by Avery Flynn
He just grinned up at her when she glared at him. “And what am I doing with you in this fantasy?”
Too many images assailed her at the same time to try to pick one. “Everything.”
“You’re gonna have to be more specific.” He punctuated his demand by blowing against the stiff peak of her nipple poking against her tank top.
Of course, that’s all it took for one of her many fantasies about being with Frankie to rush to the forefront.
She swallowed her embarrassment at admitting she fantasized about him. It would be worth it if he’d just make her come now. “I’m riding you. My hands are on your shoulders. Your hands are on my hips, your grip is tight, and I’m rocking against you.”
She could picture it. His muscular chest, the sprinkling of red hair that formed into a happy trail. The feel of his fingers digging into her flesh with just the right amount of pressure to urge her on. Tension built in her body in response to Frankie’s touch and the movie playing in her head. She raised her hips, needing more and needing it now.
Her eyes closed as his thumb moved against her clit again, and she was there, right fucking there, on the edge of exploding. She was so expecting him to stop touching her the closer that she got that she just fell into the fantasy and let go of everything else.
“I want to see that,” he said, slipping two thick fingers inside her. He pumped them in and out while pressing against her clit. “I want to see those tits of yours bounce and feel you wet and slick against my cock.”
“Oh my God, Frankie,” she cried out, unable to stop herself.
It was like having an orgasm in slow motion or watching a wave go out, knowing it was going to crash back down on the shore with double the force. Her whole body vibrated all the way down to her toes. It moved upward slowly, inching up to her ankles, then her calves, and her knees.
By the time it got to her thighs, she was holding on to Frankie like he was the only thing keeping her from taking off like a rocket. But she did anyway, the orgasm hitting her hard and wrecking her as she came, riding what seemed like a never-ending wave of pleasure.
She refused to let the heat now clinging to her cheeks lessen the moment. She’d deal with that in a minute.
…
Feeling Lucy come all over his fingers and watching her blissed-out expression as she came down from her orgasm was the best and worst thing Frankie had ever experienced.
The best because Lucy wasn’t wrong. Being with someone when it was about more than just getting off was different—and better. The worst because he couldn’t just observe and respond like he usually would. This was about more than just getting his rocks off—and he had to convince her of that, which meant she was the only one coming tonight.
“Don’t think,” she said, her voice husky as she reached for the button of his shorts, “this is done.”
Ignoring just how bad he did not want to move, he did anyway. They were going to do this, and they were going to do it right, meaning he wasn’t going to fast-fuck her on her dad’s couch like they were back in high school.
Confusion wiped out the last of the lingering satisfaction in her expression as she watched him pull back until he was once again standing a few steps away from her on the couch. Hurt flashed in her eyes for a millisecond before she shut it down. His chest tightened at her expression. Fuck. He was fucking it all up.
After sitting up, she smoothed her skirt down, turned so she was facing the TV, and reached for the remote.
“I stand corrected,” she said, her voice carefully neutral. “This is done.”
For a man who always knew the right thing to say to a woman, he had no clue how to express what was going on inside his head about her, about them. He’d run into the burning house without a plan, and now he could feel the flames licking at his back. It was a rookie mistake.
“Lucy,” he started, but she stalled him by holding up her hand.
“It was a thing—an awesome thing, but a thing. I understand. Close proximity and all that. We don’t have to talk about it. No big deal.”
She was wrong. This was a very big deal. He took a step toward her, hoping like hell that the right words would come out of his mouth when he opened it. But he didn’t get the chance.
Lucy stood up and clicked the power button on the remote. “In fact, I’m going to head off to bed.” Then she strode in the opposite direction from him, tossing a single word over her shoulder. “Goodnight.”
Fuck-nutters.
That had gone exactly not how he’d wanted—except for the Lucy’s orgasm part, that had been fucking phenomenal. However, he’d flubbed it hard-core after that.
But they had the entire day together tomorrow.
All he had to do was figure out how to convince her that this wasn’t about proximity. It was about a helluva lot more than that.
Chapter Twelve
Frankie was off for a run by the time Lucy made it down to the kitchen for breakfast the next morning. Gussie and her dad were waiting for her though and, judging by the fact that the big coffee pot on the counter was down to one cup, they’d been there for a while.
This didn’t bode well.
Who was it that said a person could never go home again? They were wrong, because you could do it, but that didn’t mean a person should. It was sort of like the too-tight jeans in every woman’s closet they refused to get rid of—she might be able to button them, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t regret wearing them. Maybe that’s why Lucy mostly wore empire waist dresses like she was now.
“Waiting for me?” she asked, snagging a cup down from the cupboard and filling it with the last of the coffee.
Her dad folded the morning paper and set it down by his breakfast plate, empty except for a dollop of syrup. “Seemed like a good idea after last night.”
Playing dumb was the last resort of someone who had no clue what else to do, which pretty much described her before her first cup of coffee, since her dad never had Mountain Dew in his fridge. “Why’s that?”
“I came home earlier than expected and quickly went upstairs. Not that either of you noticed,” her dad said. “He seems nice enough.”
Oh yes. Here it was. The Midwestern passive-aggressive advice framed as help when it was actually an invisible switchblade knife to the kidneys. She took her mug and sat down across from her dad, steeling herself for what was going to come next.
“But,” he went on, “I don’t think he’s interested in being just friends, so if that’s all you want then you should probably tell him.”
Okay, that was not what she’d been expecting—especially not after last night, which had been all about letting off some sexual steam and nothing more. Not with him. Not when it came to her. Still, she was so tossed off-balance by the sincerity in her dad’s voice that she just sat and blinked at him while he took a sip of his coffee.
He set the mug down and let out a deep breath. “It’s not nice to lead someone on.”
Her dad spoke from experience. After the divorce, her mom had married a Greek tycoon, yes, an actual real-life one. After that, neither of them had seen much of her—unless Lucy’s new stepdaddy had picked up a new mistress. These women had never lasted long, but while they did, her mom always came back to Antioch to visit her sweet baby and see dear friends, her mom had always said. In reality, she’d come for the ego-buffing that only Lucy’s dad could offer.
She’d tell him in a low, confidential voice about how horrible everything was while pressing her hand—bright with diamond rings—against his upper thigh. Lucy had walked in on them like this, once, twice, too many times to count. And it had always ended the same, with her dad believing this time was different.
It never was. Her mom always left.
Bless his heart, her dad had loved her mom. He’d told Lucy one night that he’d fallen for her mom the moment he first saw her and didn’t stop until the tycoon’s lawyer showed up on their front door to inform them of her death. Accidental drowning when she’d f
allen from the tycoon’s yacht.
Lucy had been sixteen, and even on the day of the funeral, she didn’t cry. She never had. What was the point? Tears weren’t going to fill that empty ache of abandonment.
“I know you’ll do the right thing, Muffin.”
Leading someone on was the last thing Lucy would do, even if she looked like her underwear model mom instead of her dad’s favorite high-calorie treat.
She cleared the emotion out of her throat and found her voice, finally. “Frankie is just a friend.”
“Does he know that?” her dad asked as he bent to the side and scratched Gussie behind the ears.
“Have you seen him?” What was her dad putting in his coffee these days? “We’re not exactly in the same dating league.”
He cocked his head to one side. “Why not?”
“Dad, I love you, but I don’t want to have this conversation.”
They’d had it too many times. She’d come home crying after another day of people being shitty to her—the taunts, the cruel practical jokes, the just general meanness of people for no other reason than that she was an easy target. Her dad would hug her and promise it would get better. It did, but not until she’d figured out the best defense is a great offense.
She wasn’t born brassy, mouthy, balls-to-the-wall tough. It had been how she’d survived.
She must have been silent for too long, because her dad got up from his seat and walked around to her side of the table.
“You know I love you.”
“I know, Daddy. I love you too.” Damn, and there was that clogged throat again, this time with the uncomfortable sensation of unwelcome tears in her eyes. Blinking the wetness away, she stood up and hugged her dad just like she used to on those bad days—the ones when the kids in her middle school had asked her if she’d eaten her mom and that’s why she was gone. “Do you think she ever realized what she was missing?”
Her dad gave her an extra squeeze, then took a step back, lifting her chin so she had to look him in the eyes.
“If she didn’t, then she was a fool.”
In twenty years, that was as close to a bad word as she’d ever heard her father say about her mother. Her chin was just starting to quiver when Gussie went nuts, scampering across the kitchen floor like a bullet shot from a .44. She and her dad turned just in time to see Gussie launch himself at Frankie, who protected himself by catching the flying French Bulldog and holding him out at arm’s reach.
“Am I interrupting?” he asked as the dog wriggled in his grip.
The dog was distracting, but not enough for her not to take in the sight before her. He stood in the kitchen doorway, running shorts riding low on his hips and a sweat-soaked T-shirt clinging to his washboard abs.
“No,” her dad said. “Just a little father-daughter bonding.”
Frankie squatted and released the dog, then stood before Gussie could make a run at his face. “Well, I’m just going to head upstairs to shower and then I’m good to go to kick Constance’s butt today.”
Now wouldn’t that be nice. She wasn’t above a little revenge in the form of idiotic picnic games.
“Sounds like a plan,” she said.
He opened his mouth as if to say something else but must have changed his mind, because instead of saying something he gave her a look she felt down to her toes. Then he turned and walked down the hall.
She shouldn’t have leaned a few inches to the side to watch him walk away. She shouldn’t have…but she did.
“Just friends, huh?” her dad asked with a chuckle.
She hustled over to the kitchen table, where her coffee loaded down with a Mountain Dew’s worth of sugar waited. “Yeah, Dad. Just friends.”
The kind who gave each other knee-knocking orgasms and drove cross-country to act as fake dates at a high school reunion. What could possibly go wrong?
…
Everything went straight to shit the moment Frankie picked up the potato sack from the pile at Constance’s feet.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he said, holding up the narrow bag chest high. “I can barely fit one of my legs in here, let alone one of mine and one of Lucy’s.”
Constance made a tsk-tsk sound. “Well, we can’t have different sizes for different teams, that would just be preferential treatment and we like things to be fair. That’s the size that fits the majority of people, so that’s the one we went with.”
Yeah, it would fit the majority of people who were twig-sized and short. The bag covered his knee and that was it.
“You know, there’s two words for someone like you, Constance.”
She stiffened and crossed her arms in front of her chest. “What’s that?”
Leaning in close enough that the cloying scent of her flower perfume just about cut off his oxygen, he said, “Second place.”
Then he turned and started toward where Lucy stood across the Antioch Park by the potato sack race starting line. The sound of Constance’s outraged gasp put a smile on his face that he couldn’t have hidden even if he wanted to.
When he stopped by Lucy, she took one glance at him and shook her head.
“What have you been up to?” she asked, looking like one of his fantasies come to life in a red top and a red skirt that swirled around her thighs at even the hint of a breeze.
“Psyching out the competition.”
It must have worked, because they managed to make the stupid narrow bag work and ended up coming in first place. The fact that the bag was such a tight fit actually worked in their favor because they could concentrate on speed rather than trying to hold up the potato sack. Of course, the downside to that was that he didn’t have an excuse to put his hand anywhere near the hem of Lucy’s skirt.
He didn’t get the opportunity during the next game, either. That was blind building, which meant he was blindfolded and tasked with building a replica of Antioch High School out of popsicle sticks with Lucy’s verbal directions being his only guide. They probably would have done okay, but ended up coming in at second place behind Constance and her pencil-pushing husband, Bryce.
It was Frankie’s fault. He kept getting distracted by Lucy’s voice.
And by distracted he meant turned on. It was damn hard to listen to her and not picture those cherry red lips of hers forming each word. What could he say, he was a walking, talking billboard for pent-up sexual frustration after being around her for the past few days. Add in what they’d done last night, and he was a lost cause.
However, all he had to do was to hold out until tonight, and then he was going to turn on the potent Hartigan charm that had been getting him laid since forever. She wanted him. He wanted her. There was no reason why this couldn’t work. It was just what both of them needed.
Really, as far as the relationship tools he had in his arsenal, good sex was pretty much the best thing he had going for him.
“Oh, too bad about how things are turning out,” Constance said after sidling up to him as he stood in the lemonade line. “There’s just one more event this afternoon, and Bryce and I have it locked up.”
“The obstacle course?” He glanced over to the other side of the park, where that event had been set up.
There were tires contestants had to hop through, a section where they’d have to army crawl under ropes, a water balloon firing squad, and more. Lucy had taken one look and dashed home to change so she wouldn’t have to deal with all of that in a skirt.
“There’s a climbing wall,” Constance said, pointing to the wooden structure at the end of the course. “It’s a tough one.”
There was nothing in her tone that was a callback to her bitchy greeting the other day, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that there was an underlying animus. “What is your problem with Lucy?”
She smoothed her palms over her blond hair, held back in a ponytail, and looked around as if to make sure no one overheard him. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“You have to admit this attitude of yours is extreme fo
r someone who’s not fifteen and a hormonal wreck. Hell, it’s extreme even for that.”
Something flickered in the woman’s blue eyes, something that looked a lot like the kind of old hurt that had been picked at for so long it was just layer after layer of scar tissue. “Let’s just say she brought it on herself, coming into school with those expensive clothes and fancy jewelry her mama bought her when most folks barely had enough money to put food in the fridge after the Pacifica Company plant shut down.”
Bingo. Insecurities didn’t skip over the pretty people. “So you were jealous?”
“No.” She narrowed her eyes at him, her entire body practically sparking with fury. “I was pissed.”
“Seems like you still are.” And that was the understatement of the year.
Constance marched off right as he spotted Lucy making a beeline straight for him. Gone was that sexy skirt, replaced with a pair of cropped yoga pants and long, flowing sleeveless shirt.
“Cavorting with the enemy?” she asked once she got to him.
He handed her a lemonade. “Just trying to work some shit out.”
“Well, do it from the starting line. We’ve got to win this one if we’re going to stay in the race. Good thing I do the Waterbury charity color run obstacle course every year. Now let’s go do this.”
And they did. It wasn’t easy, that was for sure, but Lucy was in great shape. The woman would kill it on the fire department obstacle training course.
He and Lucy were celebrating with drinks in a corner booth at the only bar in downtown Antioch before heading back to the house to get ready for the Antioch town carnival tonight. Then, there was one more day of activities and the reunion dance, which was set up to be a repeat of Lucy’s senior prom, complete with the Under the Sea theme.
“Who did you go to your prom with?” he asked, handing her a beer.
“I didn’t.” She gave him a look that just about screamed duh. “I was the fat girl and designated class punching bag, no one was going to ask me.”
“Not everyone could have been like Constance.” Just the idea of it had him grinding his teeth.
