His hold relaxes and I sit up in bed.
"What I want to know is why you aren't wearing any pants?"
I'm trying to remain unaffected as I gather my hair up, freeing up tangles with my fingers, and twist it back into a high bun with the elastic on my wrist.
He pulls his arms behind his head, watching me. "I didn't bring any clothes with me. I wasn't going to sleep in my jeans."
I don't answer him right away, stretching instead. "Yeah, well, it would've been nice to know you were half naked when I got in bed with you. I thought you were wearing pajama pants under the sheets like you usually are."
"Next time, you're welcome to check," he says, lips curling. When I narrow my eyes at him, he shifts gears. "Are you feeling better? Did you get your closure?"
"Honestly? I'm not sure. I think I did what I needed to do, now it's just a matter of putting time between me and…everything."
He's looking up at me, way too comfortable being in his underwear in front me. And my eyes drag down his body before my brain can tell me it's not a good idea. I'm not sure what I'm looking for. I guess I just like the way he looks lying in bed.
I clear my throat. "So…I'm going to go see if I can sneak back to my room without anyone realizing I was here."
"You don't have to worry about your parents thinking something happened. Trust me, they wouldn't think that."
"Because they know I wouldn't—"
He cuts me off. "No, because the whole house would've heard you screaming all night long."
My mouth drops open. I take my pillow and try to smother him. He makes a playful, halfhearted attempt at removing it, arms wailing around in pretend suffocation, until I pull the pillow off again. Something about his face emerging from the cloud of white makes me forget to breathe. Because his eyes look so bright, like every green hue in them is charged up.
He's undeniably handsome. And we slept in the same bed, bodies tangled around each other. Damn it. Why does that bring a flurry to my stomach?
I refuse to let this be a big deal. Refuse. Nope. Won't be me. Not going to happen. Do you hear that, brain? Ovaries? Get in line. Not going to happen.
"Let me know when you're done staring at me," he says. "Then you can head off to your room."
I roll my eyes at him, lost at what else to do. He sits up and brings his hand up to my hair, where he tugs on the hair tie until my bun is undone and my locks fall over my shoulders.
"What are you doing?"
"I like your hair when it's down. It's wild and gorgeous."
There it goes again, my stomach does a summersault. Why does the silence that follows, where we hold on to each other's eyes, make me think we're flirting a dangerous line? And why do I enjoy it so damn much?
"I feel close to you," Giles says, seemingly out of nowhere. "I don't have a friend like you. I don't even know if I have any real friends. If this is what it's supposed to be like."
"I'm not sure this is what it's supposed to be like," I confess. "Sometimes I'm afraid you'll want more."
"And I'm afraid I don't have more to give."
The shadow that whisks past his eyes is fleeting, but I catch it nonetheless.
"This? Whatever this is? Friendship, roommate-ship, whatever? I like it," I say.
"I never thought I could spend so much time in bed with a girl I wasn't having sex with. Sex is great. But honestly, I'd choose a night sleeping beside you over sex with anyone else. Hands down."
I watch him carefully. He's looking at me in a way I've never seen him look at me before. "You sound drunk," I tease. "Are you drunk?"
"Maybe I am," he says. "I don't know. I always feel drunk around you. I constantly want time to stop, freeze, so I can just breathe there for a minute. Like when we were dancing? I wanted to be there with you for longer and I wanted time to just stop."
I cover my face with my hands and shake my head, willing myself not to smile.
"You can't do that, Giles. You can't say things like that."
He pulls my hands from my face, forcing me to look at him again. "Why not? It's the truth."
"If we're going to keep things here…" I press my palm against his bare chest like it represents where we stand. His skin sears my palm, making the gesture seems too intimate. I let my hand drop back to my side. "You can't say things like that. Okay? It's just going to make things…hazy." And things are already too hazy. "So just don't."
"I'll try," he says, dragging his knuckles lightly over my cheek. Then, as if in an after thought, he adds, "I'm glad you made things right with your family."
"What about you?" I blurt out without thinking. "Have you called your mom?"
His relaxed expression tightens a notch. "I did."
I'm at a loss for words, truly surprised that he already contacted his mother and never mentioned it. All these nights we've spent talking until we fell asleep, I've been waiting for him to bring it up, sure I'd be the first person he'd tell. I watch him now, waiting for him to elaborate.
But he gets out of bed to pull on his jeans, and I don't miss the way his underwear clings to his ass.
I rub my eyes and refocus. "Do you want to talk about it?"
"No," he says, instantly. "Not yet. Let me get through my meeting with her first."
My chest tightens, a dozen words rushing to my tongue but held at bay by my lips. "Okay." It's all I can think to say.
He turns to me, holding out his hand. I take it and let him help me off the bed. "Let's go home," he says. "Where our biggest worry about sleeping in the same bed is keeping it from Ava, not your father breaking my neck."
I laugh, then lean over and kiss his cheek. "I'm here for you, okay?" I echo the words he spoke to me a while back, on a night I needed so badly to hear them.
He pulls me into a hug and I don't try to resist, taking in his scent and settling my face on his chest.
"I know you are, little leopard," he says. "And, I swear, it means everything."
I close my eyes at these words. They sound as good as him holding me feels. His arms tighten around me, wrapping me in warmth, and his scent caresses me all the way down to my inner thighs. I ignore the nagging in the pit of my stomach that we are edging closer and closer to a foggier and foggier zone.
I know what we're doing isn't smart. We are latching onto an almost we seem to enjoy torturing ourselves with. An almost kiss, an almost touch.
An almost romance we're both too hesitant to trek.
Our hesitation litters the way behind us. It litters the way in front of us, too, boulders of uncertainty that are crowding us right off the edge of everything.
And there we are, pretending we're exactly where we want to be. Like the craziest kind of fools.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Giles
THIS THING BETWEEN JULIA and me is fragile. If we move the wrong way it might break right before our eyes, shatter into a million pieces, and be lost before we could figure out what it ever really was.
But moving too slow? That seems just as reckless, because every night we've gotten physically closer, and every night winds me up tighter and tighter.
I've tried to keep my cravings for her more or less innocent. I've found a surprising satisfaction in just the thought of her throughout the day, flickers of her laughter, ingrained in my mind. Of her eyes and the way that they smile before her lips even twitch. Of the way she says my name, in warning, when she doesn't like something I've said.
I've tried to convince myself that the boundaries between us are too clear for either of us to accidentally cross. That what we've created between us is simple.
But that's a lie.
That night last week when we woke up in her parents' house, bodies twisted together, marked a shift in our nighttime situation. Now there's no other way. I need to feel her body close to mine at night and she seems to want to feel me just as bad. It's no longer a question. She lets me hold her even when the heat our bodies generate makes it hard to think. I try really, really hard to enjoy ever
y little bit she gives me without asking or pushing for more. Even though it kills me and every part of me screams to throw caution to the wind and plunge forward.
We've crossed a line and are pretending we haven't. We pretend the line has always been on the other side of this, of what we do now. The line keeps shifting, crawling, moving, while we look the other way.
We keep tracing over that line in our conversations and reminding ourselves in subtle ways that we are content with a friendship. And, in many ways, I am. For the first time in my life, I've got something I don't have to be afraid to lose. Because our friendship isn't something that can be lost easily, the way a relationship can. There's no denying she's good for me. There's no denying she's been the antidote to the poison that spread through my heart over the past two years. She came into my life and made everything ripple around her.
All of these things are true. But none of it changes the fact that I haven't been with another girl in nearly two months. And having Julia's gorgeous body pressed to mine at night is dangerous. My dreams have already shifted to visions of her hands slipping under the waistband of my underwear. Of her soft whisper in my ear begging me to take her, promising me everything will be the same in the morning.
If I thought that us having sex wouldn't change anything, God knows I'd give it all I've got. I can be convincing when I want to be, I can be more than persuasive. But I can't be sure things won't change. I can't be sure giving in to sex won't reveal everything else between us to be an illusion of lust.
I need it to not be an illusion. I need it to be something I can hold on to.
More than once, I've caught something in her eye that hints she wants more, too. But she's made it clear, over and over, that we shouldn't entertain a different possibility between us. I think she's lying to herself as badly as I'm trying to lie to myself.
We're both entitled to walk the contradiction between the things we say we want and the things we do together. It's senseless. But it's safe. And that's the one thing we have in common, the one thing bringing us together. We both just want to feel safe.
I've been keeping one thing from her, though. I can't verbalize to her just how much I'm dreading seeing my mother again. It's a shameful kind of dread. The type that paints me as a coward.
Julia knows, somehow. I can tell by the way she tries to softly pry me open to talk. But I resist. I've already opened up to her more than I ever thought I would. More than I meant to.
I used to have walls up. She blew them to pieces.
But telling her about what my mother did opens up a new can of worms. It reveals a pattern. A pattern of behavior those closest to me seem to share.
The tendency to leave me or, at the very least, attempt to.
"Get closer," I say to Julia, as she gets in my bed.
She does, wiggling over a bit more until our faces are inches apart. I wrap my arm around her waist and yank her body even closer. She gasps then lets out a low laugh as I settle comfortably against her, wrapping my arm tighter around her waist.
"Better," I whisper, her lips so close to mine, I feel my own breath curling back to me. "Now I can sleep."
I shut my eyes and start becoming more conscious of my breathing. Having her this close? God, it's torture. It's indulging in something I know I'm not supposed to have.
Minutes pass, I'm not sure how many.
Then I hear her say, "I can't sleep."
"Why not?"
"I can't stop my thoughts."
My eyes open in time to see her frown. "And what are you thinking about?"
"What are we doing, Giles?" She pulls her head back to look at me properly. "Really…what are we doing?"
I don't answer right away because I can see in her eyes how badly she wants me to simplify this for her. But there's no simplifying us. Not ever.
"I don't know," I tell her. "I really don't. I just know I don't want it to stop."
She nods, and then brings her face closer still. Her lips remain just a breath away from grazing mine.
"Why does this feel so good?" She asks the question so quietly, I'm not sure if she meant to say it out loud.
"Because it's right. Because we're meant to."
"Aww." She tries to pinch my cheek, but I grab her hand before she can lower it, forcing it to flatten onto my face. Her palm is soft and warm and brings me comfort.
"Don't ever leave me, little leopard."
I'm kidding, but I'm also not. Those words leave a strange vibration in my throat, and in my chest, too. I realize how serious I am, how badly I need her reassurance.
She yawns, a smile already in her eyes. "Don't worry, I won't. I promise."
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Giles
IT'S A RARE RAINY night in San Diego, which means slick roads and traffic backups on the interstate. Julia, who seems to rarely have a weeknight off, wanted to go to the movies. But we both agree it's a better idea to rent one at home, instead.
Ava's at work and I'm pretty sure she won't be returning until after midnight. We've got the house to ourselves and we're able to get as comfortable as we want, without Julia worrying about what Ava might think.
I plop down on the center of the couch and though Julia settles closer to the armrest, she swings her legs up over my lap. Without thinking, my hands fall onto her calves.
She's wearing shorts and my palm melts over her smooth skin. It's not like I'm going to move her legs away, even if the sight of her long, bare legs stirs something wild in me. Something I've been having a harder time containing.
We argue for a few minutes over the movie. She wants, of course, a chick flick, whereas I want a little less talking about feelings and a little more of things exploding. Finally, we settle on a romantic thriller.
The movie's good, we're both so glued to the screen we barely move. But early on, it becomes clear that the main characters have insane chemistry. Every line they speak, every move they make around each other is charged with explosive sexual energy. I didn't expect this. Pretty soon, the innocent gesture of Julia's legs over my lap no longer feels like a comfortable and unassuming position between two friends.
My eyes drag along her bare legs, up to where her shorts end. Those shorts. They're loose fitting and the leg holes are so large I could easily slide my hand between them.
It takes me a moment to notice that I've started stroking her calf, slowly, my palm warming her skin. She doesn't stop me, her eyes are on the screen, but her chest is rising and falling at slower intervals than it was before.
The actors onscreen start kissing, their heavy breathing and the woman's low moan make the room unbearably warm, heat stinging at my skin. I'm no longer thinking straight. Whatever slivers of self-control I've held on to evaporate around me. And I can no longer pretend I care about what's happening on the screen. I look down at her legs on my lap, her knees bent slightly. But I think she can feel the beginnings of a hard-on growing in my pants.
I bring my hand up to her knee and let my fingers curl over it, then slide my hand a little between, parting her legs just a bit. She doesn't move, doesn't even look at me.
My hand inches up the inside of her leg, stroking her in soft circles. I'm almost to her inner thigh when she finally looks at me. Her gaze far off and cloudy, lips parted long before words come out.
"What are you doing?" Her question is a whisper. An unassuming whisper frayed with hopefulness.
Eagerness.
"I'm touching you," I say, my voice just as slow. "Is that okay?"
The longest three seconds of my life pass between us before she gives me a slow nod and turns her attention to the television again.
This is strange. Everything about this is stealthy and dangerous, like we are treading right on the edge of a grenade and pretending it's not a big deal at all.
Pretending this can't destroy everything.
My fingers are determined as they trace small circles at the innermost nook of her inner thigh, right before her shorts begin. I urge her l
egs farther apart, and she lets one of her feet drop to the floor, while the other leg remains on me, held in place by my left hand.
Meanwhile, my right hand works to trace the curve of the shorts, listening for the changes in her breathing, the slow hitch as my fingers break past the material and find her underwear.
Using a single finger, I trace the edges of the triangle patch of cotton. She takes a sudden breath and her hips shift a fraction, into my touch. I continue my exploration, gently nudging aside her underwear until my fingers are greeted by slippery skin and searing warmth.
Fuck. She's wet. I'm not sure what else I expected, but the evidence of how I'm turning her on brings me to a full-blown erection.
"Do you like this?" I ask, keeping my fingers right outside of her entrance, tracing her wet skin.
She doesn't answer me. Doesn't even look at me. Her face is still turned to the television, but her head is on the headrest now, eyes closed.
"Answer me, Julia."
A beat passes.
"Yes," she whispers.
"Do you want me to stop?"
Another beat.
"No."
"Then look at me."
She faces me but her eyes remain closed, head tilted back. I push a finger inside of her and her mouth opens on a small gasp. Her back arches slightly off the couch, inviting me all the way in. I lean forward, finger still inside of her, and bring my lips right up to hers. I'm surprised by the way her eyes fly open, eclipsed by a lust so deep it turns me to stone. But she shifts her face before I can kiss her.
I kneel over her, my free hand tightening over the arm of the couch to anchor myself. My knee buries into the couch cushion, somewhere down by the outside of her leg. I want her closer. Her body is too far from mine. Even while my face is in her neck, breathing her in, and my finger pulses in and out of her.
She squeezes around me. If I didn't know any better, I'd think there's never been anything thicker than my finger inside of her.
"Let me kiss you," I say. Beg, really.
She shakes her head and her lids pull shut even tighter.
I start rubbing her with the palm of my hand. Rough, mean strokes. And moans leave her in a low and hesitant way, her eyebrows turning upward.
Enamor (Hearts of Stone #3) Page 18
