by J. Bengtsson
“Bathroom’s free,” I said, in an attempt to break the awkwardness and send her on her way.
“Oh, right.”
When she emerged a few minutes later, she glanced at me and then quickly looked away. My eyes shifted to her chest again. She wasn’t a large-breasted woman, but those point-blank tits… my god. My pillow levitated. Was Emma really committed to sleep? I watched as she bent down to fluff the sheets, and that rounded butt in those little shorts caused my cotton dick-shield to tip over on its side. But this was definitely looking more and more like a platonic sleepover.
She slipped under the covers. “Okay, well… goodnight.”
“Goodnight. Emma. Thanks for this.”
“I’ll see you in the morning.”
The lights went out.
I propped up a couple of extra pillows and eased my body onto them. Pain radiated through me and an involuntary gasp escaped my lips.
The light went back on. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Sorry. I bruised my ribs the other day.”
“Really? Why didn’t you say anything before?”
“I don’t know, but the thought did occur to me on the Ferris wheel when you were digging your head into them.”
“Did you have x-rays?” she asked, swinging her long legs out from under the covers, and her breasts walked over to me. Eyes up.
“Yeah – no breaks.”
“Can I look?”
She bent over, and of course, I could see right into her tank top. It was the pink panty reaction all over again. Eyes up!
I pulled my shirt over my head so she could have a look at the ribs.
“Did the doctor tell you to wrap it?” she asked, sitting across from me on the coffee table. Now her breasts were eye level. Eyes…oh shit, I didn’t know where to put my eyes.
“Finn?” She snapped her fingers, smirking. “Up here.”
“Sorry. They’re just right there,” I said, squeezing air melons with my hands to emphasize my point.
“Yes, they do that – since, you know, they’re on my chest. I can put a shirt on if that will help you focus.”
“I don’t think it will help, and no, my ribs just feel better with the wrap on.”
“It can actually constrict your breathing.”
“Oh, well, that’s not good. I’m having enough trouble as it is.”
“Breathing?”
I nodded.
Emma began unraveling the wrap until just the naked skin was left.
“Do you mind?”
She didn’t wait for my reply as her hands made contact with my heated skin. Emma’s cool touch sent shivers up my spine as she ran her fingers along my rib cage. Just a little further down. I gulped, closing my eyes and conjuring up the unsavory image of my great-grandmother snapping my nuts with her grabber arm.
“They all feel intact,” she announced, before padding to the counter and dumping the excess water from the ice bucket. I watched as she tied a knot in the plastic bag holding the remaining ice and came back over to me, pushing the freezing pack over my throbbing ribs. She wound the wrap around it to hold the ice in place. The entire time she was asking me questions about my symptoms, the nurse in her in full swing. “Have you taken any pain relief?”
“Not recently.”
“When was the last time?”
“Two days ago, I think.”
She grinned. “Well, maybe it’s time for another one.”
After I’d swallowed a pill, she stood there evaluating me with an amused look on her face and repeated her line from earlier. “What am I going to do with you?”
“Anything you want,” I offered.
Her eyes caught mine, and to my surprise, she reached out and trailed her nails along my skin. Holy shit. Springing to action, I reached around and grasped her from behind, but Emma abruptly grabbed my wrists and stood back up.
No? Okay. I couldn’t read her cues at all.
“You can sleep in the bed… just so you don’t wake up in agony tomorrow morning.”
“Just sleep?”
“Yes, just sleep.”
“Oh, Emma,” I said, shaking my head. “You disappoint me.”
She laughed as I grabbed the extra pillows and brought them with me. If sleeping really was on her short-term agenda, then I would need them. Without a word we both climbed into the bed. Tension hung heavy in the space between us. Mine was of a sexual nature, but it was still unclear what hers was. Emma and I both rolled onto our sides, facing each other. Neither one of us spoke. I lay there for a few minutes, debating with myself. Should I make a move or not? Was she expecting it? Would she be offended if I didn’t? Dammit, I wished Emma came with an instruction manual.
Fuck it. No risk, no reward. Boldly I reached over and ran my fingers over the warm flesh on her arm. She didn’t move or object, so I kept going.
“Finn,” she whispered. “I can’t have sex with you.”
“Who said anything about sex?”
I trailed my hand down her stomach, and then lower still. Emma opened her legs to my wandering fingers. Now this was a cue I understood.
Emma’s not-so-gentle nudge woke me from my slumber. I opened one eye and immediately caught the impatient look on her face. Damn, she was a complicated woman…. a prickly cactus one minute, soft and engaging the next. I had no idea where I had her or what she was thinking. It was fascinating and frustrating all at once. My pulse quickened at just the thought of spending the day with her. Would she even let me? Emma’s current body language definitely indicated that she wanted me gone. Except for her moment of weakness on the Ferris wheel last night, Emma was the opposite of a clingy woman. She was like the guy in a one-night stand, looking for a quick escape. So what did that make me?
“You need to get up,” she said, poking me once more.
“Are you trying to get rid of me?” I asked, sleep still heavy in my eyes.
“I don’t like lying around all day, Finn.”
I forced myself awake and took in my bed buddy. Her panties were back on after I’d slipped them off her shapely hips sometime during the night. Although I’d honored her no sex proclamation, that didn’t mean we hadn’t fooled around, and I’d quickly discovered that Emma was no timid mouse under the covers. The woman I’d spent the night with knew exactly what she wanted and was not shy about taking it. I felt used in the most wonderfully satisfying of ways.
“So would that be a ‘no’ to cuddling?” I asked, in response to her request for me to get the hell out of her bed.
Emma fought back a smile, and it took the edge off her restless face. She sat on the bed with her arms wrapped around both legs. Her blonde hair was wild from sleep, and as she ran her fingers through her thick tresses, she flipped over an unnatural part and exposed just the hint of dark roots. Her frickin’ gorgeous eyes watched me. I reached out and grabbed her wrist, pulling her toward me.
“Come on. Just a little snuggle,” I teased, even though I didn’t particularly care for it myself. I only offered it in the first place because I knew her answer would be a big, fat, resounding NO… which, no doubt, made me like her more.
“Dammit. I knew I shouldn’t have slept with a homeless guy. You people like the indoors too much,” she said, tilting her head and flashing me an adorable smirk. “I’m never going to get rid of you, am I?”
I shook my head. “At this point, it’s not looking good.”
We exchanged amused expressions. She didn’t want me gone. I knew that. Emma knew that. She just needed a little convincing.
“Are you hungry?” I asked. “How about we get dressed and I buy you breakfast?”
“I can’t.”
“Sure you can. Getting dressed is easy.”
“I mean, I have plans, Finn.”
“Break them. You want to hang with me today, and don’t deny it.”
Emma sucked in her lower lip, not disputing my claim. “I worry you might be reading more into this. Last night was fun, but…”
I
put my hand up. “It’s just breakfast. Stop analyzing everything and just go with your instinct. Would you rather have a boring, planned day, or would you like to experience the excitement only I can provide?”
“I guess….”
I interrupted Emma in mid-sentence by jumping out of bed, grabbing my backpack, and bee-lining it for the bathroom. “Give me two minutes and I’ll be ready. No changing your mind.”
“Finn, I…”
I shut the door before she could turn me down. Instinctively I knew I needed to stay a step ahead of her, to anticipate her decisions to keep from losing her to the rational side of her brain.
Emerging from the bathroom a few minutes later, I was surprised to see Emma fully dressed and her hair, wild only seconds ago, now brushed out to perfection. Even without makeup, she was a stunning beauty.
“Wow, you don’t take much prep time,” I complimented, as I quickly pulled on a pair of jeans. “Impressive indeed.”
“Finn,” she said. “I can’t go to breakfast with you.”
I struggled to keep my disappointment at bay. Dammit, I hadn’t stayed far enough ahead. Was my charm so lacking that it didn’t linger when I left a room?
“Because it’s my father’s birthday, and I’m meeting him and the rest of my family for breakfast. I’m already late, actually.”
“Oh.” Well, thank god. It wasn’t me. “Why didn’t you say that in the first place?”
“You wouldn’t let me get a word in.”
“I just thought you were being difficult. Go. I don’t want to hold you up.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah, I’ll go grab something to eat and then head over to the festival.”
“Okay.”
She seemed alternately relieved and bummed. Did she want me to fight harder? Did she want me to go? Would she even tell me the truth if I asked?
Before leaving, I walked up to Emma and cupped her face with my hands, giving her a kiss to remember me by. “I’ll see you later, right?”
“Yes,” she breathed out. “Later.”
I smiled, kissing her once more before heading for the door.
“Finn? Do you…” She inhaled. “Do you want to go with me… have breakfast with my family?”
It was the last thing I’d expected her to say, and I was stunned enough that words escaped me. I was starting to see a trend with her. That steadfast determination could be chipped away, but the decision had to come from her, and nothing I could say would change that.
“I mean, you don’t have to,” Emma backtracked.
“I’d love to go with you.”
“You would?”
“Of course. Parents don’t scare me.”
“Oh, well, mine might,” she said, laughing.
“Your dad must be a huge music fan to bring you all here for his birthday.”
Emma’s face contorted, and I swear she looked almost guilty. “I guess you could say that.”
I gave her a quizzical tilt of my eyebrows. “I feel like I’m constantly missing some inside joke here.”
“Sorry, I don’t mean to make you feel that way. The truth is, you’re more than I was expecting this weekend, and I’m trying to figure everything out.”
She wrapped her arms around my waist. There she was – the cuddly Emma- from the Ferris wheel. I liked this one very much.
“I do feel I should warn you. The second my mother lays eyes on you, she’ll be plotting our engagement. If you can’t handle that, speak now or forever hold your peace.”
“Oh, I can handle it,” I said, rubbing my hands together. “Moms are my specialty.”
“Oh, I’m sure,” she teased suggestively.
“Get your mind out of PornHub, woman. I’m not talking in the MILF sense. I’m referring to all the legitimate moms out there who find me utterly irresistible.”
“Sounds like there have been many. What’s your go-to line? What do you say that impresses them so much?”
“See, where most guys go wrong is they pick some physical trait about the mother and they compliment her on it.”
“And that’s bad?”
“Not if it’s a mom like mine. She eats that shit up. Rolls around in it. But legitimate mothers don’t need that validation.”
“Okay. So what do you do instead?”
“I compliment her daughter.”
The smile that spread over Emma’s face was a thing of beauty. She gazed at me in fascination. “You’re an honest-to-god genuine guy, aren’t you?”
“I try to be.”
“Oh, Finn, you have no idea how much my mom is going to love you,” she said, grabbing her bag. “You’ve got a very long breakfast ahead of you.”
Heading down the hallway toward the elevators, a different man was now sitting on the chair.
“Hey, Emma,” he said, smiling up at her.
“Hey, Ty.”
I looked between them trying to understand the connection. She knew these guys. What the hell?
“Do you know everyone here?”
“On this floor I do.”
“You have that big a family?”
“It’s big… and I guess you could say extended.”
Emma led me through the lobby and into a restaurant. Just as we were about to enter a back room, she stopped to address me.
“So there’s one thing I should probably tell you before we go in. Don’t be mad, okay?”
“Why would I be mad?”
“I just wasn’t sure how to tell you.”
“Tell me what?”
“That Jake McKallister’s my younger brother.”
I smiled at her joke, but as we stood there silently, staring at one another, and she didn’t budge on her story, it slowly started sinking in that what she was saying was true – and then everything began to fall into place.
When I didn’t respond, because my bottom lip was hanging around down by my feet, Emma said, all cheerfully, “Okay. Ready?”
Of all the scenarios I’d conjured up in my mind about who Emma was, never once had I suspected something this huge. I was all but convinced she was some rich man’s daughter getting a free ride through life. But this? Sister to Jake McKallister… this was on a whole ’nother level.
“Wait, I… no… I can’t. Is he in there?” I whispered, still too stunned to really process the words.
“I’m thinking he probably is.”
“Holy shit, Emma, that’s not something you say in passing. I mean…” I couldn’t even find the words to finish my sentence, that’s how shocked I was. “I can’t go in there.”
“Sure you can.”
“What am I supposed to say to him? He’s… I mean, come on, he’s Jake McKallister! The whole reason I made the trip was to see him perform!” My voice was getting increasingly more high-pitched and whiny with each protesting word.
“Okay, first, calm down. Second, now you get to meet your reason for making the trip – yay – and third, he’s just a person. Talk to him like you’d talk to anyone else.”
“So, yesterday, the ticket. The hotel. The security guards.” I was just rattling off all the clues from the day before and assembling them in one spot so I could try and make sense of it all.
She nodded. “Yes. All Jake. Are you okay? You look a little pale.”
“I… no… I’m fine. Just shocked. Why didn’t you say anything?”
“For obvious reasons, I don’t announce my lineage to just anyone.”
She had a point. I hadn’t exactly given her a spreadsheet on my brother and the prison cell he was sitting in. “So what you’re saying is, I’m not just anyone?”
“Well, that and a whole lot more, but if that’s all you want to focus on,” she said, grinning. “So what do you say, Psycho, you ready to pretend you’re cool enough to hang with my rock star brother?”
“Please. Give me a little credit, Emma,” I said shaking off my nerves. “I’m a goddamn actor. You don’t think I can act like a normal human being for one hour?”
/>
“I wasn’t sure at first. You went all hyper-psychotic there for a minute.”
“Okay, well to be fair, you did drop a rather large ‘by the way’ on me. Haven’t you ever heard of easing people into a conversation?”
“News flash. I’m socially awkward.” Emma grinned playfully. “I’m surprised you haven’t figured that out yet.”
“Oh, is that what this is? I thought you just enjoyed keeping me on the edge of sanity.”
“That too.” She nudged me. “And speaking of socially awkward, don’t forget about my mother, who’s going to be very excited to meet you.”
“I got this, Emma. Lead the way.”
She said he was just a person, but I wasn’t so sure I’d agree. In my eyes he was a musical god, and standing face to face with one of the greats took a lot more composure than I ever thought possible. I’d been around famous people before, but this was a different level altogether. Forcing my eyes off Jake, I went down the row of relatives circled around a table, all just as curious about me as I was about them.
“Emma!” A woman who could only have been her mother choked out the word, and a dollop of coffee actually dribbled down her chin.
“Oh Jesus, Mom,” a guy my age commented. “Don’t mind her. She’s a little Alzy today.”
“Shut up, Keith,” she grimaced, wiping the liquid away with her thumb, then treated me to a radiant smile. “I don’t have Alzheimer’s. Just a little surprised is all. My daughter didn’t tell me to expect company. Hello, I’m Michelle.”
I came in for a handshake, amused and a little surprised by the exchange. I wasn’t sure why I’d expected stuffy people on this side of the door, but if the curiously amused faces were any indication, Emma’s family was a group of entertaining characters, and I instantly relaxed under their ease.
Before I could introduce myself, Emma said, “Everyone, this is a friend of mine, Finn. Finn, this is everyone.”
