CHAPTER TEN
I felt every nerve ending in my body erupt in a million different directions as his lips hit mine with a hunger I never saw coming. Or I did. Every night.
It was soft, hard, tasting, searching. Oh God, it was Bash and I couldn’t get enough. Fingers wound in my hair as his body pressed harder. I felt my fingers claw at his shirt, my mouth move on his lips—it was a full-on sensation party as every touch was heightened. And when he tilted his head to take more and go deeper, everything in my being melted against him.
It was so good and—so bad. So many reasons not to be doing this, and yet it was like the floodgates to my dreams had been opened and I’d been kissing this man for months. Except—okay, the little voices yelling in the back of my head saying Wait! Wait! were annoying, but I didn’t care. I couldn’t care. He tasted too good to care. My hands moved up his chest to his neck, to his head, to pull him in impossibly deeper, to kiss him harder, and the growl of desire that rumbled through him—
The sound of the front door opening was like a firecracker going off.
“Mom, I’m home.”
A bomb exploding between us couldn’t have had more force. We both sucked in air as he pushed away, hands in the air like he was being arrested, turning in circles.
“Fuck,” he said under his breath, grabbing a dishtowel and hurling it across the room. “What the hell am I—”
“Hello?” Angel said as the towel landed at her feet. She looked down at it and then back up at both of us with a befuddled look. “Is there a problem?”
Bash was as far from me as he could possibly get in that room. Just about climbing out the back door window. I hadn’t moved. I was still just as pinned to that countertop as if his body was holding me there, with my hands covering half my face.
What—what had we just done? What had I just done? How could we ever find normal again after—I mean, we’d done it once before and survived it, but we were really young and really drunk. Allowances were made.
“Where’ve you been?” Bash asked.
Angel. Focus on Angel.
“And with who?” I added, dropping my hands to cross my arms over my chest. Partially to look intimidating and partially to hold my racing heart inside.
I prayed that my lips didn’t look as used as they felt. I could still feel him there.
“Jesus,” she said. “Interrogation much?”
“Buying condoms much?” I retorted.
“What?” Bash quipped, pushing off his corner of the room like he was rocket propelled.
“Mom!” Angel yelled, looking at Bash, mortified.
I might have felt bad for her. If I weren’t so angry and keyed up and wanting someone’s blood today, I just might have. But I didn’t. I felt a little bad that Bash heard it that way, but that’s what I’d been trying to tell him before we fell into each other’s mouths and got lost. Our communication line was off kilter. We were friends and then we were avoiding each other and then not talking at all and then… my skin went flushed as I relived that last and then on speed mode.
“If Uncle Bash knowing embarrasses you,” I began. “Then think about that every time you decide to do something stupid.”
“I didn’t buy any—”
“Waiting outside the door while your boyfriend buys them counts, Angel,” I said.
Her face went from self-righteous to oh shit to some other words I didn’t need her to verbalize to know they were there.
“I’m going to my room,” she said, her lips going white as she pressed them together. “I don’t need to stand here and listen to this.”
“The hell you don’t,” Bash said. “You’re fifteen—”
“And you aren’t my dad!” she yelled up into his face.
All the air left the room. All the sound. All the reason. Angel knew those words were eleven kinds of wrong the second she uttered them, I saw it on her face.
It was Bash’s face that I would never forget. The hurt, the betrayal, the jerk backwards like she’d slapped him across the face. I saw a million walls go up in his eyes, and it broke me into as many pieces. No, she wasn’t his, but he’d always treated her as if she was. She was the closest thing he had.
And Angel had just shattered that.
Over condoms.
He gave her a long look and then walked past her, plucked his keys off the table, and was out the door. I opened my mouth to call after him but nothing came out. Forcing my feet forward, I moved numbly.
Angel whirled around with tears in her eyes, as if she was unsure whether to be contrite or pissed off. I was pretty clear on the choice.
“Get—out—of my sight,” I seethed. “Leave your phone on the table.”
Big tears tracked down her face, but I didn’t care.
“Mom.”
“Now.”
I made it out of my door as Bash slammed his shut.
“Bash!”
The engine roared to life, and I jogged to the open window. The one he wasn’t using to look back at me.
“Bash, wait,” I pleaded. “She didn’t mean that.”
“Did you?” he asked, meeting my eyes for the first time.
“What?”
“I know I’m not her dad,” he said, pulling the seat belt over his body. “And she’s supposed to say shit like that. She’s a teenager. But you not telling me she’s buying condoms with that little prick?” he said, his lip curling. “That message was much louder.”
Shit.
“There’s no message, Bash,” I said. “It’s exactly what I told you.”
“That you can’t tell me things anymore because we kissed?” he asked, putting his truck in gear. “That’s bullshit, and that’s your choice. That I’ve been a dick?” He held up both hands before he rested them on the steering wheel. “Then this is me being a dick.”
The truck surged forward and I backed away, crossing my arms over my body and trying not to still taste him.
* * *
I was a zombie the next morning. One incredibly decadent, erotic-filled Bash dream, full of deep kisses that didn’t end with my mouth and the aroma of him all up in my senses, making it all so much more real, finished me off and left me wide awake and panting. There was no sleep for the rest of the night. Instead, my brain was filled with bags of money, endless aisles of condoms, and images of Bash wrapped around me, his eyes boring into me. The taste of him, the feel of him, the what-the-fuck-happens-now of him.
As I stationed myself at the coffeepot—because it was the duty requiring the least amount of thought process—I stared unseeing at Carmen’s wallet on the counter.
“So, you want me to ask Sully to set up a meeting with Mr. Bailey?” she asked, cocking an eyebrow.
“Can you?” I asked, keeping my voice low even though the counter wasn’t full. For once, I was thrilled that it was a slow morning.
“He’s gonna want to know why,” Carmen whispered back.
I bit my lower lip. “I can’t say right now,” I said under my breath. “I just need to talk to him. About my dad. Tell him that.”
Jesus, it was like trying to arrange a meeting with a mob boss.
Carmen gave a tiny shrug. “Okay.”
“And then you’ll have to take me there,” I said.
Her eyes grew wide. “Hold up.”
“I don’t remember how to find it.”
“I’ve been there once,” she said. “In the dark. By boat. After having sex with Sully at the dock. I wasn’t exactly firing on all cylinders.”
“Well, the last time I was there, I was like eleven,” I said. “Pretty sure you have a better shot.”
“Allie—” Carmen began.
“It’s important,” I said.
There was a look in her eyes. Something saying that her reason was important, too. That she’d find fifty different reasons not to go back there if she had to. But I had a hundred grand sitting in a bag in my dryer that needed to trump that.
“Fine,” she said under her breath, pulling out her cell phone. “I’ll text Sully.”
“Thank you,” I said, my eye catching on blondness walking through the door. Said blondness caught on to me as well.
“Hi!” said Vonda Sharp, drawing out the word from the door to the counter. “I’ve been wanting to meet you!”
Oh? “Am I famous?” I asked.
“You may as well be,” Vonda said, flashing sparkly teeth while the Sharp spawn hung back. “You and this diner are just indispensable,” she said. She held out a hand with no rings or bracelets or adornments of any kind. “Vonda Sharp.”
“Allie Greene,” I said.
“Yes I know,” she said. “You’re one of my Queen candidates. Tickled to death to meet you.”
She had a way. A way of making you feel good without really knowing why you felt that way. It put me on edge. Indispensable and all.
“I’m trying to get to all my candidates and talk in person,” she said. “You do know there’s an initial meet-up tonight, right?”
I had a schedule under a magnet on my fridge, but I hadn’t paid attention. I certainly didn’t know it was starting already.
“Of course!” I lied.
“And the first practice is day after tomorrow.”
“Awesome.” I plastered on a smile.
“I just know this will be a smashing success,” she said. “Oh—” She turned sideways. “Have you met my son?”
He went from tragically bored to beaming in less than a second. Those Sharp genes were something else. I had to hand it to my daughter—she had good taste. This boy was beautiful.
“I’m Aaron Sharp,” he said, holding out his hand.
“I know,” I said, taking his with as much strength as I could muster. “I’m Angel’s mom. You know, the girl you might be having sex with? You do know she’s only fifteen, right?”
Aaron’s smile faltered as he pulled his hand away, and the subsequent glow between them lessened.
“I’m sorry?” Vonda said. Her smile stayed on, but her eyes went somewhere else.
“Oh my God,” Carmen snickered, turning to check out the room, probably for saviors.
“Oh, my daughter and your son have been hanging out talking and stuff,” I said. “Have you met Angel?” Vonda didn’t shake her head, or move, or even blink. “No? Well, she’s fifteen, and they bought condoms together day before yesterday.”
I didn’t know this woman. I didn’t know her habits, proclivities, or triggers, but she was a mother of a teenager. The facial body language of what the fuck did my kid do was universal even in its subtlest forms, and I wasn’t seeing it on her at all.
Vonda turned to look at her son politely, questioning without words.
“Just in case,” he said.
She nodded and faced me again. “They are thinking about safety. I find that responsible.”
“You find that—what?” I asked, my voice cracking at the end. “No. It’s not.”
Vonda laid a cool hand on my arm, which was probably hot enough to burn her.
“I try to let Aaron make his own way, his own decisions about his life,” she said. “I feel he is more mature for it.”
“I’ll bet he is,” I said. “A little too mature for Angel. She’s fifteen, in case you missed that. Inexperienced.” I frowned at him. “And in school. How old are you?”
“Oh, I’m in a work program,” Aaron said. “I go to school in the morning and work in the afternoons.”
“He works as my intern,” Vonda said proudly.
Proudly. I’d just informed her that her son was planning sex with a minor much more minor than he, and she was proud he was practicing safe sex in his off hours and following her around all day calling it a work program.
“Oh! Excuse me!” Vonda said, tapping my arm again as she did a double take on someone across the room. “I have to go say hello to Katrina Bowman real quick. See you tonight!”
“Nice to meet you, Allie,” Aaron said, winking with a head toss as he followed his mother.
Breathe.
“Did he just call me Allie?” I said.
“And winked,” Carmen said. “Did she just praise them for being responsible?”
I looked down at my hands. “I’m shaking. I don’t shake.”
“You did not tell me that Angel bought condoms,” she said.
“Aaron bought condoms,” I corrected. “Angel waited for him outside because she thought no one would pick up on that.”
“She told you?”
“Oh hell no,” I said. “Mr. Mercer called me with that fun little news.”
“Oh God,” Carmen breathed. “What did you do?”
I inhaled deeply and let it back out. What did I do? I made out with Bash.
“I called her on it,” I said. “She got nasty and mouthy, Bash told her off, she told him he wasn’t her father, and he left and I haven’t heard from him.”
Carmen stared openmouthed. “Holy hell.”
“Something like that,” I said.
“I can’t believe she said that,” she said.
“I can’t believe she did any of that,” I countered. “And now she has to come here after school and glare at me because I can’t trust her to go home.” I rubbed my eyes. “Want a teenager? She’s highly discounted right now.”
A familiar truck caught my attention outside the window, and I did a double take on the image of Bash leaning against it, talking to Lange. Talking to Lange. What was Lange going to do to screw him over? I could go get that money out of my dryer right now and hand it to him with interest and tell him to get the hell out of Charmed. To leave me and everyone I know alone.
I could, but I needed to be sure where it came from. If it was legit.
I held my breath as Lange pushed the door open, waiting for Bash to follow him, but he didn’t. He got in his truck and drove away, leaving my stomach in a state of flailing disappointment.
“So, what was Bash there for?” Carmen asked, as if she’d read my thoughts.
Whoosh. Heat rushed to my face as the topic landed on top of my heart. Or my libido.
“He—they—he’s teaching her to drive,” I said, picking up a menu and fanning myself with it. “And we had an essay thing to work on for the stupid contest.”
“Uh-huh,” Carmen said, leaning on her forearms. “Neither of those things will turn you as red as you just went.”
“I—don’t—” I dropped the menu and grabbed a clean wash cloth to wipe down the counter.
“Allie Greene.”
I widened my eyes. “Carmen Frost.”
She gave me a knowing grin, and I was hit once again with what having girlfriends in school must have been like. Hell, having girlfriends now was still a little foreign.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
“Nothing,” I said.
“Which really means?”
I closed my eyes, realizing I did need to say it out loud before my head exploded.
“We kind of kissed. Again.”
She lunged forward and my eyes popped open.
“Kind of?” she whispered loudly, looking giddy.
“God, this is why I don’t talk,” I said, pulling a stool from under the bar and sinking onto it. Normally a no-no but I needed it.
“How do you kind of kiss?” she asked, chuckling. “Are we talking sweet, unexpected, or hard core? And who initiated it?”
My fingers went to my lips automatically at the memory of it. “Definitely unexpected. Him. And if Angel hadn’t come home, I—don’t know.”
“The not-my-dad thing happened after that?” Carmen asked.
“Afraid so.”
“Shit,” she said. “Are you okay?”
I sighed. “Yeah.”
“So what are we going to see Bailey about?” she asked, making me blink to find the my-dad-the-money-hoarder subject.
“I can’t tell you yet,” I said.
She laughed. “Hell, it was worth a shot my friend. You were on a roll.”