I adjusted my eagerly expanding cock because not only did I know what was coming, I didn’t know how I was going to respond without coming across as a total sex-crazed buffoon.
The third was…mother of fuck.
I rubbed my hand roughly over my beard and…stared. My girl was facing a mirror, completely nude, her body arched like a fucking Greek goddess or something. Her arm was wrapped around her toned waist, her hand strategically placed to cover her always shaved-bare pussy. I pouted for a nanosecond at not getting to see all of her, but the image was goddamn sexy, so unbelievably hot there was no fucking way I was going to complain about any of it.
How could I’ve seen her naked so many times, and this was what turned my gears in a whole new way?
I still didn’t know how to respond. Maybe she wanted me to act like the sex-crazed buffoon I was trying not to be I mean, she wasn’t sending me these to not get a reaction, right? I was fully reacting. I just didn’t know how to tell her that. It wasn’t like this was the first time a girl had sent me these kinds of pictures. However, those were always girls I was kind of dating or a friends-with-benefits type of thing. It wasn’t the girl I was very much into that I’d known for almost a decade, who was once married to my best friend, and now we worked together almost daily. This was a delicate fucking situation.
God. She was hot.
And she was waiting. She had to be. She was sitting somewhere, maybe even lying in her bed wearing that same outfit or nothing at all, waiting for me to respond.
Be cool, Marshall. Let her take the lead.
Me: Thank you.
There. It was simple and courteous.
Al: Thank you? A girl sends you scantily clad, nude photos and all you have say is “thank you?”
It was…a dumbass fucking response that was going to ruin any chance I had of ever having sex with her again.
Me: No! Oh my God, no! It wasn’t all, I was just…still typing! They are amazing.
No, dumbass. They’re better than amazing. She is better than amazing.
Me: YOU are better than amazing. I’m fucking speechless, or rather textless, or whatever the fuck it’s called if anything. You look so hot. Beautiful. So, so, so, so beautiful. I can’t believe you did this. For me.
Okay. That was the best I could do. If it wasn’t good enough, I’d have to brush up on my skills—my wooing skills. They didn’t get as much use as they did when I was in my twenties, and as the sexy picture thing had definitely taken off these last several years, perhaps my said skills had taken a nosedive.
I waited a few minutes, and without a response, I was starting to panic. What else could I do? Was there something that I was missing?
Wait. Did she want me to reciprocate?
Fuck.
That would entail doing only one type of picture, and while I was sporting some major wood from what she sent, I didn’t know if it would stand up to photography.
Do the same rules about the camera adding ten pounds apply to cock shots taken from a mobile phone, but instead of ten pounds you get a few extra inches?
Al: Thank you ;)
Okay. So maybe no exchanges from my side needed. Whew.
Me: I really was surprised. Thank you, baby.
Al: Just HOW surprised, Marshall? Did it…effect you?
Oh, hello, naughty girl. She wanted to play, and I was all in.
Me: Hard. The effects were immediate and hard.
Al: Is that so? Elaborate.
Me: I’ve had the pleasure of lingering over every inch of your body. I’ve watched you come as you rode my cock. You’ve pulled my hair as you’ve come against my mouth as I gave you head. Getting the pictures? A whole new level. I am so fucking hard, and you’re not here for me to show you just how hard.
Al: Thank you for elaborating. ;) Sounds like there is a situation happening over there again.
Me: There definitely is. What are you doing?
Al: Laying around.
Me: How about you get that sexy ass over here and lay around close to me.
There was a pause in correspondence, and I knew she had to be considering it. She better have been considering it since I’m sure it was her intent all along. If that wasn’t the case, then I knew I’d reached the pinnacle of cluelessness about women.
Come on, baby.
Come on.
And if you do, bring me a treat.
Al: Be over in twenty.
Yes!
After I decided that it would be fucking rude to ask if she had any cookies or even one of those margarita doughnuts she brought into Ginger yesterday laying around, and if she did, if she could bring one. Or two. Three, tops. I came to my senses, though. She had already been super generous today, and asking any girl to bring you food so you can have a postcoital snack was a level of asshole I didn’t want her to view me as.
I used the twenty minutes between her last text and her arrival to take a quick shower. Even though I wasn’t tending bar, the bar funk still radiated around me, attaching itself to my clothes. There never was a day that I didn’t have a spilled drink, food, cleaning product from post-vomit cleanup, or regular man funk from doing something at work that needed to be hosed off when I came home.
And let’s face it. If I wanted her lingering around my dick, like she so graciously does, smelling nice in all areas I’m sure was appreciated.
I decided to play the art of seduction role and lit some scented candles around the apartment. A few in the living room and several in the bedroom, where I anticipated spending most of our time.
I’d never been in a Bed Bath & Beyond, because as a perpetual bachelor, I never had to, but one of the girls at work told me they had a good selection of the good shit—shit referring to candles. I was sure I came across as a total tool sniffing at all of them, but now I was glad I did. My home already smelled fucking great from the Mango Salsa and Harvest scented candle combination I bought.
Seeing the lights of her car illuminate the pavement outside my house, and then go dark, was a level of excitement akin to fucking Christmas morning. I watched her exit her car, and while I couldn’t make out exactly what she wearing, I saw enough to know she was wearing a denim skirt. Outside of working or when she didn’t have that sexy uniform on, she was always in jeans. She never wore skirts.
I was a dude. I fucking loved skirts.
Her still red hair blew across her face as she started up the walk to my door, and my heart continued to pound so hard I thought the fucking neighbors would hear it.
They would be hearing something soon, though.
She was a vocal, very vocal lady in bed.
I opened the front door and stood waiting for her. She had barely crossed to inside when I slammed it shut and had her pushed up against the back of it. The pictures were a nice appetizer, but her? In the flesh? I was going to fucking devour her.
My eyes focused on her lips as I whispered, “Finally.”
“You got a thing for doors, huh, Jones? First your office. Now here?”
Then it was my eyes on her mouth, watching her tongue run along her lower lip, and I knew she was coming for me. It was what she always did before kissing me. I wasn’t even sure if she knew she did it, but I noticed. I always did because anticipation rose through my body.
“I couldn’t concentrate on anything else after getting those pictures,” I said in a low tone, my lips almost touching hers. “Not a fucking thing, Al, and I had a lot of shit to get done.”
“Sorry,” she whispered.
I brushed our lips together with a gentle shake of my head. “I’m sure you are. In fact, I’m going to make sure I know how sorry you say you are.”
Her head tilted back so she could see my expression. “And what is that supposed to mean?”
“It means,” I said, sliding my fingers through the back of her hair, clutching it in my hand. “I want you to prove it to me, how sorry you are, because I’ve been hard for you for so long now. I want you. All of you.”
Our lips finally con
nected, and it was hands and tongues and a sexual desire so palpable, I wondered if she felt it running through my veins, through my skin.
My heart pounded more.
Her legs trembled.
She was sorry.
I took her to the bedroom, laid her down, and yes. She was so, so sorry.
When we were done, we laid sated in each other’s arms, sleepy from the day and the sex. It was a rare moment of perfection.
Peace.
We sat quiet in it, our fingers brushing against one another’s, until I flicked on the television.
Had I known that the one action, in that one perfect moment, would lead to her unraveling, I would’ve never have done it.
Follow the yellow brick road…
Chapter Sixteen
Alexis—
The waves came crashing through at the most unexpected moments.
I was never ready for the way a memory from a sound, a voice, or smell would floor me.
But buried demons always emerge don’t they?
It was The Wizard of Oz.
My eyes were half-closed so I couldn’t see it, but I heard the music.
And then it was there.
All of it.
Everything I had run from for almost twenty years.
I recalled rolling away from Marshall slowly, him asking me if I was just going to the bathroom.
I might have nodded or maybe not.
My eyes scanned his floor, locating my clothes, as the words to the movie made my panic escalate.
I needed out.
Away.
“What? You’re leaving?” he said.
My name, his name for me, “Al?” was the background to the violent screaming in my head, as I put my clothes on with rapid movements.
I shook my head, words nowhere to be found, as I raced from his bedroom.
He called out after me, worry lacing his voice, but I had to get away.
I ran.
And I was almost free, but then his voice was shouting my name over and over again.
The silent street filled with the echoing of his voice, and I still didn’t stop.
I crossed the street to my car, the beacon of safety that would rescue me, but he was right behind me.
My hand was on the handle of my car door. I was almost free, but he stopped me.
He caught my arm and he was there, on the darkened street outside his apartment, shirtless, barefoot, and wearing only jeans. I could feel the shift of the earth under my feet and how it was all going to cave in right there to swallow me for good.
Say whatever you need to say to get away. He won’t let you leave if you don’t.
“I had to leave her,” I said. “You know that, right?”
“What? Wha—?” he stammered. “What is wrong? What happened?”
“Delilah!”
“Al. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t you understand?” I cried. “I had to do it. I had to leave her!”
“I believe you, Al. I know you did, but I still don’t understand why you had to,” he said, finally piecing together what I was trying to tell him. “What happened? Tell me!”
I pressed the palm of my hand to the center of my eye, the sharpening pain radiating from my brain was overcoming me. I couldn’t go there with him. Even if I could explain, it would lead to other questions. He’d want to know why I felt the way I did, why I didn’t, I couldn’t be a mother, no matter how much I loved her.
“I thought we were past this,” he whispered. “I thought you trusted me.”
“I do,” I said, dropping my arms to my sides. “I’m just not sure I trust myself.”
“What does that even mean?”
“It means, if I tell you, and I let all of those words out, I don’t know who I am anymore. Keeping what I did, who I am, is what keeps me safe. I can trust that…for myself, but if I let that go, then what? It’s too terrifying to think about.”
“But Al. You’re not alone in this anymore. I’m here. Please look at me,” he said, bringing my chin forward to face him. “I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. You’re not going anywhere. But if we are going to move forward together, I have to understand you. I want to help you.”
“I don’t need help.”
“The fuck you don’t. We all do. Do you have any clue how you’ve begun to heal me?” he asked.
No.
“Haven’t I shown you?” he questioned before slapping his hands on his chest. “All of this.” He pointed to it. “Every single one tells a story. These are the path to my soul, and I let you view it. So, tell me how you can say I didn’t need help, too? Tell me how all the things I held inside began to mend after I knew I loved you.”
No.
Please no.
All the things but love.
“Don’t say that,” I said. “Just don’t, Marshall.”
He pressed his lips together tightly before asking, “Why not? You don’t know that, either? Well, fuck. I should’ve verbalized it sooner, huh?”
He was pushing.
He was forgetting that I could push back harder.
“It is, it was, just sex. Don’t get it confused. That is something a girl does, but I can separate. Maybe you can’t.”
He laughed, a menacing, angry chuckle I’d never heard before. “That’s bullshit and you know it,” he said. “You and I both know it wasn’t just sex. You’re only trying to throw what you can at me to try and push me away, but it won’t work.”
Keep pushing, Alexis. You can break him like you have everyone else.
I shrugged. “I don’t know, Marshall. Maybe you were lying all those months ago when you said you didn’t want to go where your best friend had already been. Maybe you did want that. Maybe it was some sick fuck fantasy you had in your mind, and I came along for the ride.”
It appeared to be working…for a moment. He drew back, moving away from me with a couple stumbled steps before stopping. His eyes went wide before they lowered to the ground. I leaned my back against my car door, waiting for his next move.
His shoulders shook, but I was unsure if it was from laughter or tears. His head snapped up…and laughter. “Oh, Al,” he said, shaking his head. “That one stung for a minute, but I know the truth. You won’t stop until you get what you want. I’d expect nothing less from you, but this is one fight I won’t let you win. So keep the punches coming. Keep hitting me with it because I can take it and I’ll still be standing. I’ll be standing right here in front of you.”
“What don’t you get?” I screamed. “It was me or them. I had to choose or I was going to end it all.”
“What do you mean end it all? Like…kill yourself? Al, you would never—”
“I almost did! I was so close, Marshall. But if I was going to save them, I was going to need to save myself first.”
“Save them from what?”
“Me!”
I was starting to detach.
To break.
The cracks deepened, and as everything turned gray, I knew I couldn’t hold out much longer if I didn’t get away.
I drew in a deep breath, gathering whatever resolve I had left. “I break everyone I love. I break them, and then they’re left in destruction,” I said. “I know that seems strange, or I don’t know…unbelievable, but it’s the truth. You wanted the truth, and I’m giving it to you.”
“That’s ridiculous. You don’t break anything. You’re giving me love and everything to me now.”
I shook my head. “No. I’m not. And if you think I am, you’ll be my next casualty.”
I could see the wheels turning, but he was utterly confused. The questions would continue if I didn’t end it now.
“And I care too much about you to do that,” I said. “I ruin people. I would’ve ruined Aaron and Delilah, so I left. And now I’m leaving you.”
“The fuck you are. You still aren’t saying anything. You’re speaking all in code and some shit.”
“That wi
ll have to be good enough,” I said before I tried to turn around to get in my car.
“What is it?” he shouted, taking hold of my arm and spinning me around. “Fucking find the words. You ran away from Aaron, but I’m not going to let you run away from me.”
I yanked my arm away from him, mustering as much strength as I had in my body and heart. “I’m not running away! I’m saving you.”
“From what? You?”
“Yes! I’m broken. And I’m not even sad to say that anymore because it’s just who I am. I’m broken, and I break everything around me. Anyone who gets close, anyone who loves me, ends up hurt. With Aaron, I thought I could save him, but then Delilah happened and I knew I couldn’t save them both. That beautiful piece of my soul, Delilah.”
Her name left my lips, and my insides caved. It never, ever didn’t hurt. It never would. My last thoughts as I neared the end of my life would be of the beautiful baby girl and how I did what was best for her. I didn’t know whether that would deliver me to heaven or hell, because who leaves their child?
“Al?” Marshall said in a calming tone. “What?”
Waves of anguish that I’d been able to withstand for decades crashed into me and I had to sit down. Marshall’s arms reached out to catch me as I slid down the side of my car to the pavement. I knew if I closed my eyes I could see it, but I didn’t want to see it. Every detail of the day that ruined so many lives was burned into my brain and heart. I was branded and the scars that were left were too ugly for anyone to see.
I didn’t want him to see any of it, but the words began to spill out like blood, like I was sliced down the middle and torn in two. My eyes went to a small stream of water running from the gutter. It pooled at the end.
Just like the blood.
My eyes stayed there.
Not on him. I couldn’t.
Eyes to the destruction.
“She loved the swings at the park so much. I’d promised her after I was done talking on the phone with my boyfriend, we’d walk across the street. If she was extra quiet while I was on the phone, maybe I’d even buy her a sno-cone. Cherry for her and lemon for me. Just like always.”
So Wicked Page 18
