by Tessa Bailey
Now, he hooks his hands under my arms and starts to drag me across the console. “Come on over here. I’ll show you the basics.”
A surprised laugh bursts past my lips at the unexpected move. “On your lap?”
“There’s no better place for you.”
He adjusts the steering wheel and driver’s seat so we both fit, choking on a laugh when I elbow him in the ribs. When I finally settle into his lap, both of us gasp a little at how good it feels. The light material of my dress, the way it rides high on my legs doesn’t go unnoticed by him. I can feel his swift response against my bottom. With willpower I didn’t know I had, I swallow the desire to abandon the lesson altogether and simply beg him to unzip his jeans. Focus. Prove to yourself you’re not a sex-depraved nitwit. “What if I drive us into the ocean?”
“I wouldn’t let us get that far, babe.”
His smoky voice, laced with just a hint of arrogance, makes me shiver. “All right, tell me the basics.”
“The basics. Right.” With one hand settled possessively on my hip, he uses his other to indicate the gearshift. “The hardest part is learning how to get the car into first gear. That’s what we’re going to focus on now.” His thighs flex underneath me, and I bite my lip hard, attempting to control my breathing. “You have three pedals, instead of two like you’re accustom to.”
I lean back to see under the steering wheel, bringing my back against his broad chest. “Three pedals. Check.”
His hand drifts up my bare left thigh, teasing the hem of my dress. “This one goes on the clutch. The other one on the accelerator.”
I do as he instructs me. “Done,” I say, barely recognizing my own voice. It’s almost impossible not to circle my bottom on his arousal. I want to tilt my head so he can attack my neck. I want him to slip a hand between my legs. But like me, he appears determined to take this as far as we can. We seem to have the same characteristic stubbornness.
“Okay, you’re going to press down on the clutch with your left foot. Good. Now, put the car into first gear.” I do it with a flick of my wrist. “Good girl. With your right foot, ease off the brake and press slowly down onto the accelerator. As you press down on the accelerator, slowly take pressure off the clutch until you feel the gears catch.”
Shit, this is way harder than I thought. I’ve only ever driven my sister’s rusting orange truck, which we lovingly referred to as The General. The hard part had been getting the bucket of bolts to start, but driving it had been relatively easy. This was a whole new ball game. Add the ridiculously hot man beneath me with a hard-on and this is a Fear Factor-style challenge. Taking a deep breath, I close my eyes and repeat what Shane said in my head. Ease off the clutch…slowly press the accelerator…feel the gear catch.
When I open my eyes, we’re moving down the beach.
“Agh!”
“Holy shit. She gets it her first time. I can’t believe it.” Shane is shaking with laughter beneath me, arm banding around my waist as a makeshift seat belt. Obviously, he hadn’t expected the vehicle to move anytime soon. “You’re a bloody natural.”
“What do I do now?” I practically shriek, eyes glued to the stretch of sand in front of me, ocean crashing to my left.
“You relax,” he breathes at my neck. His rough hand slides over mine on the clutch. “You’re going to switch to second gear now. Press down on the clutch as you shift, then switch back to the accelerator, just like the last time. Easy.”
He doesn’t have to instruct me the next time, as I push the car into third gear. We’re moving faster down the beach now. Shane rolls down the window so salty air begins to whirl through the car, lifting the hair off my shoulders and blowing it around my face. Apart from last night, it’s the most exhilarating moment of my life. I’m laughing, I realize. I’m laughing so hard that tears are streaming down my cheeks. Shane’s arm is tight and reassuring around my belly, his chest rising and falling behind me, as if we’re one person.
“Look at you, Willa.” He speaks beside my ear. “This is what you were meant to do. You were meant to go fast. To let go. Same as me.”
“Yes.” It’s only a whisper, but he hears it. I know by the kiss he plants on my shoulder. “Can I go faster?”
His chest rumbles against my back, but I can’t tell if he’s laughing or humming his approval. “Punch it, babe.”
I move the car into fourth gear, then fifth. My hair is like a living thing inside the car, floating around us both, carried on the sea air. There is a rush in my ears. It sounds like the ocean, but I know it’s something else. It’s the same feeling of completion from last night, but now that I recognize it, I let it grow and drown everything else out.
When I see the stretch of beach ending, I’m disappointed, but only for a fraction of second. As soon as the cars rolls to a stop, I’m being turned around on Shane’s lap to face him. I have no time to catch my breath before his mouth is consuming mine. His hands are tangled in my hair, pulling me closer. Our expelled breaths bounce off the inside of the car, joining the rush in my ears to create a sound unique to me. To us.
Dying to get as close to him as possible, I spread my legs as far as the confined space will allow and begin to ride the ridge behind his fly. He moans into my mouth and grips my bottom, urging me to go faster. His hips start pumping upward between my thighs, driving my bottom into the steering wheel so hard, I hear a far-off beeping and know it’s coming from our car.
“No, no. I need to get closer,” Shane pants against my mouth, before nearly ripping off the driver’s side door to get it open. He drags me from the car and pushes me back against the hard surface, partially heated by the purring engine. Running his teeth along the line of my neck, he slips his hand between my thighs to massage me through my underwear. “Are you wet enough, girl?”
“Are you kidding me?”
“Thank Christ.” He takes a condom from his pocket, hurriedly freeing himself from his jeans to roll it on. All the while, he’s watching with rapt interest as I drag my panties down my legs. When I start to pull the dress over my head, he stops me. “Leave it. I’m going to make you come in that dress. Then I’m going to fucking burn it.”
Confused by his harshly spoken words, I start to question him, but he hikes me up against the car, propping me there with his hips and drives into me hard. Our simultaneous groans are short-lived because he hooks his arms beneath my knees and yanks my legs higher, making me go light-headed at the pressure of him buried deep inside of me. He bites into my bottom lip and draws it back as he starts to thrust. It’s a different, forceful side to Shane and this new, wild, living thing inside of me responds to it. I dig my fingernails into his shoulders, prop my heels on his ass, and beg for it with my body.
“Is this how it’s going to be?” His breath hitches as I start to match his rhythm, meeting each shove of his hips with a twist of my own. He lets me participate for a moment, then pins me against the car with a growl. “Every goddam time is better than the last. How the hell am I supposed to walk away from that? From you?”
I can’t answer that. Not only because I’m avoiding any thought of us parting ways, but because he’s filling my body over and over, making it so I can’t think beyond the oncoming release. It’s gathering in my belly, and I welcome it by latching onto Shane’s mouth, knowing his kiss will push me the rest of the way. It’s the extra push he needs, too. As soon as my tongue licks into his mouth, I feel him start to shake. Or maybe that’s me. I don’t know…I can’t tell anymore where I stop and he begins. I’m dragging him closer, he’s plastered to my body, and still, still, he’s too far away.
“Shane,” I sob, my heart feeling paralyzed.
“I know. I know,” he grates against me neck, biting the flesh there and finally sending me spiraling. “Let me have it all. No hiding from me. God, Willa.”
The car no longer exists behind us, we’re just clinging together as we free-fall. Holding one another as something that goes beyond physical response shudders through
me and into him. My chest is squeezing so tightly that I’m gasping for air. I don’t know if there’s a name for what I’m feeling, but I know if he lets me go right now, in this moment, I absolutely will not survive it.
We stay that way for long moments, letting our bodies calm, even if there is no chance of calming our minds or thoughts. I’m wrapped around Shane who has gone so still, I’m starting to feel a little alarmed. Just as I start to ask him if he’s all right, he slams a fist onto the roof of the car, then drops his head onto my shoulder.
“Dammit, Willa. I didn’t see you coming.”
He holds my hand on the ride home, but we don’t say a word.
Chapter Twenty-One
Shane is working late tonight, thanks to a bachelor party and a thirty-person pub crawl that stopped crawling once it got to the Claymore. I waited in my room as long as I could, restlessly watching the sky darken, not sure if I should wait for him to get off or go out on my own. While the afternoon on Bull Island had started out incredible, it had left something unsaid hanging in the air between us. I don’t like it, the not knowing. Not having everything on the table. My whole life, I’ve been the queen of avoidance, but secrets between Shane and I stretch and widen with every second that ticks past. Every time we’re together it seems like we’re interminably close, but when I can’t see or touch him, he feels eons away.
Thundering laughter below my feet sends me striding across the room to snatch up my messenger bag. I just have to get out of there and think. No more pacing around in this white-lace room, trying to figure out me and Shane when the answer has been the same since the beginning.
I squeeze through bodies inside the pub, trying to keep my eyes on the door, but they unerringly stray to Shane behind the bar. Dim bar light spilling over his dark hair, he’s nodding absently at the smiling girl who’s shouting to him over the music, but he looks distracted. Like he’s already picturing himself a thousand miles from the smell of alcohol, the sloppiness of the crowds. I think of him today, how his voice had changed when he explained the mechanics of driving manually. He doesn’t belong here, taking orders. He should be giving them. Behind a steering wheel, without a single thing to hold him back.
As if he can sense my specific thoughts in the midst of hundreds, his head snaps up and he’s searching through the crowd. For me? Yes. Our eyes lock with one another’s and the bottle of vodka he’s pouring drops to the bar. He wants to come after me. I can see it. Not that it’s unusual for me to go out this late, to explore Dublin at night. But I understand the look because things are different now, aren’t they? We’ve turned into a couple, even though we weren’t supposed to. Temporarily inseparable. Mustering a smile, I wave to him and keep walking, as if there should be no questions asked about my leaving this late, without him. Really, there shouldn’t be. That’s what I keep telling myself as his eyes burn a hole into my back.
As soon as I’m outside, I take a deep, gulping breath, feeling as though I’ve been underwater for the last two minutes. My feet start moving in the direction of the park, where I know there will still be a healthy crowd even at this time of night. I want to watch other people, witness their expressions and listen to their problems, so I don’t have to think of my own. I need a distraction. I need my sister.
After walking another block, I sit down on a bench across from the Liffey and dig my phone out of my bag. Ginger answers on the second ring.
“Hey.”
“Hey, yourself.”
I close my eyes, the comfort of her voice wrapping me up like a flannel blanket. “How’s my niece? Is she cursing like a sailor yet?”
“Not an f-bomb to speak of. Truth be told, we’re starting to get worried.”
My mouth twitches. “Aw, you know us Peet girls. All in our own time.”
We’re silent for a moment, and I can hear someone singing softly in the background, presumably to Dolly. When I realize its Derek, my throat closes up. I miss them so much. I know if they were standing in front of me, they would read me like a book. They would know the right words to say, or at the very least, Ginger would feed me chicken pot pie. But they can’t fix this situation with Shane for me. I’m an adult now, I went into it with my eyes open, and I have to take the inevitable pain that comes along with it.
“You going to tell me what’s wrong, or am I supposed to guess?”
Ginger’s astuteness surprises a laugh out of me. I thought I’d been doing a decent job of sounding normal. “What’s wrong, your crystal ball is in the shop?” She says nothing and I sigh. “It’s no one.” I cringe. “I mean, it’s nothing.”
“Uh-huh. Does this no one have a penis?”
“You kiss your baby with that mouth?”
“Hmm.”
I slouch back against the bench. “Yeah, no one has a penis.”
“Now that would be a crying shame.”
I don’t need a crystal ball to know we’re both smiling, but mine eventually fades. She’s just waiting on the other end for me to talk. Dammit, I love her for that. No pressure, just patience. She hasn’t brought up Evan, or the breakup I’d taken so hard. Hasn’t asked how I’m feeling or what I’ve learned on my trip. It makes me want to tell her everything. I suspect she knows that, too. She might be patient, but my sister is no dummy. “Ginger, that first week when you met Derek…could you have walked away?”
She chokes on a laugh. “You think he would have let me?”
Excellent point. “No. But if you absolutely had to, if you knew it was best for both of you, could you have done it?”
“No.”
I wasn’t expecting her to answer so easily. “Why?”
Ginger hums in her throat, the way she does when she’s thinking. “Love comes in many forms. It’s not always sweet. Or comfortable. Sometimes it’s selfish and consuming. Volatile.” Derek’s gentle singing in the background has stopped. “It makes choices for you. It demands you obey it, not taking no for an answer. And it’s usually right. It knows you better than you know yourself.” Ginger’s voice has gone soft. It sounds like she’s sitting right beside me on the bench. “It turns you inside out. Occasionally, it hurts, but in the best way imaginable. To remind you of how powerful it is. To keep you feeling alive.” She pauses. “I could have tried to walk away, but the love would have just come with me. Above all, love is stubborn as hell.”
“Shit. Good answer,” I manage in the understatement of the year. “I was just asking for a friend, of course.”
“Of course.”
Shaking my head at myself, I search for something to change the subject. When I remember what I wanted to tell her, I slap my hand to my forehead. “Hey, get this. Our great-great-grandmother was a nun.”
“Shut. Up.”
“I can’t believe I forgot to tell you.” After gaining my feet, I start walking once more in the direction of the park. “I went to the Heritage Center the day you had the baby. We actually have an ancestor who saw fit to take a vow of celibacy. They gave me documentation as proof of her virgin status.”
“Good thing, because I need to see it with my own two eyes.”
“You will.” My steps falter a little. “I’ll be home next week.”
“Dolly can’t wait to meet you.” She clears her throat. “I, uh, wouldn’t mind seeing your scrawny butt either.”
“Hey, I make up for my scrawniness in attitude.”
“Amen to that.” Ginger pauses a moment. “Listen. You know I don’t like to give advice, but seeing as I’m sleep-deprived and my tits are now a twenty-four-hour feeding station, I feel like I’ve earned the right to say my piece.”
I nod, as if she can see me. “Fair enough. Shoot.”
“I get the sense that maybe you’re in a difficult spot.” Slowly, she blows out a breath. “But there will be a moment, Wip. It’ll come when you’re not looking for it, but it will smack you upside your head. You’ll realize everything is bigger than you. Already planned out like a road map. It happened to me, and I shied away because I
was scared. This moment, it can be the worst of your life, or the best. Just make it your best. Let it be your best. Okay?”
I can’t speak around the lump in my throat, so I just mumble an acknowledgment. Ginger seems satisfied with that, however.
“I love you, Wip. You call me or Derek if you need anything.”
“Love you, too,” I whisper, then hang up. I walk back toward my bench and sit down. It’s the middle of the night before I stand on stiff legs and walk back toward the inn.
…
I wake up the next morning to the liquid sound of Kitty pouring tea into my cup. Weird. She usually knocks. Too tired to question the anomaly, I bury my face into the feather pillow and attempt to reenter the dream I’d been having about giant, dancing coffee makers in top hats. When my bed dips and I feel a breeze against my bare legs, I frown. A solid form presses against my back, pulling me up against it. My eyes pop open, my lips part on a gasp. That ain’t Kitty.
“Shane?”
“You were expecting another man to crawl into your bed?”
“Of course not. I keep a very strict schedule.” I suck in a breath when he starts circling a finger around my belly button. My nipples tighten, and I’m jolted into awareness of my skin. Every inch of it being cradled by the soft sheets, everywhere it presses against Shane’s warm flesh, the juncture of my thighs.
“Where did you go last night?”
“For a walk.” My eyelids flutter as he cups my breasts. “Needed some air.”
