Box of 1Night Stands: 21 Sizzling Nights

by Anthology

  Hot tears tracked down her cheeks. She refused to believe he’d left her. Part of her still resisted accepting the man lying there, so strong, her rock, could be gone.

  Part of her still hoped….

  Illusions destroyed by his hand, so familiar and yet so foreign, clasped in her own.

  “How dare you?” The words came out more sob than sound. “How dare you leave me?”

  Other friends, his family, her own, offered comfort by touching her shoulder and whispering platitudes she couldn’t accept. Standing, she offered a smile through her tears—little more than a baring of teeth.

  “I’m okay,” she lied. Shoving her mask on, she forced a façade of calm. “I’ll be okay.”

  Hugging his mother, the woman frailer than she remembered, Carson forced another smile, the expression almost painful on her lips.

  I can keep it together. I’ll fall apart when I’m alone. The mantra cycled on a loop in her mind.

  With one last glance back at the box holding the man who’d been her world, she strode out of the funeral home.

  This pain, it was hers. Private, because so much of their friendship had been just him, just her, because no one outside their relationship ever really understood it…them.

  Managing to nod at those who tried to engage her, she placed iron restrictions on her emotions. Hold it together, Carson.

  The rain pounded the ground, creating illusions of light that looked like sparklers on the Fourth of July. She tugged her black heels off, dangling them from her numb fingertips. Down the steps, she ignored the man with an umbrella at the ready to lead the mourners to their cars. She padded past him, into the parking lot and kept a steady pace. Once out of sight, she ran. The light from streetlamps blended with her tears, creating streamers of swirling color she couldn’t see past. Through the deluge, she sped as far as possible until her sobs ruined her ability to breathe. Like daggers coated in acid, each inhale burned in her chest while her stomach cramped. She crumpled, falling to her knees on the street.

  Punching the pavement, splashing up more cold water, she released the pent up agony. “Dammit! No! You’re not gone.” The water soaked through her black dress to track icy fingers across her spine. “You’re not gone. Fuck you! How dare you leave me?”

  The pain in her hands didn’t hold a candle to the pain of her grief. Nothing did. Not since he’d left on his bike and never come home.

  Shaking her hand at the sky, she allowed the rain to wash away the tears, but not fast enough. More streaked hot paths on her face, a contrast to the chill of the night. “Why? Why him? Why now? I won’t accept it!”

  If he were there, he might make it better. He’d tell her to go on without him—how to go on without him.

  But he was gone.

  For a long time, cars passed, lights illuminating her hell, while Carson searched for motivation, for the will to get up and go on knowing he’d never laugh again, never speak again, never anything.

  Finally, she managed to stand on wobbly legs and trudged back to her car. Arriving home, she had no memory of the drive.

  Time passed in a fugue. Numb, she spent a lot of time staring into space, looking for him. Food didn’t taste right. Nothing satisfied the ache in her chest. Wake up, cry, shower, go to work, and come home alone, over and over in an endless monotony of days.

  The hard knot of pain festered, relieved only a little if she crossed the hall and sat in his empty apartment, surrounded in the ghost of his scent, the comfort of his things, as if somehow he’d walk in the door at any given moment.

  His couch brought back memories of late night movie marathons. She smelled the popcorn, heard him berating corny heroes in sappy chick flicks.

  In the kitchen, where he told her about his cousin’s cancer and looked so broken, she still felt the way his body dwarfed hers as he held her for comfort, shrinking the space to a cocoon for two.

  Looking at the old black and white photos on the walls, she remembered antiquing trips and his need to buy every old picture he found. “Instant ancestors,” he’d called them, his lips curled in a grin. “Just add story.”

  So many moments, days, years. Gone forever.

  “How was I supposed to realize that was the last one?” she asked the empty apartment.

  It didn’t answer.

  Days passed, each a carbon copy of the last.

  They came for his things one day. She took a single bottle of whiskey from his cupboard when they asked if she wanted anything to remember him by. Crossing the hall into her own apartment, she sat alone doing shots of the alcohol, classy whiskey—his favorite indulgence—until she couldn’t hold the glass without dropping it.

  At her computer, she clicked through albums of pictures of him laughing. Of his crooked grin when he flicked her off for taking his picture. Leaning against his damned motorcycle, the cause of all this, and looking like some badass James Dean wannabe.

  She traced the line of his jaw, his face only glowing pixels without the breath of life so vibrant in the man. Blinking fast, she noticed an email from her sister. Opening it, she snorted as she read, A friend recommended this service. Said that they can find you someone. I know you’re still broken over Randall, but you haven’t dated for a long time. Might be worth a shot. A bunch of people have used it and gotten really amazing results. Love you.

  Fantasies fulfilled in one night….

  The description of Madame Eve’s 1Night Stand services—using a detailed questionnaire and thorough background check, she could find the perfect match for anyone with guaranteed safety—sounded almost too good to be true. She typed in her desires—a man, strong and handsome, who will make me feel alive so I don’t feel like I’m living in his grave. Paying the price for her fantasies, she sent the email.

  More days dropped into the pattern. Going to work. Coming home to her empty apartment.

  A response came from the dating service. She searched for a dollop of enthusiasm, but wished Randall could be there, tell her what to wear. That thought brought a wave of guilt—should she want a life if he’d never have one?

  Damn him for leaving me lost in this half-life.

  1Night Stand found the solution, the fantasy she requested. The email from Madame Evangeline advised Carson would meet her date at local bar, The WildSide, and look for the man of her dreams. She put on her makeup—a mask to hide the shadows under her eyes, and the hollowness etched in her cheeks.

  She strode in the bar and hoped it would somehow make things better.

  A nice guy, the man 1Night Stand found her might be perfect. Handsome, any woman’s dream date, he looked a lot like Randall.

  She drowned in a wave of awkwardness when he stood and made it almost around the table before she seated herself. “Hi,” she mumbled, staring at a slice of lemon floating in a glass.

  “So great to meet you. You’re more beautiful than I imagined.”

  Her snort slipped out. “Good to meet you….” What had Eve’s message said his name was?

  “So…Carson, right? If you don’t mind me asking, what does a woman like you need with a dating service? I mean, you’re really lovely.”

  She glanced up. Sweet. He blushed. How many guys do that?

  But, she couldn’t do it. Too raw, too wrong, almost feeling like cheating even if she and Randall never actually dated, not in reality. Only in her imagination….

  He wasn’t Randall.

  Before he even ordered drinks, Carson shook her head. “I have to leave.”

  “Is something wrong?”

  This is very wrong. Panicked and at a loss for words, she left the bar, apologies the best she could give him.

  Unlocking her phone on the way to the car, she fired off another email to the 1Night Stand service.

  Thanks for trying. He seemed wonderful and you can keep your fee. It turns out what I really want is a dead man, not a facsimile. Since you can’t give me what I didn’t even know I asked for, don’t worry about it. The man I loved most of my life is g
one and I only contacted you because of grief. I’m sorry for wasting your time.

  Clicking send on the email, she stuffed the phone back in her pocket.

  I don’t know why I thought Madame Eve could fix this. She punched the side of her car. No one can fix this.

  The phone beeped with incoming email. Thumbing it unlocked, she read the cryptic reply from Madame Evangeline. My dear Ms. Black, please trust me. This is all part of the plan.

  No response came to mind.

  No response….

  I never told him.

  The smack of knowledge hit her like a fist. All the years of loving Randall, all the years of being his friend and confidante, and she’d never once told him, never actually said the words.

  I love you.

  Looking up at the star-studded sky, she whispered it, hoping somehow he’d hear her. “I love you.”

  Chapter Two

  The scent of him, a blend of leather, soap and something she identified as simply him, filled her apartment. Sucking in a lungful of the tantalizing blend, Carson closed her eyes on the tears threatening to break past her determination not to cry again.

  Madness? Maybe. But if going mad meant that even for one more moment she’d sense him, hear him, almost taste him—was it a bad thing?

  “Randall?”

  She didn’t expect an answer. In the weeks since his bike flipped, the smell had grown stronger and the sense of him richer, but no answer ever came. Although it reaffirmed her going-wackadoodle diagnosis, she shrugged it off and reveled in the scent.

  “If you were here, I would tell you all the things I was afraid to say when you were alive. I loved you, do you know that? I always loved you—you dumb, arrogant ass.”

  The hot tears spilled out to splash on her cheeks. Annoyed, she dashed them away with the back of her hand. She spent her days crying. A lifetime of tears loomed in front of her, empty and aching in pain. Yanking off her robe, she turned the faucet on for the shower. Talking to myself…probably there’s a pill for that.

  “I wanted you.” Whispering it felt safer than saying it aloud, even in the privacy of her own apartment. Sick. Only a sick, sick woman desired a man dead and gone.

  She’d wanted Randall Parks from the moment her hormones kicked in. Her best friend, her guardian when things got rough, her knight in somewhat-rusted and dinged up armor—he wore many hats in her life and none more important than that of best friend. They grew up together, neighbors in the same cul-de-sac and, as adults, lived in the same building. The knowledge that his apartment, right across the hall, stood empty, carved a hollow spot in her chest that didn’t help the ache of grief any.

  Stepping into the shower, she heard his voice. Breathed on the air around her, familiar words he’d said a hundred times over their years together, even if she hadn’t heard his voice in waking moments for weeks. “You worry too much, blondie.”

  Sobs choked her, but the water rinsed the salty moisture of her tears away as fast as they poured from her. “I still need you.”

  Leaning her head against the wall, she struggled with the pain. Time, supposedly the cure for all wounds, didn’t help. Every morning became a battle to get up and to pretend to function when her whole world had flipped on that bike with him.

  A hand slid down her spine and she shivered. Her eyes popped open, but she didn’t dare glance behind her.

  No one is there. But the feel of the calloused hand, sliding down her skin, seemed more real than anything else in her grief-shrouded world.

  This time she didn’t look to see if he was there.

  If it’s madness, so be it.

  “Randall, I know you’re here.”

  “Then why are you crying?”

  She shoved her fist in her mouth and bit her fingers. Pinching her eyes closed, she sucked in a ragged breath, her heart thudding in her chest. Could a dream sound that real? Can I want something badly enough that my mind actually supplies it?

  Perception. Probably, an insane woman could hallucinate.

  Did she care if she was insane? Really? If it meant even one more moment with him?

  No.

  “Because I miss you.”

  “I never left you.”

  Again, the stab of pain at the sound of his voice, but she breathed through it, concentrated, counted each exhale. Push the pain out like they told you to do when you meditate. Using the water from the shower, she washed away the rest of the sting of sadness almost as if she could rinse it down the drain. Clear your mind. Crying solved nothing. Time to embrace the crazy.

  “I wanted you. I don’t know why I didn’t just go for it, tell you. Maybe I was afraid? But I did. I loved you, and wanted you….” She braced one hand on the shower wall, head bowed, and rubbed the other across her face. Randall would laugh—he always laughed if she got too serious, ending any conversational depth and bringing things back to playful banter.

  He didn’t laugh. “I wanted you. I still do, even though that doesn’t make a damn bit of sense. Shouldn’t I stop feeling lust since I don’t have a dick to feel it with?”

  The comment sounded so Randall. She spun on the wet tile.

  An empty shower, only steam filled the space.

  “I’m pretty sure you can’t see me, blondie. I mean, I’m dead.”

  His voice. She’d recognize it anywhere. No way could she imagine him so clearly. She wasn’t that creative.

  Goose bumps rose on her skin. One hand shielded her breasts and another covered her pussy, hiding it from phantom eyes. I’m naked…he can’t—

  I don’t believe in ghosts. But it sounds like him….

  I want it to be him.

  “Are you here?”

  Stupid question. He can’t be.

  “I’ve been here. I just figured out the talking part. Harder than you might think but now that I’ve got it down….”

  Shoving the shower curtain aside, she grabbed a towel.

  “Don’t cover up,” he ordered. Her hand stilled, a frisson of heat licking up her spine and raising the fine hairs on her arms.

  An answering throb beat an urgent tempo between her legs.

  His tone, the demanding voice she fantasized about. He’d marched a parade of bimbos through their lives, and she’d noticed the way he looked at them and the crack of dominance in his voice when he spoke to them which tripped her trigger every damned time….

  The dominance he refused to wield in her direction.

  Her fingers closed on the towel, a dare of sorts.

  “Don’t make me punish you, Carson.”

  Her legs shook at the snapped command. She fought dueling emotions—one part of her trembling in desire, the other mad…because, now? When he was dead and gone?

  “What are you going to do? You’re a ghost. I knew what you were when you were alive, Randall. Yet not once—never—did you ever make one sexual move toward me. Always the white knight. Always the friend. Why would that change now that you’re pushing up daisies?”

  A blast of warm wind picked her up, almost slamming her into the wall. The spectral gust pinned her hands above her head as if held by invisible cuffs and spread her legs open to the humid air. She fought down a wave of unbridled lust.

  “When I was alive, I worried my desires would scare you. I worried that what I wanted would disgust you, ruin our friendship.”

  She panted, breasts rising and falling with each inhalation. A cool feeling, like ice being rubbed against her nipple, zinged awareness and pleasure through her, but she bit her lip to stay silent, waiting for his next move.

  “I know what you want. You want me to take the control away from you, spank that round, white ass of yours until it’s red and tender. Now—”

  Held on the wall by invisible handcuffs, she didn’t care whether her imagination provided this fantasy or if a ghost toyed with her body. Wet, throbbing need between her legs demanded she hang on his every word.

  The voice came from the air next to her ear. “Now I have nothing to lose.”r />
  A firm twist of her nipple accompanied the comment and she writhed in her restraints. Her cry increased the pressure.

  “Silence, Carson. You will be utterly silent unless I give you permission to speak or we won’t play. Do you understand?”

  She whispered the words she’d wanted to say for so long, “Yes, Sir.”

  Chapter Three

  Carson hung suspended on the wall, unaware of the power she wielded in her submission. Randall Stokes soaked in the experience. Never before did touching a woman leave his hand trembling. He couldn’t count the nights he’d imagined his pretty next door neighbor, his childhood best friend, her thighs shaking in desire, breasts heaving as she struggled to breathe because she needed him so much, overwhelmed by passion he’d awakened….

  Instead, he’d waited.

  They’d met at summer camp, even though she lived just up the street. She homeschooled, he played football and somehow it worked out they’d never crossed paths. Not afraid to put a worm on a hook, fast with a comeback and cuter than a picture from a cereal box, she quickly became irreplaceable. Not exactly sure when the change from friend to object of his affection occurred, he knew, she made him happy.

  As a pimply faced teenager, he’d steered clear of her attempts to change their relationship into more. Back then, he tried hard, like everyone else, to figure out exactly who he was. He couldn’t afford to make a dumb mistake and lose his best friend.

  As a man, he understood himself, what he needed to find satisfaction. Not ashamed of his love of kink, but unwilling to change Carson…not for a night of pleasure and her looking at him horrified the next day.

  But the pleasure he could bring her….

  There’d been nights, late nights, ones where he’d had a drink or two and pondered leaning over and running his hand down the line of her delicate spine. He’d whispered in the shell of her ear, breathing close enough that the hairs lifted and he wondered if she suppressed a shiver of desire for him. Always he pulled back, stopped before taking what he wanted from her.

  He’d waited too damned long for her.

  Randall never expected death. An avid motorcyclist for years, he’d done everything right—wore a helmet, carried the best insurance, kept his bike up on maintenance. He never drank and rode, nor tried anything stupid to look cool.