Her voice went terse and heated, and Joel could tell that he hit a nerve. Somewhere deep, Holly was angry and he wanted to stoke the fires of her fury. He was angry, too, but he couldn’t do anything about it. He wanted her to be heated and he wanted her to go after the school and after the police and make them do their jobs. He couldn’t. Joel needed to remain publically neutral. But Holly? She could unleash fury.
He wanted her to.
Someone, right then, had gotten away with murder.
“Laziness,” he mumbled.
“Unacceptable.”
“Your girls will help.”
“Sure,” Holly said, knowing who he meant. “But this isn’t their job and ultimately, at the end of the day, they need to survive, too. Work their actual jobs…not get caught snooping where they shouldn’t. There’s risks for these girls.”
“I understand,” Joel said. The risks he imagined were upset husbands and getting yelled at in parking lots.
He could tell by a small twinkle in her eye that she didn’t think he understood at all. Joel was used to being underestimated. He knew that the members of the Love is Murder Club looked up every last piece of information about him and he knew they’d come up empty. He was begrudgingly clean—no tickets, no referrals, not a bad review to be found—because of his job in public education. His licensure in the state precluded him from engaging in behavior that the women would’ve found as red flags. But that didn’t mean he was some saint. Already, he’d had a taste of the forbidden Holly and he wasn’t going to stop.
It took a lot of work to stay out of trouble on paper.
Holly was trouble. That much he understood.
“It’s not about understanding,” she said.
Joel felt like he had to fight for Holly. He stood up and reached out for her hand. She looked at it for a long second and then took it and wound her fingers between his.
“What’s it about then?” he asked.
“It’s about experiencing. Disengaging from everything except the case. That’s what they do and it’s amazing, but it’s not healthy. They give the case everything.”
“And they want to give your son everything they can give?”
“Of course,” she said. “That’s their singular goal.”
Joel thought of the girls he’d met: Maeve and Gloria and the other one, Kristy? And realized that everyone should have friends like them—eager to help a friend or relative, no questions, only love and support. Holly was lucky.
The opera swirled around them and Joel didn’t know what the Italian was saying, but it was familiar now. Not the words, but the music, the swell of the aria, the moment at hand. He’d expected a standard booty-call when she’d baited him with condoms and she didn’t even let him make it fully into the house before attacking him. But whatever he expected with Holly was wrong. Joel wanted to remember this glimmer of time, the sliver of the moment—when they were half-dressed, dirty dishes all around, barefoot and dancing, her head on his chest and his hands in her hair.
Not a care. Not a whisper of the world outside.
Chapter Eleven
He asked to see upstairs and Holly knew she was obligated to show him. She took his hand and led him up the spiral staircase to the main floor and her master bedroom. No one was home, so she left the door open and sat down on the bed, and he followed her down.
Her room was spotless.
Not an out of place shirt or blanket—she’d rotated her deep cleaning but managed to keep most things pristine with just the two of them at home. Her entire house looked like it had come from a design magazine.
They kissed.
Innocent kissing. One kiss and then another; hands in laps and then clasping on to each other’s waists and embracing; a hand on the face and one on her back, and when they leaned back…Holly looked at him.
“So, here we are,” she said, glowing, humming with energy.
He leaned over her and tucked hair behind her ear. “Here we are,” he said.
“I don’t know what I want,” she said. It was honest and it was true, but she knew it may not be what he wanted to hear.
“In life?” He sat on the bed and remained near her, but not grabbing toward her. She liked the way she could steer the moment; she could pull forward and he pulled forward, she slowed down and he did, too. They were an amoeba, learning each other. She liked it—this stage—the newness of everything washing over her.
“I’m scared of what’s happening with my son,” she confessed and she worried it might ruin the mood.
Joel didn’t seem to mind.
Downstairs, the opera still played. She’d spent all day pre-listening to albums to pick the perfect one. In the end, it was Madam Butterfly that touched her heart and made her wistful and full of longing. She thought, maybe, it was to keep the mood in-check, too. Although, she’d clearly failed at that.
“I’d be worried if you weren’t,” he replied.
“I’m a good mother, Joel,” she told him, but she knew that she was telling herself instead. She’d learned long ago that the things people told others were the things they wanted to believe in themselves—she was a good mother, she had this under control, Alex wasn’t a monster. She needed it to be true. But beyond that, more than that, she needed to believe she’d raised a good kid. She was proud of him and he was her light, her funny little altruist. If she’d lost Alex, she didn’t know if she knew anything anymore. “And he’s a good kid, Alex. He’s a great kid.”
“I know that,” he answered quickly, giving her all the assurance she needed.
“My husband wanted to kill me,” Holly then said. The Madam Butterfly soundtrack coming to an end—Butterfly’s lament for the life she had to abandon to give her child a good life flooded through her downstairs speakers. The sharp and dramatic cries of a mother saying goodbye. She nearly had to run downstairs and turn it off.
The blurted confession caused Joel to sit up a bit straighter and he stared at her, waiting for her to elaborate.
“He what?”
“He wasn’t used to people telling him things he didn’t like to hear.”
“And?”
“And he got a gun. Threatened me with it once. Just once.”
“Holy shit,” Joel said and he ran his hand through his hair. “That’s…”
“He showed our three-year-old kid,” Holly continued. She closed her eyes and could see the whole thing unfold like it was yesterday. She’d left her husband, but he was unrelenting and even though they didn’t have a pre-nup, he was gearing up to strip her of her custody, too. Until he bought the gun and showed it to their child. Alex, ever precocious and darling and optimistic, told his mom, who told the child protective services investigator, who allowed the child to describe where the gun was hidden. He knew. And that turned the custody arrangement around in a hurry.
He’d loved and hated her so much he wanted her life to end.
It wasn’t hard to make the leap, to wonder; had Alex been scarred by that? Was it in his genes?
“That’s messed up, Holly,” Joel said. “I can’t imagine.”
“Yeah,” she replied and she closed her eyes and shook her head a few times and willed it all away. It was a memory from a long time ago, something that didn’t feel real anymore or like it happened to someone else. “You know what though?” she continued, maybe letting the red wine get to her brain a bit, “None of that is my life anymore. It’s like high school life. It happened to me and someone else all at the same time.”
“I heard it described once like this,” Joel said as he massaged her shoulders a bit, working the tender tendons with slow circles with his thumbs. “We keep growing and aging and learning new things, but all of our memories are still us. So, we’re all things at once. Not a timeline, but a ball. You were who you are now at six and your six-year-old self is still part of you…no matter what happens. No matter how you change.”
“I like that,” Holly hummed, her eyes closed, enjoying the feeling of his hands on her body. “So, I�
��m me now and the girl who wanted to kiss you in high school. All at once.”
“All at once,” Joel repeated and he leaned in and kissed her forehead, sliding back and leaving her head against the mattress.
She flipped over and watched as he got up off the bed and stretched, his next actions uncertain.
“Hey,” she said before he had time to figure out he wanted to leave. “Follow me,” Holly said. She slid off her bed, half-undressed already, and tugged on Joel to follow. He followed her like a breathless puppy-dog, and she reveled in feeling wanted. And she wanted to thank Kristy for convincing her to go with the Portlandia wax and a spray tan, too. She wanted Joel to love her for every dimpled piece of white-ass Oregon flesh soon enough, but she couldn’t undo years of conditioning about her body in twenty-four hours, so she went with what made her feel sexy.
That, she told herself, wasn’t cheating. It wasn’t for him. It was so when she walked in front of him, her ass not shoved into mom jeans, she could walk with confidence. Confidence, she’d learned early on, was nearly the entire battle.
The pool was heated and the air was warm for fall and Holly went in first without any clothes on, dipping her toe and then her whole body into the water, her breasts bobbing against the surface. It was cold, a shock, but then warm and fine. If they stayed in the water, they couldn’t notice the air around them. Joel jumped in next, ditching his clothes on the side, and swam over to her. Their skin touched. It felt strange, foreign, to be without a suit and swimming in the pool, someone’s body beside hers. When his skin touched her, she moved away, turned-on.
This had been her plan from the start. Sex in the pool.
But she’d want to make him earn it a bit.
“You a swimmer?” she asked and moved away to the deep end, positioning herself against the wall. “Wanna race?”
“I finished the Walrus Level of lessons at my local pool and can I challenge you to a game of one-on-one soccer then sometime?”
“Naked?” Holly asked with a wink.
Joel shook his head with faux-seriousness. “I mean…that sounds painful.”
She splashed at him and he swam over and set up a position beside her, stretching. Her pool was a happy place for her—a place of pure relaxation and hedonism. Last summer she’d purchased a giant margarita shaped float and spent most of the time lounging around pretending she lived in Los Angeles.
The underground pool was in a dark and secluded part of the yard, hidden from view by terraces and shrubbery. It was a strange autumn, where the heat extended past its prime and Holly was overjoyed that their Indian Summer could result in this moment.
Holly was happiest in water; when everything was submerged and weightless.
The pool lights cast a blue glow around their feet and backs.
“Okay, get ready,” she said and they both prepared themselves, feet up, arms holding on to the edge. “Get set. Go.”
Away they swam. Out of the corner of her eye, Holly could see Joel keeping pace with her quick breaststroke through the water. By the time she arrived at the other end of the pool, he wasn’t far behind. She turned and kept going. He stopped and then rushed to keep up. By the time she was back to the deep end, he had slowed down and was only paddling toward her lazily, a smile on his face.
“I’m out of practice,” he said.
“Maybe you’re out of your league,” she amended and her date laughed and conceded by dipping his head in the water and approaching her, popping up inches from her skin. The water displaced around them. She wrapped her arms around his neck and they dangled there, treading water together, the night perfect all around them.
“I’m having fun,” she said. “With you.”
“Me too,” he whispered as if it were a confession. “With you.”
He kissed her and spun her to rest against the wall. She wrapped her legs around his waist and perched herself. They bobbed together, silent, and exploratory. His lips found hers. There was only the sound of them kissing and the distant highway and a dog barking somewhere close, but far.
She stroked his cock under water and her eyes never left his face the entire time—and she almost came herself when he reared back his head and let out an unprecedented shout of pleasure as he jerked in her hand and then laughed, shocked and surprised by how fast she aroused him. They laughed together, finding the moment gloriously ridiculous. He swam away from the area playfully and Holly followed him into the dark part of the pool.
“It’s been a long time,” she admitted. “Since I’ve felt…sexy. You make me feel sexy.”
“Because you are sexy,” he said on her heels. “Because you are so sexy.” He kissed her and cupped her ass under the water; she wished his hand would stay there. She wanted to be joined to him all night—leashed to him and never letting go. This is my boyfriend, Joel.
“This is insane,” she said.
“That we’re here…that this happened.”
“Joel Rusk.”
“Holly Bloom.”
“I really love it when you say my name like that…like I’m a teenager again.”
“I also feel like a teenager again,” he replied and moved forward. “All hormones and impure thoughts. But thank God we’re not teenagers, right?”
“It would’ve been fun to have been able to compare,” she teased.
“What a missed opportunity,” he said and he kissed her shoulder and up her neck. Then he disappeared under water. Holly held her breath as bubbles reached the surface and she felt his hands on her hips, moving her backward to the wall. She stretched her arms out along the side and steadied herself; he appeared and kissed her. Then he put his hands underneath her ass and moved her whole body to the surface. “You float. Just float,” he whispered. And she did. She held on and he moved between her and lifted her to his mouth. His tongue found her clit immediately and circled and stroked and she closed her eyes and she thought of herself, at the beach, Joel Rusk with a guitar by her side, his eyes sliding from her to the audience—and she knew that guys like that didn’t date girls like her.
Until they did.
When she came, it was a magical intensity and she shook and giggled and dropped herself back into the water, throwing herself at Joel, kissing him, touching him, shivering.
Holly spun him and forced him to the side of the pool and then she climbed on top of him. They were in that position, her riding him, splashing up and down in gentle waves of the pool when she heard a distinct cough at the edge of her gate, and a cheerful call toward them, the most horrible sound.
“I should’ve called!”
Holly froze.
“Yes, I’m here. It’s MiMi.”
Xiomara. Joel stopped moving, too.
She stood at the gate to the pool, just out of the shadows, and her face was turned up to the sky, pretending not to see a damn thing, but it had been too late for that.
“We’re home,” the ex-mother-in-law called as Holly untangled herself from Joel and swam to the pool stairs in shock and embarrassment and horror. She motioned for Xiomara to turn around and with an eye-roll and an annoyed sigh, the woman obeyed.
“I can see that you’re home,” Holly answered breathlessly as she lifted herself out of the pool and rushed off to grab a towel off her rack. Even in pitch-darkness, there would be no way to hide her crimson cheeks.
“I didn’t know you’d have a date.” She was facing the darkness and calling loudly, but Holy didn’t think to hush her.
“Where’s Alex?” Holly asked suddenly, thinking of the implications of him witnessing the scene that just occurred. A different sort of panic took over and she scrambled faster, wishing it all to be over.
“Inside. Thank God,” the older woman responded and walked back up the path to the house, her swagger evident as if she knew she was being watched.
Joel appeared behind her and she handed him a towel, not before glancing at him. A real peek. Not viewing him in a rush and in the heat of the moment, but there in real life. And a
s he ran the towel over himself, she nearly died. Joel Rusk was not a guidance counselor.
He was a God and she needed to take him to bed and keep him for herself.
Joel, for his part, didn’t appear to care that they’d been caught. She tried to follow his calmness. She was thirty-five and had been caught having sex by her ex-husband’s mom. It was perfect.
Kristy would love that story.
Holly put her head down against the railing up to her house, the towel wrapped around her body, and she sighed. “Fuck,” she whispered.
“Let’s call that one a first,” Joel said with a stifled laugh. “But hey…if you don’t mind…I’m going to go.”
“Yeah, okay,” she relented. “And if you never call again…I get it.”
They sneaked up without Alex seeing either of them. Joel grabbed his coat. And she hurried him down the stairs and out to the driveway, tying a long and ragged bathrobe around her body.
“That’s ancient,” he commented, noticing a hole.
“It’s from college,” she said with a weird, wide smile. “Which I didn’t finish…because…” she motioned a belly growing and then pointed to the house, as if that could explain everything. “I’d had this plan…it’s dumb. But nineteen-year-olds are kinda dumb. I’d call the robe Donovan, I don’t know why, and tell people…I was in bed with Donovan or I’d slept in with Donovan. Ridiculous,” she said.
“Maybe I need to buy you a new robe and you can name it….nothing…and I’ll just be in bed with you and sleep with you…”
“Are you jealous of Donovan?” Holly asked and tugged the worn lapels around even further, wrapping the thinning pieces of fabric around her body.
“Yeah. Fuck Donovan,” he kissed, leaning in for a quick kiss with a glance to the house, eager not to be seen. “Hey, so, I’ll text and call and probably send you inappropriate pictures,” Joel said and he kissed the top of her head. “I’m gonna go.”
“Don’t do the last thing,” she said with swatted his ass.
“Don’t go?” he asked, turning.
“Don’t send me nudes. Those things stay on servers forever and you never know who might be looking at them,” she said in a motherly tone before taking five steps and then calling to him as he got into his car. “Okay, do it. But there better be face in there, too. Better yet, selfies. Just send me selfies.”
Dispatched Confessions (The Love is Murder Social Club Book 2) Page 12
