I do as he says, stroking my thumb over his slick slit.
He gasps against my mouth. “Oh, fuck. Jordan.”
A moment later, hot liquid spills over my hand. Miles shivers when I twist on the upstroke, and I hear a subtle gasp as I lift his balls, drawing out his pleasure. Our kisses slow, becoming softer. Almost tender.
He finally pulls away and our gazes meet. We’re both sticky with sweat, shaking, and breathing like we just ran a mile, but I couldn’t care less. I’m happy. I’m fuckinghappy.
A crash will come. It always does. But Miles just gave me the biggest anchor of all. I’ll never forget this. Him showing up cracked something open inside me that I wasn’t expecting. He gave me light. He always has, but this? This is unlike anything I’ve felt before. A high I didn’t know was possible.
And it wasn’t even from the sex. It was simply from him showing up at the bar.
Headlights flash down the alley from a car turning into the parking lot. I scramble off him and fumble to find some napkins in the mess. We clean up, then get dressed.
“So,” I drawl with an awkward laugh. “How would you like to meet Clematis now?”
12
MILES
Jordan doesn’t bother with his shirt as we climb back to the front seat, but I do. My skin is on fire. My mind racing. I can still feel his hands everywhere. His lips.
Would the sex have been that good if Jordan could see me? Like,reallysee me? There was light, sure, but not enough for him to see the way my belly hangs or all my stretch marks. Would he still have wanted me if he saw those? I doubt it.
He’s quiet as he drives across the city. It’s forty minutes away from the taco stand, which means he must drive at least half an hour every day to get to work. But Jordan doesn’t seem the type to mind a long commute, as long as he has a book to keep him company.
When we pull into a trailer park, my jaw drops. I don’t know what I was expecting, but it’s not this. This is… upscale. Four jacaranda trees line the drive in, their delicate petals droppingin the breeze. In daylight they’d probably be purple, but in the dark they look like springtime snow. Twinkling lights adorn the perimeter fence, and Narnia-style lampposts line every path.
“This is nice,” I say.
“Yeah, I guess.” He doesn’t sound impressed.
As we pass, I notice an outdoor community fire pit with a circle of Adirondack chairs around it. It looks cozy.
Each RV has their own white gravel lot with more of the wooden chairs, and a few of the RVs have private patios off the front door.
Jordan parks in front of a massive, sleek silver-and-red motorhome at the end of a long row. My eyes widen. It’s way fancier than I expected.
We get out, and Jordan pops the trunk, slinging my backpack over his shoulder before I can grab it. He carries the Ficus plant out too, setting it near a collection of others. We walk together to the front door. A patch of white fur appears in the window, then disappears just as quick. Jordan unlocks the door and gestures me in, giving me a shy and guarded smile.
“Just ignore the mess,” he mutters.
I take a tentative step inside, just as a white cat appears at the landing. Her mismatched eyes get huge when she sees me, back arching in a hiss before she bolts down the hall like an angry cloud.
I frown. So much for winning Clematis over.
“She’ll come around,” he says.
The first thing I notice is the plants. They areeverywhere.Tiny succulents lined up along the windowsills. Snake plants and ZZs lining the kitchen island, several smaller pots scattered in every available space. He even has one of those pink polka-dotted ones I can never remember the name of. A massive pothos is trailing from a macrame hanger in the corner above the longer couch—yes,longer, because there are two. How doesa motorhome even have two couches? I thought they were supposed to be cramped? This isn’t at all. It feels like a small luxury apartment.
“You didn’t tell me you lived in a greenhouse,” I say, touching a few of the plants. I quickly count the ones in the dining and kitchen area and lose track after twenty-seven.
He cracks a smile.
His collection hadn’t felt so big on video, but now I can literally feel his devotion to them. These plants are well loved. They’re thriving. They have names. I even know some of them.
As he peels out of his shoes, Jordan avoids eye contact. He’s all soft edges now. And I get it. We went from meeting each other, to sharing tacos, to having sex in the back of his car in under two hours. I’m not usually that fast either. But Jordan’s presence had been magnetic. Warm and familiar. It hadn’t felt like our first time at all. In fact, it felt like all those video chats had started something special.
Does he feel the same?
