Four
Kyle
“Bring us another one, please,” I said to the waitress, pointing toward our half-empty glasses. Or maybe they were three-quarters full or only a quarter. Or there were more than two glasses on the table. I wasn’t really sure. I’d stopped caring after the fourth round. That was when I’d stopped seeing straight, too.
But I didn’t really need to see straight. I only needed to see to the right of me—where Garin sat. My childhood bestie. The boy I’d been in love with for as long as I could remember. And the boy I’d given up because I was forced to leave New Jersey.
I hated that.
I hated it more than anything.
When I looked in his direction, I couldn’t believe he was here, sitting so close, his face filling my vision. Those eyes…their intensity.
I wasn’t cold, but my whole body was covered in goose bumps.
He was cold though. Freezing, icy. He hadn’t warmed even the tiniest bit since we’d gotten to the bar and the drinks started flowing.
“Maybe I should have ordered a water,” I said. “And gotten you some coffee to melt all your icicles.”
“You know what would make me less cold?” His eyes narrowed. “If you slowed down on the drinking and started answering some of my questions.”
I laughed, covering my mouth with the back of my hand, so I wouldn’t say anything stupid. The last time he’d said slow was during a sexy memory…the only sexy memory I had of us. “Slow doesn’t apply to drinking.” My hand must have fallen away because something incredibly stupid had slipped out.
His tongue swept over his bottom lip, reminding me of a time when he had been so possessive of my mouth. “It only applies to when I tried not to fuck you on the same night I kissed you for the first time.” His tongue swept in the opposite direction. “The first and only night I ever got to kiss you.”
So, he was thinking about it, too.
A shiver passed through my entire body, leaving a tingling sensation in my chest. I could still feel his hands and that kiss. The tingling wouldn’t budge when I tried to rub it away. It grew instead, spreading to my breasts and down between my legs. I crossed them, squeezing my thighs together, hoping that would help alleviate it.
It only made it worse.
So did the way he stared at me. His gorgeous eyes looked straight through me, the alcohol practically unzipping my soul so that he could get a better view.
A view that needed to stay hidden, so I looked away.
“Yeah…that night,” I breathed.
“And then you ended everything.”
There was the sound of anger again.
I lifted the glass to my lips. “Something like that.” I swallowed however much was left. I couldn’t feel it go down my throat. I couldn’t taste it. I was completely numb, except for the tingling, and the tingling was only getting worse. My body shouldn’t have been reacting that way. This was all wrong. So wrong.
“I’m back in Atlantic City, drinking my face off, and Billy has died from an OD. This is so fucked.”
“Kyle…”
I liked the way he said my name a little too much.
I set the glass down, my hand still clinging it for support, and I slowly met the eyes that made me so unsteady. “I know my face is still on. It just feels like it’s off.”
“Tell me why you left.”
“I left to go to school. You know that.”
“That’s not what I’m asking. You know that.”
He wanted to know why things had changed after the night Paulie died. Why I had left our relationship. Why I had never allowed him to kiss me again.
But I couldn’t tell him any of that.
My face reddened. “That kissing though…”
I could tell by the way he glared at me that he knew how he affected me. My flushed cheeks just confirmed whatever he thought. I was even sure he could sense the tingling in my body, the goose bumps, and the wetness between my legs.
“And then Paulie died.”
His gaze shifted to my mouth.
“And now Billy…” The tingle briefly turned to an ache. “Why did it happen?” My voice trailed off as I answered my own question.
I’d watched Billy’s using go from a few times a week to several times a day. That was back then. I was sure it had only gotten worse. Garin had told me not to worry, that he would take care of it. But he couldn’t fix Billy, especially after Paulie died.
No one could fix us after Paulie died.
Now, it was too late.
“He lost his fucking brother, and that ruined him.”
“It ruined all of us,” I whispered.
It especially ruined me.
“It didn’t have to,” he said.
I wished that were true.
Garin fed me, he bought me clothes, and he made sure I always had a little cash in my pocket. He made sure I stayed safe. He was my family. My everything.
And then…he was my nothing.
“You saved me, you know.” I could hear my words start to slur. “I don’t know what would have happened if you hadn’t taken care of me.”
He gritted his teeth. “Then, why didn’t you stay?”
Why didn’t I stay?
My legs were bouncing underneath the table, and my hands couldn’t sit still. I only fidgeted this badly when I thought about him or when I was around him. “My mom was a mess, and my brother used way too much. Drugs made them feel good.” That was the truth, but it wasn’t the reason I left. “And what made me feel good was you.” I wished my hand were back over my mouth instead of playing with my napkin. I didn’t know why I was saying any of this.
“Bullshit.”
He didn’t believe me. That absolutely killed me.
I guessed I wouldn’t believe me either. But he had made me feel good; that part was pure honesty.
“It’s true, Garin. Even when I slept, I always wanted to be close to you. And then I left your apartment and…”
“And what?”
“And I just couldn’t stay anymore.”
A lie.
The drinking didn’t ease the hurt of the lie, nor did it ease the guilt. That was always there, no matter what I tried to tell myself or what I put in my body.
“I just couldn’t, Garin. It hurt too much.” Another lie. I shook my head to get rid of the memory and rubbed the center of my chest. That was where the pain lived, where the gnawing started. I wanted the tingling back. The tingling was so much easier. “I struggled so much with it, and I was only—” I cut myself off. I’d already said way too much.
“You were only what?”
I raised my glass, but there was nothing in it. So, I twirled the base of it over the table.
“You were only what, Kyle?” He didn’t shout, but his voice was so stern.
I finally looked at him again. “They’re both dead now. The two brothers. Almost a whole family. It’s such a tragedy.”
“Stop avoiding this.”
He was right. I was avoiding.
And, if he continued staring at me, he’d see the truth. And the truth needed to stay where it was—hidden behind years of scars.
I pulled out my cell to check the time. The numbers were squiggly, thanks to the liquor, but it looked like it was close to midnight. Or ten past one. Either way, we’d been here for hours, and I couldn’t remember the last time I’d gone to the restroom.
“Ladies’ room,” I said, getting up from the stool. “I’ll be back.”
I hurried into the restroom and locked myself in a stall. The buzz hit me even harder now that I was standing, and I had to use the walls to hold myself up. It felt like they were getting narrower, the longer I hovered over the bowl, my ankles becoming wobblier in these heels.
Only a few more hours, I reminded myself, and then I’ll be on a plane heading home. Away from Atlantic City. Away from the secrets. Away from the lies that stared me in the face. Away from Garin Woods, who made me feel as unsteady as these damn shoes. God, he was sexy.
Hiccup.
And he’d been the best kisser.
Hiccup.
And his hands had known just how to touch me, just the right amount of pressure to use on my nipples. Hands that, I was sure, had only gotten more talented in the twelve years that had passed.
Hands that needed to find their way out of my head.
I wasn’t here to be touched or to think about being touched. I wasn’t here to feel any pleasure at all. I wasn’t here to remember how much I missed Garin, and I couldn’t miss him when I left. I’d have one more drink, go back to the hotel alone, and sleep for a few hours before I got on the plane.
Hiccup.
I wiggled my panties back up my legs, ignoring the wetness that had soaked into the fabric. Wetness that Mr. Hands had caused. Wetness that needed to dry and not be added to.
The automatic flush roared behind me as I stumbled out of the stall and washed up at the sink. The lighting showed my eyeliner had smudged a little, giving my eyes a sultrier look. My hair had loosened out of their curls and was wilder than normal. I didn’t bother to tame it.
Hiccup.
When the restroom door shut behind me, someone moved right in front of me and gripped my waist. It took me a second to connect the arms to the hands and the chest to the arms and the face to the neck. But, when I finally made it all those inches above me, I realized they belonged to Garin.
I shivered. “You’re so cold,” I breathed. The tingling was now back in my chest. “Why are you so cold?”
His icy glare didn’t stop the wetness. It was still on my panties. But I wasn’t drunk enough to mention that part.
“Because you still haven’t given me what I want.”
He was holding me so tightly. I didn’t mind. I should have. I should be pushing my way out of his hold and returning to our table. But I didn’t. It had been so long since a man had really held me. I missed the feeling of a pair of strong hands. Hands like Garin’s.
I missed him.
“Were you waiting for me?” I asked, ignoring what he’d said.
He took more of my weight, making my body feel even lighter. The thumping, the tingling, the wetness—I wished I could give him some of that because it was becoming unbearable.
“Garin?”
His hands moved up my sides, over my shoulders, and cupped my throat. It was already hard to breathe. This made it worse. But the hold he had on me was so sexy. It was like a punishment for what I had done to him.
“You like this,” he whispered angrily over my face.
I closed my eyes and let his statement simmer through me. He didn’t phrase it like a question because he obviously already knew the answer.
“What if I squeeze harder? Will you like that just as much?”
It was a threat. One that I liked more than I should have.
He didn’t wait for me to respond before he tightened his grip. Air was stuck in my lungs. Fear was pulsing through me—not because I was worried he would hurt me, even though I should have been, but because I was worried I was on the verge of telling him the truth.
“Yes,” I finally replied. “And I want more of it.”
My mind showed me what more felt like. It took me back to that night in his bedroom when he’d kissed me for the first time. I’d had zero experience before that moment. Garin had plenty, and I found that intimidating. So, before I’d gone to Garin’s that night, I’d taken a few sips of vodka from the bottle I’d found in my freezer. I’d wanted him, and it was time to finally tell him.
Vodka was now running through my body, but that was where the similarities ended.
Now, there were secrets between us.
And lies.
And years of anger over me leaving Atlantic City.
And coldness.
I was lost in a wind of dark memories and guilt, and it was all thumping inside my chest. His eyes were tearing through me, and I was losing the ability to keep it all hidden.
“Kyle…” His grip tightened once again, bringing me back to him. Bringing me back to the feelings his hands caused. Bringing me back to the tingling and wetness.
“Yes?”
His thumb grazed the base of my neck where my pulse hammered away. His eyes told me the thought crossed his mind. A harder squeeze was all it would take.
“Tell me what I want to know.”
If I could lean forward and kiss him, I would. But the way he was holding me wouldn’t allow for that. I was caged, unable to move, barely able to breathe, and all I wanted was his lips on mine. So, if I couldn’t take it, I could ask for it. “Kiss me.”
“That’s what you want?” His jaw flexed when he ground his teeth together. “My hands are around your fucking neck, and you want me to kiss you?”
“More than anything. Give me all your anger.”
His chest was rising and falling. His lips were parted in a way that they looked enraged.
“I can take it. I can take all of it, Garin.”
Seconds passed.
They felt like the longest seconds of my life.
Then, squeezing my throat even tighter, his mouth crashed against mine, and he slammed my back into the wall. Where I had once been overtaken by numbness, I now felt everything. From the gentle sparks in my toes to the throbbing in my nipples. The roughness of his lips owned me, and my entire body was responding to each lashing. I did nothing to fight it.
What I did was beg for more.
My hands went to his chest to feel the man he had become. In high school, he was so scrawny. Now, my fingers skimmed across planes of pure muscle, ripples that bulged under his skin. He was so much harder, so much more dominant than I’d expected.
He deepened our kiss as I slid my hands up his neck, his tongue swirling around mine. I combed through the thickness of his whiskers, stubble I’d never felt on him before. A coarseness that I fantasized scratching up the inside of my thighs. I reached his cheeks, and suddenly, I was in the air, my legs wrapped around his waist, my back still on the wall.
The space between us was gone. We were shirt against shirt, breasts against chest. Lips so intertwined, it felt like they’d never been apart.
And it was perfect.
It was too perfect.
All these years, I’d wanted to know what it would have felt like had I not left his apartment that night and had begged him to take my virginity. I was getting a taste of that now. It made me want more.
And it made the guilt grow.
And the guilt made it hard to breathe.
“Garin…”
I pulled my mouth away, but his didn’t go very far. It moved to my neck, biting across my throat and down my collarbone and over the tops of my breasts.
“Mmm,” I moaned.
“You want this to stop?” He lifted his face, his eyes holding mine.
Was I capable of telling him to stop? Not at this point. Not after being reminded of how good he could make me feel.
“No,” I said.
He sucked my bottom lip into his mouth, pulling it away from the teeth that were grinding into it. “I want to torture this fucking lip.” His eyes only confirmed his words. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”
“And go where?”
He kissed the outer edge of my cheek, his deep voice tickling around my ear, turning me on even more. “To a place where I can give your body everything it needs.”
He set me on my feet as he waited for my answer.
An answer that was already on my tongue.
A tongue that watered to taste more of him.
I was going home tomorrow where I could dwell on the guilt for the rest of my life. But, tonight, I wanted to feel some pleasure even if I didn’t deserve it. And I wanted Garin to give it to me.
I took his hand and led him to the door.