Nothing Less

by Anna Todd

  I take a breath, and her lips are on mine before I can exhale. Her lips taste like icing. Her tongue is warm in my mouth, and her hands are greedy in my hair. She pulls me closer, her fingers tugging at the roots.

  Both of my feet are on the floor, and I wrap my arms around her body, pulling her from her chair to mine. She settles on my lap, her thighs on either side of my legs. She’s kissing me like I’ve never been kissed, and I want to forget every kiss that came before her, every touch.

  Her soft body rocks against mine as she bites at my lip. I feel myself hardening under her, then am surprised that I’m not the least bit embarrassed. I know the moment she feels me. I taste her gasp as her arms wrap around my neck. She adjusts her body on mine so she can feel me rubbing against her. Her pants are so thin, and my sweats aren’t exactly hiding anything.

  When she rocks against me, her pussy rubbing against my hardness, I groan. I can’t help it. She feels so good against me, even fully clothed.

  Fuck, my mind is racing, she’s kissing my neck now. Her mouth knows exactly where to kiss, where to lick, the exact spot on the base of my neck to suck. I reach for her hips and gently squeeze them, guiding her to rub exactly where I need her.

  She moves her hips in the sexiest way. She’s a goddess, pure and simple. She’s a goddess, and I’m a lucky bastard to be here with her right now. There really is something about this kitchen that makes us insane for each other. This is definitely not how I thought the night was going to go.

  Not that I’m complaining at the turn of events.

  Nora pulls her mouth away from my neck, still rocking her pussy against my cock. “God, I wish you weren’t Tessa’s roommate.” She sucks at the skin again, then stops. I squeeze her hips, and she speaks again. “I would fuck you—fuck—I would fuck you right now if you weren’t.”

  The familiar tingle of an orgasm creeps up my spine at her words. She’s so sexy, she’s so open, and she makes me crazy. Absolutely freaking crazy for her.

  “We can pretend I’m not,” I say, only half joking.

  She laughs and slides against me. “I’m going to come, fuck, Landon. This . . . doesn’t . . . count . . .” Her words are throaty and sensual, and I can barely breathe as she rides me, thrusting her hips against my body.

  I move my hands to her back to steady her quick movements. Before I can stop myself, I’m on the brink of joining her. I don’t want to think about it; I don’t want my mind to ruin this moment. I just want to feel her—I just want to make her come and join her in bliss.

  “Me, too. I’m going to, too,” I say into her neck. I wish I were as good with words as she is. I kiss where her neck meets her shoulder, not exactly knowing what I’m doing, but the sounds she makes as she comes against me tell me I did something right.

  My mind goes blank. There’s only sensation now. I’m only sensation, and she’s so good at silencing my mind, and this feels so good. She feels so good, on my body, inside my hectic mind.

  As she comes down, her body slows and her breathing relaxes. She lays her head on my shoulder, and I can feel the wetness between our bodies, but neither of us seems to care.

  “That was . . .” she begins. “I—”

  Her words are cut short by the noise of the front door closing.

  “Landon?” Tessa’s voice comes from around the corner, cutting through our heavy breaths, slicing through our euphoric thoughts.

  “Shit,” Nora mutters as she climbs off me, then loses her balance. I grab her elbow, keeping her from falling to the floor.

  I stand, and Nora’s eyes move to my crotch. The wet spot there. “Go.”

  I move quickly toward the bathroom. Tessa walks into the kitchen as I reach the doorway, and I try to bolt, but she stops me. At least my back is turned toward her.

  “Hey, I tried to call you,” she says.

  I don’t want to turn around. I can’t turn around.

  “I wanted to see if you could bring my other shoes to my work. Someone dropped a bowl of salad dressing on my shoes, and I have to close tonight.” Tessa’s voice is strained.

  I can tell without even looking at her that she’s stressed, and I’m not exactly in a position to console her, or anyone, right now. I look around for something to grab so I can cover myself and turn around, but there’s nothing aside from a box of Lucky Charms.

  “Anyway,” Tessa begins, her voice lightening, “what are you guys up to?”

  I grab the cereal box and cover my crotch and turn to Tessa. Her eyes shoot straight to the box. I hold it tight.

  “We were . . .” I search for excuses and words and try not to let my nervous fingers slip from the corners of the box.

  Tessa looks at Nora, then back to me. “Oh, hey—what are you doing here?” Tessa asks innocently.

  I search for help from Nora, but she’s silent. I’m going down on this sinking ship, with only the leprechaun on the cereal box for an ally.

  “Well,” I begin, still without a clue as to what the heck I’m gonna say. Tessa is standing in the doorway with white globs of dressing covering her shoes. She’s not the only one with white stains on her . . .

  “We were cooking,” I say, and mentally thank Tessa for buying the family-size box of Lucky Charms.

  “Cooking?” Tessa looks at Nora, her expression unreadable.

  Nora steps forward. “Yeah, chicken and . . .” Nora looks at me. “Lucky Charms?” Her tone is so unsure that I’m positive Tessa will catch it. “As the breading. You know how we have those Frosted Flake–covered tenders at work? I wanted to try with Lucky Charms,” Nora explains.

  I almost believe her, and, more importantly, Tessa seems to, too.

  Nora continues, “You have to go back to work? Here, let’s get your shoes.”

  With Nora’s distraction in place, I scamper off, saying “I’ll be right back” over my shoulder.

  This is so awkward. Why is everything in my life so dang awkward? Thankful that Nora is a better liar than I am, I disappear into the hallway, cereal box in tow.

  “What’s with him?” I hear Tessa ask Nora. I don’t stay around to hear her response.

  chapter

  Three

  MY BEDROOM IS SILENT.

  It feels so small.

  Or maybe it’s me who feels small after yet another embarrassing moment with Nora? This time was better because we shared the awkward scene.

  We caused it.

  I can still feel her body against mine, moving with need, with purpose. I can hear her moans in my ear and feel her hot breath against my skin.

  Now my room feels warm.

  Too warm.

  I move away from the back of my door and walk across the room to the window. My desk is messy; stacks of books and Post-its clutter the wooden surface. Well, it’s from IKEA and cost less than a hundred bucks, so it’s probably not “wood” at all. I tap my finger on the dark brown potential wood, and it sounds hollow. I knew it wasn’t real.

  My fingers are shaky as I push my hand through my blinds to pull open the window. The windowsill is covered in chipped paint and dust, even a dead fly. Tessa would cringe at that. I make a mental note to clean it up this week. I pull at the stubborn wood, and it finally cracks open.

  I lift it higher, welcoming the calm sounds of the city into my room. I love the noise level here in Brooklyn. There are cars and usually some voices of people walking down the sidewalks, but nothing too crazy. The amount of random taxi honking is significantly less than in Manhattan. I’ll never understand the whole angry-honking thing. It doesn’t make any sense to me why people think it helps traffic in any sort of way. The only thing the rude gesture does is piss people off and create even more tension.

  Random thoughts are doing a good job of keeping my mind off what Nora and I just did. Well, not now that I’m thinking about it again. How did we go from creating a little movie scene to her straddling me on a chair? I pull my pants and boxers off and toss them into my dirty-clothes hamper by the closet door.

&nb
sp; I change my clothes and sit down on the edge of my bed, close to the window. My phone is plugged into the charger sitting on my nightstand. I reach for it.

  Hardin answers on the second ring. “It’s too late to talk me out of coming—I’ll be there this Friday.”

  I roll my eyes. “Hi, I’m good. Thanks for asking.”

  “Noted. What can I help you with on this fine evening?” Hardin asks over a car alarm beeping in the background.

  “Nothing. I’m having a weird thing . . .” I don’t know how to explain what’s going on or why I called Hardin to talk about it.

  He laughs. “You’re going to need to explain much more than that.”

  I sigh into the phone and listen to my surroundings. I can faintly hear Tessa’s and Nora’s voices in the kitchen.

  “Okay, so you know Tessa’s friend Nora? Well, Sophia was her name when you met her, but Tessa says she likes her friends to call her Nora. I mean, you probably won’t get either name right anyway.”

  He’s silent for a moment. I wonder if my voice was too loud. I can’t make out anything the women are saying, so I hope they can hear even less of my voice.

  “Yeah. I think so.”

  “Okay, so we just had sex.” I tug at the blinds, pulling the string to raise them. “Well, not really sex, I guess. But really, really close to it.”

  “And?” Of course Hardin’s response would be And?

  I make sure my voice is only slightly louder than a whisper. “This is the thing. Nora has told me so many times that we have to stay friends, and we were just talking, like usual, and then two seconds later she’s straddling me and having an orgasm and then Tessa walked in right after, and now I’m in my room and I’m kind of freaking the hell out because I don’t know what to do or say now.”

  “Wow. Tessa walked in? The chick was straddling you on a chair? Well, there’s no denying that, then. Wait—so you fucked her on a kitchen chair? Or she just rode you until she came?” he asks in a casual tone, like his mouth isn’t as dirty as a public toilet.

  “Um, the second one. We didn’t have sex—well, like the sex where something goes into something else . . .”

  “Really?” His voice is calm, amusement playing at its edges. “Did you really just say that? I might as well ask you to show me on the doll where she touched you.”

  “I don’t know why I called.” I sigh. Leaning back, I stare at my weirdly colorful ceiling fan.

  Hardin seems to notice something in my voice, so he eases up a bit. “So, do you like her? I mean, why else would hooking up with her be a problem? You’re single, she’s single. Right?”

  I contemplate this for a moment. Am I single?

  Yes. Dakota and I have been broken up for months.

  The looming fact that she was here just yesterday waves its hand in my face.

  Man, I’m an asshole. I should tell Nora about Dakota’s being here. It’s only fair. That’s what a nice guy would do, and I’m a nice guy.

  “We are both single. Except Dakota was here last night.”

  I hate to admit it.

  I’m not that kind of guy.

  I’m really not.

  “Yikes. Delilah, too? What the hell is going on there?”

  I don’t bother to correct him on Dakota’s name. “I don’t know. But don’t tell Tessa. Seriously, she’s got enough going on, and Nora is really freaked out about Tessa finding out. I mean it. I don’t care if Tessa’s naked and asks you to tell her what’s up—you better pretend you know nothing.”

  “If she’s naked, there’s no promising anything.”

  “Ugh.”

  “Fine. Fine. I won’t say anything. Did you talk to her about her schedule yet?”

  No. Because I’m too big of a chickenshit. “Not yet. She’s been working a lot lately. Oh, and I need to warn you about something, but you can’t freak out.” I pause. “Seriously, you can’t. Promise me,” I say softly. I don’t want Tessa or Nora to hear me gossiping about them to Hardin.

  “What? What’s going on?” he asks, and I can tell his mind is going to the worst of places.

  “Promise me,” I repeat.

  He huffs in impatient frustration. “Yeah, sure, I promise.”

  “You know that waiter guy from the lake that weekend? When you and Tessa were fighting the whole time?”

  “We weren’t fighting the whole time.” His voice is defensive, but lightly so. “But, yeah, what about him?”

  “He’s here.”

  “In your apartment?” Hardin raises his voice, and I start to think maybe this wasn’t the best idea to tell him right now, like this.

  “No. In New York. They work together.”

  He sighs, and I can only imagine his expression right now. “Have they been . . . you know? Like, dating or something?”

  I shake my head even though he can’t see me. “No, nothing like that. I just wanted to tell you because I think, for your sake, it would be better if you don’t make a big deal out of it. You know, show Tessa you’re maturing and all.”

  Also because I don’t want my apartment to be burned to the ground in Hessa World War Two. Of course, if it did burn down, I wouldn’t have this issue between Nora and me every time we’re in the kitchen together . . .

  “Maturing? I’m very mature. Fucker.”

  “Yeah, I can tell by your extensive vocabulary, fucker,” I tease.

  “Listen, man. I’m proud of you for cussing and for half fucking Naomi or Sarah or whatever she’s going to change her name to next week, but I have a call in one minute.”

  I can’t help but laugh at his way with words. “Thanks for the help.”

  He’s silent for a second. “If you really want to talk about it, I can call you back after?”

  His voice is so full of unexpected sincerity that I sit up. “No, it’s fine. I need to get out there and face the music.”

  “I hope it’s a death-metal band.”

  “Shut up.”

  The line goes silent.

  chapter

  Four

  BY THE TIME I LEAVE my room, Tessa has already left to go back to work, and I find Nora sitting alone on the couch, her feet propped up in front of her on a stack of my couch pillows. Her back is leaning against the arm of the leather couch, and she’s holding the remote in her hand.

  “Tessa left already?” I pretend that I didn’t wait to hear the front door close before I came out of my bedroom.

  Nora nods. She presses the arrow on the remote, scrolling through the guide. She doesn’t look at me. I notice that she’s changed her pants, too. Did she bring extra clothes with her, knowing that I was going to make a mess of the ones she was wearing? I hope so.

  The thought makes my heart race, and I try not to think too much about what Tessa almost caught us doing.

  “Do you think she knows?” I had planned on being a tad subtler when I brought up the subject, but I guess my big mouth has other plans.

  Nora’s thumb keeps pressing on the remote, but she glances at where I stand in the doorway of the living room. “I hope not.” She pauses and draws a breath. “Look, Landon—” Nora’s voice is full of the beginning of a goodbye, and I’ve barely heard her say hello.

  “Wait.” I cut her off before she can talk herself out of giving me a chance. “I know what you’re going to say. Your tone and the fact that you won’t look at me kind of gives me a pretty big hint.”

  Nora’s eyes meet mine, and I walk farther into the living room and sit on the chair next to the couch. She lifts herself up and crosses her legs beneath her body. Her hands grab for a pillow, the pillow that Ken’s mother gave me last fall, and place it on her lap. “Landon,” she says softly, and I love the way my name blends with her breath. “I’m not—”

  “Don’t.” I’m rude to cut her off again, but I know what she’s going to say, and I want to change how this is going to go. “This is where you warn me off and tell me that you aren’t good for me and all that. But not today. Today we talk about why you
think that and figure out where to go from there.”

  I feel high when I finish. I feel good that my thoughts became words, and I think I just grew a chest hair or two.

  Nora’s eyes lock onto me with a calm intensity. “There’s nowhere to go from here. I told you that we couldn’t date . . . We could never be together in a real way. I’m not looking to get into another relationship.”

  I’m surprised by her boldness. Usually when these types of awkward conversations happen in books or movies, the one doing the rejecting looks away or picks at their fingernails or something.

  Not Nora. Bold Nora is staring straight at me, and it’s making me a little nervous. My high is gone, my chest hairs have shriveled up and disappeared, and my mouth is dry.

  Nora said another relationship. What was her last relationship? I’m 99.9 percent sure she won’t elaborate on this for me, but I ask anyway. “When was your last relationship?”

  Her eyes narrow but she doesn’t look away. “It’s complicated.”

  “Everything is.”

  She smiles at that.

  “Tell me about it. I want to know about you. Let me,” I encourage her.

  “I don’t want you to know about me.”

  I can feel the conviction in her words. She means them, and that kind of stings. I can’t help but frown. “Why not?”

  The pillow is covering her chest now, and her fingers are gripping its top corners intensely. I remember when Gran, Ken’s mom, gave me the pillow. She told me that she’d bought the same one for Hardin, but when Ken took out the trash that same day, he found the blue-and-yellow pillow in the can. I kept mine, and I’m convinced that when Ken gives Hardin the pillow back someday, he’ll finally be ready to keep it.

  When Nora doesn’t respond, a hint of anger bubbles in my chest. “Why? Tell me why you don’t want me to know you. You like me, Nora. I’m not really as suave as all the other guys out there, but I can see that. Why can’t you just let me get to know you?”

  “Because you won’t like me anymore. If you keep digging around, you won’t like what you discover.”