Not terribly far from accurate.
The fucking part, not the figuring it out.
“Um, well—” I stammered.
“You know what? The waiting strategy needs a night off. You have been going a hundred miles an hour for the last year with this fellowship, and you deserve to have fun. What have we told you about losing yourself in work? You earned that drool-bait boy.”
“Yep,” Steph murmured. “Presuming he’s a decent guy and knows how to swing the hammer, don’t talk yourself out of it.”
Absurdly decent, and not even a little manwhorish.
“Of course he knows how to swing the hammer. Just look at her sex hair, Stephanie!”
Steph slapped a hand to Amanda’s lips when Matthew returned, and I shook my head as they swallowed their laughter.
“Hi,” he murmured. He kissed my temple and pressed a glass into my hands.
“Hi.” I glanced at the tumbler and back up at Matthew. I quirked an eyebrow, and he grinned at the pair of cherries floating on top of the ice. And he called me devious and filthy.
“In honor of your first time,” he whispered. “And your second. Anddrinks. And knowing what you need, even when you’d like to tell me otherwise.”
“Tell me Matthew: what do I need right now?”
“You need to spend the night with me. The whole night,” he said. His fingers brushed over the nape of my neck, and I leaned into him. “I wouldn’t be against finding a dark corner in the next five minutes, but you’re a bit of a screamer.”
I laughed and clinked my glass against his beer bottle. “You say that to all the girls?”
“I believe I’ve told you already, sweetness, no other girls. Before I forget…” Matthew retrieved his phone from his pocket and swiped it to life. He handed it to Steph. “Would you?”
She nodded and snapped a few pictures before returning the phone to Matthew. I watched as he scrolled through the images and attached one to an email. He met my inquisitive stare with a smile. “My sister,” he said, gesturing to the phone. “She asked for proof.”
Before I could stop myself, another rendition of Commodore Halsted’s Tales of Evil flew out of my mouth. “That makes me think you’re going to drug me and sell me into the slave trade, and that picture’s for your online auction.”
Matthew glanced at Amanda and Steph, and back at me. “That’s…no. No. My sister, she’s working on her doctorate in Europe. She spends a lot of time around volcanoes and doesn’t have much else in her life.”
“You’ll get used to it,” Steph said to Matthew. “Just wait until you meet her brothers.”
Yeah, that was going to happen right after I told my father I was having sex against walls. And windows. I still didn’t know who that person was or how she came to inhabit my body, although I had to admit, many of her ideas were admirable.
“We have to go mingle,” Amanda said. “In case we don’t see you before you two sneak out…it was very, very nice meeting you, Matthew. It would be awesome to see you again.”
“Enough with those comments,” I murmured, pulling Amanda into a tight hug and rubbing her baby belly. “Take care of this little one.”
Steph brushed her dark hair from her eyes and reached out for a hug. “I know we’ll talk soon, but definitely send me the dates you’re going to be in Chicago next month. I won’t have furniture or food in the house, but we’ll figure it out.”
I watched as they embraced other guests, and knew we would never be this close, this involved in each others’ lives again. And it hurt, a deep ache radiating from my bones. I leaned into Matthew, letting his warmth take the edge off.
“You’re going to Chicago?”
“Yeah,” I said, stalling with a sip of my drink. “It’s conference season, and I’m making a small marathon of it.”
“How does that work, exactly?”
I knew I should have brought it up sooner. Even if this was a one-night stand on steroids, a strange drinks-and-sex arrangement that couldn’t last much longer, I probably should have mentioned the three weeks of travel ahead somewhere along the way. After the window sex, before the wall sex.
“Instead of going to one event and then flying back home for a day or two, I’m filling the time between events with by visiting schools with similar educational philosophies. Conference in San Francisco, then observing at schools in Denver. After that, I’m going to Chicago for a few more schools. New Orleans for another conference the following week.”
“You won’t be back until October.” I nodded and met Matthew’s eyes. “When do you leave?”
