A hush falls over the room and everything inside me slows: my breathing, my heart and my body goes absolutely still. I blink. “And the baby?” I can barely get the question out.
Still gazing down at our hands, she shakes her head slowly, her blonde hair in stark contrast with her red, long-sleeved shirt. “It wasn’t my dad’s.”
My mind is spinning as a half dozen questions race through my head. Do my mom and aunt know about this?
“What happened to the baby?” Olivia never mentioned a sibling other than her older brother so I’m pretty sure I already know the answer.
“She had an abortion,” she replies, her voice just a whisper. “The baby couldn’t have been my dad’s because he had a vasectomy when I was ten so she only ever told your uncle. She had the abortion while she was up in Vermont visiting my aunt.”
My shoulders slump. I’m not sure why I feel we—Olivia and I—just dodged a bullet but I do. A baby would definitely have complicated the situation but the solution, as far as I’m concerned, was not cool.
“And she told you all this?”
Olivia nods just once. “I think she wanted to tell me before my dad does. The thing is, I don’t think my dad ever will.”
Her dad sounds like a saint; the complete opposite of mine.
“So how’d you leave things with her?” I can’t imagine what she’s feeling. In one case, I’ve always been close to my mom so I can’t imagine us not talking. On the other hand, if she did something like this, as much as my dad drives me up a fuckin’ wall, I’d be pretty pissed if she had an affair and got knocked up. Even the thought of it makes my stomach turn.
Finally, she lifts her gaze to mine, tears brimming in her eyes.
“I hate her,” she chokes out before a tear rolls down her cheek. Another quickly follows.
“Christ, Liv.” I take her in my arms, tugging her onto my lap and she burrows into me, her face pressed against my chest. While she cries, I mumble words of comfort into her hair and rub slow circles on her back.
And comforting her is my first priority but I can’t help the way my body reacts to her butt smashed against my crotch. As if sensing the war my body is having with my best intentions, she turns her face up to me. Her tears have slowed and she has that look in her eyes as her wet-lashed gaze drops to my mouth. She exhales and I feel the warmth of her breath against my mouth. My body immediately responds.
“Kiss me,” she implores softly.
I don’t need to be asked twice, my mouth is on hers in an instant. Using one hand to angle her head to achieve maximum accessibility to all of her sweet, hot mouth, the other tightens on her hip before sliding around to knead her ass.
When her mouth opens wide to accept my tongue, the scope of my world narrows to my body’s demands, the beautiful girl in my arms.
Without breaking the kiss, I carry her to the guestroom and lower her onto the king-sized bed. I want to take it slow, savor the exquisite pleasure of her beautiful body. But what I want is definitely at odds with what I’m physically capable of.
It takes me less than a minute to get us both out of our clothes. Olivia’s attempts at assistance only succeed in slowing the process. It’s hard to think much less remove my clothes with her hands anywhere near my zipper.
When I have her naked, flat on her back, I’m sporting a hard-on that won’t quit. But instead of immediately pouncing on her like some horny teen, I take a moment to drink her in.
“Beautiful,” I say, rimming her beaded nipple with my finger.
“Zach.” Her eyes drift closed as she tries to bite back a moan and fails. Her hands reach up to clasp the back of my neck, encouraging me down on top of her. I don’t resist her efforts.
Pleasure rips through me when my erection makes scorching-hot contact with the tender skin of her lower stomach. My mouth is on hers again, demanding and rougher than I intend but she doesn’t seem to mind, opening herself to me in every way.
Everything I planned to do to her—suck on her nipples, kiss her breasts and the dimples above her ass, falls by the wayside the moment she wraps her legs around my hips. I’m barely able to surface from my fog of lust long enough to grab and don a condom, before I’m surging into her. Pounding into her. And then coming with her amidst the guttural sounds of shared passion and bone-deep satisfaction.
***
OLIVIA
Wow. Wow.
After the day I had and the mind-blowing orgasm that felt as if I’d been split in two, I should be on my sated way to dreamland. Surprisingly, I’m wide awake with an overwhelming need to snuggle with Zach. So overwhelming, it’s kind of scary.
“Hmm,” Zach breathes, his lips feathering my ear as he rolls onto his side and arranges me so my damp back is flush with his hard chest. “Give me a sec and we’ll do that again but slower.”
He may be joking, but I’m totally game. The simple mention of it renews the throbbing ache in my center. His hand fondles my breast, his finger plucking at my nipple only serves to intensify my growing need. I wiggle my hips in protest and encouragement.
Zach buries a throaty laugh in my neck, his recently shaved cheeks smooth against my skin. He moves the hand playing with my breast to my waist. “So impatient,” he huskily admonishes. “Give me another minute or two and I’ll take care of you.”
I try to stay in the moment but the reality I don’t want to face succeeds in interceding. Suddenly I’m swamped by all the obstacles we face.
“Hey, what’s wrong?” Zach asks when I lapse into silence.
“What’s going to happen to us?”
After a pause, Zach turns me around so we’re lying face-to-face. His jaw is set in one of determination.
“This doesn’t change anything between us.” His voice is adamant and his gaze intense.
“But your mom and your—”
“I already told my mom about you—about us.”
I blink and my eyes go wide. “Wh-what?” Stunned, I place a trembling hand on his cheek.
He gives me a lopsided grin. “I won’t lie to you and tell you she was thrilled about it but she’s willing to try. For me. I told her I’m not giving you up.”
My heart feels as if it’s swelled to double its size as I stare into his piercing blue eyes. “I don’t know what to say.”
After dropping a hard kiss on my lips, he murmurs, “Everything’s gonna work out. We’re going to make it.”
In the hour that follows, Zach tells me about what’s going on with his dad and how his dad erupted when he refused to meet with the head coach from the University of Michigan. When he tells me he’s seriously thinking of quitting the team, which also means giving up his scholarship, I urge him not to make any rash decisions. I get the feeling he’d only be quitting to spite his father and it’d be a decision he’d end up regretting.
Zach’s wondering hands put a halt to conversation about our problems with our respective parents.
“I love your breasts,” he mutters darkly, cupping both in his hands, his fingers toying with the nipple. “You want me to let everyone know that they’re real and spectacular?”
“Watch re-runs of Seinfeld much?” I pant, the fire inside me burning higher, my hips restlessly seeking his as he’s levered above me.
Lowering his head, he sucks the tip of my breast into his mouth, causing fireworks to explode low in my stomach. “Do you?” he asks, around my nipple.
“I-I don’t care what anyone thinks anymore,” I manage to gasp.
“Good,” he grunts before capturing my lips with his and then proceeds to cover my body with his.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
OLIVIA
After Zach drops me home Thanksgiving Day, I’m in and out, leaving my mom in the kitchen cooking up a storm. The next two hours I spend visiting with Samantha, who is all sympathetic about my parents’ divorce. And no matter how much she presses, I don’t share the gory details about their split.
Next stop is my dad’s at his newly rented apartment
close to his job. Home from his business trip as of last night, despite his drawn appearance, he’s a sight for sore eyes. We hug, I cry, we talk and I cry some more. When it’s time to leave I don’t want to go but my dad insists because he doesn’t want my mom alone for Thanksgiving dinner since my brother couldn't get the Friday off work to come home. Yeah, that’s my dad. He may be divorcing her but it’s obvious he still loves her. Something, as far as I’m concerned, she doesn’t deserve.
For Thanksgiving dinner, my mom goes all out, cooking enough food to feed a small army. Okay, I’m exaggerating, but there’s a ton of food.
At first, conversation between us is stilted and awkward, and quickly deteriorates to nonexistent. Dinner’s over by seven, the kitchen cleaned and food put away by eight and my mom’s in bed by eight fifteen.
When Zach pulls up in front of the house at nine, I let her know I’m going out and won’t be back until tomorrow.
~*~*~
After Thanksgiving break, Zach and I are closer than ever. It’s amazing what sharing your whole self with someone does to cement a relationship. And yes, that includes the hot sex we’ve been having as often as we can fit it in. No pun intended.
Unfortunately, the sex doesn’t end up being all that often the week leading up to opening night. With daily and much longer rehearsals and Zach’s football game that takes him away two days that week, we don’t get to talk on the phone until the morning of the opening of the play.
“You’ll do great,” Zach assures me in response to pre-performance jitters.
“I just need to calm down,” I say, willing the growing knot in my stomach to uncoil.
“I know a good way to loosen you up,” he says with a throaty laugh. He’s using his I-wanna-get-you-naked voice, which he knows does it to me every time.
“Zach, be good,” I warn, amused and aroused at the same time.
“Will I be able to see you tonight?” he asks, ignoring my warning.
“Of course, you know we’re going out after the show with April, Rebecca and my dad.” For obvious reasons, my mom won’t be here tonight.
His voice drops low. “I mean see you see you.”
Ah sex. Right, I get it. “I hope so,” I reply, a soft yearning in my voice.
“Okay, then I’ll see you tonight. I’ve got two days of classes to catch up on and I need to start studying for finals.”
I grimace. Finals. I’ll have to cram all next week.
“Okay, see you tonight.”
~*~*~
The cast is hyped but we’re nervous. I always get performance jitters but this is the first time I’ve ever gone on stage knowing Zach is going to be sitting in the audience watching me. He’s my boyfriend, so it’s not that I’m afraid he won’t think I’m good. He’ll tell me I am whether I flub my line a dozen times. But I want him to be proud of me the same way I am every time he suits up and takes the field. Supportive girlfriend that I am, I now attend all his home games.
Last week he threw two touchdown passes and rushed for over seventy-five yards. I don’t think there was anyone in the stands screaming louder than I was. Okay, April and Rebecca screamed nearly as loud but that’s only because my enthusiasm rubbed off on them. Plus, I’m sure most of the screaming April had been doing was for Troy.
We still have fifteen minutes before curtain call and there’s not much to do now except go over my lines. I’m startled when my cell vibrates in my hand. I smile when I see Zach’s name lighting the screen.
He’s here.
“Hey, what took you so long?” I ask, smiling. “I thought you were going to get here early and kiss me good luck. Unless you want me to break my leg?”
There’s a long pause on the other end of the line. That’s when I know something’s wrong.
“Liv—”
The tone of his voice tells me something’s really really wrong.
“—I’m not going to be able to make it.” The sheer weight of the regret in his voice does nothing to temper my reaction. That is after I’m able to fully understand what he’s telling me.
“What do you mean you can’t make it?” I’m doing my best to keep my voice calm and not overreact, all the while thinking his reason had better be some hideous illness or massive catastrophe because those are the only excuses I’m willing to accept. Not that I’m wishing those things on him.
I want to cover my bases. “Are you hurt? Is it someone in your family?” Although, at this point, I’m almost sure there’s nothing physically wrong with Zach.
On the other end of the phone, his sigh sounds like a heavy expulsion of a breath, then there’s just silence.
“Zach, what is it?” My voice rises.
“No, I’m fine and my family’s fine, it’s…”
The connection starts to go fuzzy.
“Zach, where are you? Are you in the car?” I ask sharply.
“I’m on my way to Maryland.”
“Goddammit, Zach, please just tell me what the fuck is going on.” That’s how pissed I am, I dropped the f-bomb and I’m sure half the people backstage heard me.
“It’s Ashley—”
And that’s all I hear because I nearly break my nail stabbing my finger against the screen ending the call.
Ashley.
Ashley.
Fucking Ashley!
He’s missing my opening night performance because of Ashley. My chest feels like it’s caving in and my breathing has become its casualty. The pain racking me feels like a million little knives are whacking away at my insides.
How I make it to the bathroom, I can’t even remember. All I know as I stand, looking down at the ceramic floor, my vision blurred by tears I desperately try to stop from falling, I’m more angry than I’ve ever been in my life. And more heartsick than any one person should ever be.
Zach.
Ashley.
My cell rings again. And again and again and again. When it finally stops, a minute later it gives one final buzz, indicating I have a voicemail. It’s Zach of course. But there’s no way I’m going to pick it up. I can’t. Physically cannot.
Lifting my head, I look in the mirror. I have to be onstage in ten minutes and my face needs repairing where tears wove a trail through the pancake make-up. I can’t afford to fall apart. My dad and my friends are out there waiting for me to give the performance of a lifetime. The entire cast is counting on me.
A knock sounds on the door followed by, “Olivia, are you in there? Is everything alright?”
It’s Beth who plays another reporter. She must have seen me run in here, looking all hysterical.
“I’m fine,” I reply, feeling anything else but that. “I’ll be out in a minute.”
I take that minute to collect myself, carefully wiping all traces of tears from my face. A few deep, calming breaths later, I exit the bathroom and fix my make-up before taking my place on stage. By the time the curtain goes up I’m Caroline and for the next two hours, Olivia, Zach and Ashley don’t exist.
~*~*~
Ask me how I made it through opening night and I couldn’t give you anything concrete except to say I shut down my emotions and lost myself in someone else’s life. I almost forgot my lines in the fifth scene but with Greg’s—the guy I was doing the scene with—subtle prompt, I was saved from that embarrassment. All in all, we did a great job. When the final scene came to an end, the applause was deafening and two curtain calls were not enough to appease our enthusiastic audience.
As I stand on the stage, Greg on the left, Beth on my right, taking a bow, I finally allow my gaze to sweep over the audience. I see my dad so tall and proud, grinning and clapping furiously. Beside him, April and Rebecca beam up at me like it’s Oscar night and I’ll be taking home the prized golden statue. The seat beside Rebecca, where Zach should have been, is occupied my some guy I don’t recognize.
I swallow hard and look away, trying not to dwell on that but it’s hard now that I no longer have a place to channel my energy. Acting is just that, acting.
For a time, probably like the time we were in Paris, reality slips away and you can be anyone you want. But inevitably, you have to go back or sometimes you come crashing back to it wholly unprepared to face what the re-entry brings.
After our “huddle”, where Miss Ramsay heaps lots of praise upon us, complimenting us on our brilliant performances and hard work, we break and everyone goes off to celebrate a successful opening night.
The excited chatter around me only reminds me of how crappy I feel. Thoughts of Zach haunt me. The pain in my chest is unrelenting. And the thought of faking my way through dinner with my dad, April and Rebecca already has me feeling exhausted. I’m in no mood to celebrate and I’ll end up being the quintessential Debbie Downer spoiling a night out that should be marking a happy occasion. I wouldn’t know happiness right now if it came and bit me in the ass or punched me in the gut. Although what I’m feeling right now isn’t too far off from that—a punch in the gut.
But getting out of dinner is impossible. If I bailed, I’ll be doing the same thing Zach just did to me. Except, I wouldn’t be dumping them to be with my ex. The ache in my chest intensifies and my vision is a green haze of jealousy. The kind that doubles you over in pain and makes it hard to breathe.
Somehow, though, I make it through dinner. I push thoughts of my mom, whom I asked not to come because a) I’m still mad at her and don’t know how I’ll ever get past her betrayal and b) because I know how awkward it would have been for my dad to have her there. I know my dad, and to the outside world he may appear the stoic businessman, but on the inside I know he must be hurting. I mean she betrayed him and their marriage above all else.
Trying not to think about Zach is impossible so I force a smile and when everyone asks where he is, I tell them he had to go home because of an emergency. I suffer their sympathetic looks but I follow through on our plans for the night and by ten thirty it’s finally over.
My dad’s staying at the local Hilton so we part in the restaurant parking lot.
“I’m so proud of you, Livvie.” He’s the only one who calls me that and the only one who can get away with it. Enclosing me in his big, strong arms, he hugs me tightly, bussing my cheeks on both sides—that’s the European in him. I hug him back just as tightly, wishing I could take away both our pain.
When in Paris... (Language of Love) Page 28
