White Ivy(64)

The lights were off in the house. From the porch, the roaring bonfire on the beach looked no larger than a basketball. She made her way up the stairs in the dark. The only light in the hallway came from the crack under Roux and Sylvia’s room. She rapped the door with her fingertips.

Roux did not seem surprised to see her, or if he was, he didn’t show it.

“Packing for tomorrow?” she asked, closing the door softly behind her. On the bed was an open duffel bag half-filled with Roux’s scant belongings.

“I’m leaving now.”

All the thoughts Ivy had been so carefully corralling scattered like ash. “Why?”

“An electrical outage at one of my factories in Brooklyn. I have to assess the damage.”

“You’re going to New York?”

“That’s where Brooklyn is, yes.”

“Right now?”

“Yes.”

“What about Sylvia?”

Roux shrugged. “I told her to get a ride back with you and Gideon.” He spoke in a flat, distracted sort of way, giving the impression of hurrying though he hardly moved. He zipped up his bag and scanned the room before his gaze finally settled on her. “Best of luck with everything,” he said, obviously waiting for her to move out of his way.But she didn’t want to move. She wanted to place herself in his way.

“Don’t you want to know why I came to see you?”

“No, not really.”

“Why didn’t you tell Sylvia what happened between us?”

“What did happen between us?” His apathy was impenetrable.

“Sylvia told me that you knew I’d be here,” said Ivy. “But you pretended to be surprised when you saw me.”

He didn’t answer.

“Did you come here because of me?”

“Everything always revolves around you,” he said coolly. “You and Sylvia have that in common.”

“I was glad to see you again,” she said.

“I must have missed the signs.”

“We used to be good friends.”

“Friends?” He glared at her like one of the Speyers’ gargoyle bookends and dropped his duffel on the floor, both of which seemed like promising signs to Ivy. “Do you even know what happened after you left that summer? I went to your house. Got cursed by your grandmother. Your mom told me to never come near you again. Your dad was there—he had to translate but I got the gist. I was a bad person—I had corrupted you. Isn’t that funny? Parents really don’t know their children at all.” Ivy tried to defend herself—she was out of the country, her parents moved without her knowledge—but Roux snapped, “You could have sent a damn postcard when you returned—Hello, it’s me, Ivy; I’m alive.”

“I didn’t think you cared!” she exclaimed. This was a lie. She knew he’d cared. But it hadn’t mattered to her then.

“Were you actually glad to see me here?”

“Of course I was.” She hesitated. “After all—you were my first. I haven’t even told Gideon that.”

His mouth contracted. “You said I wasn’t.”

“I lied.”

“I lied, too. I want to know.”

“Know what?”

“Why you came here tonight.”

There it was. The voice from her dream. Exhilaration made her legs tremble. She saw clearly now that people could be divided into two categories: those who acted, and those who were acted upon.

She went to him. Roux’s eyes, descending toward her, looked like the scales of a beautiful fish; her heart trembled with pain. He brought his lips to her eyelids, one, then the other, leaving a trail of kisses down her temple to her mouth, softly at first, then, when she bit his bottom lip, he gripped the sides of her neck with both hands and kissed her so hard their teeth mashed together, neither breathing, until they were tearing at each other to get closer—closer! Her hands scrabbled to pull up his shirt. She pressed her palm flat against the center of his belly, feeling his breath rise and fall beneath her hand. He seized her wrists and pushed her hand down on his skin harder, until she could feel the bottom of his rib cage. He made a sound, as if he were in pain, and the noise seemed to signify his total surrender. She knew then that she had pulled him over with the force of her will. The sound set something off inside her: a sticky, inflamed need as her spine dissolved beneath her, a sudden wetness between her legs that made her legs go weak, her eyes falling into the back of her head. He picked her up by the butt cheeks and took two steps backward. They fell back on the bed; she landed on top of him.

With one motion, he pulled off her dress and tossed it to the floor. She straddled him and unclipped her bra herself, flinging it next to the dress. That it wasn’t their first time seeing the other’s body made it more exciting—they didn’t have to go through the introductory motions. He sat up, took her nipple into his mouth. She released a small breath, her fingers pulling his hair away from his scalp until his head drew back and she kissed him again on the lips, then lower, where her teeth sank into his neck. Somewhere along the way, his shorts and boxers disappeared. Their eyes met. She shifted her weight onto her knees; he adjusted her torso over his lap, the mattress creaking underneath them, and then she lowered herself on top of him.

Their heads drew back simultaneously. Ivy let out a hissing noise as she swiveled her hips over his, the tiniest of movements that sent tremors throughout her entire body. She leaned forward and placed her hands over his, then drew them over his head. She squeezed her legs tighter around his hips—any moment now, she would burst—and began rocking front to back. Roux’s mouth was twisted in an oval. She was covered in sweat, her hips slid over his, their skin smacking together and apart, together, then apart. Each time she undulated, she drew a sound from him that filled her belly with a fever to push further, faster, to bring him to the edge of desire and push him off again. She opened her eyes; Roux’s head was lying back on the pillow. His eyes were closed.