by Jo Goodman
He was ready thirty minutes before she arrived, and although he went back and forth to the front window half a dozen times in anticipation of her arrival, he still missed seeing her pull into his driveway. The first he knew she was there was when he heard the doorbell.
She looked great, and he told her so. Her thick hair was gathered in a casual knot with lots of stray, curling tendrils framing her face. There was a light blush to her cheeks and a gloss on her splendid mouth, which brought the phrase “gilding the lily” to mind. She was wearing fingertip length khaki cargo shorts and a black tee sporting a Warhol Marilyn Monroe silkscreen. She had strappy, wedge-heeled sandals on her feet and red-orange polish on her toenails. He realized he was staring because she wiggled her toes.
“What color do you call that?”
“Perky Pimen-toes.”
Sullivan grinned. “Nice.” After checking his jeans pocket for his wallet, he announced he was ready to go. Ramsey, he noticed, wasn’t in a particular hurry. Although she hadn’t moved from the carpet runner inside the door, she was looking around, making an assessment of all that was visible.
“Nice place,” she said. “Lovely, really, but I didn’t know if you’d appreciate that assessment.”
“And yet you said it.”
“I figured you could at least tolerate ‘lovely.’ Very warm. And not a single deer head.”
“I don’t hunt. Do you want a tour?”
“Maybe later.”
Sullivan wondered how hopeful that should make him, but her expression gave nothing away. Would it have hurt her to take a last long look over her shoulder at the stone fireplace? Maybe a second glance at the woven hearth rug lying in front of it? It was an inviting space. A lingering space. He was the one regretting it was August, not October, and she was the one turning to walk out.
“We should go,” she said.
Sullivan followed, climbed in her SUV, buckled up, and waited patiently for her to start the car. Belatedly, he realized she was staring at him. “What?”
“Are you going to be all cop-judgy about my driving?”
“Nope. Man-judgy.”
“All right. I just needed to know which rule book applied.”
He understood what she meant when she bore down on the gas pedal once they hit the highway. In traffic, she slipped sideways, back and forth between the lanes with only an occasional indication that she meant to do so. In his head, he cited her for about six violations, including a rolling stop and changing lanes in the tunnel, but he never said a word until they were sitting at the bar in the Stationhouse Grille.
“Admit it,” he said, lifting his beer. “You were testing me.”
Ramsey gave a sly, sideways glance. “Hmm?”
“You know. Your driving into town. That was a test.”
“If it was, and I’m not saying it was, then you passed. You didn’t say a word.”
“Couldn’t. I was biting down so hard I tasted blood.” He stuck out the tip of his tongue and pointed to it. “Thee.” He retracted it and repeated, “See?”
She stared at his mouth. “Don’t pull the trigger on that again.”
Sullivan frowned.
“Really,” said Ramsey. “I already want to suck it down my throat.”
He swallowed hard, found his voice but had nothing articulate to say. He settled on, “Jeez.”
She nodded. “Yeah. I know, right?”
Suddenly parched, Sullivan raised his Yuengling. He drank deeply.
Ramsey also took a drink. “Don’t worry. I want to see Bruno Mars too.”
“Jeez,” he said again, because, really, what else could he say?
Ramsey didn’t give any more thought to Sullivan Day’s tongue or any other part of him during the concert. They had excellent seats a few rows back from the stage. She did wonder if Sullivan would ask her how she scored the seats because he had to figure they were expensive and hard to come by, but if he had questions, he kept them to himself, reluctant, she figured, to go full out interrogation on her. Caution demanded that she have a story prepared in the event cop curiosity overcame reluctance.
They carried on with the rest of the fans, standing more than sitting, swinging, swaying, bumping hips and shoulders, bouncing to the beats, and when it was over, really over, because the encore felt like a second concert, Ramsey and Sullivan stayed in their seats, exhausted and exhilarated, until the crowd thinned.
“Is it too early to evaluate the date?” asked Sullivan as they headed to Ramsey’s car.
“I think we can do that. One to ten, ten high. Any rating five or below means we’re done. Just so you know.”
“You always have these rules?”
“Sure, but usually I’m the only one doing the rating. Seems fair at three dates that you have a say too.”
“Well, then, tonight was a solid eight for me. Would have been a nine if it hadn’t been for your driving.”
She gave a short laugh. “Then you won’t mind driving back.”
“God, no,” he said with considerable feeling.
Ramsey opened the passenger door and got in while Sullivan walked around to the driver’s side. They buckled in and after a few adjustments, he pressed the starter and joined the line of cars exiting the lot.
“Haven’t heard your number yet,” said Sullivan. “I’d rather not be kept in suspense, if you don’t mind.”
“Oh, sorry. It’s the same as yours. A solid eight.”
“So, we’re good for another go?”
“Seems that way.”
“You don’t sound all that confident. I’m not relieved.”
She looked over at him. He was staring straight ahead, carefully inching his way forward until their line caught the next green light. Even in profile, she could make out he was frowning, though whether in concentration or because he was not reassured, she couldn’t know. “Aren’t you wondering what would make an eight into a nine or even a ten?”
“I think I mentioned this evening would have been a nine if you hadn’t driven like a maniac, so I figure an eight’s good. Room for improvement, sure, but it doesn’t come with the pressure of a ten. Why? What do you think would make this eight a nine or climb to a ten?”
She sat back, eyes on the cars ahead of them again instead of Sullivan. “I guess we’ll see,” she said quietly.
Ramsey had known even before Sullivan stuck his tongue out at the Stationhouse Grille that she was going to sleep with him tonight. That is, unless the evening had gone terribly wrong or he didn’t want to sleep with her. She didn’t think the latter was a possibility, but then he wasn’t always easy to read. Maybe she got the signals crossed. It had happened before. Most notably with everything related to her marriage.
Sooner or later she’d have to tell Sullivan about Jay Carpenter. Later was her preference. The thought of sharing with anyone what an idiot she’d been did not settle well with her. Maybe idiot wasn’t the right word. Naïve. Foolish. Blind. Hopeful. Common sense, or at least some sense of self-preservation, should have dictated she throw in the towel much earlier than she did, but remaining hopeful that her situation would change, that Jay would change, kept her from realizing she was the frog in the pot and Jay was slowly turning up the heat.
Thank God for his upper right cut or she might have never gotten out. She still wondered if she had provoked him to it. She hadn’t done it on purpose, but subconsciously, maybe. Jay apologized, of course, but he didn’t take responsibility. It wasn’t his way to own up to his misdeeds, and his misfortunes were always someone else’s fault. Mostly hers, but not always. He blamed his absent father, his needy mother, his unreliable colleagues, his lousy internet connection, and if all else failed, he would point confidently to the change in the weather. To hear him explain it, the barometric pressure had a lot to do with his moods.
“You’re pretty quiet over there,” said Sullivan, glancing her way. “Sleepy?”
“No. Thinking.”
“You want to tell me?”
&n
bsp; “No. Not yet. I’m not ready.”
“All right. I get it. Secret squirrel stuff.”
Ramsey’s mouth curled to one side in a half-smile. “Something like that.”
He chuckled. “There is something I’ve been wondering.”
“Oh? What’s that?”
“Our tickets tonight. How’d you manage to get those seats? You know someone?”
“If you’re wondering what the Ridge pays me, it’s not nearly enough. I was the twenty-first caller on WRKS during one of their promotional contests. I had to answer some silly questions, my name went into a drawing, and I won two tickets to a summer concert of my choice. I didn’t know if I’d collect them, thought about giving them to Briony and Maggie, but then you and I sort of happened, so it worked out.”
“Good deal, then.” He paused. “Still, I’d like to pitch in toward the cost of the evening. Like you said, the Ridge doesn’t exactly keep you flush. I invited you to my cousin’s wedding. Except for suffering Aunt Kay, it was free to me.”
“You rented a car, as I recall.”
He ignored that. “And then I took you shooting. Again free. Worse, you tipped the jar because Anna wouldn’t accept my money.”
“Do you keep some kind of weird score card in your head?”
“In my back pocket.”
“Of course,” she said dryly. “Look, the concert was my idea, and it was free. I’d really rather not take your money.”
“I’d really rather you did.”
She sighed. “It’s important to you?”
“Yeah. It kinda is.”
“Twenty bucks, then. Beer money.”
“Ramsey.”
“All right. Thirty. That’s my final offer. If you still feel like a kept man after shelling out thirty, then that’s on you.”
He laughed with genuine amusement. “Kept man? Wasn’t any part of my thinking. I simply wanted to share the expense. Is that wrong?”
“No. I guess not.”
“This is the second time tonight that you don’t sound certain.”
“It’s just that going Dutch doesn’t make tonight seem like a date. It’s what two people do when they’re not sure, when they’re still trying to figure out if they want to go on a date. I thought we were surer than that.”
“You’re making this way too complicated. Here I was thinking we were comfortable enough with each other to share.”
She was silent, considering that. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe I am making this complicated.”
“Dating’s complicated already. I said you were making it way too complicated.”
“You know, Sullivan, you need to figure out when to stop. I conceded that maybe you were right. You should have picked up that ball and run with it, taken it to the end zone and done your happy dance.”
“I didn’t play ball,” he said, straight-faced. “I was a swimmer. No end zones. No happy dance.”
Equally expressionless, she asked, “Then what explains your brain injury?”
Sullivan grinned. “Okay. You got me.”
Ramsey looked over at him. His easy grin raised her own smile and she tugged at the shoulder harness so she could turn a few degrees sideways and study his profile. He had a clearly defined jawline and an aquiline nose that she had a hard time not tracing with her fingertip.
“You’re staring,” he said.
“Uh-huh.”
“You’re not going to jump my bones while I’m driving, are you?”
“No.” A husky laugh tickled the back of Ramsey’s throat when he made a noise that sounded like disappointment. His right hand was resting on the gear shift. She brushed the back of it with her thumb before she laid her hand over his. “I’m going to wait until you invite me inside. We might make it to your bedroom, but I’m not promising.”
19
It was only their clothes that didn’t make it to the bedroom. With their mouths fused, he pressed her back against the door and she had to do a little shimmy so he could lift her shirt. Her hands slid over his shoulders and down his arms. She grabbed a fistful of his T-shirt when his mouth left hers and went for her neck. She turned her head so her lips brushed his hair. Her nostrils flared when she breathed in his scent. No fancy products. Just him.
Ramsey loosened her fist and smoothed the tee over his chest before she used both hands to tug on his shirt and pull it up. Not wasting the moment when they had to separate, Sullivan did the same to her. She tossed his shirt left. He threw right.
“You’re a furnace,” she whispered, running her palms over his chest.
“Blast furnace,” he said. He caught her wrists, drew them down to his belt.
She obliged him by slipping the tongue free of the buckle and then unsnapping his jeans. Her fingers slid under the denim and traced the waistband until they met at the small of his back. She clasped her hands there, keeping him close, keeping him prisoner, while he played mouth marauder.
He nibbled her lips, her earlobe, tugged with his teeth, with the suck of his mouth. His tongue did magic things, wonderful things, sliding over and around hers, tangling and teasing and tying her into knots. He managed to toe out of his Nikes without breaking stride but she had to come up for air when he began to lower her shorts.
“Shoes.” She wanted to believe she gasped the word, maybe even that it had a sexy overlay, but she knew better. Her voice was a croak. A desperate croak.
Sullivan lifted his head. “Huh? Did you just say no?”
“Shoes,” she croaked again. “I’m wearing sandals I want off my feet. How did you hear no?”
“Must be the brain injury.” He stepped back. “Give me a foot.”
With her back still against the door for balance, she raised a leg. He palmed one wedge heel and tugged on the strappy leather ties. “Hey! Easy.” She grabbed the doorknob to steady herself.
“Sorry.” Sullivan tossed the sandal over his shoulder. “Other foot. I’ll be more careful.” He was. When the sandal landed behind him, he stepped back into her space. “Where were we?”
“You were trying to get me out of my cargos.”
“Right.”
“And your tongue…”
He waited. “What about my tongue?”
“It was making me crazy.”
“Yeah?”
She nodded, stared into his smoky eyes, and whispered, “Yeah.”
He smiled. “All right, then.”
Sullivan’s home was a renovated split-level ranch with the master and guest bedrooms four steps up, a large rec room and adjacent basement storage four steps down, and an open floor plan on the ground level that flowed seamlessly between the living room, dining room, and kitchen. Ramsey didn’t exactly get a tour, but he did provide disjointed commentary about the lay of the land as they were moving inexorably closer to the bedroom.
Her cargo shorts were draped on the railing. His jeans were lying in a bunch at the foot of the stairs. She didn’t know where he’d flung his socks, but if they were expensive, maybe he had folded and tucked them away while she was in a sex-starved delirium.
God, she thought. Please let him slide into home.
She was wearing her I’m-feeling-lucky bra and lacy boy shorts, one of six lacy sets she had purchased shortly after her divorce in anticipation of knocking boots with strangers if they’d have her. That never happened. Strangers did ask, but she realized before there was any damage that anonymous sex wasn’t for her. The condoms went unused also. She’d bought an assortment, all of them still in the bottom drawer of her bedside table. Past their expiration date, she was certain. The question was, did that apply to her as well?
Sullivan proved he had a deft touch when it came to getting her out of her bra, and the moment his lips rolled her nipple, she realized she hadn’t yet reached her best by date. Good to know.
She stepped out of her little black boy shorts just as they got to the bedroom door. “Boxers or briefs?” she asked Sullivan, trying to sneak a peek. What she got was an eyeful. “Co
mmando? I would have jumped your bones in the car if I’d known.”
“Shut up, Ramsey.” There was no sting in his words because he punctuated them with a hard, hot kiss and then he was swinging her into his arms and carrying her all of eight feet to the king-sized bed.
She yelped and flung her arms around his neck. “I could have walked.”
“I know, but I’ve always wanted to do that. What do you think? Sexy? Romantic?”
“I’ll get back to you on that.”
“Fair enough.”
“Now what?” she asked at bedside. “Do you just drop me? Lower me gently? Complain about your back? You know, how about you let me stand again and I turn back the covers while you turn on a light? I still want to jump you.”
“No argument there.” He lowered but didn’t release her. She was flush to his body, cradling his groin, her nipples sharp twin points against his chest. Her arms were still around his neck. “Jesus,” he whispered against her mouth. “I don’t want to let you go.”
“Then don’t.”
He didn’t. They more or less fell on the bed together, tangled first in each other, then in the blankets as they tugged and twisted to get under them.
She reached between their bodies, circled his cock with her hand. He was most definitely ready for her. She didn’t know if the reverse was true. She thought she was. It felt like she was. She really did want him to slide in. “Condom,” she croaked. What the hell was it with her voice? She retracted her hand as if burned. “You have a condom, right? Please tell me you have a condom.”
Sullivan rolled to the side, swung his legs over the edge of the mattress as he sat up. “Light,” he said, warning her. He turned on the bedside lamp and then opened a drawer in the nightstand. He pulled out a packet, tore it open. “I guess I should have asked you if you were on the pill.”
“I’m not. I get a Depo shot every three months. That raincoat is for protection.”
“I get it.” He held the rolled condom between his thumb and forefinger. “You want to do the honors?”
