3
Tate
We were sitting at our gate at LAX, waiting for our flight from LA to Seattle to board. The past month had flown by—literally—and we were finally beginning our break. Aerie was standing at the window, watching the planes come and go, her phone pressed to her ear, chatting animatedly to someone. I wasn’t sure whom. Which was unusual.
I had my iPad out, catching up on last-minute social media, posting about our upcoming period of complete radio silence, dealing with fan emails and bloggers and Instagram comments. Aerie typically handled this stuff—the social media bullshit. I hate it, personally. I’m the live-and-in-person sort, the one who schmoozes at parties and charms ad managers and does live stream Q-and-A videos and all that, while Aerie answers messages and PMs and DMs and responds to comments. But she was on the phone, so the job fell to me.
God, I was looking forward to unplugging in Ketchikan.
I dreamed about Corin, last night. He was shirtless and we were at the beach together.
It was like a dream I had about Corin years ago. We’d spent the day at the beach together, Aerie and I in matching bikinis, which were super crazy revealing and made us feel all grown up and sexy, and that was the first time I’d ever noticed either of the boys looking at us like not just girls and their best friends, but as women, with women’s bodies. They couldn’t keep their eyes off of us, and Corin in particular kept staring at me, and I’d catch him and he’d look away.
It was also the first time I remember looking at them as men, as objects of attraction. Up until then, they were just Cane and Cor, the boys. The twins. But that day at the beach, they were wearing these super low-slung board shorts which showed off their V-cuts, and their abs were all shredded and their arms were veiny and muscular and they were so fucking sexy I couldn’t handle it, because it was Cane and Cor, the boys. But they weren’t just the boys, anymore. They were men. And I’d kept staring at Cor, at the bulge in the front of his board shorts, and wondering what those shorts hid, and maybe even possibly daydreaming about finding out.
Later that night, I’d had a dream about Corin, and finding out what those shorts hid. Of course, being sixteen, my experience had been limited and so the dream had conveniently glossed over the actual dimensions of his cock, since I’d never seen his, and only had messed around with a couple other guys at that point and hadn’t gone all the way yet. The dream had then jumped forward from him dropping those sexy-ass board shorts to us being naked together in the dark, and he was all around me and I was touching him, feeling him, and he was making sexy desperate little sounds. I’d woken up just before he’d come, which had left me wildly frustrated.
I had glanced at Aerie, asleep across the room, and then had slipped my fingers between my thighs and made myself come, not once, not twice, but three times.
While thinking about Corin Badd the whole time.
I’d felt utterly bizarre about it, too. Conflicted. Disturbed. Confused. He was my best friend. And Corin and Aerie were always tighter than Corin and me. We’d all go out together, and Corin and Aerie would sit together on one side of the booth and Canaan and I would sit on the other. If we shared popcorn and a Coke, it would be Aerie and Corin sharing, and Canaan and me. Conversations would flow naturally between Canaan and me, and Corin and Aerie. We’d all talk and it would often be unintelligible chaos to anyone else, but to us it was just…us; only us always meant me and Cane, and Aerie and Cor.
And the dream last night was about him again. Similar situation, him shirtless, and me thirsty for him. Only…in the dream last night we were adults, and his gaze was hungry and knowing, as if he knew I wanted him. And planned to do something about it. It wasn’t just an innocent, teenage wet dream short on details. It had been…very lucid.
Aerie was done with the phone call now, and was prancing across the waiting area to where I was sitting. She was wearing a plaid miniskirt that came almost to mid-thigh, teasing anyone who looked at her with any hope that she’d move just so and the skirt would fly up. With it she wore a simple white V-neck T-shirt and no bra—it was chilly in the airport so her nipples were standing out. She wore basic black flats to complete the outfit, with a Tory Burch watch and a slim Prada clutch. Her hair was loose as usual, brushed to a shine and curled into loose spirals.
I was wearing a tight, fire-engine red romper, the shorts portion just barely covering the lower swell of my butt. The top had a full length and wide-open V-neck which I’d had to tape so my tits didn’t fly out. But hell, it was a hot look. I had killer black heels and a few bangles on my wrists and a chunky black necklace to match the heels, a thin strap clutch-size purse, and my hair braided and draped over one shoulder. We’d both gone minimal with makeup, just a bit of concealer and blush and a pop of color on our lips.
This was the first day of the rest of our lives and we were determined to celebrate by wearing something totally unlike what we’d probably end up wearing in Ketchikan day to day.
Aerie pranced—she never prances—across the gate waiting area and draped herself into the chair beside me; she sat for a moment, and then, as was her habit whenever we had a few moments of downtime, she took her ukulele out the case and leaned back in the chair, picking at the strings idly.
“Who was that?” I asked her.
“Who was who?” she responded, examining her fingernails.
“On the phone, you turd. Don’t play dumb with me.”
“Oh. That was Corin.”
I felt a strange bolt of something hot and sharp running through me which, if I didn’t know better, and it wasn’t utterly moronic, I’d have said was jealousy.
“Corin, huh?” I tried to sound casual and unaffected, and mostly succeeded. “He called you?”
She shrugged. “I called him, actually.”
“You did?”
She wasn’t looking at me, which I found odd. “By accident.”
“You called Corin…by accident?” I couldn’t help sounding skeptical.
She nodded. “I meant to call Canaan, but I hit the wrong number. Their phone numbers are, like, only different by a single digit. I thought I was talking to Cane at first, too, but when I referenced a meme I emailed him yesterday, he was totally clueless.”
I blinked, because her explanation didn’t quite add up. “Aerie,” I said, sounding a lot like a disbelieving parent.
She eyed me. “What?”
“Are you…are you lying…to me?”
She huffed. “Fine. I called Corin on purpose.”
“Why?”
She flicked a French manicured fingernail at me. “I was curious to see how you’d react if I did.”
“What? Why?”
She grinned wickedly. “Because you like Corin, and you want him for yourself. And you’re jealous that I talked to him on the phone.”
“I am not!” I yelled, a little too loudly.
“Now who’s lying, T?”
I groaned, sinking lower in the chair. “Fine. I’m jealous. But it’s weird, and I don’t like it, and this whole thing is messed up.” I whacked her on the bicep with my phone. “You’re a bitch.”
“I know.” She whacked me on the shoulder. “Really, though, I didn’t actually call him just to make you jealous. Although it’s funny that it did.”
I laughed. “What’d you talk about, then?”
“Oh, this and that.”
“Aaaa…”
“T?”
“What’d you talk about?”
She laughed, a tinkling little giggle. “Just letting him know we were about to board our plane soon.”
“I already texted Corin and Canaan with our gate info, you dork.”
“Oh.” She shot a glance at me. “So, um…full disclosure? I really did call Corin by accident, but it was a couple days ago. And we ended up talking for a few minutes.”
“I see,” I said, hating the weird sting I felt for a lot of reasons. “And what did you talk about then?”
She shrugged. “Oh, I just bored him stupid with East Coast gossip. He was…cool, with me. Like, a little distant. And, in related and also interesting news that I forgot to share with you—did you know Baxter is in a relationship with Evangeline du Maurier?”
“What? You’re shitting me!”
“No! For real. I’ve heard rumblings from the Yale crowd that she’d turned down several proposals from Thomas Haverton, of all people.”
“Who in their right mind would accept a proposal from that pretentious, philandering douche-waffle?” I said. “He’s horrible.”
“I know, right? Apparently her parents and his are lifelong friends, and Thomas has always been after Evangeline, and she keeps turning him down. Which, good for her, I say, because Thomas may be richer than Midas, and have an absurdly perfect jawline, but he’s vain and arrogant and egotistical and a chauvinist besides. Her life would be a living hell if she ever married him.
“He hit on me once at a fundraiser on the Upper East Side, even though he’d been there with a different woman, who was not Evangeline. Shady, shady, shady.” She waved a hand indicating she had more info on this topic.
“Anyway, I was emailing with Trina MacCauley who knows literally everyone and always has all the gossip. Well, guess what she told me?” And without waiting for an answer from me she said, “Thomas and Evangeline are suddenly getting married. Evangeline vanished recently, I guess, so her father was having all of Manhattan and Beverly Hills torn apart looking for her, because she apparently just…poof, vanished, and nobody could find her.
“And Corin was talking about how their brother Baxter, the avowed bachelor and über-player, had met this hoity-toity East Coast princess type he was calling Eva, who had told a story about strict parents and a jerk she knew named Thomas. Sounding familiar?
“So, yeah, dear spoiled Evangeline had somehow ended up in Ketchikan of all places. She ran into Baxter, and they had a thing. But then I hear from Trina that the du Maurier’s have rented out the Wadsworth, and Thomas and Evangeline are getting married!
“I may not know Evangeline personally but, if true, this story sends up red flags in my head, because one doesn’t go from turning down multiple marriage proposals from Thomas Haverton to running away and hooking up with Baxter Badd, and then going back to marrying Thomas. It stinks of manipulation or coercion on the part of Thomas and Mr. du Maurier.”
I blinked, absorbing this information. “So, Evangeline du Maurier is marrying Thomas Haverton? But she’s in love with Baxter?”
Aerie shrugged. “I’m not entirely sure. But Corin seemed interested in this bit of information, and those boys don’t give a single shit about East Coast gossip, which makes me wonder about the whole situation. What makes it all the more suspicious to me is that the wedding is very sudden. Like the announcement went out a week ago, and the wedding is tomorrow. Very sudden. Too sudden, if you ask me.”
“No kidding. Too sudden indeed, unless it’s a shotgun wedding.”
Aerie waved that suggestion off. “In that case they’d force her to get an abortion and keep the whole thing under wraps. They wouldn’t do a shotgun wedding.”
“Yeah, that’s probably true.” I sighed. “It’s still weird how strongly I felt about you calling Corin. I’ve never been jealous of you about anything.”
“Well, I can tell you, I felt weird calling him.”
“What do you mean?”
She shrugged. “Just that I was always so close to him growing up. He and I were always sharing everything, you know? Like, Cor was my guy. My best friend. Then it’s like…” she trailed off, at a loss.
“Like we lost touch, stopped seeing each other almost completely for a few years, and now suddenly everything between us is reset in some weird way?” I supplied.
“Exactly!”
The gate attendant finally announced boarding for our section of the plane, so we boarded and settled in for the short flight to Seattle, which would be followed by a quick layover and the connecting flight from Seattle to Ketchikan.
En route to Seattle, I lowered my tray table, set my laptop, iPad, and iPhone onto it, and then nudged Aerie. “Your turn.”
She was deeply engrossed in a Twitter thread, and took a moment to register that I’d spoken. “What?”
I snatched her phone out of her hand. “All devices on the table.”
She blinked at me. “Um. Did we really mean no contact with anyone? I thought we’d just…you know…check notifications less frequently?”
I laughed. “Nope. We’re shutting them off.”
“What if someone needs to get hold of us?”
I frowned at her. “That’s the entire point of this, A—so no one…and I mean no one…can get hold of us.”
“Not even Mom?”
“Especially not Mom. She’d have us on a plane to Manhattan in under twelve hours.”
Aerie frowned. “Did we officially inform her of our decision to go on the lam?”
“On the lam? Are we in an eighties cop drama now?” I powered her phone off, followed by all my devices. “Yes, I sent her an email while we were in Italy, and I know Lacy has spoken to her as well.”
Aerie’s frown deepened. “You emailed our mother informing her that we were quitting and going off the grid?”
“Yep!”
Aerie laughed. “Oh my god. So, what did you tell her?”
“That we needed some time alone away from everything and everyone to reassess our life goals, and that we would be out of communication, entirely and indefinitely, until we decided what we want to do.”
“Did she reply?”
I shrugged. “I dunno. I haven’t checked. Mainly because I’m scared of her response.”
“She’s going to go absolutely nuclear! Did you tell her where we're going?”
“Are you nuts? She’d show up and try to literally drag us back. This whole thing we’ve been doing the last five years has all been her idea, A. That’s the entire point of this. We need to take time and reevaluate what we really want for ourselves, without Mom doing her momager routine and trying to force us into fulfilling her failed dreams of being a model.”
Aerie pulled her iPad and laptop out of her bag. She fired up her laptop, connected to the in-flight Wi-Fi, and pulled up her emails. “Did you CC me on the email?”
“Duh.”
She refreshed her email, creating a blitz of new emails, mostly junk, which she clicked through until she came to the thread between Mom and me.
From: m
To:
CC:
Subject: Important News
Dear Mom,
Aerie and I have officially decided to take an indefinite leave of absence from modeling.
We’re sick of it all, Mom. This was your dream, not ours, and we’ve had fun, but we need time to decide for ourselves what we really want to do with our lives. I’m sorry about the email but if we give you even an inch of room to horn in, you’ll have us back in the game faster than we can blink.
And we’re just not going to do everything your way anymore. We love you, and we’re eternally grateful for all you’ve given us, and all you’ve done for us, and how hard you’ve worked to get us to where we are now. We really mean this.
But we need to do things for ourselves, now. Make our own way. We’re safe, I promise. This is not just what we want, but what we really and truly NEED. I hope you can understand.
Just to confirm, this is not a joke and there’s no convincing us otherwise. We are shutting off our phones, iPads, and laptops. We will not be checking email, we will not take phone calls, and we will not be checking social media.
Love,
Tater Tot.
Aerie blew out a sigh. “Wow. You really didn’t pull any punches, did you?”
I shrugged. “Nope. I’m not a punch puller, in case you missed that about me.”
She laughed. “You signed it ‘Tater Tot’? Mom hasn’t called you that since you were eleven!”
“I actually made that email account specifically to send that email to Mom. I’m gonna shut it down again at some point.”
“But…Tater Tot?”
“I hated it when Mom called me that. Remember how ballistic I’d go?”
Aerie laughed. “You went on a hunger strike until she stopped calling you that.”
“Actually, I just stopped eating when Mom was around. I snuck down and ate myself sick in the middle of the night,” I said.
Aerie cackled. “You sneaky little scamp! I believed you were really starving yourself!”
“You’d have cracked if you’d known.” I poked her forehead. “Mom has always been able to get you to crack.”
She sighed. “This is, sadly, all too true. She does that glare and the eyebrow, and the silence? I just can’t handle it.”
“You just have to outwait her. She gets frustrated eventually, and then you can turn it into a nice loud shout-fest, and then she just goes ballistic and sends you to your room, and then she forgets the whole thing a few hours later. She’s consistent about that much, if nothing else.”
Aerie eyeballed me furiously. “You had this tactic going our whole lives, yet you never thought to share?”
“I thought you knew!”
“No, I didn’t know! Why do you think I was always spilling the beans?”
“You got me grounded for two weeks because of Amos Doherty and that whole incident with the fifth of Jack Daniels.”
Aerie tilted her head back against the headrest. “Oh my god, she was so mad at you!”
“I didn’t even drink any of that whiskey, you know. That was all Amos, Nate, Lane, and Louise.”
Aerie shrugged saucily. “You were a bad kid! You were always sneaking out, and dragging me with you half the time. I was grounded almost as much as you.”
“Oh bullshit. You always wormed out of it, and I took the blame.”
“You could outwait Mom and all that, but you were always useless at getting out of trouble. ”
“Yeah, and trouble was my middle name.”
“That, my dear little Tater Tot, is not a shock to me or anyone.”
“That was not an invitation to call me Tater Tot, Aerie.”
“Sure it was…Tater Tot.”
“I’ll switch your toothpaste for Preparation H if you call me that.”
She cackled yet again. “You still hate it. You just sent that email as a way of giving Mom the finger.”
“True.”
I glanced at her laptop. “Has she replied yet?”
Her laptop blipped, then, as an email came through.
From our mother.
In all caps.
FROM:
TO:
CC: [email protected]zmail.com
SUBJECT: Important News
HAVE YOU LOST YOUR GODDAMN MINDS??!! YOU’RE NOT ANSWERING YOUR PHONES, YOU’RE NOT MESSAGING ME BACK ON TWITTER, FB, OR INSTAGRAM. I AM SO FURIOUS WITH YOU! THIS IS THE MOST IRRESPONSIBLE THING YOU HAVE EVER DONE! YOU’RE GOING TO RUIN YOUR CAREER, AND I’M NOT GOING TO HELP YOU GET IT BACK. GET YOUR SKINNY, IDIOTIC LITTLE BUTTS BACK TO MANHATTAN NOW BEFORE I PUT OUT A MANHUNT ON YOU.
PS: Tater Tot? Really?
Mom
All caps, though. Wow.
Aerie glanced at me. “So…do we respond?”
I closed the laptop. “Nope.”
“Maybe we should reply. She really will send out a manhunt. We’ll have the FBI looking for us.”
I sighed, and opened the laptop back up. “Fine.”
I typed a response:
From: m
To:
CC:
Subject: Important News
Mom,
I do understand that you’re upset, but we really do need to do this. I’m sorry, I really am. I know you don’t understand, and probably never will. Please don’t send anyone looking for us, we really are safe and doing this of our own free will. Remember when we ran away when we were 8 because you wouldn’t let us have cake for breakfast? This isn’t like that at all. We are adults, Mother. And when I told you we weren’t checking our devices at all, I wasn’t kidding. We are sending this from an airplane, and we will not be sending any further correspondences until such a time as we see fit.
We really do love you.
Love ya!
Tater Tot and Aerie Bird
Aerie screeched. “Aerie Bird? Have you lost your mind? You have, you really have, haven’t you? Aerie Bird? I hate that nickname!”
I laughed maniacally. “I know! That’s why this is so fun. This way she knows we’re not, like, being kidnapped, and it’s a way to poke her a little.”
She eyed me speculatively. “Why do you do that? Why piss her off?”
I sighed. “Mainly because I resent the way she railroaded us into modeling.”
“Oh, come off it, T, you’ve had fun. Plus, we’ve made a lot of money. If we hadn’t done the modeling thing, we’d be broke college students right now.”
I nodded and shrugged at the same time. “Yeah, there have been fun moments. But…it was never what I really wanted.”
“What do you think you want, then?”
I shook my head. “I have no idea. Something mentally challenging, and something creative.” I went silent a moment, thinking. “Remember in high school? All those projects we used to do? We’d paint crazy murals, and then we’d do a multimedia thing, with like, wood and glue and copper wires and toothpaste, and then we’d write a play and act it out and record it and put it up on YouTube, and then we’d pretend we were in a band and write all these songs and play them and stuff? We had so much fun just being artistic little nerds, and we didn’t give a shit. We were so cool! And now we just…prance around half-naked for leering old men, so different leering old men can jerk off to our half-naked Instagram photos. It’s not art, it’s…it’s just lame. I hate it, and I hate what we have become.”
Aerie was silent a long time. “Weird. I’ve been thinking about trying to get out of the Instagram world and do more for magazines and print publications.”
“Oh. Sounds interesting, but it would not be for me.”
“If we end up doing different things, it’s not going to be weird for us is it?” Aerie asked.
“Oh.” I shook my head, and trailed my fingers through her hair. “No. We’ll always be twinsies. No matter what.”
With our devices turned off, we ended up turning on a rom-com on the in-flight entertainment, which we only got halfway through before landing. There was a backup on the tarmac, which ended up eating into our layover. When we finally got into the SEA terminal we had to run to the next gate like our butts were on fire. We only barely made it, and got into our seats just before they closed the doors.
The flight to Ketchikan was short, and we were landing before we even really got settled. Of course, we’re used to long-haul flights from one point on the globe to another, so the two-hour flight felt like it was barely getting started before we were landing.
As we were exiting the jetway, Aerie turned to me, panic on her face. “Did we ever tell Canaan and Corin when we were landing?”
I laughed. “You’re such an airhead, A, oh my god.” I patted her on the head mockingly. “Yes, Aerie, I texted them both our flight information, and told them we’d need a ride from the ferry.”
“We still don’t have anywhere to stay, though.” She said this as we made our way to baggage claim.
I stopped walking and stared at her as if she’d grown an extra head. “Um, you’re kidding right?”
She stared back uncomprehendingly. “What do you mean?”
“Grandma and Grandpa? They own a B and B? Remember?”
“Oh. Duh. I really am an airhead, aren’t I?” She sighed. “Do they know we’re coming?”
“I emailed them a few days ago to say we were coming back to Ketchikan for a while. They said we could stay with them if we wanted and just to call when we got back.”
“Good.” She paused to grab two of her suitcases from the conveyer belt, and then glanced at me. “I’m not really an airhead, am I?”
I laughed and hauled her in for a bear hug, squeezing until she squeaked. “You’re forgetful of commonplace things, but it’s because you’re always thinking about the important stuff. I tend to shuffle that stuff aside and not think about it until everything is a whirlwind and I’m in the middle of a full-on panic attack.”
“Yeah, you’re kind of guy-ish about dealing with emotions.” She pushed me off and grabbed one of my suitcases off the conveyor. “I don’t know how you do that—not think about things.”
We got the rest of our luggage and I led the way toward the exit. “It’s not that I don’t think about them, it’s that I intentionally choose to think about practical stuff instead, so I don’t have to deal with the emotional stuff until I’m ready.”
“So is that what you’re doing right now, about finally being back in Ketchikan and seeing the boys?”
I sighed as we reached the exit leading to the ferry, which would take us to town from the airport. “Yes, as a matter of fact. If I think about any of that, I’ll freak out.”
“I mean, it’s all I can think about. We’re home. We’re in Ketchikan! We’re about to see Canaan and Corin! How can you not be freaking out about this?”
“Because…I don’t know. It’s just the way I am. I don’t like freaking out, especially not in public. I like to freak out alone, preferably in a dark room, under the covers, while you’re asleep.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s embarrassing! Having some kind of emotional meltdown in front of a bunch of total strangers is my actual worst nightmare.”
“Who gives a shit what other people think? Everyone has emotions, and there’s no embarrassment in letting them out.” She followed me onto the ferry, which was the only way from the airport to Ketchikan, and we took seats near the front, our suitcases and carry-ons piled beside us.
I shook my head. “Some things are private.” I watched the water rush past the window, and then after a few minutes, turned to Aerie. “Do you still think of Ketchikan as home?”
She didn’t answer right away. “Um…yes, kind of? If I think of home, this is what comes to mind, not Mom’s condo.”
“Me too.” I paused, and then shot her a grin. “You know, in Mom’s email address, the U-W-S actually stands for Upper West Side, which is where her condo is. For her, that address is an identifying feature, to the extent that it’s part of her email address.”
Aerie blew a raspberry of laughter. “No way!”
I nodded, laughing with her. “Right?” I sighed. “But…that’s Mom for you. I mean, I love the shit out of her, but she also annoys the shit out of me.”
And then the ferry was docking and we were disembarking, struggle-bussing hardcore as we tried to maneuver three suitcases each, plus purses and our carry-ons—laptop bags and Aerie’s ukulele case. I wanted to look for the boys, but it required all my attention just to juggle all my luggage which, to be fair to myself, did contain literally everything I owned.
I smelled him first—spicy, understated cologne layered over deodorant and other scents. And then I glimpsed a right hand, masculine, strong, with heavy silver rings on several fingers, and a barcode tattooed on the back with more ink wrapping around the wrist and up the forearm. The hand grabbed the handles of two of my roller suitcases, and then the left hand, also decorated with rings and a 3D grayscale tattoo of an infinity symbol, reached up and took my carry-on from my shoulder.
In just a few seconds, my eyes took in a bright red Chinese-style dragon tattoo, and woven in between the coils of the dragon were musical notes; I could read music, and I recognized the melody as the tune to Bishop’s Pawn’s first hit single, “You, Me, Us”, which had gone platinum in something like two weeks. He was wearing a tight black T-shirt, the sleeves taut around his biceps, hiding the rest of his tattoo sleeve.
And then his face. Sharp jawline, dark with heavy stubble. Lip ring at the center of his lower lip, high cheekbones, and those eyes, god those eyes. Brown, mocha and chocolate and yellow, piercing and intelligent and amused. His hair, the sides freshly shaved, the top pulled back into a neat topknot.
Ripped, tight, faded blue jeans, liberally decorated with Sharpie doodles, some faded to near illegibility, some new, all over the thighs and around the rips. Combat boots, calf high, laced halfway up, the tongue lolling loosely forward, the jeans draped with casual perfection into the opening. Leather cuff around his left wrist, rings on half of his fingers. Earrings in his earlobes and around the upper shell.
Corin, in all his rock star glory.
God, he was gorgeous.
He had my luggage in one hand, and with the other he reached up and tugged on my braid. “Tate. Whassup?”
In person, his voice was…so sexy. A hint of a rasp, not too deep, confident, almost arrogant, but not quite. His voice resonated in my gut and lower, so much lower. His voice made my thighs quake and my core heat up.
“Corin. Hey.”
I knew Canaan and Aerie were around somewhere nearby, but for the moment, all I could do was stare, soaking up the beauty that was Corin Badd. I was staring, and I knew it, and he was staring back, and it was tense and awkward and weird, because for once I couldn’t think of a damn thing to say.
“God, you’re hot,” I heard myself say. “I want to lick your lip ring.”
Oh. My. GOD. Did I just say that? Out loud?
His eyebrow quirked up, and he flicked his tongue out so his tongue ring clicked against his teeth. “I’ve been told my tongue ring does some amazing things when I do the licking…” He raked his gaze down my body, pausing meaningfully at the juncture of my thighs.
My cheeks flamed, and my pussy quivered, and my stomach dropped out and then immediately shot up into my throat. “Um. I mean. Um.”
“You used to be a little more verbose than this, Tate. You all right?”
I wanted him to tug on my braid again, and all I could think about was what his tongue ring would feel like against my clit, and words were just not coming to my aid at this moment. Which was, as he’d pointed out, extremely unusual for me.
I was never at a loss for words. I never stumbled or tripped over my words, much less got stuck in an um rut.
I blinked hard and shoved the inappropriate thoughts out of my head. “Sorry, sorry. I’m just jetlagged.”
Corin’s grin was amused. “You came from LA, by way of Seattle. Same time zone.”
“Yeah, but we had lots of travel before that.”
“Really?” His tone of voice told me he wasn’t buying it. He leaned close to me. “You bring that shirt you were wearing when we Skyped the other night? I like that shirt.”
Ohhhh shit. “I may have it somewhere.”
“You should wear it again for me.”
“I was drinking that night,” I murmured, “I wasn’t in my best frame of mind.”
He licked his lip, and his tongue ring clicked against his lip ring. “Tate, babe, you know my brothers and I help run Badd’s now, right? We’ll do plenty of drinking.”
“Is that so?”
He leaned even closer, and I could smell coffee on his breath. His eyes trailed down from mine, tracing over the column of my throat to my cleavage, which was, admittedly, on display in this particular outfit, which I may or may not have chosen specifically for this purpose, for this meeting.
“You look you’re one sudden movement from a wardrobe malfunction right now,” he said, letting his gaze linger.
I shimmied my torso side to side. “They’re taped in place,” I said. “No escaping this time.”
His eyes bulged a little as he watched my tits sway. “Damn. That’s a real shame.” He returned his eyes up to mine. “Still a hell of a view, though. You’re looking pretty fuckin’ hot your own self.”
“We’ve all grown up, I guess, huh?”
“Guess so.” He tugged on my braid again, backing away. “Truck’s parked pretty close. We should get off the pier.”
Somehow, he had my entire luggage plus my carry-on, so all I was carrying was my purse, and he was making it look easy. I followed him, which was at least 80% a ploy to see what his butt looked like. Verdict? Goddamned incredible.
Canaan was walking beside Corin, a few paces ahead of Aerie and me, and he was also hauling all of her stuff.
Aerie leaned close, whispering in my ear. “Holy shit, T! They’re even hotter in person than they looked on Skype!”
“Corin hinted at going down on me,” I said, and again, this just popped out unbidden.
Aerie sputtered, covering her mouth with one hand. “Tate Kingsley! We’ve been here less than five minutes!”
“It just…came up,” I said.
She snickered again. “Damn girl, you work quick.”
At that exact moment, Canaan twisted to glance over his shoulder, winking slyly. Which, I assumed, was meant for Aerie.
I eyed her. “No faster than you, something tells me.”
She shrugged demurely. “There was no mention of anyone going down,” she said.
“He just winked at you, and it was a very meaningful wink.”
We arrived at the parking area and Canaan tossed Aerie’s luggage in the bed of their truck—a big, new, crew-cab Silverado.
“You two ladies are incredibly beautiful,” Corin put in, setting my luggage beside Aerie’s, and then holding the front passenger door open for me, “but you’ve been stone-cold foxes your whole lives. You’re just…even more beautiful now than you’ve ever been.”
I climbed in, and he hesitated before closing the door after me. “Thank you, Corin.” I smiled up at him, and found it difficult to look away. “How gentlemanly of you, opening the door for me.”
He leaned into the doorway, closing in on me before I could react. I smelled him, a heady male scent, and then his stubble scratched my skin as he touched his lips to my cheek, whispering. “Don’t read too much into it. I’m only doing it for…personal reasons.”
After getting Aerie settled in the truck, the boys got in the car, Corin behind the wheel and Canaan behind him in the passenger seat, next to Aerie.
“So,” Corin asked, “where to?”
“Grandma and Grandpa’s B and B,” Aerie said.
At the exact same time, I said, “Your place.”
Corin chuckled. “How about we split the difference and go to Badd’s for a drink, and you two can get your stories straight.”
Aerie leaned forward to put her lips to my ear. “What the hell are you doing?” She hissed. “You said we were staying with Grandma and Grandpa.”
I twisted in place as Corin pulled out of the ferry dock parking lot and headed through town. “That was before,” I hissed back.
“Before what?”
I glanced meaningfully at Corin, and then at Canaan, my eyes wide, trying to imply a whole host of meanings in that one look.
Apparently she caught them all, because she flopped back in her seat, crossing her arms under her breasts. “God, you’re such a slut,” she muttered under her breath.
I laughed out loud. “Um, hello, Pot? This is Kettle.”
Corin guffawed, slapping the steering wheel. “God, you two haven’t changed a bit, have you? Still bickering about literally everything.”
“And you two are the same too, aren’t you?” I sniped. “Thinking with your dicks.”
“Well, it’s like Robin Williams said—God gave men both a dick and brain, but only enough blood to run one at a time,” Canaan shot back. “So you can’t blame us, it’s just basic anatomy.”
“Plus, when faced with a ridiculously hot chick with insane cleavage and a wicked tight ass, what do you expect? Sainthood?” Corin slid a sly glance my way. “I was talking about you just then. Just…you know…so you know.”
I snorted. “Yeah, thanks, I got that.”
“Just wanted to be clear.”
“Speaking of tight asses,” Aerie said from the backseat, “while we’re here, Tate plans to eat cheeseburgers and pie and drink beer until her ass balloons into something with its own zip code. So, don’t get too attached to it being all tight and whatever.”
“Oh, I don’t think that’ll be a problem for Cor,” Canaan said. “He likes big asses. The bigger the better, he told me.”
We were at a stoplight, so Corin twisted in the seat and glared at his brother. “You’re such a jackass. That’s not what I said.”
Canaan tilted his head to one side, his expression doubtful. “I dunno, man, that’s what it sounded like to me.”
Corin defended himself. “Just to be clear, I wasn’t talking about you girls specifically, I was talking in general.”
It was my turn to laugh, now. “Which of us bickers constantly? ’Cause I don’t think its just Aerie and me.”
There was a thick, palpable tension in the truck, now. A silence, but not an awkward one.
It was the rife sexual tension crackling between the four of us.
We had just arrived in Ketchikan, but already things promised to become interesting.