Losing Me, Finding You(17)

And then Austin is pulling away from me and stepping back, leaving this cool rush of air that's as uncomfortable as it is embarrassing, leaving me open and exposed to the (as of now) empty room. I hear a zipper being pulled and then Austin's rough fingers are grazing my skin, tugging my skirt back into place and spinning me around to face him.

I choke on words that won't come, standing there with my back ramrod straight and my nails still gouging the wood. I know that my eyes must be round as marbles and my lips pursed. I can't seem to move at all anymore, not even to pick up my panties. I watch as my chest rises and falls quickly, like I've just run a marathon or something.

Austin grins at me with his big, white teeth and reaches out to brush away some hair that's gotten stuck to my lips.

Literally, a second later, the doors swing inward and Christy's blonde head appears, mouth set in a questioning 'O'. I try to smile at her, but I can't. I can't even move. All I can do is look at Austin and try not to notice the sheen of sweat on his muscles, the way his sandy hair complements the sun weathered bronze of his skin. I feel … electrified, like maybe I could conduct a whole symphony of energy with my fingers right now. Surreptitiously, I kick my panties under the pool table. Let somebody else find them later and wonder why someone with very tasteful, very dull, laceless, nude panties was back here doing something even G-string wearers rarely do. As the British might say – shagging. In public. Oh bloody hell.

“I was thinking of going,” Christy says, eyebrows bouncing up and down as she tries to signal to me that she wants to leave. “It's getting a little … weird in here. There's some chick dancing on the bar … ” Christy pauses here as if for emphasis. “Shirtless.” I watch Austin's throat as he swallows and then groans, not like he did just a few minutes earlier, but like something Christy said bothered him.

Like a ghost materializing out of thin air, the redhead (Beck was it?) appears behind my friend and slaps a tattooed hand on her shoulder, flashing me knuckles sprinkled with big, blocky letters. HOPE. I wonder briefly what's on the opposite.

“I could walk you, if you want,” he tells her, but already, I'm shaking my head and looking around for my purse. I can't find it anywhere, but I figure it doesn't matter; it didn't have much in it anyway. Well, not much except for poor Adam, but I figure after the time I just spent with Austin, that he might be pretty angry with me anyhow.

“We're fine,” I say, starting to walk away, feeling a curious tickle between my thighs that's one part throbbing, swollen need and two parts aching soreness. It rubs when I walk and feels both wonderful and terrible all at once. I pray that it goes away quickly.

Austin grabs my arm in a vise-grip, squeezing but not hurting. He doesn't want me to go. I stop resisting and look over my shoulder at him, eyes even bigger and wider and rounder than they already were. I imagine that I look something like a deer caught in the headlights with that stare. Austin doesn't seem to mind.

“We're?” he asks, like he doesn't get it. “You're leaving? But you just got here.” He looks perplexed, like he can't figure me out, can't even figure himself out. He doesn't want me to go. I swallow hard and try not to notice the curious way that Christy's staring at me, like she can smell me or something. Oh God, is it that obvious? I wonder, going back to my romance novel knowledge for comfort. Quotes come flying into my brain, unbidden. 'He could smell it on her – sex and lust and longing – like sweat and mangoes ripening in the hot, hot sun.' Lame as said quote is, it begs the question: Can they f*cking (ah, I love you F-word; you are my new best friend) smell me?

I look up at Beck and see that he's looking between me and Austin with a big, fat, perverted grin on his scruffy face. Pardon my language, but he looks like a bit of a whore anyhow, so maybe he has that sense. Clearly, from her next words, I can tell that Christy does not.

“What were you guys doing back here anyway?” she asks, sounding genuinely confused. I open my mouth and blurt out the first thing that comes to mind, just to keep Beck quiet. He'd been about to say something crude; I could tell by shimmer in his green eyes and the laugh lines crinkling up his face. I'm not ashamed of what I've done, but that doesn't mean I want Christy to know yet. Soon, I'll tell her. I'll tell her and I'll tell everyone else because I won't care, because soon, I'm going to be leaving this town for good.

“Just asking a question,” I say nonchalantly. I watch as Austin releases my arm, leaving a tingly spot where his flesh was touching mine. I watch his face, his lips, his eyes, desperate for some sort of hint on the answer to my previous question. How do I join? How do I get a one-way ticket out of here? I had no delusions of grandeur when I came here. This was a desperate ploy at best, and I never expected Austin Sparks to get down on his knees and ask me to marry him, but I do hope that he'll help me. I'd hoped that even before I'd had sex with him – and that was not why I came down here in the first place. It just sort of … happened.

“Give me some time and I'll see what I can do, sugar,” Austin says and I notice that Beck's red eyebrows have climbed halfway up his forehead. Christy glances at Austin and then at me and then over her shoulder with a frown. I hear breaking glass from the area of the bar and use that distraction to move away from Austin. I'm afraid of what might happen if he touches me again, of what I'll do to actually get him to touch me again. Down below, something stirs.