(Those were song lyrics, by the way. You can look them up if you don’t believe me.)
And Celine Dion. Good God, Dutch went through this Celine Dion phase that seemed to last for fucking years.
And I hate to admit this, but there’s this part of me — this very small fucking part of me, mind you — that still kinda likes Celine Dion.
So when I walk back out of the bedroom where all the coats are and make my way to where Amy’s drinking in the corner, watching Mr. Sausage and leaning her back against the wall in measured, patient silence, I don’t even hear the bass-y electronic music or the squealing women. What I hear is
There were nights when the wind was so cold
That my body froze in bed if I just listened to it
Right outside the window
(Also fucking song lyrics.)
I reach an arm around Amy’s waist and accept the drink she hands me.
“Did you get lost in there?” she asks. “I thought I was going to have to send in a search party.”
I shake my head, hesitate, opt for honesty. “Jenny kinda cornered me,” I explain, glad that the volume of the dance music keeps my words just for Amy’s ears. I lean against the same wall she’s leaning on, slide down a little so that I don’t have to bend over to speak in her ear. “A little unexpected drama. But it’s fine.”
I finished crying in the instant that you left
Just then, Jenny walks out of the bedroom — she’d opted to go to the bathroom to clean her face up at the same time that I left to head back to Amy — and Amy spots her right away, leaving the same room I’d left only moments before, which makes me goddamned glad I decided to be honest about what had happened.
And I can’t remember where or when or how
“Anything I should know about?” Amy asks warily.
“No. Honestly, it’s fine. She just…”
And I banished every memory you and I had ever made
“… She’s had too much to drink, and she always gets weepy and nostalgic when she drinks. So she followed me in there, wanted to talk about our shitty past.”
Marty McFly appears on my other side, leans back against the same wall. “That’s not exactly what happened,” he says. “She also made a pass at you.”
But Amy nods like she’s satisfied by this, reaches a hand behind me and sticks it into the back pocket of my jeans. “Your jeans are still wet from the dock chair,” she comments.
I shrug. “They’re fine.”
“Did you bring another pair? We could get you out of these, put you into something dry.”
I raise my eyebrows. “Is it just me, or did you just suggest you want to take off my pants?”
She answers with a one-shouldered shrug. “Sounds like you’re choosing to interpret it that way.”
“You’re such a tease.”
She blushes, eyes falling away from mine. Hesitates a moment, and then says, “There’s another bedroom behind the kitchen. Technically a kids’ room, I guess. I’m sure we could get you out of your pants in there. Without anyone coming in.” She nods towards the knot of dancing women in front of them. “They’re all too busy and too drunk to notice if we disappear again for a while.”
I let the hand that’s on her waist drop a little lower, run it lightly over her round behind. “I think your pants might be a little wet, themselves.”
She grins. “I’m wet? That’s not from the dock.”
“See? Total tease.”
Amy pops an eyebrow up. “Really? I thought I was being pretty obvious that time.”
“Then maybe you’d better show me where that kids’ room is. Help me out of these wet, wet jeans.”
Her smile grows, and she takes me by the hand, leads me in the direction of the kitchen.
I must feel the eyes boring into my back, or else it’s some kind of psychic fucking twinge, leftover from the days when we completed each others’ sentences, because I look over my shoulder almost on instinct, and
But when you touch me like this
And you hold me like that
find Jenny watching us, brown eyes filled with sorrow and loss.
I just have to admit
That it’s all coming back to me
#
Amy doesn’t waste time. We aren’t even all the way inside the room when she practically fucking jumps me, fingers moving as fast as they can to undo the buttons of my shirt, pulling me down into a hungry kiss at the same time as her foot fumbles behind her, kicking distractedly at the door until it clicks shut.
She manages to get the final button undone, but instead of pulling the shirt off, she runs her hands up and down my bare skin, scratching at me lightly, stopping with both hands cupping my boobs.
“God,” she says. “I’ve wanted to rip your clothes off since the moment you touched me on that airplane.”
I try to remember touching her on the airplane and come up with the moment I chose comfort over politeness and gave her shoulder a reassuring pat.
Guess I didn’t know my own strength.
I answer with a kiss, pull back with a laugh when she bites my bottom lip a little too hard. “Tell me this isn’t a case of you just being some sort of weirdly obsessed basketball groupie.”
“I am a basketball groupie,” she says. “I’m not ashamed to admit it. I’ve been following you for years. But I didn’t get obsessed until you started telling me stories on that plane.”
“Seriously? Hearing about my parents’ getting together is what — ”
She pushes her fingers beneath the bottom seam of my sports bra. “Too much talking. Not enough ripping clothes off.”
I help her with my bra, then lift the fancy, cashmere sweater over her head. Under the sweater is only a black tank top, accentuating her curves. I go to take the tank off, too, but she grabs my hands, pulls them away.
“Not yet,” she breathes. “Please? I’m too self-conscious.”
I run my fingers under the bottom edge of the tank, but don’t try to take it off again. “I have a hard time imagining you being self-conscious about much of anything,” I say, but at the same time, my exploring fingertips hit something that feels like it might be scar tissue, and I wonder if I’ve found the source of Amy’s self-consciousness.
She grabs my wrists, pulls my hands to her backside, starts working at the button of my jeans while landing soft, open-mouthed kisses against my bare chest.
“I thought we said we needed to get you out of these jeans,” she says between kisses.
“Yeah, I think you might’ve mentioned — ” But I stop with a gasp when her hand slides into my underwear, squeezes, which of course sends all the blood in my body rushing out of my brain and into my nether regions, leaving me feeling lightheaded and weak-kneed.
Fingers tease through the wetness accumulating there, and Amy pushes me back until my legs hit the end of a bed. With her free hand, she shoves me lightly backward, and I oblige, lying back onto a Super Woman bedspread.
She climbs on top of me, straddles my stomach, gazes down at me for a moment before folding down onto my chest. She sucks on the same spot at the base of my throat where she already left a hickey. Her mouth moves up my neck, her slacks scratching my ribs as she wriggles up my long-ass body. She reaches the side of my face, takes an earlobe into her mouth for a long, agonizingly slow moment before breathing into my ear, “Tell me what you want.”
And because there’s still no blood in my brain, it takes a while to formulate coherent words.
“I think,” I start to say, but stop when lips curl around my earlobe again. I close my eyes. “I think you’re doing just fine without my help,” I manage at last, which is answered by a light rumble of laughter tickling my ear.
Her nails trail up my arms, down my sides.
“Is there anything I need to know about? You’d tell me if I was going to run the risk of catching anything from you, right? Because I’m about to mix a lot of bodily fluids together.”
I nod, and even
though it’s somewhat embarrassing to admit, I tell her the truth: “It’s been more than a year for me. The rumors about all the nookie professional athletes are supposed to get turned out to be completely false. At least in my case.”
Her mouth moves from my ear to my neck, my neck to my jawline, my jawline to my mouth. When her kiss finishes, she runs her tongue slowly across her upper lip. “Good. Then I can have you all to myself.”
“The last time was with one of my teammates in Switzerland,” I tell her. She leans down, takes a nipple into her mouth. Sucks. “Cici — Rademaker,” I manage to gasp out. “Did you ever see her play? We dated on and off for a couple of years, but when she got an offer in Australia — ”
Amy lifts her head. “Anika. Seriously. Please stop talking.”
And with that, she’s traveling down my body again, pausing long enough to tease each nipple between her teeth, then trailing little kisses down the plane of my stomach, using her hands to tug the jeans off my narrow hips, down across long thighs and calves, off two enormous feet.
I’m expecting her to take my underwear when she takes my jeans, since that’s all I’ve got left now, but she doesn’t. Instead, that tongue of hers draws a light line from my ankle to my knee, my knee up the inside of my thigh, and when she reaches my hot, damp fucking Hanes Her Way black bikini briefs, she drags her bottom lip up the crotch, starts kissing me right through the goddamned cotton, and I swear I almost lose it right fucking there.
“God fucking dammit, Amy.”
My hips squirm up all on their own, and I tilt my head back, gripping the Super Woman bed spread in both fists and biting the inside of my cheek to keep from screaming. Amy laughs against me, tonguing the cotton between us, and I manage to force a ragged breath into air-starved lungs.
Her face still between my legs, she hooks both index fingers around the top of my underwear and starts to pull. Her tongue’s on my bare clit a moment later.
There were moments of gold and there were flashes of light
There were things I’d never do again
But then they’d always seemed right
There were nights of endless pleasure
It was more than any laws allow
Baby, baby…
And for the first time in almost nine years, I surprise myself by being with someone and not thinking of Jenny even once.
Chapter 31: Departures and reunions.
Saturday morning
“I wish I could stay,” I say between two little kisses, car keys dangling from my fingers. “But with Mom and Dad both still out… I don’t want Gerry to have to be at the restaurant all day on his own.”
Amy wraps Tinkerbell-sized arms around my waist, pulls me close once more, lands another kiss on the underneath side of my jaw. Then she lets go. “Okay. You’re a better big sister than I’ve ever been.”
“I seriously doubt that.”
She closes my hand around the car keys. “Go. Before I change my mind and kidnap you, take you home to the B&B for the rest of the day.”
“You’re needed elsewhere anyway,” I remind her. “Isn’t the rehearsal and the dinner tonight?”
She rolls her eyes. “Yes. Unfortunately. Which — you’ll come with me to the wedding on Sunday, won’t you?”
I think for a second. We hadn’t discussed me coming to the wedding until now, but if I’m being honest, I have to admit that I want all the time I can get with her between now and her departure from Ohio on Wednesday morning.
“What time is the wedding, again?” I ask. “The after-church crowd gets busy, but we close early Sunday nights.”
“Six o’clock. At the Lutheran Church.”
“St. Peter’s? I know that one. How about I let you know tomorrow morning? PJ’s arriving home today, so if he can cover me…”
“Can I drop by the restaurant tonight?” she asks. “After the rehearsal dinner? I could help you guys close.”
“Don’t be silly, you don’t need to help us.”
“I know I don’t ‘need’ to, but it will give me an excuse to visit,” she says with a shrug.
I kiss the top of her head. “You never need an excuse. I’d love for you to visit.”
The smile she gives me in return is shy. She walks backward a few steps. “I’ll see you tonight, then.”
#
My phone buzzes before I make it even a mile from the lakeside cabin, a video chat request flashing at me from where the phone sits in its air vent holder. I know I should probably wait until I’m stationary and not try to video chat and drive at the same time, but when I see who’s calling, I can’t help myself. I accept the call with a grin.
“How’s Ohio?” the voice on the other end says.
I give the screen a quick glance, see that Alex is in her living room, probably sitting on the couch with her laptop on the coffee table. A head of messy blonde hair passes by in the background behind her.
“Shitty as ever,” I say cheerfully. “How’s the Deep South? Warming up yet?”
“Who are you talking to?” I hear Graham ask off-screen. The blonde hair reappears in the frame, and a face hovers over Alex’s shoulder. “Hey — Anika!” Then her brow crinkles and she says, “You shouldn’t be video chatting while driving, you know.”
“I know. But since we’re practically in the same time zone for now, I didn’t want to miss the chance.”
“Same time zone?” Graham asks, the crease in her brow deepening.
“Alex didn’t tell you? I’m in Ohio.”
Graham smacks Alex playfully on the back of the head. “Nooo. You know she never tells me anything.”
“Did she tell you my mom’s sick?”
Graham nods sympathetically. “Now that I did hear about. How’s your family?”
“Driving me fucking crazy. Gerry’s clean, though. And he seems to be doing really good.”
“How long are you going to be home for?” Alex asks.
I admit to her that I don’t really know, reminding her of how I broke my contract to be here and that my basketball career is most likely over. Graham meanders out of the frame when we start talking basketball, while Alex and I go over the highlights of the NCAA tournament season this year. Rosemont got knocked out early, during the Sweet Sixteen, a sensitive topic that Alex is still grouchy about. After basketball, the conversation roams to Danny and Aria, and how Aria’s walking now and talking up a storm, and Danny’s latest obsession is birdwatching.
“Birdwatching?” I ask, surprised.
“I think it has more to do with the binoculars than the birds,” Alex says. “Graham says he’ll either grow up to be a zoologist, a super spy, or a peeping tom.”
We share a laugh.
“Speaking of kids…” I trail off, clear my throat. “So, uh, Jenny came by the restaurant a couple times this week. She’s up to three kids now. I got to meet the two little ones.”
“Jenny?” Alex says, eyebrows dipping. “As in Pearson? I thought you weren’t talking to her?”
I shrug. “I wasn’t. But she wanted to… mend fences or some shit.”
“I think she wanted to mend a hell of a lot more than that,” says Marty McFly, who has appeared in the passenger’s seat next to me.
There’s a moment of silence. “And?” Alex says.
“And what?”
“And did you mend your fences?”
“Go on. Tell her,” McFly says.
“I don’t know. Maybe,” I say to Alex. “She said some shit last night… maybe it was just the alcohol speaking, but… She and Mason are splitting up, and then kind of implied that she wants us to try again.”
Alex studies me thoughtfully. “It’s a pretty bold move on her part, after everything you two have gone through. But — wait. You’re not actually considering that, right?”
I’m at a stop light, so I look down at the phone, meet Alex’s eyes for a second. “No,” I say firmly, then backpedal with, “I mean, I don’t think so. Maybe if things were different for me right n
ow… Or if…”
From the passenger’s seat, McFly hums a bar of Celine Dion. I shoot the evil-ass figment of my imagination a glare before turning back to Alex.
“What I’m trying to say is — I met someone recently. On the plane from Toronto to Cleveland. And… it’s too early to say anything for sure, but I really like her.”
I tell Alex a little about Amy, confess that we’ve been seeing a lot of each other lately, and then say that even though it’s only been a week, I think there might be something there. Something real. Something worth seeing through.
She chuckles when I finish. “You are so U-Hauling right now.”
“I am not!” I say. But my face burns.
“You so are.”
“Fuck you, Woods.”
Alex cocks her head to the side. “Does Amy know about Jenny?”
“Yeah. They met by accident at the restaurant. And I told Amy how long Jenny and I were together and everything. So that’s out in the open.”
“But did you tell her what Jenny said to you last night? About divorcing Mason and wanting another try with you?”
I shake my head. “Amy and I… spent the second half of our night a little too busy to talk.”
This earns a brief arched eyebrow from Alex. It’s a look so arrogantly fucking regal and knowing that I remember why we nicknamed her Commander.
“You slept with her already?” she says. “That’s fast. Even for you.”
I roll my eyes. “Fucking don’t even. Look who’s talking.”
Anika takes the long way home up soul mountain: A lesbian romance (Rosemont Duology Book 2) Page 19
