Licks

by Kelly Siskind

  He smirked over his shoulder. “Like what you see?”

  “Love it.” The defined muscles of his back. The divots at the base of his spine. How his toned ass flexed with each move. “Bathroom is down the hall to your left.” I watched him in all his naked glory until he disappeared. I tilted my hips to keep his release from spilling farther down my thighs, and the wackiest of wacky thoughts blindsided me: I wish I wasn’t on the pill.

  I pressed my hands to my flat belly and almost keened. The urge to have a permanent reminder of what we’d shared ripped through me. A piece of August mixed with a piece of me. Forever. If he could read my mind, he’d probably bolt so fast the air would spin.

  I focused instead on the tenderness between my thighs.

  That had been life-altering sex. Moving with him, staring into his eyes while he pumped into me hadn’t been like I’d imagined. And I’d imagined it a lot. This had been more intense than expected, deeper. Like we’d never lost our connection.

  Or maybe the intensity was because we had lost it. The anger, the regrets—they’d fueled our flames. And what flames they’d been. Unfortunately, flames too often left scars…and unhealthy baby-making thoughts.

  While waiting for him, I removed my bra and tank top. I lay on my hard floor, naked and exposed. Instinctively I knew nothing in my life would be the same. I wasn’t the same. I closed my eyes, pressed my fingers against my breastbone, tried to tame my rattling pulse. Heat pricked my neck.

  “Gwen, honey?” I opened my eyes. August knelt beside me and ran a warm washcloth up my inner thighs. “You okay?” He worked as he talked, tenderly moving the cloth over my sensitive flesh, and I melted. He was buck as naked got, on his knees, taking care of me. I was a puddle of happiness. I was petrified.

  “I don’t think I’m okay.”

  He frowned and tossed the cloth behind him. Leaning on his elbow, he pressed to my side, his legs stretched next to mine. With his free hand, he traced dizzying patterns on my abdomen and breasts. “Talk to me.”

  “You’re going to leave. Go back to Europe, aren’t you?”

  His fingers faltered. He flattened his palm on my ribs, below the curve of my breast. “I am. But—”

  “When?”

  His answer took too long. He swallowed one too many times. “Two days. Early Monday morning.”

  If this was how getting punched in the gut felt, I’d leave boxing out of my workout regime. I curled away from him, stood and gathered my clothes, blinking the burn from my eyes. My throat stung. My belly churned. How would I say goodbye to him?

  “Gwen.”

  I kept moving, kept breathing, kept blinking.

  “Gwen.” When I didn’t answer him a second time, he wrapped his arms around me from behind, stilling my frenetic movements. “Don’t you dare do that. Don’t you dare cut me off again. Not after tonight.”

  He cocooned his naked body around mine, forced me to drop my clothes. He spun me around and locked me in his arms. “That was the best sex of my life. It’s the beginning, not the end. We have another day and a half together, and I plan to spend every second of that time with you.”

  “Aren’t you scared?”

  He sputtered out a laugh. “Are you serious? I’m fucking terrified.”

  “How do we do this?”

  “Easy.” He loosened his hold on me, stroked my back. “We take this one second at a time, while I figure out the rest. I don’t want you thinking about anything but each moment, because right now I have a beautiful, naked woman in my arms, but she’s frowning. These are not things that should coexist.”

  A small smile escaped me. “One second at a time?” It seemed impossible.

  “Make each one count. Leave the rest to me.”

  I couldn’t pick up and leave my job. I didn’t want to. He had no clue the life I’d created for myself here, in San Francisco. The years and determination it had taken. Yet the prospect of losing this amazing man in two days—one and a half—had spots clouding my vision. I wasn’t sure I could compartmentalize my emotions, give him what he wanted. All I could do was try.

  My rigid posture thawed slightly. I nuzzled my face into his neck. “Every second.”

  He wove one hand into my hair and sighed. “Every second, Possum.”

  When he thickened against me, I extricated myself from his hold. “But no more bikini posters now.”

  “Bikini posters?”

  Ainsley’s ridiculous comment about him staring at me like my scantily clad poster had adorned his teenage wall wormed into my mind. I motioned to his gorgeous cock, half-stiff and flushed at the tip. “Sex. No sex right now.”

  He squinted. “Bikini posters means sex?”

  “Just go with it.”

  He mumbled something like “Girls are weird,” but his eyelids lowered and he stroked his length once, roughly. “But there will be bikini posters later, right?”

  His searing glance had tingles erupting across my skin. “Definitely later. For now we need to go through my mother’s journal and search for more clues.” I needed to regroup. Find my feet. Reorder my upside-down world by putting on some clothes and creating emotional armor.

  August

  After a quick snack of cheese and fruit, Gwen and I relocated to her plaid couch, her mother’s diary and an awkward silence between us. It wasn’t okay. I wasn’t okay. My Monday morning flight meant we only had a day and a bit. The timeline was akin to torture. We hadn’t mentioned my departure date again. We hadn’t said much of anything. The prospect had new lyrics looping through my mind: cruel fate, wicked ways, oceans apart.

  I had commitments in Germany and France, unbreakable contracts, weeks and months scheduled on the road. But this wasn’t the beginning of the end. I wouldn’t let it be. I simply had to make a plan and figure things out. Think long-term.

  Still, she was freaking out, shutting down in increments.

  Which meant beginning with the small stuff, here and now, was important. Making use of all our seconds. “When did you start surfing?” I needed to learn everything I could about Gwen Hamilton.

  She glanced up from the worn journal. “Sorry?”

  I nodded to the board taking up the opposite wall. “Surfing, I don’t remember you wanting to try it.” Or skydiving. Or mountain biking. Gwen had always been athletic, running track and acing gym class, but she’d never been an adrenaline junkie.

  Keeping the journal open, she leaned her shoulder into the couch. “During college, my third summer off, I was bartending at night but needed as much cash as possible. A daytime job renting surfboards came up, and I got bit by the bug. The job allowed me free lessons and equipment use.”

  Watching her navigating a wave, water dripping down her toned body, hair slicked back would be quite the sight. “The only time I surfed involved me sucking back buckets of sea water.”

  Her attention darted to my mouth. Her pupils flared, as though mention of inhaling the ocean was akin to dirty talk. “Learning is rough.”

  “Have you ever taught?”

  “I prefer the rush of riding.” Her gaze dropped lower, to my groin. She nibbled her lower lip.

  Was she picturing riding me? A shot of lust accompanied that visual. Although making love to her had been unreal, I hadn’t explored the lean lines of her body, kissed my way up her strong thighs. I suppressed my groan. “Maybe you could teach me some time.”

  Although too turned on for my own good, I did mean the surfing. I wanted to enjoy a lazy Sunday walking the streets with Gwen, fall into a small lunch spot, lie in the grass while she read and I wrote music, learn to surf with her, sleep next to her, wake with her. Collect all our seconds, turning each into an eternity.

  She stopped the lip nibbling. She might have stopped breathing, too. “Sure,” she said. It took a moment to realize she’d answered my surfing question, but it had been a distracted sure. A we don’t have a future sure.

  I really fucking hated that sure.

  She returned to analyzing the dia
ry. I kept analyzing her: the full bottom lip I’d had between my teeth, the swell of her breasts in her fitted white tank top. She had beautiful breasts, small yet lush with tight pink nipples I hadn’t gotten to feast on, since I hadn’t removed her bra.

  She slid her jaw to the side as she read a section carefully. I didn’t remember her doing that when we’d studied together, and I would know. I’d spent most of those hours like this, watching her, picturing her hands on my body, tugging down my jeans. My mouth on her.

  We were close enough that I could reach forward and run my fingers through her wavy hair. I followed my instinct. I couldn’t keep away.

  Air rasped through her teeth. “That’s distracting.”

  “You’re distracting.”

  “You know what I mean.” But she didn’t pull back. She leaned toward me.

  My sweet Possum. “These are my seconds, honey. I need to touch you. And I’ll figure out the rest with us. Please don’t worry.”

  Already, I’d been poring over my schedule in my mind, blocking out times I’d return to San Francisco. Weeks I could fly Gwen to Europe. I’d plan it out, make it foolproof. She wouldn’t have to do a thing but say yes. Instead of fighting me further, she turned her face into my hand and kissed my palm. Not an agreement, exactly, but the tender move nearly split me in two.

  We stayed like that awhile: her flipping through her mother’s journal, my hand in her hair, my heart playing an unsteady bass line.

  Suddenly, she sat straighter. She lifted a flimsy cocktail napkin from inside the book. “She mentions a bar a few times, a place a guy used to take her. I think it’s the same guy who watched her dance, but she never mentions his name.”

  “Considering she hid the journal in a defaced bible, I’m guessing she was worried it would be riffled through. Her parents weren’t exactly lenient.”

  Gwen had snuck into my room the night she’d searched out her grandparents. She hadn’t cried or ranted, but she’d picked her nails until they’d bled and had asked if she could sleep over. I’d watched her breathing softly the entire night.

  She closed the book and held the napkin gingerly. “By the sounds of things, this guy knew the owner of the bar or a bartender, had no issues getting my mother served without her ID. Mary Hamilton liked her Long Island Iced Tea.”

  “I can’t picture your mother drinking.”

  “I can’t picture her smiling or laughing or dancing. Drinking is tame compared to that. And this isn’t about her, anyway. I couldn’t care less what she was like. None of it changes the woman I knew.”

  Her defensiveness said otherwise. Not that she’d listen to me. Gwen was stubborn like that. My fingers slipped through her hair in slow strokes. She clasped my wrist, stilling the movements. “I think this is our next clue, where we should go. If this guy knew the owner and he’s still around, we might get answers.”

  Ted Mercer, I almost blurted. That’s your father’s name.

  He’d lived in Oakland, only twenty minutes from his daughter. I hadn’t dug deeper, no point after learning he’d passed, but I had the name she’d sought her entire life.

  I nearly spoke it aloud, but I clamped my mouth shut. Not because of my guilt or knowing my deception could obliterate our fragile footing. Not fully, at least. There were too many coincidences piling up: her mother’s letter to me, my choice to delay, Mary’s death, her luggage. A journal offering more insight into that woman than Gwen had gleaned in twenty-eight years. Like everything was happening for a reason, including learning about Mary Hamilton.

  Gwen could pretend these scraps of information meant nothing. I saw how her eyes had widened when peering at that dancing photo in the TASC center, how she’d sucked in an amazed breath when Loretta Walsh had called Mary and her sister the Sunshine Girls.

  Not knowing her father had always been a thorn in Gwen’s side, but living with a frigid mother had been the larger bruise on her childhood. This journey could help her understand what had stripped the light from Mary Hamilton’s world, lead Gwen to accept the woman Mary had been. That type of closure was invaluable. Plus, the odds of Gwen actually learning her father’s name before I left were slim to none. I’d have time to explain after.

  “If that’s our next clue, then we better get on it,” I said.

  “Badass PI partners?”

  “As long as you don’t go telling anyone else I get the shits.”

  She cackled. “I make no promises. And”—she held the napkin flat and read the writing on it—“looks like our next stop is the Blue-Eyed Raven.”

  I reared back, stunned into silence. Three rough swallows later, I found my voice. “The Blue-Eyed Raven?” Please tell me I heard her wrong.

  She nodded. “In Haight-Ashbury.”

  Just my twisted luck. Another coincidence, this one as pleasant as chewing rocks.

  Of all the bars in all of San Francisco, Mary Hamilton had to have set up camp where my twin brother now worked.

  10 p.m., 26 Hours…

  Gwen

  According to August, the Blue-Eyed Raven was a Haight-Ashbury fixture, the sprawling bar once home to performing greats like Neil Young and Joni Mitchell. In its heyday, smoke had curled through the three-hundred-seat supper club, guitar licks rippling in the hazy air, weed and booze plentiful. Women had danced with women. Couples had swapped spouses.

  Another of Mary Hamilton’s shocking hangouts.

  “Is it still popular?” I asked as I parked near the venue.

  “Yes.”

  “Have you played there?”

  “No.”

  “Do you want to play there?”

  No answer.

  I turned off the ignition but didn’t release the key. We’d taken my car, and August had kept his hand at the back of my neck during the drive, his thumb rubbing mindless circles. As nice as the contact had been, the mindless part had been the antithesis of nice. The closer we’d gotten to the club, the quieter he’d become. The louder I wanted to scream.

  I opted for confrontation. “What happened to your let’s savor our seconds pact? Because the imposter in this car is freaking me out.”

  This entire situation was a giant pile of freak out. I’d shut down on him in my apartment, kept yo-yoing between the consuming desire to touch him and continuing my Popsicle routine, freezing him out. I wanted to thaw, but defrosting could end with me as a gooey, blubbery mess.

  August released my neck and massaged his chest like it pained him. Streetlamps and passing cars cast buttery slices of light through the darkness. One spilled through the windshield, emphasizing the broody angles of his face. Without a word to me, he undid his seat belt, pushed open his door, and slammed it shut behind him. My seat vibrated. I vibrated. I wanted to be vibrating with August’s hard length thrusting inside me, not because I was a defrosting Popsicle.

  My mind kept replaying how he’d felt, how my body still sizzled and swelled with want. On the drive here, I’d almost slipped my hand between his thighs, over his thick denim, to cop a feel of his girth. Fear had kept me fisting the steering wheel.

  I sat immobile now, the car key clutched in my hand. I debated turning the ignition and tearing off as he rounded toward my side. I could leave right now, forget this journal and August and everything that had the power to break me, but I played my Popsicle game.

  He opened my door and poked his head inside. “Come out here. We need to talk.”

  His no-nonsense tone brooked zero argument. The dominance of it was kind of sexy, but mostly scary. We need to talk only ever meant heavy subjects, and I had all the heavy I could handle.

  Instead of complying, I said, “Beetlejuice.”

  August snort-laughed. The sound calmed a fraction of my panic.

  Beetlejuice had been our safe word. When he’d pinch my underarm skin to distract me from his Monopoly cheating? Beetlejuice. When I’d twist his nipple until he’d give me the remote control? Beetlejuice.

  Blurting the word now was easier than facing his ominous we
need to talk.

  He straightened slightly, taking his face out of view. He leaned his forearm on the car roof. “You don’t need a safe word for this conversation.”

  “Says you.” But I could hear the smirk in his voice. I also liked the view.

  The way we were situated—his crotch at face level, me strapped into my seat—I could undo his belt buckle, slip his zipper down, and take his length into my mouth. I salivated.

  He backed away and crooked his finger, beckoning me. “Stop looking like you want to lick me, Possum. We need to talk. It won’t be a nice talk, but we can’t go into that club before it happens.”

  “That’s quite the sales pitch.” It was downright alarming. Unfortunately, I saw no other options.

  I worked methodically, going through the steps of shoving the journal in my purse, leaving my car, and locking up extra slowly. Delay, delay, delay. A hot dog vendor was down the block, thick scents of charred meat teasing my nose. My belly rumbled. Our cheese and fruit earlier had only been a snack. I was hungry for food. I was hungry for August. I was not hungry to learn about the thing that wasn’t nice to discuss.

  I moved to the sidewalk and anchored myself against the car. “Go ahead. Rip off the Band-Aid.”

  His right hand was in his pocket. The fabric bulged rhythmically. He probably had a guitar pick in there. Whenever August was nervous or uneasy, he’d spin his pick restlessly. Like now. He gnawed on his bottom lip. “Finch manages the Blue-Eyed Raven.”

  I pitched forward slightly. “Excuse me?”

  “Exactly.”

  Well, wasn’t that just my luck? The day I made love with the brother I’d always wanted, I had to stand in a building with him and the one I should never have fucked. Good times, Gwen Hamilton. “How is that even possible?”

  “How is it possible I show up at your door the same day as your mother’s lost luggage?”

  A slew of impossible impossibilities. I glanced toward the club, then to August, then at the inky sky. Nerves twisted my insides. I replayed Rachel’s comment earlier, how she’d thought her birthday wish had been touched with magic and that believing in the unbelievable had given her the push she’d needed to fulfill her resolution. My self-imposed sink-or-swim deadline was in twenty-six hours, and fate had been dumping a pile of life preservers on my head.