by Nana Malone
“Is it just going to be us tonight?” Marc asked Asa as he looked around the large table and then took the chair directly next to hers.
He moved his chair closer to her, his thigh now pressing against hers, causing her to jump at the contact. But she couldn’t move away. Asa was on the other side of her at the head of the table. There was no place else for her to go, and she didn’t want to lose her cool in front of him by calling out Marc. Asa hadn’t known about their secret relationship either, and she wanted to keep it that way.
“Carlos’s family should be here soon. I didn’t know what to think when my sister told me she was in love with a pro ball player, but he and his family are cool. And if he hurts her he knows I’m going to come after him with one of his baseball bats.”
“So protective.” Willa smiled at him, trying to ignore the heat that Marc’s leg had produced beside hers. “You’re not that same kid who used to put fake spiders in her food.”
He smiled fondly and shrugged. “I’ve never seen anybody so afraid of spiders. You could hear that girl scream all the way to Seaside. But I don’t bother her much anymore. I grew up.”
“Yeah,” Marcus said. “We’ve all grown up a lot since high school.” He placed his hand on her thigh, just above her knee, making it clear that his message was just for her. She tried to ignore his touch, pretend that she hadn’t noticed the heat, that slight jolt, that shot between her legs. But she couldn’t, and suddenly she wished that her long dress wasn’t there serving as a barrier. That his big warm hand was directly on her skin, that his fingers were creeping along the inside of thigh.
It was an insane thought, considering how much she wanted to be away from him. But he had always had that power over her. He always made her want to lose herself with him.
She wanted to think that he made her feel this way because she hadn’t had sex in so long. Her last relationship had ended almost two years ago, and any man could have had this effect on her. But handsome, charming Asa was sitting on the other side of her, and she felt nothing more than friendship for him.
“Are your parents here, Asa? I haven’t seen them yet,” she asked, trying to distract herself from the way Marc’s hand felt, still on her leg.
“They’ll be here in a few days. Virginia banned my mother from any part of the planning. My mother likes traditional. She wants to see Gin in a big white dress in our hometown church. This is definitely not what she pictured. I wish I could be there to see her face when they pull up to the resort. She’s going to have a heart attack.”
“I almost did,” she said, distracted. Marc’s hand was still on her leg; his thigh was still pressed against her. He gave her no space, his touch a constant reminder that they had unfinished business in his eyes. “How is your mother?” she turned to Marc, looking him directly in the eye as she pushed his hand off her leg. He caught her fingers, squeezing them softly as he looked back at her. His eyes were trying to send some unspoken message, but she wasn’t in the mood to receive it.
She shook his hand off.
“My mother is doing well. She’s still in South Carolina, but she’s just outside of Charleston now. She’s got a boyfriend. He’s a police officer. Nice guy. He treats her well. They were getting serious when I was down there for Thanksgiving. I think there might be another wedding in my future.”
“How do you feel about your mom getting married?” she asked, remembering the difficult relationship they had.
He looked at her for a long moment, as if he was carefully weighing his words. “She’s been through a lot. I want her to be happy.”
Willa believed that. Marc’s mother was fifteen when she had him and cast out by her very conservative family. She knew that his mother had been too poor, too young and too alone to give him the same stable upbringing the rest of the group had. He had bounced around a lot when he was younger. But all that changed when he was fourteen years old and his mother sent him to live with his aunt and uncle in Short Hills. She was twenty-nine at the time and decided it was time she better herself. She went on to finish high school and got her degree in accounting. But Marc felt abandoned, and when they had first met he was a very quiet, very angry boy.
She had felt sad for him, then. His mother was something they had talked about a lot. “Are you two closer now?”
He nodded. “It took some time. I knew she loved me. She just needed to grow up, and I had to realize that she did what she thought was best. There is no way I would have gone to Howard and gotten such a good job in DC if she hadn’t sent me to live with my uncle and aunt.”
“You went to Howard?” She shook her head in confusion. “I thought you were set on going to University of Pittsburgh to play football. They gave you a full ride.”
“He never even played ball in college. Our boy has gotten himself in the politics game instead,” Asa said. “I thought you knew that.”
“No.” She shook her head, but she couldn’t take her eyes off Marc, and for the first time he wouldn’t look her in the eye. Football had been so important to him. His teammates had been so important to him, and in the end he had chosen them over her. She had a hard time believing he never played after high school. “I didn’t know any of that.”
“Yeah,” Asa continued. “He’s the guy all the politicians go to when they get caught doing something they’re not supposed to be doing. The man could make a serial killer look like a saint. You guys didn’t keep in touch after high school at all?”
“Why would we?” She turned away from Marc to look at Asa. “He was your best friend, not mine.”
The jab didn’t go unnoticed by Asa, who looked from Marc to her in confusion. “You guys look like—like...” He trailed off as he studied each of them. He wasn’t stupid. He could see how close they were sitting. He had noticed the lingering kiss Marc had given her when he arrived. “You two look like you’re still close.”
“We were close,” Marc told him, shaking his head. “She’s mad at me.”
“Mad at you? Why?”
“I was a straight-up asshole to her when we were in high school.”
Willa turned around to look at Marc, surprised he admitted it aloud.
“What?” Asa frowned. “Why were you an asshole to Willa?”
But Marc never had the chance to answer because Carlos’s family arrived then.
* * *
Asa had his hands all over her.
That thought had kept playing on repeat in Marc’s head since he entered the dimly lit dining room that night. The air was slightly perfumed with flowers, and when he saw Willa in his best friend’s arms, embracing him like he was her lover instead of her friend, something that felt a little like jealousy crept up into his throat.
To Asa, Willa was fair game. Single, no attachments, successful and looking damn good in the dress she wore tonight. He had never known about their yearlong relationship, that she was his first, that she was the only one he had ever really been in love with. He couldn’t blame Asa for wanting her. And he sure as hell couldn’t blame himself for doing what he had to do to make sure Asa stayed away. Because in Marc’s mind, even though he knew it wasn’t true, he felt like Willa was still his girl.
Too bad she hated his guts.
Since Carlos’s family had arrived she hadn’t spoken to him unless she absolutely had to. Thinking that if she ignored him he would go away. But he wasn’t going anywhere. He was going to be in her face until they had it out about what had happened with them.
Her hand brushed his as she reached for her wineglass and she shot him a look full of heat. He knew he was in her space, knew he was too close. All evening she kept bumping into him, her shoulder, her arm, her leg, and it sent a little jolt through him each time.
That, coupled with the coral dress she wore tonight, made it hard for him to have any clear thoughts. All that bare silky skin of her arms
and shoulders. It was distracting. The dress was only held up by one little tie at the back of her neck. All he had to do was pull. One good tug and the dress would tumble down, and if didn’t, he would have no problem pulling the rest down and revealing that creamy distracting skin.
Willa’s laugh snapped him out those thoughts, but as he looked at her with her head thrown back and her throat exposed, new thoughts popped into his head. Thoughts of him running his lips down the seam her neck, thoughts of his body over her nude one, thoughts of her curls spread over his pillow and a look of pleasure on her face.
He had it bad.
Nobody affected him like this. No woman. Not even the one he had thought he was going to marry.
“You guys are crazy,” she said, still laughing. “This was fun, but you wore me out. I think I’m going to head back to my room and relax.”
“We’ll see you at breakfast tomorrow?” Julia, Carlos’s older sister, asked. “The lovebirds are going to take a break from planning to grace us with their presence tomorrow morning.”
“That sounds nice,” she said. “I’ll be there.”
“Meet us at the Cala Lagoon at nine. Rumor is that there’s going to be crepes.”
“You know I won’t miss crepes.” She stood up. “Good night. I’ll see you all in the morning.”
“I’ll walk you back.” Marc stood. He knew that this was the chance he needed to get her alone, to apologize. He knew the longer he waited, the harder it would be to get her off his mind. She had already spent too much time there as it was.
“You don’t have to.” Her smile dropped as she turned to look at him. “I’m a big girl. I think I can make it back just fine by myself.”
“I insist. It’s dark.”
“The resort is well lit.” Her eyes sparked. He saw resistance there and stubbornness and heat. He kind of liked it. “I appreciate your offer, but it’s not necessary.”
“It is necessary. I won’t be able to sleep tonight unless I know you’re safe in your room. Just let me be a gentleman and do this.”
“Gentleman? Ha! I think it’s going to take a little more than a walk back to my room for me to think of you as a gentleman.”
“I’m not doing this for you. I’m doing this for myself.” He wasn’t going to quit. Didn’t she know that? Willa had always been willful, but didn’t she understand it would be better for both of them if she just let him have his say?
“You don’t have to worry. I’ll text you when I get there.”
“But you don’t have my number.”
“Let’s keep it that way. See ya.”
“Well, damn,” they heard Asa say.
They both turned to look at him and noticed the table around them had gone silent. Every pair of eyes had turned to them, surely wondering what the hell was going on. Her smile reappeared, but her eyes didn’t lose that annoyed spark. “I’m kidding. Walk me back.”
She stepped away from the table, her body stiff, but her hips still swaying that seductive sway. “Stop staring at my ass,” she added when they were out of earshot.
“I can’t help it. It grew.”
Her head snapped around. She scowled at him, but he couldn’t help but grin at her.
“I like your big ass, Willa. I like it very much.”
Her eyes narrowed and her lips twisted, like she was trying to prevent a smile, but she failed and that lopsided grin of hers appeared. “Thank you. I’m quite proud of it,” she said, walking once again.
“You really do look good, Wil. I mean it. I can’t stop looking at you.”
“You’re surprised the ugly duckling turned into a pretty good-looking chick?”
“You’re not pretty good-looking, you’re beautiful.”
“I would say thank you, but I won’t. I’m not sure I can believe you, judging from our past and your present role of helping slimy politicians become more slimy.”
“You don’t have to believe me,” he said as they left the dining room completely and walked onto the candlelit path that led back to the villas. “I wouldn’t lie to you about that.” He shook his head. “You’re incredible.” He moved ahead so that he was beside her instead of behind her. He needed to see her face as they talked. Her words might be biting, but her face always gave everything away.
“I didn’t want to cause a scene before, but you really can stop following me back to my bungalow. I’ll be fine. It’s just beyond this bend.”
“You know I’m not here just because I want to see you back to your room. I want to talk to you.”
“I really don’t want to listen to you, but since you won’t leave, talk.”
“How could you think I would forget you? I spent every free moment with you. You were important to me.”
“Whatever, Marc. I’m over it. So what, you told your friends I was like your ‘practice dummy’ when they found us kissing? So what if you denied our yearlong relationship to your teammates? It doesn’t matter that you told them that you would never be with someone like me. I grew up. I grew a backbone. You actually did me a favor, because now I know I’ll never be with another guy who doesn’t think I’m worthy of him.”
“You’re right. You never should be with a guy like that, with an idiot like I was. But I think you got your revenge when you killed me off in your second novel. I thought the decapitation was a bit much, but it was so well done, even I have to admit I had it coming.”
“You knew that was you?” They came to the steps of her bungalow and she stopped. She couldn’t hide the surprise on her face.
“Former jock who humiliated his killer in high school? Who else could it have been? My only question is, do you kill off everybody that’s ever hurt you in your books, or am I the only one with that honor?”
“Just you.” She searched his face as if she were trying to see if he was telling the truth. “You read my book?”
“I read all four of your books. The last one was my favorite. I didn’t know you were so dark or so damn funny. One moment I’m so wrapped up in your words, racking my mind trying to figure out where you were going, the next minute I’m laughing so hard there are tears streaming down my face. I’m telling you the truth when I say you’re incredible. I am amazed by you.”
“Thank you,” she said softly as she walked up the steps to her door and he followed, not wanting to let her go just yet. “I appreciate that.”
“I’m sorry, you know. I’ll always be sorry for what I did to you. I hated myself for it. I hated myself because I did to you what I thought my mother did to me. I threw you away. I was a coward. I thought I needed those guys. I thought I needed their respect and acceptance to feel worthy, but I didn’t. I lost my best friend when I said those words that day, and you don’t know how sorry I am for it.”
Her eyes filled with tears. He hadn’t expected that. Her anger, yes. That he deserved in droves. But seeing that he had hurt her so much was painful. “You said you loved me. How could you have lied to me like that?”
He closed the distance between them and wrapped his arms around her, bringing her close enough that his lips touched her skin. She didn’t fight this time, just let him hold her. Let his lips graze her forehead.
“Damn it, Willa. I didn’t lie to you. I never lied to you. I loved you. I know I did wrong by denying us, but I loved you. I couldn’t have spent a year with you if I didn’t.”
“I believed what you said to your teammates that day. That you were only with me to practice your game. I used to wonder how we happened. You were the goddamn quarterback and I was the nerd. We couldn’t have been more clichéd if we tried.”
“I was a defensive end,” he corrected her as he dropped a soft kiss on her forehead. “I liked you because you made me laugh and I thought you were cute.” He kissed the bridge of her nose, causing her to shut her eyes. “I was with y
ou because I was amazed by how smart you were. You were almost too smart for me. I felt dumb around you sometimes. But I forgave you for it because you were a damn good kisser.”
She opened those big pretty eyes of hers and stared up at him, but instead of tears in her eyes he saw curiosity mixed with a little bit of hunger. Or maybe he was seeing his eyes mirrored in her own. She was fully pressed against him from her breasts to her toes. All of her softness, all of her warmth, was seeping into him. He felt kind of drunk, kind of heady, like a boy with his first love instead of a man who had had more than his fair share of women. But that’s what she did to him. She made him feel like no one else ever had, and now that he felt her against him again, he was sure that no other woman could ever make him feel this way.
“I was a good kisser?” she asked with a slight hitch in her breath. “I was a champ, wasn’t I?” She grinned at him and it hit him right in his chest. He had never seen a smile as sexy as hers. “Taught you everything you know, didn’t I?”
“You sure did.” He grinned back at her, glad to see her smiling at him.
“I didn’t know anything, Marc. Nothing. You were my first everything.”
Chapter 4
“You weren’t my first kiss,” he said to her as she watched his mouth grow closer to her once again. “But you were my first and greatest everything else.” His lips dropped to her neck, kissing her in that little curve that always felt so good to be kissed. Especially by him. His lips were full and warm, and the way they expertly trailed up her neck made her wish that it wasn’t just her neck that he was kissing.
Her eyes drifted shut as his hands slid over her hips on top of the soft material of her dress, which had suddenly become confining. She wanted to feel his skin against hers, his hard body on top of hers. She may have been his first, they both might have been young and inexperienced then, but he always took his time with her, went slow, made sure she was comfortable, made sure she always felt good in the end. She had thought sex would get better as she got older, but it hadn’t. She hadn’t wanted to admit it, but she had foolishly compared every other man she had been with to him.
