by Lauren Wood
“Well pay attention. You have a lot to decide on today and Marsha isn’t going to be so happy with us if we don’t get it done.”
“She’s not happy with me most of the time.”
“Then remind me why you two are getting married?”
“Well for one, I asked, and she said yes.”
Jesse nodded and waited for two. This was the tricky part and of course it was the main reason that I was going through with marrying Marsha. She was my boss’ daughter. I knew better back then that Marsha was off limits, but I hated the idea of not being able to have someone, anyone and I had pursued her hard until she’d given me the time of day. It was no small feat.
Now if I walked away like I thought about daily, I was going to have to find another job, not to mention her father would black-ball me from the industry for sure.
“And two, Malcolm.”
Jesse understood my predicament and I didn’t have to explain any further.
“And she does give good head.”
Jesse just grinned. “Well you were always one to make the best out of situation, but damn I can’t believe you’re wanting to get married. I never thought I would see the day.”
“Me either, but it doesn’t matter. Nothing will really change except she will just stay over instead of leaving in the morning.”
My friend shook his head and told me that I had a messed-up view of marriage. He was getting married as well, but it was Jesse that was going first. His marriage was more of love than convenience. We’d been together too long not to marry her, but there wasn’t the sort of love that there was supposed to be. There couldn’t be because I wasn’t in love with Marsha. I was pretty sure that she wasn’t in love with me either, just the money and the status.
Now I was at a tuxedo rental place and I was supposed to pick out a suit that went with her theme. I didn’t care what I wore, if she didn’t complain about it. I wish she would just pick it out herself, but she insisted that I be a part of it. It didn’t seem right, but this was how it was supposed to be. I would have rather been doing anything else than this.
“You think this is bad. Anna’s friend, the one that is going to be the bridesmaid is coming down tonight and she will be staying with us for the next week.”
“What does she look like?”
I was curious because in truth I was always on the prowl.
“I don’t know, but she’s not Marsha, your soon-to-be wife, so it doesn’t matter.”
I sighed to myself. He may understand a lot of things, but he didn’t understand this. Jesse was head over heels in love with his bride to be and they were perfect together. I met some girl years before that I thought would be perfect for me, but then she disappeared without a trace. That was a long time ago, but every now and then I started thinking about Mariss and all the what-ifs. Sometimes it was the idea that if I couldn’t have her, I didn’t want anyone. So, to marry someone I didn’t love didn’t seem like that big of an idea.
“When is Anna going to get her?”
“In a little I must go get her from the station, though I don’t know why she didn’t just fly in. She’s worth a lot. Anna is working, and she doesn’t want Mariss to have to take a cab. I don’t see the big deal, but whatever. You want to ride along with me and keep me company?”
“Are you afraid to be alone with her?”
“No, I just don’t want to go alone. Come on, it will be fun.”
It didn’t sound like it was going to be that much fun. Anna didn’t really like me most of the time. She told Jesse that I was a bad influence on him and maybe she was right. Jesse did seem to get into more trouble with me, but that was because we were around each other a lot. It was bound to happen, and it wasn’t anything wrong with that.
“I don’t know.”
“Well you can stay here like a good little boy and pick out the stuff for the wedding then.”
I gave him a dirty look and grabbed my coat. He knew that I didn’t care if she was mad. I just didn’t. I should, but I didn’t. it was just that simple. It didn’t take much to get me to agree to go with him.
We got into his truck and headed to the train station on the other side of the city. The traffic was heavy, so it took longer than we’d anticipated. Anna called twice, making sure that we hadn’t fucked off somewhere. It was one of those times where she showed how she truly felt about me because I could hear comments coming from her about me.
He hung up and looked at me guiltily. “You didn’t hear that, right?”
We both knew that I had, but I wasn’t going to bring it up. Anna had him wrapped around her little finger, but he was happy, so I didn’t give Jesse too bad of a time about it. I was glad he’d found someone, even if it did leave me as a third wheel sometimes. We went on double dates once and a while, and it was clear what me and Marsha had was nothing like the two of them had. Maybe that was the cost, although to me the cost just seemed too high for comfort.
“Nope not a word.”
“She’s a little wired up with Mariss coming in. I don’t know what the deal is with the two of them, but they’ve known each other a long time and as soon as Anna knew that we were getting married, Mariss was the first person that she called. I had a feeling that this woman is going to be a pain in my ass. I already had to move all my stuff out of the guest bedroom so that she could stay there. I will be happy when the wedding is over, and everyone goes home.”
I had to laugh at him because he hadn’t been engaged long. Anna had made it happen so fast that I had to up my game with Marsha in comparison.
“You just want Anna all to yourself.”
“You’re damn right I do. I can’t get enough of her.”
I was jealous in a way, but that didn’t matter. I could be happy and jealous all at the same time. I hoped I could anyways, because I’d been feeling dual emotions for a long time since he told me that he was getting married. I had announced, or rather Marsha had announced our coming nuptials not a week before that.
“Well let’s go pick her friend up so you’re not in the dog house tonight.”
He grinned at me and waved me off. We both know that he probably already was, and he didn’t seem to mind. If he was with Anna, that seemed to be the only thing that really mattered to Jesse anymore.
We stopped in front of the station and looked around for a woman waiting out front. That’s where Anna said she would be and that she would have a red coat on. It didn’t take long for my eyes to scan the groups and crowds to find out where she was. I pointed to the woman and I heard Jesse call out to her. At that point, I hadn’t known her name, but the one being hollered out was rather familiar.
“Mariss?!”
My head snapped back to the figure and waited for her to look up. Silently I was telling her to look up. She did, and my heart stopped. What were the odds?
Mariss
I heard my name being called and I recognized the man that was waving me over from pictures that Anna had sent me. I couldn’t believe that she was getting married, to this guy. I wanted to get to know him and I wanted to make sure that he was going to be good for my friend. My other best friend was now hitched and loving life. I wanted the same for Anna. She was the type that had thought about marriage before she thought about boys.
When I got closer though, I saw that Jesse wasn’t alone and it took me a minute as I was walking up to the pair of men for me to realize that I knew the man standing next to him, but I couldn’t place him. His dark eyes were on me and I was finding it hard to look away. A shiver ran through me and I instantly knew who it was in front of me. It was that guy I’d met at a party. We had a wild night and then that was that. I ended up having to leave school because of family problems. I never went back to the school and I never got to see Cal again.
He was a part of my past that I still thought about. I don’t know why, but there had been connection between us and as I stood in front of him now, him looking down at me, I had a feeling that the connection between us was al
ive and well, ten years later.
“Mariss.”
“Cal.”
“Do you two know each other?”
Cal answered his friend by saying that he did. “Yeah, uh we met a long time ago. A decade or more?”
I agreed. I didn’t like to think about how long ago it was because it just reminded me how old I was getting. It also made me remember how strange and pathetic my love life was that I still thought about him this many years later.
He had the same self-assured smile as before and he pulled me in for a hug after I pushed my hand out to greet him. His hard body was smooshed against mine and so help me I remembered the ripples that were his chest and the hardness that was the rest of him. It was all just too much and the longer that his scent was filling my nostrils and his hardness was pressing against me, there was no hope for me. It was just that simple.
I had to push him away and it was then that I remembered that we weren’t the only ones there. Several people were looking at us, but the one I was worried about was Jesse, Anna’s fiancée. He had a grin on his face that was hard to deny, and he just couldn’t stop smiling. I didn’t want Anna to know about Cal. She knew what I had told her before about him, ten years ago right after it had happened. It would be awkward if suddenly, he materialized after all these years.
“It’s good to see you again Cal. We should catch up while I’m here.”
“Yes, we should. It’s damn good to see you again. You look just as good as you did before.”
His words made me smile to myself, but he always did have a way with words. His reputation used to proceed him, and I had a feeling that he wasn’t much different than he was before. Men like Cal didn’t change. That much I knew for sure. He was most likely the same playboy that he was in college.
“Thanks Cal, you always was a charmer.”
I tried to detach from him and not seem too friendly with him. When it came down to it, I really didn’t want anyone to know about what happened before. It was a one-night stand. Everyone had them, but of course I was the one that ran into them years later and had to fight the urge to jump on him. He was just so damn sexy, still and I knew what Cal was capable of with his hands and mouth.
“You were always easy to charm.”
My smile fell a little and I didn’t know if he was taking a jab at me for that night. I don’t know what had came over me, but I wasn’t that way. I wasn’t before that night and I wasn’t after. It had been an isolated incident and even though it shouldn’t bother me, it did that he thought that way. I wasn’t easy, and I took offense to it.
“Well that was a long time ago when I was dumb and didn’t have much sense.”
Anna’s fiancée was looking from one of us to the other and I didn’t try to smooth over the situation. I could have if I’d wanted to, but instead I just let it go. I didn’t want to admit how easy it had been for him to get into my panties. My very wet panties I might add. And I certainly wasn’t going to admit to the moisture state of them now.
“That was all in the past, water under the bridge, right? You guys ready to go?”
I was trying to act like I wasn’t shaking inside, but I was. I couldn’t help it. Seeing him again was not what I’d expected from this week. I wasn’t prepared, even though I don’t know how I could have been prepared for him. Seeing Cal after all these years was a blast from a past that was so different than now.
We all got in the truck and I was wedged between the two men. I wanted to tell them that I would have been better off just getting a cab, but Anna had insisted. I knew that she wanted me to get along with her fiancée, I just didn’t know that it was going to entail having to see Cal again. My luck, he was going to be in the wedding too.
I asked him about it when we were going down the road, trying not to act like I cared, but more that I was just making conversation. I needed to know how much I was going to have to be around Cal.
“I will be his best man.”
“You guys have known each other for a while?”
Cal and Jesse agreed, and it was almost in perfect step with each other. They were around each other a lot and I could see what Anna was talking about. I had to keep asking myself what I had gotten myself into agreeing to this wedding. I don’t know if I would have come if I would have known about seeing a ghost from my past. This was going to be a rough one.
I didn’t try to keep any conversation going because it felt weird in the truck. It was tense in there and the more I tried to force it, the weirder it got. I had a lot on my mind suddenly and it looked like Cal did too.
When we got to Anna’s place, I knew it because I’d visited several times before. I was glad that Jesse was staying with her. It would have been worse if it would have been in a place that I wasn’t already familiar with.
I practically pushed Cal out of the way when he opened the door and went in to see Anna. I left my bag out there because I wasn’t thinking. Anna knew who Cal was and I wanted to tell her about it. I was ready to lose it already and I’d just gotten here. I thought it would be the wedding itself that upset me, not Cal. Why did it have to be Cal of all people?
Cal
“So how well do you know this chick?”
After watching the hot little piece of ass run in the house when we got to Anna’s, I knew that I wasn’t going to be able to deny all. He knew about her, in a roundabout way. I couldn’t believe she was here, in front of me. It had always pissed me off that she just took off and now that she was here. I was finally going to get some damn answers. I was determined.
“Pretty damn well. I can’t believe you just went and picked her up and she’s staying with you for a week.”
“Why, is she crazy?”
I could have told him that she was, but there was nothing crazy about Mariss. I hadn’t gotten to know her, but there was a vibe and feeling about her that was hard to deny. She’d been laid back and mellow. Even now in this situation she was not getting too freaked out, except for her quick exit.
“No, nothing like that. I was thinking about her earlier today.”
“She was your mystery frat girl?”
I forgot that he’d coined the phrase for her when I told him about her. I was trying to find out if I could track her down and see her again. The next day I had a fixation on finding her to no avail. I tried repeatedly, but I never did get close to her.
“Yeah, that’s her.”
“Oh.”
That was all he said, and I betted that there was a reason he said it that way. He must have remembered how I had been back then when I was trying to find her. I’d drove the people around me crazy about it. But it hadn’t lasted all that long. I gave up after a certain amount of time and picked up the next girl I saw. I’d been doing that ever since. Marsha was a rather new development and after a year together it was all moving too fast. I hadn’t worried about it before because I didn’t really care. Now I wondered if that was the wrong approach.
I kicked myself for all the thoughts of me and her rekindling something. I’d forgotten about the fiancée that I was supposed to marry in less than forty days. How was I going to explain it off to either one of them?
“Yeah, oh.”
We were quiet for a bit and then he looked over the truck bed at me.
“Well I guess it’s a good thing you’re getting married, huh? Now you won’t have to worry about it because you aren’t available anymore.”
I hadn’t said anything about us getting together, but it must have been rather obvious. Maybe there was something between us that was palpable like I felt it, or he just assumed because Mariss was hot as hell and I was a hot-blooded man that had a problem controlling myself.
“I’m not. Is she?”
He looked at me like I was stupid or something.
“Why in the world would I know that?”
I didn’t press because I could see that he didn’t want to talk about it. I just dropped it because it didn’t really matter. He was right. I was about to get
married soon and the same reasons that I was doing it before I saw Mariss was the same. I didn’t really have a choice. If I didn’t go through with, the life that I knew and loved would change forever. I don’t know if I was ready for that or not.
“Don’t get yourself in trouble over this chick Cal. I can see it in your eyes. You’re out on the hunt.”
I ignored him and took the bag of hers inside that she’d left behind. Was she as bothered to see me as I was to see her? I liked to think so, but there was just as much of a chance that it was merely because she missed her friend.
We had plans to go drink some beer down at the bar with Kyle and Sean. It was our weekly thing and even though we had weddings in our future, some part of our lives didn’t have to change. This night was our sanctity. It was the one night that we were able to forget about the females in our lives.
Stopping by my house to get changed before we went to Mickey’s Pub, I couldn’t stop thinking about that damn girl. What the hell was she doing here now, after I’d given up on finding her?
“I haven’t seen you this drunk in a while Cal. Something on your mind?”
I scowled at Jesse and told him to drink some more. He obviously was too sober to be here with us and I pushed another drink his way. Kyle ordered another round of shots and another pitcher of beer. We hadn’t been here an hour and I was already halfway to drunk.
“You know damn well what is on my mind.”
“I’ve never seen you like this. What is it about her? I mean, I get it, she’s hot and all, but so is Marsha.”
I knew that he was bringing her up because he wanted me to not fuck up. We worked together, and it would be a shame if that changed. I knew where he was coming from, but he didn’t know where I was coming from and that was why he asked. How could I put it into words?
“You ever been sucked off until you felt like the girl had sucked the very life out of you?”
He nodded his head and leaned in.
“You ever met a girl that was so tight, hot and wet that you almost busted a nut before you even got two strokes in?”
