by CL Rowell
“No—Mom…Mom…you have it all wrong.”
“I’d better have it wrong.” She dropped to the couch beside me and I saw a shimmer of hope replacing the disappointment in her eyes. “So, you’re telling me you aren’t using her?”
“That’s exactly what I’m telling you.” I cleared my throat, nervous as hell. “I love her, Mom—I’ve loved her from the day I met her. I didn’t buy that ring on a whim.” I put a hand up when she opened her mouth, “It may have started out as a misunderstanding but when I put that ring on her finger, I meant it. I don’t know how it’s gonna happen, but I made my mind up. It isn’t coming back off if I have any say in it. I am going to marry her and we’re staying married.”
“Well, now,” she smiled, obviously pleased with my words, “it’s about time you came to your senses. I’m happy for you, son.”
I looked closer, noting the exhaustion in her face and fresh lines around her eyes. Concerned, I asked, “Shouldn’t you be resting?”
Her shoulders dropped and she shook her head, “I tried. It’s no use, though—I can’t sleep without Frank lying beside me.”
“That’s funny…I’m always hearing you complain about how loud he snores, how you feel like you’re trying to sleep in a logging camp,” Grandpa cackles, “and how much you’d give for a quiet night’s rest—I guess we should take this as a lesson.”
I looked at him. “What do you mean?”
He shrugged, pointing out what I could tell he plainly saw as more than obvious, “Technically, she got what she wanted—a quiet night to rest—but I don’t think this was what she meant when she was complaining all those times.”
“It wasn’t.” Tears glistened in her tired eyes and I heard the hitch as her breath caught in her throat. “If he pulls through this, I’ll never complain about his snoring again—I’ll invest in a bag of ear plugs and happily wear them to bed every single night.” She sobbed and pressed her fist to her lips, “I just want my husband back, safe and sound.”
“And you will get him back,” I assured her, “right, grandpa?”
“Of course, she will. You heard the doctor, Vera—the kids did everything right, giving him the best chance for survival, and the surgery went smoothly. He’ll be back home before you know it, running you ragged—watch and see.”
I clapped my hands together and stood up. “It’s rapidly approaching two am. If we want to find out how he’s doing before noon, I suggest we all try to get some sleep. Grandpa, you’re sleeping here, right?”
“My little girl needs me. I’m not going anywhere.”
Nodding, I hugged each of them before heading up to my old room, praying for my father to pull through with every step I took.
Chapter Fourteen
Juliet
∞∞∞
I knew I wouldn’t hear from Geoff in the morning. I knew he’d be at the hospital with his parents. But when I didn’t hear anything by midafternoon, I started to worry. He’d call me if things went downhill, right? I picked up my phone several times but forced myself to put it back down, telling myself to wait. If he was still at the hospital his phone would most likely be off. I just had to be patient and have confidence that he’d call if the worst happened—or at least text even if it didn’t. I kept repeating that to myself, but it didn’t help much.
My phone finally rang around five, but it wasn’t him.
“Hi, Mom,” I injected a little enthusiasm into my voice.
“Hi, sweetie,” I could tell she had me on speaker because of a certain echo-y effect I’ve noticed in the past when she did it. When I was younger and still living at home it usually meant she was driving, but she could have been cooking or at the gym, too, as she had become more health conscious since I moved out.
I tensed. “Is everything okay?”
They didn’t usually call me on school days unless it was an emergency…I clutched the phone tighter, but then I remembered it was Saturday. Regardless, I was concerned.
“Oh, yes, everything is fine, here…”
“That’s good.” I dropped to the papasan chair at the foot of my bed. “I get worried when you call out of the blue. I’m glad to hear everything is fine.”
“I hear a faint rebuke buried somewhere in that comment…”
“I’m sure she didn’t mean it that way, dear.”
“Daddy!” I jerked upright, grinning, “I didn’t know you were there, too! It’s great to hear your voice!”
“I could be wrong, though,” he laughed, warming my heart through my ear. “Anyone listening would think we deserted her at the main entrance to the university and immediately started avoiding her calls.”
“Daddy!” I protested, giggling. “That’s not true.”
“Speaking of true,” Mom mused, “is there anything you’d like to tell us?”
“Very subtle, Maureen.”
“Well, how would you have approached it, dear?”
“I’d have simply asked her.”
“Asked me what, Daddy?”
“One of Maureen’s friends at her gym congratulated her on your engagement and upcoming nuptials and she didn’t know quite how to respond, seeing how that was the first she heard of it and all.”
My stomach dropped. “Wow, word travels fast…” I stumbled to a stop, unsure of how to proceed or what to say. “It’s barely been forty-eight hours.”
“So, it’s true—you’re engaged?” Mom’s voice was full of disbelief. “What happened to seeking the potential bride’s father’s permission?”
“A bit archaic, don’t you think? Plus, it happened very suddenly.” My face felt like I stuck it in a hot oven.
“And when were you going to tell us?”
“Well, it kind of slipped my mind—”
“Really?” I could hear the skepticism in her voice, “Your engagement slipped your mind?”
I sighed, squeezing my eyes closed, “Mom, Dad, I didn’t feel it was my place to say anything, but—we were at Geoff’s parents’ house last night, and…and…” my voice broke, “his dad had a massive heart attack at the dinner table right after Geoff announced our engagement.”
“Oh my god!” Mom gasped. “How horrible!”
“Between calling nine-one-one, and waiting for the ambulance to arrive while Geoff performed CPR, and then rushing to the hospital where we waited on news of his condition—plus, sitting around all day, today, waiting to hear more…” I pause for breath. “I guess our engagement just wasn’t at the top of my concerns at the time.”
“Understandable,” I barely heard her words. “Is he—?”
“Going to be okay? One of his doctors seemed to think so. He said we did everything right, calling for an ambulance, immediately starting CPR—but it was a bad one, and I haven’t heard a word from Geoff all day.” I started to cry against my will.
“I’m sure everything will be—”
My phone beeped in my ear. I pulled it away to look and it was Geoff. “Mom, Dad,” I interrupted them, “Geoff’s on the other line. I gotta go! I’ll call you back later. Love you!” Knowing they’d understand, I hung up and switched over, “Geoff, finally—I was so worried! How is he?”
“Improving little by little but still pretty much out of it.” Irritation dripped from his words, “Can you come down? The wicked bitch of the South won’t let me come up.”
“I’ll be right there.” Hanging up the phone, I checked my image in the mirror, ran a brush through my hair, slipped on a pair of leopard print mules, and, with my clutch, phone, and jacket in hand, flew out the door. I spotted him as soon as the elevator doors opened. “Hi…”
He grinned, flashing dimples and turning my knees to mush, “Hi.”
“No guests in your room,” Anna bellowed from her office, halfway down the hall. “It’s getting close to cutoff time. I could get in trouble if I let you go up and you lost track of time.”
We started back toward the front doors. I deliberately paused at her door and smiled sweetly, “It’s o
kay, Anna.”
“No hard feelings?”
“Of course not,” I waved a hand in the air like I was brushing the words away. “Why go up to my tiny room when he has a big fancy private condo with a Jacuzzi and a heated indoor pool…” I paused and winked, “and a king-sized bed.”
I dragged him away as her jaw dropped and envy shot from her eyes like poisonous daggers, contorting her whole face. Served her right.
“I can’t believe you did that,” he hissed in my ear, low enough that only he and I heard what he said. “You know what she’s going to think?”
“Yep.” Smirking, I bit down on my lip and put on a burst of speed, dragging him through the door.
“Well?”
Once outside, I burst into wild laughter. “I couldn’t resist,” I gasped out. “She was asking for it. I’ve seen her and her besties sneaking guys in and out at all hours of the night. It’s just the rest of us who are forced to follow those rules while they do what they want.”
“Why don’t you say something? If you complain—”
“If we complain she’ll just make life hell for us. She’ll nitpick, writing us up for small shit until we get tossed out. Plus,” I giggled, “did you see her face? She was positively green. She’ll sit up until I come in just to know how long I was out—otherwise, it’ll eat at her.”
A devious smirk crawled across his handsome face. “You should absolutely spend the night, then—not go home until late tomorrow afternoon or early evening.”
I squealed, doing a delighted little skip and hop, “I should, shouldn’t I? Tomorrow’s Sunday, so I don’t have to worry about school. Why not? Let’s do it.”
“We can stop and grab a pizza, cheesy garlic bread, maybe a salad, and perhaps a good Cabernet Sauvignon to go with it?”
“Sounds good.” I drop into the passenger seat and wait until he rounds the hood and gets settled behind the wheel. “Guess who I just got off the phone with…”
“Umm, me.”
“Before you.”
“I give up,” he shrugged, turning the key and shifting into drive. “Who?”
“My parents.”
He slammed the gear shifter back into park and turned in his seat to face me. “Huh?”
“One of Mom’s gym rat friends congratulated her on our engagement and impending wedding.”
“Shit. What did you say?”
I lifted my shoulders, “What could I say? I stuck with the story. I confirmed the engagement and told them about your dad. They totally understood.”
“Oh. That’s good.” But I could sense that he was just saying the words. Something had changed in the short amount of time since we climbed into the car. He seemed cooler—frosty, even—but why? I went over everything I’d said since we sat down. Was it something I said?
“Geoff?”
Without another word he shifted back into drive and I could definitely see that something was wrong. He didn’t talk and he barely turned his head in my direction to check for traffic during the whole trip.
Chapter Fifteen
Geoff
∞∞∞
I stuck with the story. My heart dropped with those words. I stuck with the story. But of course, she did. What did I expect? A confession of undying love? She didn’t love me—not like that. Not like I wanted her to. She loved me as a friend—a friend who wanted to help me get my inheritance so I could stay in school and get my degree. I was the one breaking my own heart by seeing more than was really there. If I was smart, I’d play my part over the next few weeks until my birthday—getting married, getting control of my inheritance, and going away for the honeymoon—then staging a public breakup soon after we got back home…after which I could lay low, understandably too heartbroken to even consider dating anyone else.
Remembering I’d promised her pizza and wine, I pulled into the parking lot at Johnnie’s. I ran in and ordered, then hurried a few doors down for the wine. My timing was perfect, and I arrived back just as they were boxing up my order. I tossed it in the back and headed for the exit, giving a cursory glance to the right before pulling out onto the street.
“Look out!” She threw her arms up.
I heard brakes lock up and smelled the acrid stench of rubber burning. Already committed, I goosed it and laid rubber, praying I was fast enough even as part of me braced for impact. Several long seconds passed without the crunch of metal on metal and I slowly relaxed. I darted a glance at her after my heart stopped pounding. “You okay?”
“No thanks to you.”
“No thanks to—my fast reflexes kept us from getting hit!”
“Your childish pouting was what almost got us hit.”
“Childish pouting?”
“I didn’t stutter.”
“We didn’t get hit, did we?” I pushed the button on the garage door opener a little harder than I needed to. The plastic creaked but I barely noticed. “You’re welcome.”
I slammed the car door shut and stomped to the entryway off of the garage as the overhead door closed.
“For what?” She followed me inside the kitchen, “For frightening ten years off my life? I’ll be sure to think of you when I’m lying on my deathbed at seventy, thinking of the ten years I could have had ahead of me if not for your driving habits.”
“Screw you.” I tossed the boxes on the counter, setting the bottle, the car keys, and my phone down beside them.
“You wouldn’t like it. I’d just lie there thinking of my happy place.”
“I seriously fucking doubt that.”
“Ha!” she sneered at me. “Let me guess—you probably think I’d be screaming your name.”
“You’d be too breathless to scream anything.”
“In your dreams.”
“I could make you cream using nothing but my tongue.”
“Yeah, right.” She rolled her eyes. “The shit’s getting deep in here.”
But her cheeks were flushed, and I could hear how fast she was breathing. She was as turned on as I was. I stepped closer, plastering her against the wall. “Why ya breathing so hard, Palomas? Huh? The mental image of my face buried between your thighs getting you hot and bothered? Hmm?”
“Oh, like you’d know what to do. I’d have to draw you a map before you’d be able to find my clit.”
I got right up in her face, so close I could feel her minty breath wash across my lips, “I oughta turn you over my knee and paddle dat ass.”
“Yeah? You and what army?”
I don’t know which one of us closed the gap between our lips but suddenly I had my hand buried in her hair, jerking her head back. Her tongue tangled with mine, fighting for dominance as she climbed me, locking her legs around my waist. Starving, but not for food, we practically ate each other’s faces as I stumbled in the general direction of my bedroom, too proud and too desperately horny to watch where I was going.
Somehow, I safely traversed the stairs, and the hall, and crashed onto the mattress in my bedroom on top of her writhing form. Without taking my mouth from hers I peeled her out of her pants, throwing them in the direction of the floor, quickly followed by her shirt—I had to pull away in order to yank it over her head. She took the opportunity to jerk my shirt over my head as well before blushing and trying to cover her barely clad breasts with her hands. I wasn’t having it, though.
“Uh uh, baby.” I held both of her wrists in one hand and freed her from the lacy cups of her fire engine red bra with the other. Leaning down, I pulled a pebbled pink bud between my lips and sucked it deep into my mouth, tugging at it and scraping my teeth across the sensitive tip before laving it with my tongue.
“Aahhh!” She arched against my mouth, struggling to free her hands. It wasn’t happening, though. I simply tightened my grip and transferred my attention to the other breast.
I could feel her getting damper against the skin of my bare stomach. Every tug of my lips sent a tiny trickle of moisture to dampen the crotch of her panties and cool my skin as I moved aroun
d. The musky scent of her desire drifted up to tease my nose and my mouth watered. Curious about how she’d taste, I slid down until I was face to face with her saturated red thong. I blew a breath of air across the material and she froze.
“What are you doing?”
I didn’t bother answering. It should have been obvious what I was doing. I ducked my head and dragged the flat of my tongue straight up her center, thong and all, pressing the material against her saturated pussy lips.
“Mmm,” I groaned. She tasted so sweet. I tugged her panties down around her knees and raised her legs toward her chest, opening her naked slit to my admiring gaze. I braced my arms against her thighs to keep them up and open, barely realizing that I still held her wrists in my left hand.
“Geoff, what are you—” I leaned in and shoved my tongue between her puffy lower lips, searching for every drop of nectar I could find. When I grazed her clit with my tongue, she came unglued, bucking her hips against my mouth. “Oh, god!”
Can’t find it without a map, huh? I grinned but didn’t say a word. Instead, I tugged at the little pink nub with my lips, sucking on it and lashing it with the tip of my tongue. Her hips lifted even higher, pressing her clit harder against my mouth…so I responded by sucking it deeper between my lips. She shook like she was in the middle of a California earthquake and nearly drowned me with her excitement as she came in a rush.
“A squirter—I like that.” I wiped my face with one hand and licked it off as I got to my knees. I pushed my pants down with the other hand. I took my time, going slow—torturously slow—as I stripped. I watched her, waiting for any hint that she might want to take it slower. “Now would be a good time if you wanted to stop,” I murmured.
“Don’t stop.” A flicker of fear danced in her blue-green eyes for a brief moment, then she blinked, and it was gone like it had never existed. She kicked her panties off, sending them flying, “Please, Geoff—don’t stop…”
