by Roxie Noir
“About here,” she says. “It’s a little bit blurry before that and really blurry after.”
I wriggle toward her on the bed, kiss her hand, put my face where it was.
“There,” I say.
She laughs.
“Thank you for the gift of your face, I guess,” she says.
“I wouldn’t want to deprive you in this important moment,” I say, putting her arm back over me. “I wanted to make sure you imprinted properly or whatever.”
Imogen makes a face and scrunches her nose.
“Humans don’t imprint and they especially don’t imprint after sex,” she points out.
I raise my eyebrows, wait.
“What?”
“You’re about to tell me all about what imprinting really is and why I’m so wrong right now.”
“Well, not anymore,” she says, her eyes crinkling. “Now you’re going to have to suffer in ignorance for being a dick about it.”
“Oh, come on, Squeaks. You love correcting me.”
She laughs, silently.
“Maybe it’s because you imprinted already, and now every time you think sexy thoughts you, I don’t know, impose my face onto whatever else is happening at the moment. Like when you hear a song that makes you want to dance dirty—”
“Okay, that’s really not what it is,” she says, finally breaking.
Now it’s my turn to laugh.
“Baby animals do it to their mothers, sometimes. Right after birth, so they follow the right one around.”
“Are you saying you’re gonna be following me around now?”
“Mammals don’t even imprint. It’s just birds. And ew, Wilder.”
“You do have to go to work sometimes,” I tease her. “I wouldn’t want your career hurt just because I sex-imprinted you so well that you’re following me around all day every day.”
“Oh, my God,” she mutters, but she’s laughing.
I grin, because it can be so easy and fun to get a rise out of her. Even though I’m the one who’s followed her everywhere, the one who flew to the Arctic just to see her face.
“Do you know about anglerfish?” she asks, her eyes still dancing.
“Know what about anglerfish?”
“They’re these crazy, super-deep-sea fish,” she says.
I shrug.
“Anyway, they’re called anglerfish because they have a single glowing antenna that sticks out, because it’s always pitch black when you get that deep in the ocean, and they have these enormous mouths and horrible teeth and jaws that can unhinge so they just eat anything that wanders close enough to their forehead light. Super ugly,” she says, helpfully.
I just wait to see where this is going.
“And it’s really hard to find other fish in the dark down there, even though they’re got the glowing forehead thing,” she says. “So when a male anglerfish does find a female, he uses his big horrible mouth to latch onto her, after which he fuses to her body and basically becomes a parasite that shares the same circulatory system. That’s how they mate.”
I blink.
“They fuse into one body?”
“Gross, right?”
“Shit, Squeaks, is this a warning?”
She laughs.
“I was only gonna ask if you wanted to have dinner tonight,” I tease. “But if that’s too much…”
“Sorry,” she grins. “I get carried away with cool biology stuff sometimes.”
“As long as the anglerfish isn’t a metaphor for something else,” I say. “See, I know big words too.”
“I’m so impressed.”
“If you’re gonna be like that I can start going through flight preparation checklists for several different models of fighter jet,” I tease.
“Are you going to tell me about lubing up the coxen?” she asks, batting her eyes.
“No, because that sentence was total nonsense.”
“But you’ve gotta lube something, right?”
“Did I interrupt you while you were telling me how fish fuck?” I ask, laughing.
“That was fascinating and sexy,” she protests.
“Sexy?” I say. “Sexy, Imogen?”
She just laughs, turning her face into the pillow.
“Okay, point taken,” she finally says, her voice blurred.
She turns her head back to me.
“I’d love to have dinner tonight,” Imogen says.
I take her hand, kiss her folded knuckles.
“How about next weekend, too,” I say.
“Sure.”
“And the weekend after that?”
She raises one eyebrow.
“Okay.”
“Just get dinner with me all the time,” I say. “And sometimes I’ll spend the night and we can post cutesy pictures of ourselves being ridiculously happy on the internet and sometimes we’ll argue about whose turn it is to drive or do the dishes or what shows we’re going to binge-watch next. How about that?”
She wriggles in until her body is halfway across mine, warm and supple and inviting as hell. My cock twitches once, but it’s still too soon.
“I can’t imagine us ever arguing,” she says.
“Now you’re just lying.”
“Do you at least have good taste in television shows?”
I grin over at her.
“You know I don’t.”
Imogen sighs, blows a strand of hair out of her face, wriggles against me with the bars of light playing across her naked body.
This isn’t what I’d imagined. Not even in high school, the few times that I wondered what my life could be like if I chose the other girl.
Back then I thought it would be… normal, the way it is for anyone who ends up with their high school sweetheart. We’d date, we’d be long distance, we’d both go back to Solaris where we’d get married and I’d work for my father and she’d get a marketing job or something.
But now, I can’t imagine anything else but this. Fuck, I’d cross the Rockies on my hands and knees for this.
“Well, maybe I’ll learn to love dumb superhero shows,” Imogen sighs. “I accept your offer anyway.”
I reach out, trace her bottom lip with my thumb.
“It worked,” I say.
“What worked?”
“Bothering you until you said yes.”
She laughs, ducks her head slightly, kisses the pad of my thumb.
“You mean the part where we did nothing but talk for a couple of months and you didn’t break my heart again? The part where you put your money where your mouth was?”
“I still can’t believe you didn’t fall for my big romantic gesture.”
“I’m a scientist, Wilder. I believe things when there’s evidence for them.”
“So, charts and graphs for Valentine’s Day, not flowers and chocolates?” I tease.
“I’m still human,” she laughs. “I’d take chocolates.”
I close the distance between us, kiss her again. It’s lazy and slow, both our faces half in the pillow.
“I do love you,” I murmur. “You need proof of that?”
She kisses me, bites my lower lip, her body curling toward mine. My cock twitches again, only this time it comes halfway to life because now it’s been long enough.
“What kind of proof are you offering?” she says, her mouth still against mine. “Theoretical, physical, what?”
With one move I push her shoulder, flip her onto her back, climb on top of her. Imogen gasps, the noise half-squeak, and I press myself into her belly, her legs already winding around me.
“You’re so smart,” I growl. “Guess.”
Epilogue
Imogen
Two and a half years later
Wilder’s words hit me right in the chest, momentarily pushing the air from my lungs.
“What do you mean he doesn’t know?” I ask.
Wilder’s face is tense in the dark, headlights and taillights and street lamps washing over his features.
&
nbsp; “I mean I haven’t told him,” he says evenly.
“But your mom must have told him,” I counter. “She must have. I mean, for fuck’s sake, she’s practically already started ordering monogrammed china—”
“She said she hasn’t told him,” Wilder says, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows. “And I don’t think you monogram china.”
“Not my point.”
He sighs.
“They barely talk,” he admits. “Honestly, I think she mostly stays at the condo and he’s got the big house all to himself. I don’t know what he does there, I don’t know if he has affairs or what. He probably sleeps on the couch in his office most nights. God knows he did when we were growing up.”
Something in Wilder’s voice softens my heart a little, the muscles in my ribcage thawing.
“Gray knows,” Wilder says. “I told him the very next day. Promise. It’s not a secret, Squeaks, literally all he’d have to do is ask my mom how I’m doing—”
“That wasn’t my point at all,” I say. “You just don’t think it’s weird that your dad doesn’t know you’re getting married in six months?”
He sighs, shoves his hair out of his face with one hand.
“Yeah, it’s weird,” he admits. “But there’s a lot that’s weird about our particular relationship, and he’s not exactly the guy I go to when I’m bubbling over with good news.”
I look down at my hands. I’m holding an enormous arrangement of pale-blue-and-white flowers that we just picked up from the florist in Solaris, who was kind enough to stay open fifteen minutes late a couple days before Christmas.
I’ve been more nervous than a basket of squirrels on crack cocaine about this visit for a couple of weeks now. It’s not like I’m particularly good with people, and it’ll be the first time I’m really spending time with Wilder’s family.
Actually, the only time I met his dad I was in seventh grade, and he was giving out a civic award at the middle school. I think he sponsored it or something.
I doubt he remembers me, or at least, I hope he doesn’t. Seventh grade wasn’t my best year.
The rock on my ring finger glimmers gently in the low light, sparkling even now. I told him a thousand times that I didn’t want a big engagement ring, that I wanted something small and understated, maybe not even a diamond.
He didn’t listen. It’s the only time he’s touched his trust fund since moving to Seattle.
And, even though I kind of hate to admit it, I like it. I wasn’t sure I would, honestly, but it’s gorgeous. Plus, there’s something about going out with Wilder and the moment that other people see him, see me, then look at the ring.
Something that says yeah, bitches, he’s all mine.
But it’s weird as hell that his own father doesn’t know we’re getting married. I’m really only mostly sure that Marcus Flint — owner of Flint Holdings, Inc., as well as about half of Solaris, hated by my own parents — knows we’re dating.
“He knows we’re coming, right?” I ask, stomach twisting again as Wilder drives us down the dark road.
“That he does,” Wilder says dryly. “I talked to his secretary about what time we’d be having Christmas Eve dinner.”
“And he knows I’m coming?”
Wilder reaches over, puts his hand on my knee, squeezes through my jeans.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell my father we got engaged,” he says, glancing over at me every few seconds, eyes mostly still on the road. “I kind of avoid talking to the man.”
“I get it,” I say, softly.
One more time, I wish we were spending the first night with my parents — my lovely, normal, not-crazy-rich parents — who know all about our engagement. My mom texts me several times a week with suggestions of absolutely hideous wedding dresses, and every single time I have to talk her down.
But a while back, I decided a ‘get it over with’ approach was best, this got scheduled, and now… here we are.
Wilder slows the SUV, puts on his blinker, turns left into a snowy driveway, angled up. There’s a moment where the wheels don’t grip properly, but Wilder just shoves the car into all-wheel drive and gives it more gas.
My knuckles are white on the huge flower arrangement.
It’s fine, I tell myself, over and over again.
You’ve met Brenda a million times, and Grayson was just out in Seattle last month, they’re both very nice…
I breathe deep. I force myself to relax, because new people and new social situations will never be something I’m good at. It’s better now than it used to be, at least when Wilder’s by my side, but I don’t think it’ll ever be easy.
He pulls into a driveway, yanks up the parking brake, puts the car in park.
“They’ll love you,” he says, his hand on my knee again. “I mean, my mom and Gray already do, and if Dad doesn’t, fuck him.”
I put one hand over his, squeeze.
“I know,” I say. “Thanks.”
He leans over, kisses me quickly. Up ahead the huge chalet house is glowing from within, the roof outlined with Christmas lights, the snow making it look like something out of a storybook.
“Okay,” I say. “Let’s do this.”
We get out of the car. It’s freezing out here, and immediately my breath puffs into the cold air, my snow boots biting into the thin layer still on the driveway. It’s the first time I’ve been back to Solaris in the winter since Wilder and I got together, and I’d somehow forgotten what the biting cold is like.
“I’ll come back for the suitcases in a little while,” he says, coming around the front of the car. He takes the heavy flowers from my hands, leans over them, kisses me one more time, and I follow him up the stairs, to the front deck where there’s a fire pit and benches all around.
As he rings the bell, I glance over my shoulder, then gasp.
The view from here is amazing. All of Solaris is spread out below us, and even though it’s nighttime, it looks like a cheesy painting or a photograph or something. It doesn’t even look real, just a beautiful valley of light.
Of course this is their view, I think. This way they can survey all they own every time they leave their house.
Before I can get any further, the front door opens, and I plaster a smile onto my face as my heart hammers in my chest.
“Oh, thank God,” Grayson says, the moment he opens the door. “I was about to start sending up flares. Get in here. Ooh, lilies, my favorite.”
Wilder laughs, and already, I feel better. The first time I met Grayson he was absolutely nothing like I expected — I knew that he was the good son, the one who was being groomed to take over the business, the one who was straight-laced and went to a good college, serious and studious.
Except he’s got the same wicked sense of humor the Wilder does, only more deadpan. He and Wilder could almost be twins, except Grayson’s eyes are an unearthly amber brown, his hair a few shades lighter.
He’s also my second-favorite member of Wilder’s family, and I’m already relieved that he’s here. Even if he’s the only one who’s got some idea of what happened between us in high school, since he was a freshman at the time.
“Mom’s made mulled wine and Dad’s had three glasses already, so he’s telling us his opinions on the latest Range Rover and Mom is looking at her phone instead of paying attention. Welcome to the circus,” he says, and gives us a grin over his shoulder before leading us into the living room.
“They’re here,” he announces.
“Wilder!” Brenda exclaims. “Oh, my gosh, I love them! Lilies, my favorite!”
Standing next to her, Grayson smirks.
“This is just gorgeous,” she gushes. “Here, put it down on the new sideboard, I’ve got just the spot…”
She leads Wilder a few feet away, directing flower placement, and Wilder’s dad steps in to take her spot.
Instantly, my heart ties itself into a knot. Grayson’s wandered off to the mulled wine, so I don’t even have his backup.
> “You must be Imogen,” Wilder’s dad says. “Marcus.”
He holds out his hand as if we’re about to make a business deal, and the first thing I notice is that he’s wearing a white button-down shirt and gray slacks, even now, relaxing at home.
The second thing I notice is that he’s got Wilder’s eyes, only where Wilder’s seem like they change from one moment to the next, soft to warm to laughing to cool, Marcus’s eyes are brittle as diamonds in his face.
“Yes, of course,” I say.
Of course what? Of course I’m Imogen? Jesus.
“I’ve heard so much about you,” I say, smiling as much as I can and making sure I’m not slacking on my end of the handshake.
“Likewise,” he says, though I’m pretty sure he’s lying. “Good, firm grip. Be good in the boardroom someday.”
I just keep smiling, because I’ve got no idea what to say to that. I’d be terrible in a boardroom, not to mention I’ve got zero desire to go anywhere near one.
After a moment, the handshake ends, but he keeps looking at me with those eyes like lasers, like he’s adding and dividing and running the numbers about me in his head, calculating something I don’t even know.
Still at a loss for words, I push my glasses up my nose with my left hand.
His eyes alight on the ring, and a split second too late, I realize what just happened.
Shit.
I meant for Wilder to at least tell him, with words, not just find out sort of by accident…
But Marcus just nods once.
“Congratulations,” he says, his tone neither pleased nor dismayed, just perfectly businesslike. “Excuse me, I ought to go help my wife with those flowers.”
And with that, Marcus Flint steps away. I glance over at Grayson, at a loss for words, and he holds up an empty white mug, a question on his face.
I nod. I’m definitely gonna need that wine tonight.
Later that night, after Wilder’s parents have gone to bed, the two of us and Grayson are sitting in their chalet’s upstairs lounge, which is a couple of leather couches, a huge fireplace, and an amazing view. We’ve got the lights out, wrapped in blankets, looking out at Solaris, drinking hot cocoa.
