“Cool. Can I take this one, too?”
I hesitated. The book had been a gift. It had also sat on my shelf gathering dust for years without so much as a glance from me. “Sure. Of course.”
He gave me a real grin, then, the first of the evening. “Great. Thanks, Miss Kavanagh!”
He let himself out, and I stared for a moment at the empty space the book had left behind before I started cleaning up.
That night I dreamed of a roomful of roses and woke with a gasp, eyes wide open to the darkness. Turning on the light chased it into shadows cowering in the corners of my room but could do nothing for the darkness lingering in my thoughts. I lay in my bed for a few minutes before admitting defeat and reaching for the phone.“House of Hotness.”
I had to smile. “Hi, Luke.”
I’ve never met my brother’s lover. They live in California, a world away from my safe nest in Pennsylvania. Chad doesn’t come home. I hate flying. So far, it’s just never worked out.
We weren’t strangers despite this, and his reply warmed me. “How’s my girl?”
“I’m fine.”
Luke clucked into the phone, but didn’t comment further. A moment later Chad got on the line. He wasn’t so taciturn.
“It’s after midnight there, sweetie. What’s wrong?”
Chad is my younger brother, but you wouldn’t know it by the way he pampers me. I settled further into my blankets and counted the cracks in my ceiling. “Can’t sleep.”
“Bad dreams?”
“Yes.” I closed my eyes.
He sighed. “What’s going on, punkin? Is your mother getting on your case again?”
I didn’t bother pointing out that she was his mother, too. “No more than usual. She wants me to go with her.”
I didn’t have to tell him where. Chad made a disgusted noise, and I had no trouble picturing his expression. It made me smile, which was why I’d called him.
“You tell Puff the Magic Dragon Queen to leave you the hell alone. She can drive her own damn self wherever the hell she needs to go. She should lay off you.”
“You know she can’t drive, Chaddie.”
He launched into a tirade of cursing and colorful insults.
“Your creativity and vehemence leave me in awe,” I told him. “You are truly the master.”
“Do you feel better now?”
“I always do.”
He snorted. “What else is going on?”
I thought of the man I’d met in Sweet Heaven. “Nothing.”
Chad paused to give me time to add more, and when I didn’t, he snorted again. “Ella. Baby. Honey, love muffin. You don’t call me after midnight your time to talk to me about the Dragon Queen. You’ve got something else on your mind. Spill it.”
I love my brother with all my heart, but I wasn’t going to tell him about my sudden lustful fixation on a stranger who favored odd ties and liked black licorice. Some things are too private to share, even with someone who knows all your deepest, darkest secrets. I mumbled something about work and the house, which he seemed reluctant to accept but did, anyway.
The conversation drifted from my pathetic mental state to his work in an elder-care home, his plans to meet Luke’s family, the dog they were considering buying. He had a cozy little life, my brother. A good job. A nice house. A partner who loved and supported him. I relaxed as he talked, my body melting into my bed and sleep beginning to tease me into thinking it might return.
Then he dropped the bomb on me.
“Luke wants to talk about having kids.” His voice had dropped to a whisper.
I might suffer from occasional social awkwardness, but even I know the appropriate response to that announcement is not “What in the holy fuck are you thinking?” but rather “Oh, that sounds nice.”
I didn’t say either one. “What do you want, Chaddie?”
He sighed. “I don’t know. He says I’ll be a great dad. I’m not so sure.”
I didn’t doubt my brother would make a wonderful father. I also knew why he feared the thought. “You have a lot of love in your heart.”
“Yeah, but kids…kids need a lot of…stuff.”
“Yeah.”
We sat in silence for a few moments, separated by distance but connected by emotion. At last he cleared his throat. He sounded more like his usual self when he spoke again.
“We’re just thinking about it. I said we should get a dog first. See how we do with that.”
It was more than I’d ever wanted to commit to, a pet. “You’ll be great, Chad. Whatever you decide, you know I’m here for you.”
“Aunt Ella.” He laughed.
“Aunt Elle,” I corrected.
“Elle,” Chad agreed. “Love you, bunny muffin.”
As far as pet names went, bunny muffin was among the more bizarre. I didn’t quarrel with it. “Love you, too, Chad. Good night.”
We disconnected and I settled back onto my pillows, my mind whirling with his news. A child? My brother…a father?
I fell back to sleep with visions of laughing babies in my head, which was marginally better than the dreams of red roses.
Friday came faster than I’d expected. I’d never been to The Blue Swan, but it was everything Marcy had said. More an intimate-coffee-shop setting with a dance floor than a dance club, it featured a steady pulse of electronic dance music, soothing blue lights and soft couches, an interesting array of drinks and stars scattered across the black-painted ceiling.Marcy introduced me to her new beau, Wayne. He looked like the junior executive he was, complete with a hundred-dollar haircut and trendy designer tie, plain, without skulls and crossbones. He shook my hand and, to give him credit, did not overtly check out my breasts. He even bought my first margarita.
Marcy grinned. “Planning on getting wild, Elle?”
“Ah, one drink’s not a big deal. Not everyone’s a lush like you, babe.” What might have been condescending sounded fond from Wayne, his arm outstretched along the bench behind her to toy with the long, curling strand of her hair. “Trust me, Elle, we’ll be carrying Marcy out of here.”
Marcy made a face and nudged him, but didn’t look displeased. “Don’t listen to him.”
“Hey, so long as it gets me laid,” Wayne said, “I don’t care how drunk you get—”
She slapped him in earnest this time. “Hey!”
She sent me an apologetic glance, but I shrugged, not as embarrassed as I think she expected. The fact was, I liked drinking too much to be a hard drinker. I liked the oblivion, the way a few drinks softened the edges of my mind and chased away even the ever-present need I felt to count, catalog and calculate.
Alcohol is the noose with which my father keeps trying to hang himself. I understand why he does it. He is, after all, married to my mother. Now, retired and in his sixties, drinking is my father’s career and hobby all in one. Maybe it’s his shield. I don’t know. We don’t talk about it. We aren’t the only family with a white elephant in the living room, but who ever cares about anyone else’s family when their own is the one they have to live with?
“So, you work with Marcy?” Wayne earned points for what appeared to be sincere interest.
“Yes. She’s in public accounting and I’m in corporate, but we both work for the same company.”
Wayne grinned. “Me, I’m in murders and executions.”
“Wayne!” Marcy rolled her eyes. “He means—”
“Mergers and acquisitions. I got it.”
Wayne looked impressed. “You know American Psycho.”
“Sure.” I sipped my drink.
“Wayne thinks he’s Patrick Bateman,” Marcy explained. “Aside from that pesky bad habit of slicing up prostitutes with a chainsaw.”
“Well,” I said carefully, watching him, “nobody’s perfect.”
His smile rewarded me, and then he laughed. “Hey, Marcy, I like your friend.”
She looked at me. “Me, too.”
Sometimes you share a moment with someone that has
nothing to do with where you are, or what you’re doing. Marcy and I giggled, girly in a way I wasn’t used to but enjoyed nevertheless. Wayne looked at us, back and forth, until he shook his head with a shrug at our feminine absurdity.
“To murders and executions,” he said with a lift of his beer. “And to all things materialistic and shallow.”
We toasted his words. We drank. We talked, though much of what we said had to be shouted over the music. I relaxed, letting the alcohol and music loosen my tense shoulders.
“It’s my turn,” I protested when Wayne made to order one more round of drinks.
He held up his hands. “I’m not gonna argue. My mama told me a woman’s always right. You go right on ahead, Miss Kavanagh, and buy the next round. I’m comfortable enough in my masculinity to accept a woman’s generosity.”
“Oh, ho ho,” said Marcy. “You mean you’re drunk enough you don’t feel like getting up to go to the bar.”
Wayne grinned and pulled her close for a kiss that made me feel like a voyeur. “That, too.”
That was my cue to leave them for a few moments. I needed to stand, anyway, to gauge my own level of inebriation. Two drinks took me a lot farther than they had three years ago.
A space opened up at the bar as I approached, and the bartender gave me his immediate attention. I knew he was paid to flirt as much as he was to mix drinks, but his smile still flooded me with warmth. I’m no more immune to my sense of self being reflected in the light of another’s esteem than any other woman. I smiled back and ordered two more beers and a bottle of water for myself.
“She doesn’t want that. Get her a shot of Jameson.”
I didn’t turn to face the voice that had haunted me for the past three weeks. I nodded at the ’tender waiting my approval, and he slid the shot glass toward me without another word.
“Hi,” said the man from Sweet Heaven, and I turned.
“Hi.”
The crowd had grown as the night wore on, and now it jostled us closer. He looked down at me, his smile bemused. In the blue neon light his eyes looked darker than I remembered.
“Fancy meeting you here.”
My fingers curled around the shot glass, but I didn’t lift it. “Yes.”
His gaze traced the lines of my face; I felt his look as if it was a touch. Someone pushed toward the bar behind him, nudging him forward another inch. He reached to grab my arm just above the elbow, so the sudden impact didn’t make me stumble. He didn’t let go.
“Aren’t you going to drink that?” He nodded toward the shot without taking his eyes from mine.
“I’ve reached my limit.”
More people pushed to the bar behind each of us, pressing us together. His hand slid down my arm to rest on the curve of my waist. A touch so casual anyone watching would assume we’d known each other for years. A touch so blatant it made my breath catch.
“So, you’re a good girl.”
Another man who’d called me a girl would have earned a stomp to his foot and maybe the drink in his face. For him, my mouth curved. Closer we drew, magnets attracting, one to one, without the pressure of the people around us.
“Depends on your definition of good.”
His fingers splayed against my side, his thumb drifting back and forth along the smooth fabric of my shirt. “Are you flirting with me?”
“Do you want me to?”
“Do you want to do what I want?” My pulse pounded at his question, murmured directly into my ear.
We’d already aligned thigh to thigh, belly to belly. If I turned my head, our mouths would be close enough to kiss. His breath caressed my ear and the slope of my neck exposed by my upswept hair.
I nodded. “Yes.”
“I want you to drink that shot.”
I did without a second protest. It burned in my gut and shot liquid fire through every vein. He hadn’t moved anything but his hand, which now lingered at my lower back, keeping me tight against him though the crowd at the bar had eased a bit and there was no longer a need for us to remain so close together.
“Take down your hair.”
A command, but voiced as a request, and I reached to undo the clip holding it on top of my head. Released, it tumbled over my shoulders and halfway down my back. It brushed his face, still so close to mine.
“Dance with me.”
He pulled back to look into my eyes, his smile less bemused and his gaze brighter. Hungrier. He didn’t move his hand.
“Is that…what you want?” My hesitation sounded coy, and I hadn’t meant it to. I’d meant to sound sultry, to play the game.
He nodded, solemn. His eyes stared into mine, hard, and I could see nothing else. Could feel nothing else but the spots on my body where his body touched.
“That’s what I want.”
I gave him what he wanted. The dance floor, even more crowded than the bar, left little room for maneuvering, but most people weren’t really dancing. Bouncing up and down in time to the rhythm, maybe, and wiggling, but not dancing.
He took me by the hand, fingers laced, and put us in the center of the dance floor. One step, and he drew me close to him. Another, and his hands fit my waist like they’d been made to match my curves. Three steps and his thigh slid between mine. These points of connection grounded me, kept me tethered.
There could be no talking here, for even a shout would’ve been difficult to hear above the pounding throb of the music. The bass thumped its pulse in the pit of my stomach, the hollow of my throat, my wrists, between my thighs. The crowd surged around us like the ocean against rocks, parting and retreating to return in the next instant, surrounding us. It pressed in on us as the song changed and brought more dancers onto the floor.
He wasn’t smiling anymore, like this was serious business. Like he could see nothing else around us, like his world had narrowed to only me. I shivered at the look.
When he put his other hand on my side, up high, just under my breast, I startled but had no place to go. No retreat. I looked up, into his eyes, those light-and-dark eyes, and lost myself in them.
We moved together, and my hand slid from his shoulder to cup the back of his neck. The edges of his sandy hair tickled my knuckles. The heat of his hand branded me through my blouse. Heat flared, too, in my belly where it rubbed against his groin.
It had been a long, long time since I’d danced with anyone, an eternity since I’d had a man’s hands on me, since I’d seen my own desire reflected in another’s gaze. It stole my breath and drew my tongue out to lick my lips. The motion caught his attention the way a cat will watch a mouse.
His hand slid up my back to tangle in my hair, tip my head back, bare my throat to his mouth as he bent to slide his lips along my skin. I felt myself gasp but couldn’t hear it. He pulled me closer, and I gave in to his whim.
The crowd had become one body moving to the music’s sensual beat. One entity with us in the center of it, pressed so close I could no longer be certain where I ended and he began. His hand slid up to embrace my breast through my blouse. I blinked and saw nothing but his face shadowed with blue and green, the colors pulsing in time to the rhythm.
Nobody watched us. Nobody saw. We had become part of something bigger and yet remained separate from it. The couple next to us kissed, their tongues tangling as their hands stroked and kneaded each other. The dance floor had become an orgy of lust. I smelled it, tasted it, saw it reflected in his eyes and knew he saw it in mine. The song changed again, blending into the previous one without break.
Bodies all around us pressed us together. Sweat slid down my spine and shone on his forehead. Everything had become heat and beat.
His cock pressed hard against my belly. The sensation parted my lips in silent reaction, and his gaze watched my mouth again, his expression tense, as though he was in pain.
It wasn’t pain that thinned his mouth. I knew it by the way his jaw tightened when another surge of the crowd rocked me against his body. The hand on my ass splayed, then stroked upward to
reach the small of my back, then down again to caress and press me against his erection.
I was lost. Lost in his eyes, in his touch, in the pounding pulse of music and lust. Lost in my own desire, which I’d denied for so long and now could no longer fight.
I saw the shift in his gaze and knew the exact moment when he recognized my reaction. If he’d smiled smugly or leered, I’d have fled. Instead, his eyes narrowed slightly, and his expression became a mixture of determination and helpless admiration. He looked at me as though he didn’t care if the song ever stopped or if he never looked at another woman again.
His hand slid down my hip to my thigh. His fingers caught the hem of my skirt, inching it up as we danced, until he could slip his hand beneath it. He cupped me, the heel of his hand pressed against my clit on the outside of my panties.
The crowd moved us, so he no longer had to. The hand on my rear kept me secured close to him. Another shift of the crowd, and his fingers moved to dip inside the lacy edge of my panties and find my slick heat.
His eyes widened so slightly only someone staring into them as I was could have noticed. His lips parted in an unheard gasp or groan. My body jerked as his flesh came in direct contact with mine, and a groan tore from my throat.
His fingers teased my folds before gliding up to caress my clit. If not for the support of his hand and the crowd crushing us on all sides, I’d have stumbled. The touch speared straight to my core. My fingers gripped his shoulder in a sudden, tight hold, and his gaze flicked there as he winced. I’d hurt him but could do nothing about it. Every stroke he gave my clit made my fingers dig involuntarily into him.
Now he looked determined, admiring and quizzical, but the last passed in a moment as he circled my tight nub and watched the reaction I couldn’t hide. Now he looked…honored, was the only way I could think to describe it, if I could do any thinking at all, which was becoming impossible.
Everything had become this man. His hand. His eyes. His cock, still pressing on my hip and now throbbing, hard, hot. He licked his lips, and my clit pulsed in immediate response beneath his fingers.