Beach Read(44)

A stupid gasp escaped me at the feel of his chest unyielding against mine, and I ground my hips against his. He braced one hand on the window behind me, and his teeth caught my bottom lip again, a little harder this time. My breaths came fast and shaky as his hand swiped down the car window to my chest, feeling me through my shirt.

I raked my hands through his hair, arched into the press of his hand, and a low, involuntary groan lifted in his throat. He leaned away and flipped me onto my back, and I greedily pulled him over me. A pulse went through me at the feeling of him hard against me, and I tried to will him closer than clothes allowed. That sound rasped out of him again.

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been this turned on.

Actually, I could. It was seven years ago in a frat house basement.

His hand slipped up beneath my shirt, his thumb scraping up the length of my hip bone and seeming to melt it as he went. His mouth grazed hot and damp down my neck, sinking heavily against my collarbone. My whole body was begging him for more without any subtlety, lifting toward him as if pulled by a magnet. I felt like a teenager, and it was wonderful, and it was horrible, and—

He tightened over me as light hit us, as cold and sobering as if someone had dumped a bucket of ice water on us. We sprang apart at the sight of the surly middle-aged woman with the flashlight aimed our way. She had a frizzy triangle of gray hair and a bright blue track jacket screen printed with the BIG BOY BOBBY’S logo.

She cleared her throat.

Gus was still propped up over me with one hand tangled in the hem of my shirt.

“This is a family establishment,” the woman hissed.

“Well, you’re doing a great job.” Gus’s voice was thick and husky. He cleared it again and gave the woman his best Evil smile. “My wife and I were just saying we should bring the kids here sometime.”

She folded her arms, apparently immune to the charms of his mouth. Must be nice.

Gus knelt back onto his heels, and I tugged my shirt down. “Sorry about that,” I said, mortified.

The woman jerked a thumb down the dark, grassy aisle between cars. “Out,” she barked.

“Of course,” Gus said quickly and jerked the tailgate closed, shutting us off from her. I burst out in humiliated, deranged laughter, and Gus turned toward me with a faint smile, his lips bruised and swollen, his hair disastrous.

“That was such a bad idea,” I whispered helplessly.

“Yeah.” Gus’s voice slipped back into its dangerous rasp. He leaned forward through the dark and caught me in one last viciously slow, dementedly hot kiss, his fingers spanning the side of my face. “Won’t happen again,” he told me, and all the sparks awake in my bloodstream fizzled out just a bit.

One time. That was his rule. But did this count? My gut twisted with disappointment. It couldn’t. It had done nothing to satisfy me. If anything, it had left me worse off than before, and from the way Gus was staring at me, I thought he must feel the same way.

The woman banged on the back window, and we both jumped.

“We should go,” Gus said.

I scrambled from the back of the car into the front seat. Gus got out the back door and back into the passenger seat.

I drove us home, feeling like my body was a heat map and everywhere he’d touched, everywhere he looked when he glanced over from the passenger seat, was glowing red.

GUS DIDN’T APPEAR at the kitchen table at noon on Sunday. I figured that was a bad sign—that what had happened had destroyed the only friendship I had in this town. Really, one of only several friendships I had the world over, since Jacques and my couple of friends, it had turned out, had no use for Just Me.

I tried to put Gus out of my mind, to work on the book with singular focus, but I went back to jumping every time my phone buzzed.

A text from Anya: Hey, love! Just wanted to check in. The house would really like to see some initial pages, to give some input.

An email from Pete: Hello! Good news! Your books will be in stock tomorrow. Is there a day this week you could stop by to sign?

An email from Sonya, which I did not open but whose first sentence I could see: Please, please don’t let me scare you off from book club. I’m totally happy to stay home on Monday nights if you’d like to keep …

A text from Shadi: January. Help. I cannot get ENOUGH of that haunted hat. He’s come over the last THREE nights and last night I let him STAY.

I texted her back, You know exactly where this is going. You’re INTO him!!

I HATE falling in love, she replied. It’s always ruining my bad-boy reputation!!

I sent her a sad face. I know, but you must persevere. For the good of the Haunted Hat and so I can live vicariously through you.

Memories from last night flashed across my mind as bright and hot as fireworks, the sparks landing and burning everywhere he’d touched. I could feel the ghost of his teeth on my collarbone, and my shoulder blade was a little bruised from the car door.

Hunger and embarrassment raced through me in one twisted braid.

God, what had I done? I should have known better. And then there was the part of me that couldn’t stop thinking, Am I going to get to do it again?

It didn’t have to mean anything. Maybe this was it: I would finally learn how to have a casual relationship.

Or maybe the deal was off and I would literally never hear from Gus Everett again.

I was out of both cereal and ramen, so after I’d painfully churned out three hundred words, I decided to break for a grocery trip and, on my way out the door, saw that Gus’s car wasn’t in its usual spot on the street. I forced the thought from my head. This didn’t have to be a big deal.