“Where are we going?”
“Turn down this street. There’s a stretch of hotels on this strip.” We drive for a while, circling, theno vacancysigns mocking me at every turn. I pull out my phone and finally find one that lists a last-minute deal for tonight.
The Sunset Cove Resort is one of the nicer places on the island. We pull into the parking lot, and I trudge into the lobby, barely registering our chic beach surroundings. At the front desk, I try and haggle a bit over price, but the tired night clerk won’t budge. It’s more money than I’m used to spending on much of anything, but I pull out my credit card. Jack approaches and throws down his before I can hand mine over. I protest.
“I insist,” he says, signing the receipt and taking my hand to pull me along. I’m too tired to argue.
The room has two queen beds. It’s pretty, a space full of blues and whites, with a balcony facing the ocean. I pull open the sliding glass doors and lean into that surf smell, trying not to let it drag me back into the quicksand of memory.
I can sense Jack behind me. And I feel like I need to say something.
“I’m sorry I dragged you—”
“I volunteered. Nothing to be sorry about.”
“She’s just… I should’ve known. She’s like that.” I hug myself and peer into the dark. “She wasn’t a bad mother. She just… Life disappointed her. Everything disappointed her. So she wanted control.
“And that control was over everything. She practically had me wearing a chastity belt for years. Even little things could end up being a landmine. The outfit you decide to wear to church. The cookies you want to bring to a bake sale. The way you want to do your hair for prom. That could be a war. Every day, normal things could blow up into conflict, and she was relentless. So you learn to avoid them as best you can. To look for triggers. It’s hard to make yourself smaller than you are. To be the stillest version of yourself. It takes effort. Practice. But it’s easier than fighting everything all the time.”
Not “you.”I.I learned to be the stillest version of myself. I wonder if Wendy would be proud of me for noticing, even if correcting myself out loud is a bridge too far.
Jack pulls me back against his chest and gently brushes my hair out of the way, pressing a kiss against the sensitive skin where my neck meets my shoulder. I shiver. We don’t say anything after that, but the mood has shifted. I’m not comfortable in the circle of his arms any longer. I’m a tangle of nerve endings and awareness. Every brush of fabric, every minor shift, sets alarm bells sounding all along my skin. My breathing has picked up.
“You still sporting that chastity belt? Good thing we got two beds in here—”
I turn in Jack’s arms and pull his head down to mine, crushing our lips together, hard. I didn’t know how much I craved this, how much I wanted this, the singing in my veins, until I’m finally feeling it all again. I grab his thick hair in my hand and pull him more firmly to me.
His arms go around me. The ever-combustible air around us has erupted into a conflagration, burning away every rational thought. He spins us, pressing my back up against the glass behind me, and his large hand skims its way up my torso. His tongue tangles with mine.
I run my free hand under his shirt, raking my nails gently down his stomach—God, I’ve been dying to touch that stomach. I run a thumb over his nipples, and real-Jack enjoys it as much as dream-Jack. They wander, my hands, until finally they’re playing with his waistband. I look up at him and dip my fingertips inside. He groans.
I release his hand and waistband, pulling at his shirt, desperate to have it off, and he leans back to let me, snatching it from me and tossing it into the room. He pulls me in, closing the sliding door and locking out the humid sea air.
We stare at each other, breaths chainsawing in and out of both of us. And then I grab him by the waistband of his jeans again, pulling, until his single visible eye, meltingly intense, is inches away. He gathers the material of my tank top into his fist and pulls it down, stretching it until the tops of my breasts are on display. He runs an open mouth from the skin revealed above my bra to my neck. I hear myself moan.
I rip my tank over my head and feel my bra go slack: the magic bra-unhooking maneuver again. I’m impressed, but there’s a shot of green threaded through that feeling. I push away thoughts about how exactly the talent was developed and resolve to enjoy it. But then he’s pulling my bra off, and I’m topless in front of him.
He sucks in air like someone about to be submerged, and I feel my nipples tighten. The way he’s gazing at me. I want to tilt my face to that sun and let it warm me all day, every day. He pulls his eyes from my chest, and I hear his words in my head:You want me. I want you. We like each other. God knows why, but we do.
“You’re the most beautiful—” His voice is strangled.
I feel like a goddess. I am barefoot, bare-chested, clad only in my shorts while Jack Craig worships me with his one good eye. He holds out a hand, and the second I place mine in his, he’s got me pressed up against his chest, skin to skin. The friction of his chest against mine is a pleasure-pain I’ve never felt this intensely before. He stares down at us, at my breasts crushed up against his golden chest, and he bends his head until his forehead touches mine.
“You had an intense day.” He sounds pained. “We’re supposed to be taking this slow. We need to stop…”
“You don’t want to—?”
“Holy shit, Penny.” His laugh is a shuddery thing. “Are you kidding me? You have no idea how many nights I’ve thought of nothing but this. Since way before you and I made nice.”
“You know all that moaning you hear through the wall? It’s because I’ve been dreaming about you.”
I run my hand down the hard angle of him and hear his indrawn breath. He closes his eye and grabs my hand, holding it tight, stilling it.
“Do you still want to be a little bad with me?” I whisper, going up on tiptoe to brush my lips against his cheek, my mind dizzy from the feel of my nipples dragging against his chest.
He picks me up and carries me to the bed after that, and somehow in a tangle of tongues and hands, we both lose our pants along the way. He stands and sheds his boxer briefs, and… Good lord.
My eyes shoot up to his. “I’m— I’m glad I signed you up for that ED literature.”
