Forbidden Fruit Vol 2

by Millstead, Kasey

  “I don’t want to talk about this.”

  “Mal-”

  “Don’t call me that. We shouldn’t even be talking.” I shook my head, my eyes stinging.

  I heard him gather a deep breath then whisper a curse on the exhale. His hands on the wheel opened then tightened around the beige leather.

  I attempted to find some anger, focus on the loss of my future—the future I’d imagined—rather than on the longing I felt for him and fact that we were alone for the first time in eight years.

  The difference between fourteen and twenty-two, the clumsy and awkward fumbling of new feelings versus the heated, simmering knowing that comes with age and experience.

  How nice it must be for him to have a car that works, I thought. But my attempt failed. I wasn’t angry at him for living his carefree life, for being surrounded with material comfort, or for the things he owned.

  I was angry with him because I wanted him so desperately.

  My life was my own, I took responsibility for it—which was why I was still working at a theme park and living in a trailer with my aunt, why I was saving my money, why I was starting community college in the fall on a scholarship, and why I hadn’t dated anyone since leaving the University of Florida.

  Actually, it was only part of the reason I didn’t bother to date. There were two other reasons.

  First, the type of men that seemed to be attracted to me, the ones that approached me, were all assholes. The guys I was actually interested in never seemed to be able to move beyond how I looked.

  I had an hourglass shape—all tits and ass and legs. Since puberty, which had arrived in full force at thirteen, I’d felt the gaze of men follow me. I saw the displeasure in my father’s eyes when he looked at me before he left our family. I’d been compared to my mother enough to last me a lifetime.

  That pretty face, those eyes. You have the kind of body men want for one thing, my aunt told me over and over, Just like your mother.

  If she were drunk, she’d say instead, Between your purple eyes and those tits, they won’t know where to look. They’ll all want to fuck you, but that’s all they’ll want. Then she’d laugh like it was a joke.

  The other reason I didn’t date was that despite our ages when we were separated, despite the time that had passed and the distance between us, I compared everyone to Phillip. Everyone, in comparison, was lacking.

  It didn’t matter. I didn’t need anyone. Relying on others—like my mom relied on Phillip’s dad to do the right thing, like my dad relied on my mother to be faithful, like my brother relied on Phillip’s sister to be truthful—only led to heartbreak and ruin.

  I knew my hard work would eventually get me where I wanted to be. Specifically, out of Florida, independent of my relatives, and earning enough money to help my brother fight the false charges against him.

  My life wasn’t what I wanted it to be, not yet, but it would be soon.

  As long as I stayed clear of the McAlisters.

  He slowed the car and made the left into the trailer park. I lifted my finger and pointed through the white sheet of rain to my aunt’s almost invisible trailer.

  “I’m the last one on the right,” I said, gripping the towel in my lap with my other hand. I was thinking about keeping the towel. I told myself it was because it was ruined and he’d have no use for it, not because I wanted a token of him, something to keep.

  He could probably buy ten thousand towels. I didn’t understand why he even worked at the park over the summers.

  But he did. Every year he’d come back and play the role of Prince Phillip in Sleeping Beauty from June until August. Then he’d disappear back to New York for the school year.

  Every year I saw him from a distance, in the tunnels under the park, and I’d run in the other direction. When we were on stage or on a parade float together, we were playing a role. We were adversaries. It was safe because the first rule of being a character actor at the world’s largest theme park is to never break character.

  No matter what.

  Get punched in the baby maker by a kid? Act through it. Get yelled at by a drunk parent for not displaying an appropriate amount of attention for their ugly, screaming, snotty baby? Act through it. Four million degrees outside during the noon Main Street parade while donning a seventy pound costume? Act. Through. It.

  Everyone has their role to play.

  Some people, crazy people, take this rule a little too seriously. They never break character. From the moment they enter the cast member—because that’s what we’re all called—parking lot until park closing, they are their character.

  Actually, it’s the princesses.

  And do you know who the princesses hate?

  The villains.

  But do you know who the princesses love?

  The princes.

  This was perfectly fine by me. Phillip was surrounded by his summer harem, and this was the last week of August before he’d be leaving again to go back up to New York for his senior year of college. Another summer gone, and I’d managed to successfully avoid him outside of shared performances.

  Until now.

  The car slowed when we were two lots away from my trailer and he inched the car the last three hundred feet, our velocity no more than five miles per hour, maybe even as little as three. I sensed his restlessness even though the car was crawling.

  I took a calming breath through my nose, unbuckled my seatbelt, and moved my hand to the handle, ready to bolt as soon as he stopped.

  But just before he came to a complete stop, he locked the doors and released his seat belt. I heard the switch of the lock just as I tried the door. When it didn’t budge, I attempted to lift the toggle manually, but it also wouldn’t move.

  I blinked at the door three times then turned just slightly in my chair. I offered Phillip only my profile. “Unlock the door.”

  He didn’t respond. Instead, he reached toward me as though to touch my hair, still wet and slick against my cheeks and down my back. Usually, when it wasn’t plastered to my body, it curled as thick, black ringlets to my lower back.

  I flinched and he hesitated, his hand suspended mid-air between us. When I didn’t retreat any further, his hand settled—impossibly warm and strong, both soothing and exhilarating—on my neck, his fingers threading into the wet curtain of my hair. I closed my eyes just as a bolt of lightning lit the sky, a strobe flashing through windshield.

  For a moment I wondered if I’d imagined the lightening, because where his hand gripped my neck caused an electric shock then current through my body. Despite my wet clothes—heavy drapes of black and purple fabric—my skin was on fire.

  “Phillip…” His name was a curse and a prayer.

  “Look at me,” he whispered, his voice thick with some emotion I wasn’t ready to hear, let alone see.

  I squeezed my eyes shut tighter. “I can’t.”

  “Please. I want you…” He paused, his hand tugged me softly as though coaxing me to turn toward him. “God, Mal. I need you to look at me when I say this.”

  I inhaled a ragged breath and shook my head, my chin wobbled, and I was surprised as how difficult it was for me to keep from choking on my words. “Please, just let me go.”

  “I’ve tried that,” he growled, his grip on my neck tightening, his tugging a bit more forceful, urgent. “I’ve tried everything. I’ve given you time and space. I’ve stayed close without pushing. I’ve tried to follow your lead—but you never talk to me, not unless it’s in a script. If I have to spend my life watching you without you looking back, I’d rather be blind.”

  His words were a dagger to my chest, and I couldn’t draw breath—as though the wind had been knocked from my lungs. I curled forward, into myself, my head bent, my shoulders slumped.

  “Please…” His whisper was tortured, ragged, “Dammit, Mal. Look at me.” These words were punctuated by his other hand coming to my cheek, cupping it, and lifting my chin.

  I pressed my lips together, gripped th
e towel in my lap, and looked at him. His eyes were searching.

  Phillip winced, a subtle half blinking of his lids, when our gazes met—as though the sight of my unusual violet eyes caused him physical pain. I watched his chest rise and fall with a breath that was as large as it was unsteady.

  He surprised me by asking, “Do you miss me?”

  I blinked, which caused two tears to roll down my cheeks. Despite the traitorous evidence on my face, I said, “We were just kids.”

  He winced again in much the same way he’d done before, but this time he paired it with a shake of his head, a denial of my words. “I know you do, I know you miss me. I know you’ve thought of me, that you think about me like I think about you.”

  “What do you want me to say, Phillip? Because I’ll say it.” My mouth tasted bitter with the words I was about to say. “Do you want me to tell you that I found my soul mate in kindergarten, and we were separated by forces out of our control? That I want to be with you? That I think about you every night before I fall asleep and in the morning when I wake up and every minute of every day? That I l-love you?” I paused, my heart thumping painfully when I saw a shadow of hope behind his features. Therefore, I quickly added, “Or do you want me to tell you how much I hate you?”

  This time his wince wasn’t subtle; he flinched as though I’d struck him and his hands fell from my face.

  “No...” he said. It was a rejection of my words, not an answer to my perverse question.

  I tried to swallow again, but my mouth was too dry. My words were choked as I continued, “Because I hate you.” My face crumpled and I twisted the towel in my lap. “I hate you.”

  What I didn’t tell him was that both sentiments were true. I hated him, and I loved him. He was my soul-mate and my prison.

  I wanted him with the same ferocity that I needed him to let me go.

  He spent the long minutes of our mutual silence struggling through his shock to reconcile my words with my tears. Suddenly his gaze sharpened and his jaw ticked. He narrowed his eyes and I watched them grow cold and distant, terrible and fierce.

  He released the lock on the doors.

  I wiped my cheeks with the back of my hand and fumbled for the door handle.

  “You are such a coward,” he said.

  My hand stilled on the latch, and I absorbed his effective blow before I responded.

  “Maybe.” I nodded, opened the door. The sounds of the storm filled his BMW. I hoped he wouldn’t hear my next words. I hoped they would be lost in the rain. “But if we destroyed each other, I wouldn’t survive it.”

  Despite the pain with every beat of my heart, the screaming of my blood rushing between my ears, despite how wrong it felt to leave him and know that this was likely the last time, I jumped out of the car and slammed the door.

  I tore through the rain, deaf and blind to my surroundings. I slipped in the mud and almost fell but recovered my footing just in time. A sob ripped from my chest and I lunged for the retractable metal stairs that would lead to a measure of safety, another door between us.

  I pulled my keys out of the costume pocket and managed just one step before I was lifted off my feet by strong, capable arms. He held me tightly against his chest, one arm behind my back, the other under my legs. Phillip climbed the stairs swiftly—as though they weren’t slippery, as though he weren’t holding my weight, as though we were being pursued by fire instead of rain.

  He took the keys from me and used the hand at my knees to quickly manage the lock, dipping me only slightly to accomplish this task. This was more a testament to his strength, the power of his form, than the ease of the deadbolt. The door pulled open and he ducked us inside.

  I was crying freely now. I’d never been a loud crier—one of those hysterical, breast clutching, wailing women. Even so, even without audible whimpers and gasps, just silent tears streaming down my face paired with inelegant sniffles, the soft sounds made me feel weak.

  My hands were on his shoulders, my face buried in his neck. The door shut with a clang that was lost to my ears.

  Phillip held me tighter, nuzzled my forehead, kissed me as he hesitated just inside the small space. I hiccupped.

  “Shhh…” I felt his soft shush then swallow, because my mouth was pressed against his throat.

  Decided, he walked us past the miniscule kitchen, the postage stamp bathroom, and paused on the precipice of the two bedrooms. Ultimately, he chose my room correctly, which was the size of a closet; the twin mattress leaned against the wall because, when it was on the floor, it took up ninety percent of the space.

  Phillip gave me a squeeze, then set my feet on the ground. He gripped my shoulders as though to make certain I could support my own weight. His hands, sure and steady, reached around my neck and found the zipper of the costume. My head was bowed, and I’d stopped hard crying, but my breathing was erratic and errant tears still slipped from my eyes. I blinked them away because I didn’t know what else to do with them.

  With the zipper undone, he knelt and encouraged me to lean against him as he took off my black tennis shoes and socks. Then with curious carefulness, he tucked the socks in the shoes then placed them just inside the entrance to my room and shut the door. I watched his movements with a stunted numbness, not certain what to say or do.

  He turned back to me. His eyes moved between mine—searching or imparting a command, I didn’t know which—as he stepped into my space, all lithe movements and restless energy.

  He didn’t ask for permission before he pushed the costume from my shoulders, down my arms, over my chest, stomach, hips, legs—until it fell to my feet, leaving me in a pink lace bra and underwear.

  Phillip’s eyes roamed over my body. The subtle wince made a reappearance, his eyes half blinking, but this time it was as though he were struggling with himself, fighting against instinct.

  I tried to imagine how he saw me.

  I didn’t cover myself.

  I didn’t hide from his gaze.

  I didn’t feel embarrassment at my hardened nipples, clearly visible and straining against the thin, wet fabric of my bra. I didn’t feel modesty at the ample swell of my breasts or the steep curve of my waist, nor did I feel shame at the round softness of my hips and bottom.

  “Are you cold?” he asked. The question was absentminded, likely an automatic query prompted by years of ingrained good manners.

  I shook my head. “I’m not cold.”

  He lifted his eyes to mine and he swayed toward me. “I had to get you out of those wet clothes.”

  I nodded softly. “I know.”

  “I need to know that you’re going to be alright.”

  New tears sprang to my eyes and I nodded again.

  Silence stretched for a beat, then he said, “Don’t hate me.”

  I stared at him, at his goddamn fucking handsome everything. His shirt was plastered to his chest leaving nothing to my imagination. He’d always been built like an athlete—tall and lean—but over that past two years he’d grown another inch. Phillip’s six foot four made my five foot nine feel petite.

  Another change, where before he was lean and almost sinewy, now he was lean and brawny. Everything from his biceps to his chest to his V-shaped torso was cut with corded muscle. He was just so… big. Powerful. Strong.

  I wanted to touch him, peel away the wet shirt. I wanted to undress him, explore every inch of his skin, feel the weight of his body, take him in my mouth, make him surrender to me.

  He’d grown from a boy to a man, and both were completely out of my reach.

  His attention had strayed again, his eyes devouring my body, lingering on the swell of my breasts, golden fire lit from within.

  I don’t know what made me say it—maybe I was drunk from our proximity, with his wary confession in the car, with fairytale possibilities—regardless, I listened to my voice form the words, and they were spoken before I could lament the ramifications.

  “Touch me, Phillip.”

  Immediately, as th
ough he’d been waiting for my command, Phillip lifted his hand and curved his fingers around my waist; his movements measured, slow motion; his attention fixed to this single place where our bodies connected.

  As though mesmerized or in a trance, his palm glided from my waist, paused just above the band of my panties. His fingers flexed just once, gripping me, as though testing the authenticity of my skin under his touch, then slipped into the lace. He lowered the scrap of fabric, his fingers lightly caressing the soft curls directly above the apex of my thighs.

  “Fuck…” The word was a harsh rasp. His breathing had become labored during his achingly slow exploration.

  I watched his face as he watched his hand on me. His expression was a mixture of disbelief, greed, and dazed reverence.

  My abdomen twisted, deep in my belly. An anticipatory tightening, aching. My skin was alive, sensitive, both fevered and chilled by the rain.

  I couldn’t take his gentle caresses. I wanted him to be rough, I wanted him to lose control. His unhurried movements, forward then ebbing, made me want to scream in frustration. Abruptly, without forethought or intent, I reached for the fly of his pants.

  Where his touch was steady, my hands were shaking and my movements jerky. I quickly undid the button of his jeans and before his zipper was half pulled, I gained a full step closer, the lace of my bra against his cold shirt, and moved my hand fully into his boxers.

  His breath hitched and he rocked his erection against my palm; an inelegant, animalistic response to my sudden intrusion.

  Phillip lifted his gaze to mine. His eyes were cloudy and I saw a madness, a hunger present that I imagined was reflected in me.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Do you want to be with me?”

  “Mal, I didn’t-” He sucked in a sharp breath as my fingers squeezed his length, the base of my palm roughly shifted downward against the smooth skin of his cock, already hard and throbbing. Again, he pressed into my hand with a graceless, involuntary thrust.

  I rubbed the length of my torso against his wet shirt, delicious friction against my straining nipples.