by Megan Hart
Bess had worked with Eddie for the past three summers, and he’d never stopped by to say hi. “That was nice.”
Eddie shifted a little. “Want to take a walk with me?”
This earned them both another set of looks, so to fend off questions, Bess nodded. “Sure.”
Eddie let her go first down the set of splintery stairs to the sand below. Bess waited at the bottom. She found she couldn’t quite look at Eddie as they walked side by side toward the water, and for the first time, understood how it must be for him to be near her.
“So…how are you?” Eddie scuffed some sand.
He couldn’t have known she needed a friend just then, and yet there he was. “I’m okay.”
He nodded, not looking at her. “Good.”
Bess slipped off her sandals and walked to the water’s edge. The cool waves tickled her toes as she stood, staring out at the sea. She thought there should be something to say, some conversation to be had, but nothing seemed to come. Eddie didn’t seem inclined to say anything, either. Together they stood at the edge of the waves and watched them go in and out.
They stood there for a long time.
“Thanks, Eddie,” Bess said finally.
“Sure,” he said, and looked at her. She looked back. “Anytime.”
Now
Neither of her sons seemed to care when Bess told them she had a boarder. They’d hosted exchange students in the past, and this didn’t seem too different. They were both a lot like their father in that way, not caring about things that didn’t have much to do with themselves. Connor had only grunted, staring out the window, and from the backseat Robbie hadn’t said much more.
Bess stopped herself from talking more about it, though her mouth wanted to keep running. Something in her words or the tone of her voice would give her away if she spoke too much. If the situation had been different, she told herself, she’d have been honest about Nick’s presence in her life in the way Andy hadn’t been. But things weren’t different; Nick still looked twenty-one and he wasn’t quite alive. It would be asking a lot for her boys to accept him as her lover.
She didn’t want to admit she was afraid about telling the truth. If Andy was the only one with a lover, she’d shine so much more brightly in comparison, wouldn’t she? If the finger of blame were pointed it would be at Andy, not her. She was ashamed to realize how important that felt.
The closer they got to the beach house the faster her heart beat. By the time they pulled into the carport beneath the house, she was sweating. Her back ached from sitting so stiffly behind the wheel. Her stomach dipped and dived with anticipation.
Love and food poisoning, strikingly similar.
Connor and Robbie got out of the car before Bess did, and both had grabbed their duffels from the trunk before she’d even closed her door. She’d given them both their own keys, and Connor unlocked the door. They were both inside, the door hanging open behind them, while she still stood by the car.
The longer she waited to go inside, the higher the anticipation built. The longer she could convince herself he’d be there, that all would be well. If she didn’t go inside, she’d never have to find out if he’d left her while she was gone.
“Mom!” Robbie’s voice drifted down the stairs. “Can you grab my pillow?”
Bess unlocked the trunk again and pulled out Robbie’s pillow. With no more excuse to linger, she went inside. Directly ahead of her down the short hall were the stairs. Immediately to her right was the door to the laundry room, and next to it the door to Nick’s room. It was closed. Had it been open when she left? She couldn’t remember.
“I get the big room!”
“No way!”
“I’m older!”
“Mom!”
“Coming!” She navigated the stairs, gave Robbie his pillow and went to her bedroom to put away her purse. Her heart lifted and fell when the room was empty and silent.
No Nick.
He was gone. She knew it. She’d left him for two days and it hadn’t been enough to keep him here. He’d gone away again—
The rumble of voices in the living room caught her ear and an undertow of relief tumbled her around for a minute before she went out to see them all. Connor had already raided the fridge for soda. Robbie was pulling out the video game console Bess had brought on an earlier trip but had never hooked up.
And Nick…oh, Nick stood in the living room wearing a pair of jeans and a button-down shirt over a plain white T-shirt. She’d bought him those clothes based on her memories of his taste, and they fit him as well as if he’d picked them out. The sight of his bare feet had her wanting to get on her knees to kiss them.
“Hey, Bess.” Nick’s casual grin and wave were not the sort of greeting she’d grown used to from him.
It took her too long to answer, and before she could, Nick had already bent over the video game system Robbie was untangling.
“Sweet system,” he said.
It was the perfect thing to say. Robbie beamed. “Thanks. I got the new Bounty Hunter game. Want to play?”
“Sure.”
Connor hollered from the kitchen, “He sucks, man! You’ll kick his ass.”
“I doubt it,” Nick said.
“So, you’ve met N-Nick.” She stuttered a little on his name and earned a curious glance from Robbie and a more intense one from Connor. “Nick, these are my sons, Robbie and Connor.”
Robbie grinned. “And I don’t suck.”
Connor wandered into the living room with the bag of chips and the drink and plopped onto the couch. He put his feet up on the coffee table and tossed the chips there, too. “You do, dude.”
“Whatever.” Robbie dismissed him. He finished untangling the myriad of cords and handed one game controller to Nick. “My mom says you’re staying for the summer, huh? In the little room?”
“Yeah. Got a job at the Rusty Rudder, tending bar. So I won’t be around that much.” Nick took the controller and passed his thumbs over the knobs and buttons. He didn’t look at Bess.
None of them looked at her. She’d experienced this before, the Invisibility of Motherhood. She shouldn’t have been surprised or disappointed. She wanted her boys to accept Nick as part of the household. She wanted him to like them.
So why did it feel as if they’d automatically formed some sort of club in which she was not welcome?
Bess went to the kitchen to put away the bottle of soda Connor had left on the table. The blips and buzzes of the video game filtered into the kitchen from the living room, punctuated by Connor’s taunts and Robbie’s retorts. A quick check of the fridge and cupboards told her she needed to buy groceries. What had sustained her for the past few weeks was going to last no more than a day or two with the boys in the house.
She looked out into the living room. Nick’s dark hair contrasted sharply with Robbie’s blond shag. The three of them laughed. Boys playing. How could she have thought he wouldn’t get along with them? He was only a few years older than they were, after all.
Her gaze caught the framed reproduction of a map of the world hanging on the living-room wall. Here There Be Monsters, indeed. She didn’t want to stand in her kitchen, feeling old and comparing her lover to her sons.
“Guys, I’m running to the grocery store for a few things. Any special requests?”
“Froot Loops,” Connor called over his shoulder without turning around.
“Ho Hos,” Robbie added.
Nick said nothing, just manipulated the three-dimensional character on the TV screen.
“Nick? You want anything?” Jesus, now she sounded like his frigging mother.
“No, thanks.”
Bess left them to their game and went to the grocery store. Unlike the last time she’d been here, she didn’t have to sit in the parking lot and wonder if she’d lost her mind. The girl on the beach had seen Nick, and so had her boys. He did exist, even if she still hadn’t figured out how or what they were going to do for the rest of their…her…life.
>
She hadn’t had time yet to read the books she’d bought from Alicia at Bethany Magick, but a thick paperback caught her eye at the checkout counter: Spirit Guides. She scanned the back cover copy, expecting some New Age or Native American text, but the blurb seemed to cover a more extensive topic, and on impulse she tossed the book onto the conveyer belt with the rest of her purchases.
Back home—and it did not escape her that she’d begun thinking of the beach house as home—Connor and Robbie helped her unload the groceries, but Nick was nowhere to be found.
“He said he was going to bed,” Robbie replied to her too-casual question.
There was no good reason for her to see if that was the case, and when all the bags had been emptied and everything put away, Bess went to bed herself.
She didn’t think she’d fall asleep so fast, but she must have dozed off almost at once because she was dreaming when her eyes flew open when she heard the creak of her door. She sat up, instantly on alert, the knowledge that her children were in the same building having infiltrated her subconscious responses.
Her door closed again with a click. The dark figure moved at once to her bed. By the time he got to her, Bess already knew it wasn’t one of her sons. She threw back the covers and shifted over to make room for him, and Nick slid between the sheets wearing nothing but boxers and a T-shirt she stripped him out of quickly.
They didn’t speak. It had been a long time since she’d had to do this in silence—so long Bess couldn’t recall the last time she’d had to be so quiet when making love. As Nick’s tongue found her breasts, her belly and thighs, when his mouth moved over her body and began to lick, she fisted her hand against her mouth to keep from crying out. The whisper of the sheets might have given them away, but when he finally moved up her body to slide inside her, his thrusts were so slow and deliberate the bed barely creaked.
They moved together, mouths sealed so no noise could leak out. His body pressed hers as his cock filled her and withdrew, over and over. They’d never fucked so slowly. While normally she needed a finger on her clit to help her along, this time the easy pressure of his body against hers built the pleasure with excruciating slowness. Her thighs trembled as she locked her legs around him. The stroke of his tongue in her mouth echoed what he was doing with his prick. Slow and easy. Sweat covered her and her fingers dug into his back, then his ass, pushing him harder against her.
Her orgasm happened in small but growing ripples, each beat and pulse larger than the next as her body jerked beneath his. She came and came again, or maybe she never stopped. Even after the initial climax eased, the nudge of Nick’s pelvis against her clit sent waves of pleasure throughout her.
He was still kissing her when he shuddered into his own orgasm. He sucked in a gasp, stealing her breath so she could make no noise even if she’d wanted. The darkness spun with stars. Pushing against it, Bess tried to breathe, but with Nick’s mouth slanted so tightly across hers the effort was impossible.
He broke the kiss and rasped out the breath he’d stolen. She drew heated air into her lungs with a sudden, grateful mewl. It was the only sound they’d made, and she tensed, listening for any sign they’d been heard.
Nick rolled off her but kept close, his hand on her belly. Bess stared at the ceiling, where stars no longer danced. After the heat of Nick’s body covering her, the room’s chill pimpled her arms and legs and perked her nipples, but she didn’t yet reach for the sheet to cover herself.
She turned to look at his head, so close to hers on the pillow. Nick smiled. His teeth flashed white. Bess cupped his cheek and smiled, too.
“This was risky,” she murmured.
“I know.”
“We really can’t do it like this.”
“I know.” He kissed her hand and tucked it between his.
Bess linked their fingers. “I don’t want to have to hide, but—”
“I know.” He stopped her with a kiss to her mouth. “I know, I know, I know.”
She felt worse about his acceptance than if he’d fought her about it. “It won’t be like this for always.”
Nick didn’t say he knew. He kissed her and crept from her bed. He left her in the dark, staring at the ceiling. It took a long time before she fell back to sleep.
CHAPTER 29
Then
Nick didn’t say a word when he opened the door to find her on his porch. Bess gave him no time to speak. She pushed him back and closed the door behind them.
She kissed him, hard, on the mouth. Then she hugged him, just as hard. It took Nick a few seconds to wrap his arms around her, but when he did she sank against him with a small sigh. His hand came up to stroke the length of her hair.
“You okay?”
She nodded against him, not trusting her voice. His arms tightened around her again. Beneath her cheek, his heart provided a steady thump-thump that threatened to hypnotize her. They were swaying, just a little, to some unheard music.
He made no protest when she hooked her fingers into the hem of his white T-shirt and eased it up over the flat plane of his belly, or when she bent her mouth to kiss his bare skin. He said nothing when she tugged the shirt off over his head and tossed it to the floor, or when she tucked her fingers in his belt buckle and pulled it open. But when she made to undo the button and zipper, Nick put his hand over hers.
“Bess.”
She looked up, vision blurred. Nick took her hand and linked their fingers. He didn’t move, and neither did she.
“Are you sure this is what you want?” he asked.
She drew a slow, deep breath and blinked away the blur. “Yes.”
She led him to his bedroom, where she pushed him gently back onto the bed, stripped of everything but a sheet. She straddled him, her hands on his chest, and looked down while he gazed up. Under her, his erection nudged her, but Bess didn’t do anything just yet. She looked, instead.
“What are you waiting for?” Nick asked at last, his voice raspy.
“I just want to remember this,” Bess said.
“Why are you afraid you’ll forget?”
She shook her head and small tendrils that had escaped her ponytail tickled her cheeks. “I don’t know. I’m just afraid I will.”
Nick half sat to capture her and bring her down to his mouth. “You won’t forget,” he murmured against her lips. “You couldn’t ever forget this.”
She laughed at this show of ego and let him roll her onto her back. “You’re pretty sure of yourself.”
He nipped at her jaw and throat. “Yep.”
She pushed him gently until he looked into her eyes. “What about you?”
“What about me?”
Bess turned her face so his kiss landed on the corner of her mouth. “Will you forget about me?”
“Bess,” Nick said as he ran a hand down her body to center it between her legs. “I don’t intend on having to.”
She kissed him fiercely then, her fingers digging into his hair and holding him tight to her mouth. He groaned when she tipped his head back to bite the curve of his shoulder.
They rolled again until she was on top and could pull her shirt off. Her bra went next. His hands came up to cup her breasts. Bess hissed when his palms skidded over her nipples, already tight. She’d never liked a rough touch, but with Nick she craved it.
They got the rest of their clothes off with avid hands. Naked, she lay against him, their breath coming faster. Bess licked her lips and thought of speaking, but words might have ruined it just then. She stayed silent, hoping her eyes and hands and mouth told him what she felt. Wishing she could know for sure what he did.
She thought he would fuck her hard and fast. She thought it was what she wanted. She should have known by then she couldn’t ever tell what Nick wanted. He made love to her slowly, slowly, looking into her eyes the entire time.
And Bess discovered that was what she’d really wanted, after all.
Now
Through the big glass windows at the fron
t of the shop Bess saw Eddie waiting for them, and smiled. “There’s Eddie.”
Robbie, scrubbed and shaved and smelling of some cologne that made her want to cry a little at how grown-up he’d become, nodded. “And you’re sure he’s going to give me a job?”
“Positive.” Before they got to the shop, Bess stopped to look at him. “But I don’t want you to think you have to take it.”
Robbie rolled his eyes. “Relax, Mom. I’m not going to be a douche like Conn, okay? If he wants to turn down a sure thing, that’s his problem.”
Bess didn’t reprimand him for his language, which also made her want to weep for her baby’s childhood. “I won’t be upset if you decide to get something on your own, that’s all I’m saying.”
Robbie’s quick and unselfconscious hug reiterated how tall and broad he’d grown, and how precious he still was to her. “I told you, I want to.”
By this time Eddie was opening the front door and waving them in. He greeted Bess with a surprising hug and kiss to the cheek, a gesture she didn’t know how to return without feeling foolish. Eddie didn’t bother giving her the chance to worry about it. He held out his hand to Robbie.
“You’re Robbie. God, you look like your mom.”
Robbie laughed. “Not really.”
Eddie laughed, too. “That’s a compliment.”
“In that case,” Bess said, “thank you.”
Eddie gestured for them to sit at one of the café tables, where a folder of paperwork awaited. “So, Robbie, you’re ready to work for me, huh?”
Robbie sat obediently. “Yes, sir.”
Eddie looked faintly surprised and grinned at Bess. “Nice manners.”
“Mom’s a drill sergeant,” Robbie said.
They all laughed. Eddie pushed the papers and a pen toward Robbie. “I just need you to fill out all this stuff, and you can get started today. Kara will be here in about an hour and she’ll be able to walk you through all the major tasks. But I’m sure you’ll do great.”
“Robbie worked for two summers at Hershey Park in their foods department,” Bess offered.
Robbie rolled his eyes, and she stopped herself from bragging about him more.
