by Crowe, Liz
“Does he know?” Rob jumped, and gripped the edge of the sink at the interruption.
“Jesus Christ. You sure know how to sneak up on a guy.” He turned, hoping to capture the tall gorgeous woman in his arms but she sank into a chair, munching on an apple. The too-large sweatshirt slid down exposing her shoulder, making him blink and clutch the chair back. She observed him a minute, taking small bites and chewing them, letting the silence spin out around them. The tingling in his spine climbed up to the base of his brain. “Does who know what?” He didn’t mean to sound angry. He needed to get the fuck out of there, away from her.
“Jack.” Her voice was easy-going, calm, as if she were asking about the weather. Rob glared at her. In the matter-of-fact fashion he’d come to associate with her she floored him with her next words. “Does he know you are in love with him?”
Rob’s jaw dropped. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
She shrugged. “I could have misjudged, but I don’t think so. Do you?” She leveled that dark stare at him, and he squirmed under it.
A sharp pain pierced his chest. “You’re nuts.” He started to walk past her, but she stopped him, threading her fingers through his.
“I don’t mind, you know. I’m just saying. You might want to acknowledge it; get past it.”
“I’m straight. Thanks.” He pulled his hand from hers, with reluctance. It was warm, and made him want to kiss her.
“I’m sure you are.” She leaned back. The sweatshirt neck dropped further, exposing the upper swell of one breast. Fury surged through him.
Who the hell did she thinks she was anyway? He was the seducer. He and Jack. Not her. He had no frame of reference for the pain swirling in his gut, the eerie tightness in his chest, or for the images in his brain. He walked away, found his gear and headed for the slopes.
He didn’t see any of them for the rest of the day. Simply focused on taking every black diamond slope he found including the one he hit the day before. When he got back to the condo, everyone greeted him as if he’d never left. Jack and Suzanne still clung on each other like a pair of lovebirds. Her cousin had coupled up with one of the other guys and they kept disappearing into the bedroom. Christine was curled up on one couch with a book, the firelight throwing yellow hues onto her skin, which was already reddened from a day in the sun-shot snow. Rob forced himself not to look at her.
It was his turn to cook so he started slamming shit around in the kitchen, trying to ease some of his frustration. By the time he had the pork and beef, onions and green peppers sizzling in one large pan, the tomato sauce, spices and beans in the other, he’d downed four beers and had calmed somewhat. Kitchens did it for him, no doubt. Sensing someone behind him at one point, he turned. Jack was poking through the fridge, pulling out grapes, cheese and beer. “Seems like you broke your vow,” he crossed his arms and watched his friend give him an odd look. “I mean, about Suzanne.” Jack sighed and tossed a grape in the air. Rob caught it in his mouth, chewed, swallowed and spoke. “Think that was wise?”
“No.”
Rob waited for more. Jack just shrugged and took a long drink of his beer. “But I want to do it again.” His eyes lingered on the red headed woman as she laughed and schooled one of the other guys at a game of darts.
“Better not, unless you’re looking for something more permanent. She’s not our usual type Jack. Don’t hurt her.”
“I know. I know.” Jack leaned against the counter, clad only in flannel pants, his jet-black hair dripping from a shower. Rob frowned as he quashed the image of himself running a hand down his friend’s rough jaw, wanting the sense the sandpapery rasp of his skin. He turned, re-focusing on the meal. The tension between the two men was something Rob simply did not want to explore. Jack was his friend, and he wanted to keep it that way, no matter how conflicted he might be about his own motivation. Finally, Jack wandered back out, leaving Rob to his tumbled thoughts.
He combined the ingredients into a gigantic soup pot, pulled homemade cornbread from the oven and set shredded cheese, sour cream, and hot sauce on the table. A hand snaked around his waist as he stood at the sink. He closed his eyes at the sensation of warm breath against his neck. “Missed you today.” Christine’s voice brought his whole body to attention. He moved , hoping she’d get the hint and let go of him. He had a very bad feeling about this—about the intensity of his need for her. He had no business getting emotionally attached to anyone, or letting anyone get close to him, lest that bitch of a cancer librarian crook her finger and call in his loan. He sighed as she leaned against his back, both arms circling him now, her firm breasts pressed against his back.
“Watch it or I’m likely to lose control,” he winced. Way to give it away Frietag, so much for subtlety.
She giggled, and bit his earlobe. “Good. I’ll be ready for it. Later. You’ll know when.” She slapped his ass and was gone.
Within an hour they lay in the mess of sheets and blankets, their skin drying under the creaking ceiling fan. Rob tried to get his brain to still, to stop sending him images of him, with her, forever. He had no forever and no reason to think otherwise. She ran a finger down his jaw, tracing his neck then his pecs, making him shiver. “You’re pretty amazing.” She kissed his shoulder then lay back, flopping a bare leg over his. He fought off the impending, refractory nap. He’d cornered her in the laundry room while the others ate, yanked her sweats and his jeans down and fucked her hard up against the wall, grunting and crying out, wordless, intense and a little angry as his lack of self-control.
Afterward, she’d kissed him so long and so hard he’d gotten a strange feeling of rightness, of perfection. A sense of completeness he rejected in favor of lifting her up and carrying her the few steps to the empty bedroom. He dumped her on the sheets and dove between her luscious legs, using his lips, tongue and fingers to bring her a near operatic series of orgasms. His scalp still hurt where she’d yanked his hair while giving him direction, guiding him to her hot spots; teaching him shit he thought he already knew, but clearly had more to learn.
The taste of his own cum as he licked her sweet lower lips had not been unpleasant, and by the time he’d been about to burst, she’d flipped herself over, and exposed her amazing, heart-shaped ass to him, handed him a tube of lubrication, making him nearly dizzy with need.
The sensation as she released herself to him gave him that odd, completely happy feeling again. He’d come so hard he’d nearly passed out from the effort, filling her, as she guided his hand around to her clit drawing yet another climax out of her body. They’d had a quick shower together, kissing, groping, laughing, ending with them on the bed. She propped herself up on one elbow. Rob sensed her stare but kept his eyes closed.
“I didn’t mean to presume anything about you and Jack.” She kept her voice low. Rob’s skin prickled as her leg moved against his.
He shivered, realizing he might as well own up to it, at least to her. “It’s okay. I try to be completely honest with myself. We’ve done a lot of shit together. One girl wanted us to kiss once and we were so drunk we did it. I never thought I’d like it. I did. But right now, I’ll just say I’m damn glad you decided to join us.” He pulled her down to his face, kissed her slowly, letting his lips and tongue say more than words could. His eyes burned. The sudden need to have her in his arms forever terrified him.
She tensed. “Okay, well, you know since we are being honest, I have a boyfriend. Back at school.” Rob stared at her. “I mean, um, we are on a break right now but…”
He sucked in a breath, and rolled out from under her, sitting on the side of the bed and bunching the sheets in his fists, lest he launch himself out into the stratosphere of really stupid behavior. She sat beside him, resting a hand on his thigh. He pulled away, his brain already going into self-protection mode. “Good. Because I don’t get attached. You are, however, an amazing lay.” He stood, and walked out, getting shitfaced drunk with the rest of the group and ignoring her when she emerged, unwill
ing to meet her eyes when she tried to capture his as she’d been doing for the past two days.
Fuck that shit.
Jack guided him to a couch at one point, throwing a quilt over his limp form. “Wait,” He clutched his friend’s arm. “I…, I’m…,” he’d revealed so much about himself in the few days, too much. It made him nervous, and relieved. Jack sat next to him, his blue eyes bright. Suzanne joined him, gazing down at him. Worried looks on both their faces. “Shit.” Rob threw a hand over his eyes. He knew that look and he did not want it. “Go ‘way. Leave me ‘lone. Keep her,” he pointed blearily over to the beautiful woman across the room, “the fuck away from me.” He remembered nothing else from the night.
Chapter Three
Three Months Later
The chef did a complex dance around the huge kitchen, while Rob tried hard not to panic. He’d made a leap that spring, sought out and found a job at a popular, upscale restaurant for the summer instead of taking the lab job he’d had lined up. Jack had gone home to Ann Arbor for his usual summer of manual labor with his father’s building company. Bitching to high heaven with every phone call and email, but always returning with a well-padded bank account for his efforts. He and Suzanne had eased back into their friendship state, and Jack claimed he’d been hands off, and would remain so, for both their sakes.
The night before Jack had hit the road south they’d shared a joint and a case of beer on their miniscule balcony, tossing empties down onto the crappy, dead lawn. To his credit, Jack hadn’t brought up the cancer since the trip north. He had all the information he required, Rob supposed. But their easy camaraderie felt changed somehow and he wasn’t willing to explore the reasons why. He had extended the lease on their dump of an apartment and stayed, enjoying the quiet calm of a college town in the summer months.
That, and Christine.
He smiled to himself, letting the rawness of his cock remind him of the strange state in which he existed. She’d appeared at his door the day after Jack left, with a suitcase, a laundry basket, and a smile that set his heart on fire. She’d tossed everything down and launched herself into his arms. They had done little but eat and fuck since.
“You! New boy, get your ass over here,” Rob snapped his attention back, erasing the previous night’s session and the ensuing discussion from his brain. Soon, he was up to his elbows in foie gras and then screwing up batch after batch of a lemon reduction sauce. He loved it.
****
One night, about halfway into the steamy Michigan summer, it happened. He sat on the small balcony, listening to the summer-quiet college town sleep, sipping a beer, trying with everything he had not to run back inside and declare his love for the woman who’d fallen into his life. He sensed innately that doing so would get him exactly nowhere with her. She was simultaneously under his skin and a million miles away.
“Hey,” he jumped when a hand landed on his shoulder. She slid onto his lap, kissing him in that way that made him horny, possessive and terrified all at once. The night sounds enveloped them, and Rob let his brain slip away from the constant background thoughts of “limited time” and “remission” which haunted him, and just enjoyed her. She sighed and put her head on his shoulder. “I’m sorry.”
He kissed her hair. “For what? For rocking my world for the last month and a half? For making me cook for you so I can practice?”
She giggled and snuggled deeper into his arms. Rob had never felt more complete. But he knew, like all the good things in his life, this too was on loan, soon to be taken from him. Still, he couldn’t have predicted her next words.
“I got the call.” She kept her voice low. “I’m leaving in a week.”
“Of course you are.” Rob tried to eliminate the anger from his tone. She’d been waiting to hear from the modeling agency for weeks. He’d had no doubt the call would come. He cupped the back of her neck, pulled her face close to his. “I love you.”
“No. You just love what I’ve taught you.” His cock hardened immediately at the sound of her gravelly, teasing tone. She had been instrumental in showing him the errors of his ways with the female anatomy. Pulling no punches about what he kept doing wrong. Their sessions left him amazed, drained, and on the constant edge of a hair-trigger orgasm. She bit his lower lip, sucked it into her mouth, grinding herself down against his lap. “You are amazing, Rob Frietag. You know that, right?” She whispered, as she nibbled her way down his neck.
“Yeah? Then don’t leave. Stay here with me.”
She stood, unzipped his jeans, lifted her skirt and settled herself back onto his aching flesh. She rocked against him, sucking his nipple, and by the time he rolled into a mind-bending climax he’d nearly forgotten her deflection. They decamped to the bedroom where he used his Christine-bestowed skills to bring her a series of shuddering orgasms with his tongue and fingers. Later, as she lay in his arms, tracing the line of blond hair between his navel and cock, he felt a wetness on his chest. He pushed her up, cupped her face between his hands. “You think I’m kidding? I love you.”
“I know.” She let a tear drop onto his skin. He touched it, put the salt to his lips. “But, I can’t. You know that. I’m not staying here with you. Not with anybody. I have to…”
He held up a hand. “Spare me. It’s okay.” His heart ached, but in some perverse way, he understood. He hated it. But he understood.
A week later, she was gone. Rob spent the reminder of the summer before his senior year of college in a haze of regret and fury, pushing himself further at work and taking his body to the edge of its limits with daily ten-mile runs and weight lifting, driving himself to exhaustion every night. Mainly to avoid the dreams of her.
****
One Year Later
“You are doing what?” He and Jack sat on their balcony, dressed in graduation gowns and nothing else, sucking back beer while watching the annual mayhem of graduation weekend unfold below them. They’d had dinner with the Gordons, enduring the evening only after fortifying themselves with a joint in the car before heading into the ritzy restaurant. The scowling, constant criticisms from John Senior were all par for the course. As soon as they could escape, they did. Heading back to their apartment, already demolished from a massive party the night before and laughing themselves sick about Jack’s step mother’s hand crawling up Rob’s thigh under the table.
“Paris. France. You know, the country?” Rob lifted his bottle. The absence of Christine had formed a hole in his psyche; one he still had to manipulate daily just to resist calling her. But he had a new focus now. One that eased the pain somewhat.
“Dude.” Jack tossed him another beer. “Uh, hello? Medical school? Endless nights studying for the MCAT? What the fuck? Cure for cancer and all that?”
Rob sat back and observed his friend. Jack had grown in college, hit near six foot five, his body filling out and becoming ever more agreeable to the hoards of women they’d managed to amass in their four years in East Lansing together. His tastes had taken an interesting turn of late. He’d invited Rob to join him at a “BDSM” party off campus. Rob was not entirely sure it was his thing, but Jack was grooving on it and seemed a natural, so who was Rob to judge? He pulled two pieces of paper from a folder on the table between them.
“Ah, yeah, clean bill again, right?” Jack’s deep blue eyes locked onto his, making him uncomfortable. He held up the PET scan report.
“Yep. As a whistle.” He lit the thing on fire with Jack’s lighter, held it as long as he could then tossed it down to the dead lawn below. Then, he did the same with his acceptance letter from the University of Michigan’s School of Medicine. Jack whistled, then slapped him on the shoulder.
“You have a set of clanging balls my man. Clanging!” They hooted as the letter burned its way down to join its fellow, still-smoldering companion below. Rob felt a sudden lightness in his chest, a relief at the thought of taking the Cordon Bleu option—something his boss at the restaurant had even recommended. His mother was pissed, but what e
lse was new?
“And you? Still Chicago bound?” They settled back in their nearly broken lawn chairs, propping bare feet on the rickety iron rail.
Jack shrugged. “Yeah. I’m not as brave as you, my brother. Not even close.” He rose, stretched, and Rob kept his eyes trained outward. He shifted, a low buzzing sound starting in his ears, which he knew could only be remedied by one thing. “Law school for me. Then take over the old man’s construction company. Find a lovely girl. Father some spawn; join the country club. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.”
Rob sighed and watched Jack wander back into the apartment. “I am feeling a need.” He called back to his friend. “A need…”
Jack poked his head back out the door, a wicked grin on his face. “Thought you’d never ask. Check this out.” He tossed a device onto Rob’s lap. He picked it up, unfolded it, and realized it was some kind of phone. “Gordon Senior got them for us. Try it.” Rob put it to his ear, and grinned at the sound of a female voice on the other end.
****
Rob took another long drag from the joint, let his hand drift down to grip his shaft. He and Jack sat, watching the two girls writhe around each other. Jack held up his glass of whiskey. Rob clinked it and stood. “Done being a spectator,” he kept his eyes pinned on the women kissing on his bed. “Break it up ladies. Rob needs some attention.” They giggled, and parted, letting him lie down between them. One latched onto his lips, the other one took his throbbing cock in her mouth. He threaded his hands in her hair and closed his eyes. Let himself imagine Christine one last time. After only a few minutes, he pushed one of them away from his face and sat. His need was great, overpowering and he had to do something about it. He could sense Jack’s presence near him. “
