thoughts were about as easy to catch a hold of as gnats.
In barely a whisper, she asked, “Are you awake?”
“Of course I am.”
/>
“What are you feeling?”
“I dunno. I never know what I’m feeling. Stupid, maybe. Or creepy. What are you feeling? Pissed?”
“It was thirteen years ago. I don’t know that I feel much of anything except surprised. And relieved.”
“Oh?”
“I always imagined you must have told him some nasty lie about me or something.”
“Never. There’s nothing nasty to be said about someone like you.”
“That’s one man’s opinion. But, in all honesty, I think it’s kind of sweet.”
Daniel sighed. So the last thing he wanted to hear. That his only experience loving a woman was quaint and adorable. Plus it hadn’t been sweet. Who lusted and ached after their best friend’s girlfriend? It had been ugly, made him feel shitty and jealous and wound up and crazy. And, at times, euphoric. The nice-feelings equivalent of the rush he got standing in the path of a wildfire. “Great.”
“I had feelings for someone in high school, too.”
“Duh.”
“Not Matt,” she said evenly. “Someone else. While I was with Matt.”
“Oh. Wish I’d known that then. Might’ve wrecked my crush on you.”
“It ate me alive, too. I kept waiting for it to go away, but it never did. I felt so guilty about it, that Matt was so great, yet he didn’t seem right. Or like, enough. I almost broke up with him, too. You could say he beat me to it.”
“Oh?”
“No one had ever told me you could love one guy and still be turned on by other ones.”
He turned that around in his head. “Guys get told that sort of crap, too. About which kinds of girls are just for sex, versus the one magical woman you marry, and who’s too good for you to want to do nasty things with.”
“Ugh. Why do we feed ourselves that bullshit?”
“I never bought into it. I always thought, why wouldn’t I want to marry the woman who makes me feel that the most? Why wouldn’t I want to do those nasty things with my wife more than anybody else?”
Carrie laughed softly in the dark. “I’m with you there. I’d be really pissed if I married some guy and found out he used up all the really hot sex with all these skanks who came before me. Maybe I want to be his one, most special skank. A skank for keeps.”
Daniel snorted. “Yeah. I always thought that was a crock.”
“I wish I’d known the whole having-feelings-for-two-people-at-once-is-unforgivable thing was bull back then. I’d have beaten myself up about it a lot less.”
“And gotten to be with that guy you liked more than Matt.”
“I don’t know if I liked him more.... Just differently. He made me feel such different things than Matt did.” She laughed. “Matt was the marrying kind.”
“Who was your skank, then?”
“Someone I never could have been with.”
“Was he dating someone, too?”
“No. He was just off-limits.”
“Oh,” he said. “Not like...not like a teacher or something?”
“What? Ew.”
“Just asking.”
“Anyway, I couldn’t have been with the other guy. End of story. I was tempted to break up with Matt just so I wouldn’t have to feel guilty about it anymore.”
“Wish I could have turned off how guilty I felt all the time,” Daniel murmured. “From how I felt about you.”
“That’s so strange.”
He frowned, unseen. “I don’t think it’s strange. Then again, I couldn’t imagine why everyone wasn’t in love with you. I thought you were amazing.” And it was just as amazing that he was even saying these things. Amazing and oddly calming. Freeing.
“I never, ever would have guessed,” she said. “I was positive you hated me.”
“You remember those stupid parties at Jenny Holmes’s house, every year when her parents went to the Bahamas?”
“Stupid? I think you mean the awesomest parties of all time.”
“Those ones. Where the cool people always wound up in that basement rec room, playing Spin the Bottle.”
“And you were always too cool for the so-called cool people,” she said. “I don’t think I ever once saw you play.”
“Like any of the girls would’ve wanted to kiss me.”
“That’s not true. Girls can’t resist a bad boy.”
He smirked. “I didn’t wear a leather jacket and have a tattoo, Carrie. I was just an asshole.”
“Trust me. You would’ve been well received.”
“I think I was afraid of how you’d react if I played and you got stuck kissing me. Or if your friends would’ve teased you. Maybe that’s why I acted like I thought it was all too stupid to bother with.”
“You acted like everything was stupid.”
He chewed on that. “Yeah, I did. I’ve never been good at admitting I care about stuff.”
“How come?”
“Because if you do, then you have to admit it hurts if you can’t have it. Or if it goes away.” Goddamn, stupid wine, letting his feelings leak out. He felt a sting in his sinuses and immediately fought to get ahold of himself.
They were silent for a long time, Daniel staring at the stripe of sallow parking lot light painted across the far wall.
Carrie broke the silence. “I wouldn’t have given a shit what the other girls thought if I’d kissed you. And if you’d been good at it, I’d have told them so.”
He smiled at that. “I always liked that about you. That you could’ve been one of the popular girls so easily, but even at sixteen, or whatever, you already knew it was bullshit.”
“You’re giving me way too much credit.”
“You could have been the queen of our school. Easy.”
“I don’t know about that. But if there was any reason I didn’t become one of the popular crowd, it wasn’t because I thought it was dumb. It probably was because it looked like too much work. You had to look good all the time—makeup and hair, and cute shoes or whatever. Running isn’t compatible with any of those things, and I liked running more than I ever wanted people to like me.”
“You know, I only smoked for an excuse to stand around under the bleachers and watch you at track practice.”
No reply. Shit. Shit, shit, shit. How much of a stalker could you sound like?
“Sorry,” he added. “That probably came out creepy.”
“Nah. Just...surprising.”
“You’d have thought it was creepy back then, though. If you’d known.”
“You don’t know that.”
He laughed sadly. “I’m pretty sure you’d have sided with Matt on that. And I’m pretty damn sure he’d have disapproved.”
She didn’t answer.
“Guess that’s enough truth for one night,” he said. “We should probably get to sleep.”
And he thought he could sleep, now. He still felt foolish but also relieved. And it wasn’t as if he’d expected this little confession to be received with enthusiasm or for Carrie to echo his feelings. There was no disappointment to suffer. If anything would change, it’d be that this woman wouldn’t have to go forward assuming he’d disliked her back then. Not that she’d likely think of him at all in a few weeks...
Ouch.
“’Night, Baxter,” he said, and rolled over.
“Good night, Barber.”
6
CARRIE DIDN’T THINK she’d ever felt quite what she was feeling now—no longing even half this deep. So deep it hurt. She wanted to turn over, to reach out, to wrap herself around Daniel and feel his body against hers. To kiss him and taste her own desire mirrored in him. To slide her hand low and find him excited—hard from wanting her. Flushed and thrumming, exactly how she felt between her thighs.
Fear held
her back. Fear that if she made the leap and bridged the gap, he’d clam up, his muscles being the only part of him growing hard as he locked her out, shut himself down. But she didn’t know if fear could hold her back much longer. Fear froze, but desire burned. And everyone knew which would win in a fight between ice and fire.
She’d willed him to press her for the identity of the boy she’d liked as much as Matt, but he hadn’t. She didn’t know how to make such an announcement now that the conversation had petered out. She only knew what her body wanted to say to him. And she’d always trusted her body above her brain—it was her physical self that kept her mental one in check, after all.
So, after ten minutes of dead silence, she turned things over to instinct.
He was lying on his side facing away from her, on top of the covers. Carrie was beneath them, but she rolled over, edging herself up against his back. He wasn’t asleep, or wasn’t anymore. He froze as she pressed the fronts of her legs along the backs of his through the tangle of covers. With a guilty thrill, she rested her nose against his warm, hard shoulder and breathed him in.
“Are you awake?” he whispered.
She wrapped her arm around his middle, hand at his ribs and her forearm against his hard belly. “Yeah.”
“What are you doing?”
“I’m spooning you. Forwardly.”
“Because you’re drunk?”
“I don’t feel drunk.” She felt a lot of things just now, but impaired was not among them.
“Is this a pity spooning?”
“It was you,” she murmured, and pressed her lips to the collar of his tee. The soft hair at the nape of his neck tickled her nose.
“What was me?”
“You were the boy I wanted so bad that I knew I’d have to break up with...him.” She couldn’t say the name anymore. He had no place in whatever might come next.
Daniel’s body was as rigid as wood. “You’re just saying that.”
“No, I’m not.”
“I know you. You’re just saying that so I won’t feel like an asshole for telling you what I did.”
Wild Holiday Nights: Holiday RushPlaying GamesAll Night Long Page 11