Her head smacked tile.
“Josh!”
Over and over again, his name echoed on her tongue and off the walls, melting into the water and his touch as her whole body shivered and exploded from the center out. From the hot, ripe apex of her pleasure and his kiss.
Had she ever come this hard? Felt this much?
“God, Josh.”
The fog slowly faded, and she opened her eyes to look down at him, still on his knees, hair slicked back from his face with water, lips shining. With a low, wet sound she could hear even over the shower, he pulled his hand from her and sucked his fingers into his mouth.
And it was then. Right then and there, naked and shaking, with the water pouring down over them, that Ellen knew.
A week and a day would never be enough.
Chapter Six
Thursday
The second the front door closed, Josh was there.
“Hey, Dad.”
His father looked up, suspicion already clear in his expression. “Hi.”
“I need to talk to you and Mom. Now.”
With a withering sigh, his father took his coat off and hung it up. “Will I need bail money?”
“No.” Josh wrung his hands. “No, nothing like that.”
“A shotgun?”
“Don’t think so.”
“Huh.”
After no small amount of corralling and cajoling, Josh managed to get him into the living room and seated. With a raised eyebrow, his father looked at his mother. “Apparently our son needs to talk to us.”
Josh’s mother hummed, and Josh took in a deep breath, pacing a few steps one way and then a half dozen in the other. He’d already told his mom that they’d be having company for dinner, but the real bombshell he’d waited to drop until now. He balled his hands into fists and straightened his arms at his sides, then pivoted to face them.
“I invited a girl over for dinner.”
His mom’s face twisted into a knowing smile. “I knew it.”
“Right, right. So, her name is Ellen, and she’s really great.”
His father was less enthused. “You’ve been seeing this girl?”
“Yes.” Josh swallowed around the lump in his throat. “Not for long and it isn’t serious, yet.”
“Does she realize you’re going to med school in the fall?”
“Dad. Cart.” He gestured at a spot in the air with one hand, then at another spot a foot ahead of it in space with his other. “Horse.”
“This isn’t the time to be getting distracted with—”
“Dad.”
His father glowered but raised his hands in submission. “Continue.”
“Anyway, she’s…special. And she wanted to meet you guys. But it’s complicated.”
His father sat up straighter. “She’s not pregnant, is she?”
“God, no.” Josh shook his head. “Nothing like that. Just… Look.” He forced a long inhale and an exhale. “Here’s the thing. I need a favor.”
“Here we go…”
“I don’t have time to explain. She knows I’m in school, but she…” Josh winced and just dove right into it. “She doesn’t know I go to school here. When we met, she assumed I was just home for spring break, and I didn’t correct her, and now…”
His mother arched her eyebrow. “Seriously?”
“Seriously. I know it’s stupid, and it’s ridiculous, and I have to set everything to rights soon, but things are going really well, and just for tonight, can you please, just…” He glanced from the clock to the door and then back to his parents. “Can you play along?”
They were both looking at him like he was an idiot. Probably because he was.
“Play along?” his dad asked.
“Yeah, just…like, you don’t have to lie. I haven’t lied to her. Just don’t, you know…tell the truth.” He shot them a grimacing smile. “Please?”
Before they could answer, the doorbell rang, and a cold sweat broke out on the back of his neck.
Why the hell had he ever agreed to this?
Edging toward the door, he pled with them again. “Please? For me?”
His father and mother exchanged exhausted looks, doing that weird silent-communication thing that always freaked Josh out, especially when he was pretty sure he was in trouble—basically in moments like this. His mother shrugged and his father rubbed his temple with one hand and waved Josh off with the other.
“We’ll behave. For now. Go let her in.”
“Thank you. I will make this up to you, I promise.”
“Sure, sure.”
Josh was barely out of the room before he heard them laughing behind his back. As if he hadn’t been nervous enough.
Pushing their reaction out of his mind, he wiped his palms on his jeans and crossed the entryway to the door. For a second, he paused there with his palm on the knob, forcing himself to return to his role. When he felt like he had himself more or less under control, he flipped the lock and pulled the door open.
On some level, every time he’d seen Ellen since that first night in the bar, he’d braced himself, just waiting to find out which version of herself she would choose to reveal. The person standing on his doorstep was one he felt pretty sure he’d never met before, and yet he knew her better than any of the Ellens he’d met so far. Halfway between the shy girl he’d watched and the brash woman he’d taken to bed, she stood before him in a modest skirt and heels and a top that showed just enough but not too much. Her stance and smile were confident, but there was something uncertain in her eyes.
As he took her in, her gaze darted from his face to the space behind him and back, her head tilting. “Am I early?”
“Nope.” He coughed to clear the gruffness from his throat. “Right on time.”
“Okay.” Her eyes shifted around again and her chin jutted out. With a nervous laugh, she asked, “Can I come in?”
Right. Idiot.
He stepped aside and held the door open for her. She angled her face up, her eyes moving around the space as she entered. He closed the door behind her, then offered, “Can I take your coat?”
“Oh. Sure.”
Standing behind her, he slipped his fingers under the collar of her jacket, brushing his knuckles over the bare skin of her neck and soaking in her shiver. She shifted something from one hand to the other as she shrugged her arms free from the sleeves of the coat. As he hung the garment up, she turned to him, a foil-wrapped bundle held in front of her. “I brought some rolls. They’re just from the diner, but…”
“That’s great. Thanks.”
Finally, he closed the space between them and brushed his lips over the smooth, sweet-smelling skin of her cheek. “You look beautiful.”
“Thank you.”
He wanted to do more. To take her mouth and taste her tongue or push her up against the wall and trail his fingertips up her thigh. Instead, he pulled away and put his hand at the small of her back. “Come on. My parents can’t wait to meet you.” And to humiliate me.
“No pressure.”
He chuckled and put his lips near her ear as he walked them forward. “Remember: you asked.”
“Don’t remind me.”
His folks were still sitting together on the couch as they turned the corner, but they stood when he cleared his throat. “Mom, Dad, this is Ellen. Ellen, these are my parents, Dr. and Mrs. Markley.”
His dad stepped forward first, hand outstretched. “Please. Tom and Nancy.”
“It’s nice to meet you,” Ellen said.
His mom took Ellen’s hand in both of hers. “We’re so pleased to finally meet the girl Josh has been spending so much time with this week.”
It was exactly the kind of innocently barbed comment his mom excelled at. Ellen smiled tightly and shot a look at Josh, echoing her comment from the day before about what his parents must think about his being gone so much.
The awkward silence only lasted for a few seconds before his mother let go of Ellen’s hand and ges
tured at the two wing-backed chairs opposite the couch. “Please. Make yourselves comfortable.” As the rest of them sat down, she motioned toward the wrapped plate Ellen was still holding. “Is that…”
“Just some rolls. I thought…”
“How nice of you. I’ll just pop them in the oven.” After asking Ellen if she wanted anything to drink, his mom disappeared into the other room, leaving Josh and Ellen to wither under his dad’s gaze alone.
God. What had he been thinking?
Ellen wasn’t the first girl he’d brought home to meet his folks, but it had been a long, long time. He’d certainly never brought someone over after such a short time, and definitely never anyone he’d been straddling such a fine line of a lie with. One offhanded comment from his dad and—
“So,” his dad said, shifting back on the couch. “Nice weather we’ve been having.”
“Very,” Ellen agreed.
“I hear it’s supposed to be nice tomorrow, too.” Josh wanted to beat his head against something as he scrambled for anything to talk about besides the weather. Or the truth. “Nice enough to take the bike out.”
Both Ellen and his dad perked up at that.
“You’ve ridden it a couple times this year already, haven’t you?” his dad asked.
“Yeah.” He shot a glance at Ellen. The guilty expression on her face said she was thinking the same thing he was, remembering how it had felt to ride with her on the back of it, her arms and legs tight around him.
His dad turned to her, too. “Do you ride?”
“No.” She caught her mistake immediately and bit down on her lip, darting her gaze to Josh and away again as her hands clenched into fists. “Um, er… I have. But not much. Recently.”
“Terribly dangerous. We keep trying to talk this one into selling his, but no dice.”
“As if I would ever,” he scoffed. His parents had never approved, but considering the way he’d worked on it and put it together himself, they’d never officially put their foot down. “I actually took Ellen out on it a couple days ago. She loved it, right?”
She relaxed her posture and looked at him with a relieved expression. “Absolutely.”
Just then, his mom appeared at the doorway, looking like a merciful angel. “Dinner’s almost ready.”
“Great.” Josh rubbed his hands together as he stood up, moving entirely too quickly in his rush to end one awkward conversation and move on to the next. He waited for Ellen, threaded their fingers together and clasped her palm tight before heading to the dining room.
At that big table, they sat across from each other, with his parents at the head and foot. They served up and passed plates with the absolute minimum of conversation, the silence broken only by the sound of metal on china and the occasional murmur of someone’s name to get their attention. When his father finally nodded with the go-ahead to dig in, Josh did so with gusto, just glad to have something to focus on. Plus, the faster they ate, the sooner he and Ellen could escape.
It still wasn’t soon enough.
“So,” his mother said. “Josh has told us so little about you, Ellen.” She gave him a pointed glare.
Ellen looked like she wanted to hide under the table, but she kept her brave face on. “Oh, well…”
“Yes,” his father interrupted. “Tell us all about yourself.”
With all eyes in the room on her, Ellen dabbed at her mouth with her napkin before resettling it in her lap. She met Josh’s gaze for a second, and he gave her a sympathetic look. She smiled and glanced between his parents again.
He didn’t mean to, but Josh found himself holding his breath anyway as he waited to hear what she was going to say.
His heart swelled with pride as she sat up straighter and kept her chin high. God, how had she hidden in the back of that classroom for so long? When she got up her nerve, she was magnificent. Confident and sexy and amazing.
“Well, I’m kind of between things right now. I waitress at the Park Diner, but I’m looking to go to school. To study medicine.” She gave the same basic details she’d given Josh, but he listened more closely this time, heard the way she parsed her words.
It struck him all of a sudden that she was between things. She was a senior like him. She probably had her own little pile of acceptance and rejection letters somewhere in her apartment. He swallowed hard. Even if they did get past their current miscommunication and he got everything he wanted, she could be planning on moving halfway across the country come fall.
He needed to know.
He heard his own voice before he’d fully decided to speak. “Ellen told me she was thinking about going to school here.” He turned to her. “But did you have any other schools in mind?”
Just like him, she hadn’t flat-out lied yet. She’d danced all around the truth, but she hadn’t lied.
He begged her with his eyes. Tell me.
“I have a few on my list,” she answered slowly, and he could practically see the gears turning in her head.
“Such as?”
“Just some schools on the coast.”
He wanted to groan with frustration. He needed specifics.
Of course, at just that moment, his dad broke in. “Josh has been applying to medical school. We’re just waiting to hear.”
Her eyes flashed to his for just an instant before she addressed his dad. “Well, I’m sure he’ll end up someplace that’s right for him.”
“I have no doubt.” He chuckled. “Though I’m still holding out for Harvard.”
“Dad…”
“Hush, hush. Johns Hopkins will do just as well.”
Josh’s stomach fell. He wasn’t ready for this conversation. Didn’t know if he ever would be.
“And which would you prefer, Josh?” Ellen’s voice sounded innocent, but she knew exactly what she was doing.
He swallowed and forced a smile. “Guess we’ll just have to see.”
“Surely you must have a preference.”
She couldn’t just let it go.
He gazed at her across the table without speaking, and silence hung in the air for a moment before his father chuckled. “I’m pretty sure Josh is a Harvard man. Just like his old man.”
Josh looked down at his plate, catching the inside of his bottom lip between his teeth. He could feel Ellen’s gaze, probably his father’s, too. But he couldn’t meet either of their eyes. Hell, he didn’t think he could have even met his own.
After a long, tense minute, his mother coughed. “These are lovely rolls, Ellen.”
“Thanks. Actually, Josh, would you mind passing me one?”
His eyes darted to hers and then to the basket, and he lifted one eyebrow. She could reach them well enough herself. Still, he flipped the cloth covering them aside and pulled one out.
“No, not that one. The smaller one, next to it.”
His eyebrow lifted higher. Humoring her, he dropped the one he was holding onto his own plate and went for the one she’d requested. “This one?”
“Yes, thank you.”
“Picky, aren’t you?”
“What can I say?” She gazed at him levelly as he deposited it on her plate. “When I know what I want, I’m not afraid to go for it.”
What felt like hours later, Josh’s father finally pushed back from the table and dropped his napkin down next to his place setting. “Wonderful as always, Nancy.”
“Yes,” Ellen chimed in. “Everything was great.”
“I’m so glad you liked it.”
“If you’ll excuse me.” Josh’s father rose, nodded at each of them and then walked away.
That was their cue. Josh and his mom rose as one, followed immediately by Ellen. As he always did, Josh went to gather up his father’s plate and his own, but his mother waved him off. “I’ll take care of this tonight, hon. You two can run along.” She gestured toward the door. “I’m sure Ellen would like a tour?”
Josh smiled at her gratefully but didn’t move away from the table until she’d disappeared int
o the kitchen. He hadn’t quite managed to look Ellen in the eye since she’d hung him out to dry with her little metaphor about the rolls, and he wasn’t entirely sure what to do with her now. The silence between them felt hot and shameful, and that in and of itself had him clenching his jaw.
She was the one living a lie right now. And she had the audacity to try to call him out. She didn’t even know what she was talking about.
He heard his mother moving about in the kitchen, and he rapped his knuckles against the back of his chair, then walked around to the other side of the table to stand beside Ellen. As uncomfortable as things were, whatever conversation they were about to have, he wasn’t willing to have it in front of anyone else.
“Come on,” he said, still not quite looking at her, nodding his head toward the doorway. “I’ll show you my room.”
Any other time, it would have been suggestive, and on some level, it still was. Even as irritated and indignant as he was now, the air between them was charged. When he brushed his hand against hers, he still felt it all the way up his arm.
The second he had the door to his room closed behind them, he had her pushed up against it, his mouth on hers. It wasn’t a kiss full of the sweetness they’d shared up on the roof beneath the stars, nor of the raw heat from those first couple nights. It was frustration and bitten-back words—all the things he hadn’t said to her and to his parents. To himself.
If he didn’t kiss her, he was going to scream at her.
She pulled away, gasping for air, head thumping against the wood behind her, but her hands clutched at him. As if he was going anywhere. With an intensity he didn’t know what to do with, his whole chest a mess of emotion, turning and twisting, he nipped and sucked his way down her throat and slid his hands up the skin of her thighs. Lifted her up and pressed himself against her.
And all the words came spilling out.
“It’s not so easy,” he said, panting against her ear. “It’s not so easy for some of us to forget everything. Everyone’s expectations.”
“What—?”
He growled and bit the tendon in her neck, pulling a gasp out of her that sounded as full of dismay as it did arousal. Bracing himself, he pressed his face against her hair. “Not everyone can just decide to be a different person one day.”
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