by Avery Flynn
She and Frankie were laughing and arguing about which one of them was sassier while walking between the Tilt-A-Whirl and The Hammer toward the Ferris wheel when they were stopped by an unmistakable voice.
“I didn’t realize they made stuffed animals that big,” Constance said, her words slurred. “It’s almost as big as you are, Muffin Top.”
Lucy and Frankie turned. Constance, per usual, looked absolutely perfect, from her casual yet cute outfit to the waves of her blond hair—right up until a closer look exposed the pained tightness around her mouth, the sheen of perspiration making her forehead dewy, and the glassy look in her blue eyes. Perfect Constance was drunk as hell—and back to her high school mean-girl self.
Next to her, Bryce blanched and shot them an apologetic look. “I think it’s time to head home, honey.”
Constance didn’t even acknowledge what her husband had said. Instead, she looked up at Frankie. “I don’t know what’s wrong with you, but it’s gotta be big if you’re with her. Why else would someone like you be with someone who looks like that?”
A punch in the gut wasn’t the right metaphor for how Lucy felt at that moment. Run over by a train? That was closer, but still not quite right. Whatever it was, the pain of it shocked her into silence.
Next to her, Frankie wasn’t suffering from the same affliction. “You fucking bit—”
She put her hand on Frankie’s arm to shush him. There wasn’t any point. Bryce was dragging Constance away, his head close to hers as he said whatever it was that kept the other woman’s feet moving.
Lucy just stood there, shell-shocked, the hateful words on repeat in her head.
There must be something wrong with him.
It took a second, but her anger started pummeling her in hot waves of fury. Of course there had to be something wrong with Frankie if he was with her, because people sure seemed to think there was something wrong with her. Her degree, her professional success, her friends, none of it mattered to some people who would only see her as the fat chick to ignore or to passive-aggressively correct. She wasn’t a person. She was a walking, talking morality lesson of what happens when a woman lets herself go, when she fails to meet society’s expectations.
By the time Constance and Bryce were out of visible range, her gut was a sloshing mess of angry bile and humiliation.
“I’m not really in the mood for the Ferris wheel anymore,” she said, squeezing the llama too tight for a cheap carnival stuffed animal, but it was better than tracking the witch down and strangling her. “I need to cool off.”
Most people would have downplayed the bullshit of what had just happened by saying it was just the ramblings of a drunk—or they would have looked at her with pity. Not Frankie. He laid his hand at the base of her spine, offering the comfort she so desperately needed at the moment.
“Does this town have a pool?” he asked. “I wouldn’t mind a little cool-off myself.”
“Oh, there’s a pool all right, but I’ve got a better place in mind.”
Emerson Lake wasn’t really a lake so much as it was an oversized pond a mile down a dirt road in the woods with a floating dock in the middle. When she was growing up, all the cool kids at school had hung out at Woodson Lake, which was bigger and had a beach. Lucy and her small group of friends—none of whom had come back for the reunion—had taken over Emerson Lake and made it their own.
The bubbling anger had cooled to a simmer by the time Frankie parked his car in the makeshift parking spots between two copses of trees. Once she’d slipped off her shoes and put her toes in the water, her vision wasn’t tinted with red. It was close to what she needed, but not quite there. She needed more. She needed water up to her chin, she needed to float free, she needed to be able to let go.
“Turn around,” she said, reaching behind her for the zipper of her dress.
Of course, that just had him turning so that he faced her straight on as they stood on the edge of the lake. “Why?”
“Because I’m taking my clothes off.” The sound of her zipper going down seemed way louder than the gentle lap of the water against the shore.
But talk was cheap. She wouldn’t let Constance’s drunken verbal vomit hurt her anymore, and she wouldn’t be fooled by Frankie’s sweet nothings. Just go with it? She should have known better. This was why she led with insults. Being always on the defensive meant not getting sucker-punched by the assholes of the world who knew nothing about her but felt perfectly fit to judge her anyway. She knew who she was. She was the woman who’d made something of herself, and fuck all those people who couldn’t stand that.
Fuck. Them.
“And I don’t get to look?” Frankie said it with a joking tone, but even in the moonlight there was no hiding the serious set of his jaw.
“No matter what happened the other night, it’s different when you can see the whole package, and I’m done with people who can’t accept me for who I am for one day.”
She’d been through it before. Occasionally there had even been comments. She’d walked out on those assholes while they were holding their dry dicks in their hands. That didn’t mean it didn’t hurt, though—that didn’t mean it didn’t still hurt today.
“And you don’t think I’ll like what I see?” Frankie’s voice rose with frustration. “Have you been listening at all to what I’ve been saying to you for the past few days?”
Yeah, the past few days when he hadn’t been having any sex at all for the first time in forever. And it wasn’t like they hadn’t known each other before. He’d had the opportunity to approach her before and hadn’t until he’d turned off his sex tap. Hurt and anger and self-doubt and all the old insecurities brought to the forefront by coming home again pummeled against her ribs, made her lungs tight, and clogged her throat with emotion. They’d been at the same BBQs and parties for months, celebrating Ford’s engagement to Gina, but he’d never given Lucy a second look—at least not one of those looks. And now he couldn’t get enough of seeing her?
“You want to see?” she asked, her voice strained with pent-up emotion.
Tension came off him in waves as he spoke slowly and with absolute conviction. “Yeah, I do.”
Okay. If that was what he wanted, that was exactly what he was going to get.
Frankie spoke all the right words, but he couldn’t help himself. He was a natural-born flirt. He had probably been born looking like the redheaded son of Apollo. He didn’t know what it was like to grow up in the shadow of a woman whose posters had been on adolescent boys’ walls. He didn’t see the disappointment in his mother’s eyes when he reached for another cookie. He’d never been given clothes that were purposefully a size too small, supposedly to encourage him to shed just a few stubborn pounds. He hadn’t been the cause of a rift between his parents that had ruined a marriage because he was an embarrassment to his mother.
That had been her.
All her.
And suddenly, everything just seemed too much. The “good for you”s her co-workers would offer when she’d mention she was heading out early to hit the gym. Or the way conversations always seemed to end up on their favorite “easy” exercises and healthy recipes whenever she was around. Or how someone would ask her if she’d lost a few pounds because she looked good today, as though that were a compliment. But most of all, she was tired of the pitying looks.
Why would Frankie be any different?
If he wanted to see all of her, fine. And when he showed pity in his eyes, at least once and for all she’d be able to get her hormones off of this roller coaster ride to eventual heartache.
Because the one thing she knew more than anything else: Frankie’s rejection was going to hurt worst of all. Better to just get it over with. And if there was one thing Muffin Kavanagh knew best, a good offense was always the best defense.
“Okay, fine then.” She released her hold on her dress and shoved it down over her hips so it fell down her legs and landed in a heap in the wet grass. “This is what you get when
you have a naked Lucy Kavanagh.” She reached behind her back to her bra clasp. “There are rolls.” The bra hooks gave way, and she shook it off, letting it drop where it may. “There are stretch marks.” She slid her thumbs into the waistband of her high-waisted panties meant to hold her not-perfect stomach in and pushed them with more force than necessary to her ankles. She kicked them off with enough power that they went flying through the night like a red cotton bullet and landed on a bush near where Frankie had parked. “There are curves where there should be dips.” She held her arms out wide. “There is all of this, and I’m not apologizing for it—not to you and not to anyone.”
Was she sounding a little bit like a woman on the edge of losing it? Hell yes, she was, and she didn’t care. This was it. This was her.
The longer Frankie just stood there staring at her, the expression on his face unreadable for once, the louder the doubt demons screamed in her ears. She could last it out, though. She was a strong woman made of stern stuff and—the first tears burned the backs of her eyes. No. She would not. She would not allow herself to cry. She would not. Grinding her teeth together in an effort to clamp down on her emotions, she watched Frankie do nothing but stand there and stare.
At her size-twenty body.
Naked.
Without saying a damn thing.
Her nose twitched, and she had to blink back the tears. She may not be able to stop them, but she sure wasn’t going to let him see her cry. God, this was worse than she imagined. She felt raw and exposed and vulnerable—everything she fought every damn day not to be.
“Yeah,” she said, her voice raw. “That’s what I thought.”
Without waiting on a response that wasn’t about to happen, she strode into the lake, waiting until she was waist deep before she dove under the water and began swimming toward the floating dock and away from such a stupid fantasy as being more than just a pity fuck for Frankie Hartigan.
Chapter Fourteen
Frankie had no idea what had just happened. Wait. He took that back. He knew what had happened, but was clueless about how he’d become the asshole in all of this.
What in the ever-loving hell was going on?
Once actual thought had burst through the haze of WTF, he started to strip down. It didn’t take long, since he wasn’t slowed down by having to deliver an angry tirade directed at a person who was so turned on by seeing Lucy’s naked body that they couldn’t think straight, let alone form words.
By the time he was bare-ass naked, the woman in question had made it out to the floating dock. She pulled herself up onto it, and Frankie’s brain went into shutdown mode again.
The moonlight caught every inch of her skin, wet and tempting from her swim. He might have been—okay, totally was—mesmerized, but she couldn’t even be bothered to look back toward the shore. Instead, she went straight to the metal box in the middle of the wooden square and pulled out a blanket. With a few efficient moves, she had it spread out on the dock and sat down, facing away from him as if he didn’t even exist.
Oh no. That was not going to happen.
Lucy Kavanagh wasn’t going to tell him that he couldn’t possibly want her when every part of him—including the part pointing right at her—wanted her very, very badly.
That need, hot and urgent, spurred him forward into the water. On any other night, the squishy ground and God-knew-what that had brushed against his leg in the murky depths of the lake may have stopped a city boy like him who’d only ever been in chlorinated pools. However, tonight was a different story.
His patience had run out.
He made it out to the dock in record time, if someone kept records for naked night swimming to go have an argument with a woman who made him nuttier than a handful of peanuts. Reaching up, he planted his palms on the floating dock and vaulted up onto it.
“Lucy Kavanagh, you are fucking maddening.”
She jumped up from the blanket with a squawk of surprise as if she really had figured he’d just gotten an eyeful of her naked and had slunk away into the night. That just pissed him off more.
“I am not that bitch Constance, or that guy from Marino’s who told you to eat a salad, or any of the other dumbasses who’ve been too stupid to see you as you are.”
She whirled around. “Oh yeah, and what’s that?”
“One of those women who men start wars over.”
He heard her breath hitch in surprise. God, all he wanted in the world was to take the three steps it would take to reach her so he could touch his fill, but he wasn’t going to do that. Precarious didn’t begin to describe the situation, and he wasn’t about to intimidate her with his size or the fact that they were both naked, staring at each other like they were the answer to each other’s questions.
At least she was to his. He knew that to be a fact and he’d swear to it in court—just hopefully with more clothing on. “Lucy Kavanagh, you’re the kind of woman who makes a man so desperate he’ll happily lose his ever-loving mind for the chance to touch you.”
She let out a sigh and all the brusque, angry tension went out of her. “I’m not a small woman.”
“Maybe you’ve noticed,” he said, straightening to his full height. “I’m not a small guy.”
Her eyes dipped lower, and yeah, he reacted to the appreciation he saw in her eyes when her gaze moved back up. A small smile teased the ends of that sweet mouth of hers, the one he couldn’t stop fantasizing about, much to the detriment of his sanity, and she took a step closer.
“Do you even know what to do with that?” Her voice had gone husky. “What if all the talk around Waterbury is exaggeration?”
He raised one eyebrow, which was all the response that asinine question deserved. Still, he answered anyway. “Why don’t you give me a try and find out.”
She took another step closer, the blanket still clutched around her body like a shield, but almost near enough to touch. It was killing him to stay still, not to push his advantage, but this had to be her call. Thank all that was good in the world, because she took another step forward, and another and another until his body was tense with anticipation. Then, she reached out and glided a fingertip across his chest, following the line of freckles that he’d hated as a kid but was so goddamn thankful for now because Lucy seemed to be fascinated by them.
“What happened to being patient?” she asked, her tone as soft as her touch.
And that’s all it took to break the last thread of self-control holding him back. “This.”
In the next breath, his fingers were digging into her wet hair, his mouth on hers, and nothing else mattered. It was a frenzy of touching, licking, tasting as they came together. He glided his hands over her body, loving the way she reacted to him with throaty moans and answering touches.
He couldn’t get enough of her, the round curve of her full hips, the weighty heft of her breasts, which filled his hands as he plundered her mouth. Fuck, there was so much he wanted to do with this woman that he had no idea where to start. With other women he’d always known, but this wasn’t a flirty seduction, this was a full-on, fully engaged four-alarm fire, and he was glad as hell to be burning.
…
Lucy had lost her ever-loving mind. If she had a mind. She wasn’t sure anymore, not after she’d turned around in time to catch Frankie pull himself out of the lake and onto the floating dock.
He had been naked. Had she mentioned that?
And he was still naked.
And kissing her.
And touching her.
And turning her brain into total rambling mush wherein she was having a silent conversation with herself because there was no way she could kiss this man and not do something a little crazy at the same time.
Had she mentioned they were naked? Yeah. Good, because they were, and his long, hard, and thick cock was pressed against her belly. And his hands? They were everywhere at once, and his touch wasn’t gentle or timid or unsure as if he wasn’t sure he wanted to be doing this. Nope. Frankie was a
grab-a-handful-like-you-mean-it kind of guy, and she was reveling in it.
When his hands slid down her back and cupped her ass, he gripped both cheeks in his big hands and gave just the right kind of squeeze that made her break their kiss with an appreciative moan.
He let go immediately, his gaze searching her face. “Too much?”
As if that was even possible. “Not even close. I’m not some delicate flower who can’t take a man like you.”
“Is that a challenge?” he asked, his voice a low rumble.
“It’s a promise.” Lame response? Yeah, but she was lucky to be stringing two words together at this point. “So why don’t you show me what you’ve got?”
He gave her a grin that would have set her panties on fire if she’d been wearing any. “Everything you need.”
He yanked the blanket over so it was wrapped over the steel box, sat down, and tugged her down to him, so she straddled his lap with one knee on each side of his hips. Somehow enough of her brain cells were still functioning to make sure she balanced her weight on her legs instead of giving him the full brunt of it.
“Oh fuck that,” he practically growled, a heated look promising a million naughty things in his eyes. “I want you right”—he grabbed her hips and pulled her lower so that all of her was pressed against him, without holding any of herself back—“here so I can feel that slick, wet pussy of yours against me as I finally get to taste these beautiful nipples of yours. Now give them to me.”
She didn’t have to think twice. She cupped her breasts and lifted them higher as her nipples hardened to tight buds under his hot gaze. For half a second, he just stared at them, looking every bit like a man who’d finally gotten what he wanted most in the world. Then, he dipped his head and lashed his tongue across her aching nipples. Sensation shot straight down to her core and, unable to stop herself, she arched her back and undulated against him.
