by S. A. Wolfe
“One more round,” he says, holding my waist and leaving a trail of wet kisses down my neck.
“No, get dressed, please.” I don’t have to beg long before we hear the front doorknocker banging.
“Jesus, that thing is loud,” Carson says. “Are you expecting someone?”
“Yes, the gallery is sending someone over to pick up the rest of my paintings.”
We hear Lauren answer the door and her high-pitched voice carries upstairs as Carson gets dressed.
He follows me downstairs and, when I see Griffin, I feel Carson fill in every breathable space behind me like an ominous presence. I sense his growing heat like he’s protecting his turf.
Griffin is a twenty-three-year-old graduate student who interns for Tom and is one of the few people that likes talking to me about my science background. Griffin dotes on me and happens to be very cute in an academic way with his wire-rimmed glasses and khaki pants. He’s getting his Ph.D. in art history and is wiry and slender. He also doesn’t emit any dangerous pheromones like sexy, hunky Carson. Yet our recent sexcapade is still fresh in Carson’s mind, his head is running low on blood and he can be a big, dumb male. I suppose it’s fitting since I’ve proven that I can be a stupid female on occasion. Carson does the territorial dance as if Griffin is a threat, so he immediately walks in front of me and circles Griffin like he’s Carson’s next meal.
“Carson, this is Griffin,” I introduce, trying to diffuse Carson’s detonation trigger.
“Hello,” Griffin says to a towering Carson and sticks his scrawny hand out. Carson captures his hand with a little too much pressure.
I give Carson my best stare down. “Griffin, the portfolios are over here.” I point to the living room and Griffin follows with Carson inches behind him.
I have ten portfolios stacked on the table with all my recent paintings. Earlier in the week I photographed them and emailed them to Tom so he would know what to expect. He and Griffin have been very supportive of my grunge style paintings with their whimsical and chaotic compositions, so I am immensely grateful that I have this opportunity. I offer to help Griffin carry the cases to the SUV he parked outside, but Carson interjects and insists on helping Griffin. When they return to the house, Griffin is carrying a large tote bag and Carson is carrying a large, flat cardboard box.
“I brought you something. It’s a gift from Tom and me. This has brushes, watercolors, ink; all your favorite brands.” Griffin says hands the bag to me with a big smile. “And that’s more paper. Arches and Fabiano. The one hundred forty pound weight ones are in there, too,” he says, pointing to the cumbersome cardboard Carson is setting against the wall.
“Griffin, that is so nice of you. I’ve been meaning to make a trip in to visit Lee’s and New York Art. You saved me a drive.” I give him a kiss on the cheek. Carson watches me without blinking.
Lauren is about to invite Griffin for dinner, however, I intercept and tell him to be careful on his drive back to the city. Griffin looks a little disappointed to be rushed out of the house, but his smile returns when I tell him I owe him a dinner in the city sometime.
“Well, that was very rude,” Lauren says when we see Griffin get in his SUV. “Why didn’t you invite him in for dinner?”
“Because The Hulk over there looked like he was going to have Griffin for dinner.” I wave my hand in Carson’s direction.
“I didn’t do anything.” Carson scowls.
“You didn’t have to. You were practically breathing fire down the guy’s neck, hovering over him.”
Lauren starts laughing.
“The guy is totally into you. He’s bringing gifts and he drove out here at night so he could get invited in for a drink. That was at least three hundred dollars’ worth of supplies he gave you.” Carson stops and tries to think of more ways to inflame the situation.
“Carson, he’s doing his job. There’s nothing more to it,” I say in a huff.
“Did you see his face when you said you owed him dinner? He’s one of those guys who hear, ‘I owe you a blow job.’” Carson mimics and crosses his arms.
Lauren can’t contain her laughter. “Dinner is ready,” she says and heads back to the kitchen.
“He did not think that, Carson. You’re being ridiculous and jealous.”
“Sound familiar? I’m only jealous because every guy thinks you’re available. If you were with me, I wouldn’t worry about other men because I’d know that you’re mine.”
That shuts me up. I stand back and think for a moment. There’s nothing I can say that hasn’t been repeated to Carson too many times already. I don’t want to drive him away, but I’m not ready to give him the three words he wants. I feel powerful and cruel at the same time.
“I don’t want to argue,” he says, noticing my discomfort. “Let’s go eat Imogene’s dinner and try not to say our trigger words.”
“I agree, but every word seems to be a trigger word for us.”
“I’m going to go eat,” he mutters, raising his arms above his head in defeat, “before I consider doing something else with you.”
“No, wait. You don’t get to have the last word and walk away. I have thought about this a lot and I have something to say.”
“I’m not going to like this, am I?” Carson’s hands clench and open at his sides as he watches me.
“I believe in you, Carson. I do. I screwed up. Anyone in town will tell you that. I shouldn’t have been with Dylan, but I’m not entirely to blame. I do think you’re Mr. Romance. I also think you’re Mr. Take Care of Everyone. But you screwed up big time, too. You like ‘should haves’. Well, you should have been strong enough to stop Dylan and me from going out in the first place.”
“Here we go again,” Carson mutters.
“It’s true!”
“I know,” he growls. “You don’t think I play that over and over and regret not doing something then. I was afraid of hurting my brother. Seeing you two together made me sick. Sick! But I failed to act on it immediately from day one.”
“Why?”
“Because for a long time I thought Dylan was my weakness. I couldn’t be happy because I worried about Dylan. I couldn’t go to college because I had to take care of Dylan. I couldn’t have more in my life, other than work, because Dylan consumed all of my energy. I allowed myself to believe that I was doing the right thing by letting Dylan be with you even though it felt so wrong.”
“So you’re not made of steel. You do have weaknesses?” I give a small smile to restore the peace.
“I do. But I can’t blame Dylan. He’s not really my weakness. I actually think he makes me stronger. I have to be… for him… for me… because failure isn’t an option.”
“Geez. Now we’re back to Mr. Perfect again.”
“I’m not perfect at all. As you know, I can be too uptight, too controlling, too opinionated and too stupid when it comes to you. You’re my weakness.”
“Really?” The thought that I can bring this impressive man to his knees inflates my ego with a jolt.
“You’re a weakness in a good way. When I’m with you, I let part of my tough exterior down and you bring out a side of me that I like. Do I make any sense to you?”
“You make perfect sense to me.”
Forty-One
I put on the final touches of black ink, splattered in some places. The photo of Carson hugging Dylan at the party is captured in my own style. I blew the photo up and hung it on my wall so I could paint my own rendition of it. The goal is to capture their love for each other and their stand-out charisma in a sea of bodies. I am pleased with the finished product and it gives me pause to memorize Carson’s loving gaze on his younger brother. It makes me miss Carson more and it’s the reason I could never really leave Hera to move back to New York. Knowing he’s a short distance up the road from me is a geographical significance that I don’t want to lose.
I pull off my smock and take a quick shower to scrub the paint from my nails and arms. The house has a distin
ct, ever present chill, like any old Victorian home, so I put on a black tunic sweater with a mock turtleneck and my black leggings, topped off with my chunky glasses to remind me of my afternoon with Carson in the library. I put Carson’s key necklace on over the sweater. I wear the necklace every day and flip it between my fingers when I think of Carson.
I try out the new flat iron I bought online. Imogene showed me how to create a new look. It makes me look a little more sophisticated, I think, when I straighten my hair out to its full length, letting it drape in thick, silky strands.
The third floor is the warmest part of the house, so I stay in my bedroom and work on the bed with my laptop on a lap desk. It’s these times of day when the girls are working at the diner that I daydream too much, thinking about Carson.
Sometimes I get funny texts from Dylan, sent to a wide circle of his friends; photos of a sandwich he’s eating, or his feet propped on a table. His messages are optimistic and are meant to reassure us, especially Carson. However, when my phone pings, I am always hoping it’s Carson. He will no longer initiate anything between us. Lauren called it; he’s waiting for me.
I run some tests on a program and take a few work phone calls while Bert snuggles on the bed at my feet. I like to run my toe over his jowls and under his chin. He flips over on his back with his legs in the air, hoping I’ll rub his belly. “You males are all the same,” I say to Bert.
“What about us males?” Carson fills the doorway, his hands raised above his head, gripping the doorframe, and one bare foot bent slightly forward in a casual stance.
“I didn’t hear you come in. What are you doing here?” I try to fight back a smile so I don’t look too eager.
He shrugs. “I still have a key. I decided that I need to show you what you’re missing.”
“You mean sex?”
“Nope. By the way, your hair looks great like that.”
“Are you trying to get in my pants?”
“Nope. There will be none of that.”
“Did you bring your handy dandy tool belt to hammer something senseless? Something to drive me insane?”
“Nope. I’m making dinner. I’ll let you know when it’s ready.”
“But you can’t cook.”
“Imogene gave me some tips. It won’t be as good as Dylan’s cooking, but I’ve got some moves.” He is serious and it occurs to me that he is intentionally staying outside of my bedroom.
“Dylan used to cook for me. Is that what this is? I thought you weren’t jealous of Dylan and our short affair.” I had to put that out there since it seems to be one of the main reasons why I can’t give myself completely to Carson.
“I’ve never been jealous of Dylan. I know how much he has struggled. I would never want to live with the demons that battle in his brain.” He’s about to say more and then clears his throat to end our conversation. “Be downstairs in an hour or I will come and carry you down. Don’t cross me on this one.” His lovely mouth curves and I am tempted to ask him for a kiss, but I will follow his rules.
An hour later, when I walk downstairs, I smell tomato sauce and burnt garlic and enter the kitchen to a scene of Carson flinging spaghetti noodles against my new refrigerator. There’s a pile of cooked noodles on the floor and a trail of them sticking to the fridge.
“What are you doing to my new appliances?”
“Imogene told me how to test the pasta to make sure it’s al dente. I think I got it.” He picks up potholders and takes the boiling water off the stove and dumps the noodles in a strainer in the sink. He moves fast, sliding on his bare feet, tossing olive oil in the pot and then tossing the drained pasta back into it. He adds more olive oil and a touch of marinara sauce from another pan. I see empty jars of Rao’s Marinara Sauce on the counter.
“You got me Rao’s?” I am excited.
Carson smiles. “Sit down. Imogene told me it’s your favorite and you miss it. I bought two cases for you when I was on the Upper Westside yesterday.” He nods to the boxes on the floor.
I put my hands together gleefully as if he just unveiled a pony to a five-year-old. He dresses our pasta bowls with more sauce and freshly grated Parmesan cheese. “So what’s the nasty smell?”
“I annihilated the garlic bread. Apparently the two-step directions were too complicated for me.”
I laugh, seeing the charred bread log on the counter. “It’s the stove. It’s made for a professional chef and it’s easy to ruin your food if you don’t know what you’re doing.”
“Now you know why Talia is the only one who uses my range.” His remark is meant to be funny, but I feel a pang of envy that Talia spends several days a week cooking for Carson and handling his laundry, folding his boxer briefs!
He fills two glasses of wine. “Eat,” he commands.
I dig in and eat with a craving for my favorite starchy carbs, twirling mounds of spaghetti on my fork against the pasta spoon before shoving it in my mouth. “Forgive me, but no one looks attractive eating spaghetti and I’m really hungry.”
“Go ahead. Slurp all you want.” He is pleased with himself. “Oh, and I fucked up the salad, too. It was supposed to be arugula with shaved fennel. I accidentally pulverized the fennel in the food processor, so the salad is arugula with a side of arugula. But this is very good wine and there’s ice cream for dessert.”
I bark a laugh. “I thought you would offer yourself up as dessert. Isn’t that a guy move?”
“Nope. No sex, babe. And if that’s what your previous boyfriends offered, I don’t want to hear about it. Got it?”
“Sure.” I twirl a smaller amount on my fork and try to look a bit more elegant, if that’s possible with spaghetti. I like that he calls me babe, a new endearment. “There weren’t any other boyfriends, Carson. And Dylan was… you know, a moment in time.”
He nods and keeps eating and re-filling my wine glass.
When I work on my dish of caramel ice cream, he gets up to do the dishes. With his back to me at the sink, I watch his butt like it’s the swim relay at the Olympics when the hunky anchor is coming down the lane for the photo finish. My eyes never leave Carson’s ass.
“Getting enough there?” he asks without turning around.
“I have plenty of ice cream, thanks.”
“No, I meant the view.” He turns around and points to the window over the sink where my reflection looks back at me.
“Oh. Yeah, it’s a nice view.” Caught red-handed. I smirk and lick my spoon.
“Don’t do that.” Carson is looking at my tongue. “That new hair, with those glasses? It’s like having a horny, sexy librarian staring at my ass.”
“How do you know I’m horny?”
“Because I’m horny,” he growls. He takes my bowl, finishes loading the dishwasher and washing the pots by hand.
“Thanks for dinner and doing the dishes. It was a very nice surprise.”
Carson turns around and leans against the sink. “It doesn’t have to be a surprise. I’m happy to do this anytime. I’m happy to do a lot of things for you that have nothing to do with sex. Believe me, when I get horny, I don’t cook for any old girl.”
Our conversation is interrupted by Imogene and Lauren making a commotion as they come in the front door. “Who made dinner?” Imogene yells as she comes down the hall.
“Ah! Mr. Blackard, did you follow my instructions?” Imogene smiles to me, sniffing, looking for some sign of how the dinner went.
“I got about fifty percent of it right. There are leftovers in the fridge for you and Lauren.”
Lauren pops into the kitchen with snow still in her hair. She stands next to Carson at the sink and looks at me, waiting for the game replay.
“Lauren, your eyes are about to pop out of your head,” I say, getting up to put my wine glass on the counter.
“Babe, don’t forget I’m coming tomorrow to fix the downstairs toilet that keeps running and I’m going to measure the windows. I’m not going to replace them when it’s this cold, but I can order
them.” Carson kisses me on top of the head and starts for the front door. I am a little tipsy and giddy that he called me babe again, another obvious move on his part.
“Babe?” Lauren whispers.
I ignore her and head to the door as Carson puts his boots and coat on.
“Is this your new strategy? Show up and fix things, cook for me, call me babe?”
“Yep,” he says and looks past me to see if the girls are listening. We both know they are staying perfectly quiet in the kitchen so they can hear us. “You told me you didn’t want me barging in anymore, but I’m thinking fuck that. I’m going to be around and you’re going to know it.”
“To what end? Why?”
“So you’ll know how good it feels to be wanted and needed; to know that it’s what you really want.”
“You think so?” I linger, hanging back at the far end of the front hall.
“Yeah, I do.”
He strides toward me and covers my mouth with his lips that taste like marinara sauce and wine. I let a small moan escape and he probes further, running his tongue inside every part of my mouth before tugging on my bottom lip with his teeth. We slowly pull apart, not wanting the kiss to end.
“I’m going to get in my truck and think about you on the drive home. Then I’m going to go to bed and think about you until I fall asleep. When I wake up, I’ll think about you again and then I’ll have to take a cold shower. I’m going to pick up lunch because I know you like when Sushi Dan is town. So I’m going to bring you lunch. I’m going to work in your house the rest of the afternoon, not because I want to fuck you, but because your house needs work. I wouldn’t mind if you think about me, too. Even if it’s my ass that turns you on.”
I am touched by his thoughtful assertiveness and insistence and he’s so goddamn sexy. “I love Sushi Dan.”
His mouth does that slight curve again. “I have to leave before I kiss you again.”
