A Crazy Kind of Love by Mary Ann Marlowe (17)

Chapter 17

Exiled.

I hadn’t worked the airports since I first started on the paper. It’s a despicable job. The exhausted celebrity encumbered by carry-on luggage and sometimes children, too, must push through a sea of cameras and shouted questions. The beleaguered traveler exits the terminal too haggard to pose for a picture or compose a well-constructed response. Most just walk on by as though the paparazzi were invisible.

I wondered if Micah walked on by or if he stopped and chatted. He probably offered to take the reporters all out for a beer.

Celebrities who didn’t have their own plane had to use the same entrances and exits as everyone else. They stood out with all their elaborate camouflage. Anyone wearing a hat and sunglasses inside was suspect. Sometimes travel routes were predictable from telegraphed information dropped on Twitter or elsewhere. Whenever anyone flew into JFK or LaGuardia, there’d be a good chance they’d be ambushed. Keeping other paparazzi in my sights often clued me in to some action.

Wednesday had been a total bust, but by Thursday afternoon, I’d gotten lucky and shot some pictures of a young stage actor who hadn’t yet made it so big that he was above free publicity. He stopped and chatted with me about his current projects before some passersby saw him talking to a reporter, or maybe even recognized him, and crowded around for autographs.

Andy wouldn’t care about the interview, but it was better than nothing. I’d started to feel serious hunger pangs, so I went in search of a restaurant with plenty of seating. Bonus if they served healthy food. I passed a bakery, dying to go in and shove an entire chocolate croissant in my face. That was a bad sign. When my sugars dropped, I’d start craving any kind of sugary junk. It’s not that the pump couldn’t handle the sweets, but I’d found that giving in to temptation only made me want to fall into a vat of liquid chocolate. Like scratching a mosquito bite—it only made the itch that much stronger. I was always hungry, but I could usually manage to ignore my sweet tooth as long as I kept on top of my diet.

At last, I found a kiosk selling fruits and salads. I got some nuts and strawberries and splurged on some yogurt. Not a bad snack.

I had to settle for a seat in a high traffic area, but after standing out on the street waiting for hours, it was nice to have a place to rest. I couldn’t remember why I’d been so dead set against coming back to the airport. Seats, food, free WiFi, and no Andy. It was like a mini-vacation.

I opened my laptop and took advantage of the airport’s hot spot. First, I checked my email and found that Eden had written me earlier.

 

Subject: Micah.

 

I hesitated for a minute before clicking on the link.

Although we had only just begun something, her warning the day before had loomed in my mind like a portent. I was still freaking out a little about Micah’s lifestyle choices until I read her email. I could handle a bumbling boyfriend if that’s where things were headed. As long as I wasn’t one of those girls he slept with for a month before parting ways with no hard feelings. If Eden thought he could treat me differently than he’d treated the women he’d burned through so fast, maybe I could relax and go with it. I hoped so because I really did like him.

I started uploading the pictures I’d taken and wrote down the questions and answers I’d recorded. If Andy declined to run it, I’d ask to send it down to Sang Moon-Soo.

It occurred to me that if I waited to upload the story closer to five, Andy wouldn’t know whether I’d stayed at the airport or gone home. I gathered my things and started to head toward the exit when my phone buzzed with a text message ringtone. I dropped everything and sat down. I’d hoped it would be Micah and squealed a bit when it was.

I texted back: I go home, eat a snack, have some hot tea, change into my gym clothes, and walk two blocks to a step aerobics class.

A minute passed. Then another. I had no idea if he was flakey or responsive with communication and didn’t want to be stuck in the airport all day waiting for an answer, but another text came before I’d even moved to gather my things.

I took a deep breath and let it out. He knew nothing. Safe. Necessary. Everyone should exercise.

You want to come to my aerobics class? The visual of that made me giggle. I lifted my eyes expecting to make eye contact with someone to share the hilarity of it, but the strangers trudged by, lost in their own worlds.

Can I? Everyone should exercise. He had me with my own words.

My fingers flew. On one condition. You have to let me take pictures. For the paper. Andy would have to give me back my freedom if I gave him Micah’s head on a step aerobics platter.

I sat for a minute trying to come up with a witty, flirty response, but the phone buzzed again. Fine. It’s a deal. What time should I be at your place?

The girls in my aerobics class owed me. Big-time.

I hurried home so I could test my blood sugar without Micah there. I knew he’d have to see it at some point. And frequently. But I didn’t want to plant that image into his brain quite yet.

I hit the Suspend button on my pump and fetched a glass from the cabinet and poured some orange juice. In my fridge, I discovered a boiled egg Zion had left me and swallowed it in two bites. Then I had the presence of mind to brush my teeth and check my hair and makeup. Would it be overkill to wear lip gloss to exercise class?

The buzzer rang as I was heating some water for tea. I pressed the intercom. “Micah?”

“Yup.”

“What’s the magic word?”

“Uh. Alohamora?”

I buzzed him in. I stood in my open door until he climbed the stairs. He panted. “Is aerobics any harder than those stairs?” He had on a goofy pair of running shorts that looked like something from a middle school gym class. One leg said “Broo.” The other leg said “klyn.”

“Where’d you get those shorts?”

“You like them? I found them in this great store up the street from my apartment.”

I covered my mouth with my fist, hiding my smile. “Do you want some tea? I was fixing to make some.”

He grimaced. “Water?”

“In the fridge.” The water came to a boil, so I threw in my tea bag and then excused myself to change into my gym clothes.

The tea had steeped when I came out. I stood at the counter to discard the tea bag. Micah slipped up behind me and laid his hands on my waist. His lips grazed the back of my neck. I froze in place, wanting him to keep touching me. My chest rose and fell, and my heart rate sped up. His fingers dragged across my back and under the hem of my shirt. His hands on my skin sent tingles to the tips of my toes. But I wanted those lips on mine. I wanted to press myself into him.

As I turned around, he loosened his hands and pushed the teacup away. Then he lifted me onto the counter. We were face-to-face. He stopped and looked at me, and I looked at him. I was asking myself how I could have ended up with someone like him—a literal poster boy of rock star boyfriends.

He traced a finger along the side of my neck. “Has anyone ever told you how beautiful you are?”

I resisted the urge to laugh. It would have totally spoiled the mood. “Does Zion count?”

His head tilted. “No.”

“Micah?”

“Jo?”

“Do you think you might kiss me now?”

“What about step aerobics?”

I hooked my foot around his back and pulled him closer. “I can tell you’re not in good enough shape for that. You need to work up to it.”

“How about I lift weights first?” He placed his hands under my thighs and hoisted me up.

I wrapped my legs around him and laid my hand against his chest. “You’ll need to add some cardiovascular.”

His arms flexed and showed off his tight muscles. “Can we start now?”

Breathless, I whispered, “Yes.”

He carried me to my room and set me down on my bed, pushing the door closed with his foot. He sat beside me and took my hand. “Jo, am I rushing this?”

I brought his hand up to my face. “Would you just kiss me?”

He brushed my hair over my shoulder and bent down to kiss my neck. “Here?”

I shivered. “Mmm, yes.”

He ran his lips up to my ear and caught my earlobe in his teeth. He trailed kisses across my cheek. “Like this?”

My body was electric. “No. Like this.” I tangled my fingers in his hair and dragged my tongue across his lips, teasing and pulling away when he’d try to catch me in a kiss. Finally, I gave in, and we melted into each other. He grabbed me by my upper arms. But I moved my hands along him, finding out where I could cause a shiver or a rise of goose bumps. He loosened his grip, and I dragged my fingernails down his back.

His eyes closed and he groaned. “Oh, my God.”

When he reached down and lifted my shirt up and off, his hand brushed against the insulin pump attached to my shorts. “What’s this?”

I detached the tube and laid the device onto the nightstand. “That’s my insulin pump.” If I hoped he might just ignore it, I wasn’t so lucky.

“What’s it for?” He returned to the exploration, touching the adhesive disk covering the needle insertion point.

“Basically, it keeps me alive.”

He stopped and glanced over at the pump. “Shouldn’t you be wearing it?”

“Relax. It’s okay.” I took his hand and put it back on the adhesive disk. “Are you weirded out?”

He tapped the plastic connector. “Does it hurt?”

“Not really. Only sometimes when I put it in.”

His eye drifted to the device on the nightstand. “Are you part robot?”

“I guess so.”

“Cool.” He ran his fingers around the edge of the white fabric circle. “Sexy robot.”

Every time he touched me, my skin responded with tingles, and I wanted to see his body and touch him, too. I slipped my hands under his shirt and peeled it off, then helped him with the insanity of my sports bra.

His fingers moved across every inch of exposed skin, bringing me to such a state of arousal, I needed him more and more until I couldn’t wait any longer. But when I reached for his waistline, he put a hand on mine. “Are you sure?”

My answer came in the form of a guttural moan.

He jumped up and left me lying on the bed, wondering if he’d taken “Argh yeeees,” as an ambiguous invitation. But he came back and tossed a square packet onto my nightstand next to my pump. Good thing one of us was thinking.

As soon as he lay down, I ran my finger down his side and along the waistband of his shorts.

He stopped my hand with his and twined our fingers. “Slow down. I want to make the moment last.”

I laughed. “You want to slow down?”

He laughed, too. “Yeah. I don’t want to just have sex. I want to get to know you. I want to take our time.”

“Micah? Do you think we could take our time next time?”

“You sure?”

“Micah, I need you right now. Please. I am dying.”

“Well, I don’t want you to die.” For all that, he took forever sliding my shorts off and then touching me until my back arched, and I begged him to stop toying with me.

I clutched at his ridiculous shorts and dragged them off. And then I made sure he’d want to seal the deal sooner than later by touching him in delicate places to heighten his arousal.

He groaned as I stroked him slowly. “You sure you don’t want to go to your step aerobics class instead?”

“Yeah. Let’s go to aerobics.” I pretended to sit up, calling his bluff.

But he caught my arm. “Come back here.”

And we lay on our sides, driving each other more and more insane with need. It was like a game of chicken. Who would blink first? I didn’t honestly know what the toll of this much excitement was going to be on my blood glucose and hated that I had to stop and wonder. So I threw my leg over him and rocked him onto his back. He stretched his arm over to the nightstand and tore the condom open with his teeth. I straddled him and let him guide himself into me.

I’d had sex before—frenetic dorm room sex in college mostly. Never had I been made to wait so long. Never had I been so near the edge at the moment of impact. So almost as soon as I felt him deep inside me, a sharp explosion of pleasure shook me, and I collapsed onto him. Then horrified, I realized he was still hard as a rock, still in me. I lifted my head and looked into his eyes. They glittered as he smirked.

“Never had that kind of response before,” he said, literally all cocky. “Do you want to stop?”

I wasn’t ready to stop touching him, to stop feeling him in me. “No.”

He flipped me over onto my back and thrust in me again. As I watched him, I touched his tight abs, his nipples, his shoulders. He was beauty in motion. His eyes closed, and his face moved through various expressions until he said, “Oh, God.”

Then he slumped over to my side. He kissed me hard, sucking on my lips, skimming his tongue against mine. He fell back panting. “I can’t get enough of you.”

He wrapped his arm around me, and my head rested on his shoulder. My heart rate hadn’t slowed, and I was starting to feel almost euphoric. High. Like a sugar rush.

I reached for my pump and reattached it. “Stay here. I have to do something.” I threw on a bathrobe and left my bedroom.

I pulled out my testing strips and pricked my finger, hoping everything was normal. The last thing I needed was to find out sex with Micah would kill me. The numbers were high for me, but not dangerously so.

Micah joined me in the kitchen, clad only in his gym shorts. “Is that something you have to do a lot?”

“Only like six times a day. Or whenever I want to be sure. I can’t always trust my body to tell me. And you saw what happened when I let things go last Friday.”

“So are you good? Did I hurt you?”

“I’m fine. I felt too good. And that could be bad. But everything’s fine. Everything’s good.”

His shoulders dropped, and I realized he’d actually been worried. This seemed like as good a time as any to ground him in reality. I opened a drawer and took out a small notebook. I sat at the table and opened it up to today’s date and wrote down the time, the readings, and the words Amazing sex.

I raised an eyebrow at him. “My weird diary. I keep this so I can get a handle on how changes to my routine affect me. You are a change to my routine. And I need to make sure I can predict and adjust my diet—and possibly this.” I lifted the hem of my shirt to reveal my pump. “It might take a little time to work out the kinks.”

He knotted his brow. “So maybe next time, I’ll listen to you a little better.”

I stretched like a satisfied cat. “I like the sound of next time.”

He stretched, too, showing off his beautiful torso. “So what do you want to do now?”

I got up and opened the fridge. “Throw something on. I’m gonna fix supper.”

“You cook?”

I peered over the open fridge door at him. “You don’t?”

He put up his hands. “I eat.”

Zion had been shopping recently and stocked the fridge with red, yellow, and green peppers; onions, and strips of beef. I grabbed a pair of peppers and laid them on the counter, then went back for the rest.

I glanced up and caught Micah’s expression. He looked panicked like a diabetic about to be served a plate full of candy. “What’s the matter? Are you allergic to peppers?”

He cleared his throat. “No. It’s just . . . You’re not a vegetarian, are you?”

“Seriously? Would that be a problem?” I closed the fridge and laid my hand on my hip, daring him to tell me I needed to eat meat.

“No. I mean.” His eyes darted around as if the words he was searching for were hiding in the cupboards. He took in a sharp breath and exhaled as quickly. “I can live without alcohol. And I guess I’ll learn to live without the cigarettes.” His whole face was a comedy of tragedy. “But meat?” He rubbed his eyes with his palms. “Meat!”

I opened the fridge, pulled out the package of steak, and dropped it on the table. “We’re having fajitas.”

“Oh, thank God.”

“Micah.” I sat down at the table. “Why do you think you have to give up alcohol? And cigarettes. Well, you should give up cigarettes. But you don’t need to change for me.”

He sat beside me. “But isn’t it hard to be around people when they have things you can’t have?”

“Totally. But I’ve been living with this disease most of my life. I’ve learned to deal with it. Would you expect me to start drinking and smoking just because you do?”

“That would be dumb.”

“Yeah.” I knocked his chin with my fist. “Don’t be dumb.”

“But I will quit smoking. My mom’s gonna love you for that.”

The door rattled with the clattering of keys, and then Zion came in. “I thought you were going to—” He stopped dead. His eyes grew three sizes when he saw Micah sitting half-naked at our kitchen table.

The thought hit me a second later. Micah Sinclair was sitting half-naked at our kitchen table.

It hadn’t seemed so extraordinary until I thought I’d need to hand Zion a tissue to wipe the drool from his chin. Micah had nothing on but those stupid shorts. He didn’t have an ounce of fat on him. For a guy past thirty, he had the body of a twenty-five-year-old gym rat.

“Micah, can I ask you something?”

“Uh-huh.”

“How do you look so good when you drink, smoke, eat like shit, and apparently never go to the gym?”

He beamed. “You think I look good?”

I snapped a dish towel at him. “What’s your secret?”

“Amplifiers.”

Zion got a knife and sat at the table to help cut up the peppers. “Amplifiers?”

Micah pointed at the peppers. “Should I be helping with that? It doesn’t look too hard.”

I shook my head. “You just keep us entertained. Tell us about your magic amplifier regimen.”

“Okay, but give me a second. I feel weirdly out of place suddenly.” He stood and headed into my bedroom.

Zion blew through his lips. “I hope that doesn’t mean what I think it does.”

But sure enough, Micah returned, pulling a shirt over his head. He started talking before he’d even gotten to the table. “So do you guys know how heavy amplifiers are? They are crazy heavy.”

“Do you bench them?” Zion asked.

“Close enough. I push those suckers down hallways and up ramps at least once a week. It’s a workout.”

“Don’t you have roadies?” I hadn’t seen him push a single amplifier when we’d left his show.

“Well, yeah. But I help. And they don’t come and unload everything into our practice studio. We aren’t made of amplifiers and roadies.”

Zion stopped chopping. “Don’t the venues have their own sound systems?”

“Not always. During the summer we play some gigs outside in places where they have nothing but a stage. And carrying all the equipment . . . The drums take us about forty trips. Most of the drum pieces are small but all that walking. It burns a lot of calories.”

The skillet had heated up, and I started browning the onions. When I threw on the meat, Micah started making sex sounds from the delicious smells filling the kitchen.

Zion set plates on the table and put the tortilla wraps in foil to heat in the toaster oven. “Micah, could you open a bottle of wine?”

The poor thing wanted to do what Zion asked, but he shot a glance at me. “Wine?”

“Zion drinks. You can drink, too.”

Zion reached into the cupboard for two wineglasses. “Josie, you could have a little, right?” He hesitated, then pulled down a third glass.

“I guess I’m having wine tonight.” I started plating the veggies and meat.

I hadn’t thought about what a messy meal this would be, but it was one of Zion’s favorites, and he didn’t mind getting it all over his hands and face. Micah didn’t stand on ceremony either. So I dug in, too. We were all too busy “mmming” to care. I sipped the wine economically. I knew Zion only wanted to help me fit in, but I didn’t even like wine.

Micah said, “Sho whajyu wanna ju?”

“What?”

He swallowed his food. “What do you want to do? What do you normally do?”

Zion said, “I usually read up on the latest medical discoveries. Josie practices jujitsu.”

In truth, usually I tied up any loose ends from work or—“Oh, shit. I never submitted my story.” I jumped up and froze, trying to remember where I’d left my gear. “Stay there. I have to do something.”

While I hunted for my camera, Zion grilled Micah about Adrianna. Micah said, “Sorry. She’s more friends with Adam and Eden than me.”

I sat on the sofa and eavesdropped on them while uploading the day’s pictures. I just sent everything without going through it all. Then I turned on my laptop. Thankfully, I’d already written the story, so I hit Send. “Done.”

Micah pushed his chair back and turned it around to face me. “I have a question for you.”

“Shoot.”

“What do you like to be called?”

“What?”

“When I met you, you introduced yourself to me as Jo and as Josie. And I know you don’t want to be called Anika. Zion calls you Josie. I like Josie. It’s pretty. It fits you.”

“Then I like Josie.”

“Josie. I might need to write a song.”

Goose bumps shot down my arms. Then I thought about his concert and asked, “A hard rock song called ‘Josie’?”

Micah scowled. “You don’t know any of my music, do you? I have several solo acoustic CDs, you know.”

I blanched. “I—”

He jumped up. “Now I know what we’re doing tonight. Get your things.”

“Where are we going?”

“My place.”

He pushed his chair in as though that were the end of the debate, but Zion held up his hand. “Wait a second. Will you be coming back here tonight?”

Micah shrugged as if he hadn’t thought about it. “She can stay the night.” He looked at me. “You can stay the night, right?”

“Uh, yeah. I just need to pack some things.” I got up and fetched a small travel case so I could carry all the crap only I had to worry about.

I opened the fridge and took a deep breath before I began the rundown. “First, I’m packing a couple of syringes. These are for emergency only, in case my blood glucose spikes. I’m pretty good about watching my sugars—”

Zion butted in. “Too good probably. You shouldn’t need those.”

“Just in case.” I held up a small black phone book, saying, “Emergency phone numbers.”

Zion added, “The hospital, the pharmacy, me, her mother, her doctor, everyone you might need to reach is in here.”

I tucked the phone book in with the syringes. “We can program your phone with the numbers, too. But I keep them on paper for traveling.”

Micah’s eyebrows drew together. “Do you normally need all this?”

Zion laid a hand on his shoulder. “She hasn’t ever needed any of this since she’s lived here. But you have to be prepared. She lives in between the margins.” He kept talking while I packed a couple of juice boxes and glucose tablets. “Her worst habit is letting her blood sugar drop too low. She doesn’t eat enough or at the right time. She can usually tell you if she’s feeling faint, and a juice box will do the trick.”

“Now for the worst.” I let him see my strips and blood stick. “I’ll have to show you how all this works. Zion made a cheat sheet for the readings in here.” I flipped through the phone book until a small paper fell out. “Here.”

Zion said, “If she’s unresponsive or falls outside these ranges, get her to the hospital immediately.”

I took a glance at Micah, hoping my love life hadn’t just gone up in flames. It was worse than the time Molly Johansen walked right up to Danny Burke and told him I had a crush on him. Micah rubbed his temples clearly overwhelmed by it all. I walked behind him and wrapped my arm around him. “Don’t worry. It’s all a precaution. I just have to be a little careful.”

He nodded, eyes glazed over. And I had an idea. “You want to come help me pick out my pajamas for tonight?”

His face relaxed, and he looked at me again like I was human. “Yeah.”

By the time we had everything ready to go, with my clothes, cameras, laptop, and medical crap, I looked like I was going to stay a week. I gave Zion a hug before I left, and he whispered in my ear, “Damn, girl. Don’t blow that.”

I whispered back, “That’s what she said.”