by B. N. Toler
“That was…” she paused, lifting her brows, her cheeks rosy, “nice.”
“Yeah,” I managed, scratching the back of my neck. Pulling my lower lip between my teeth, I groaned a little. “I can still taste you.”
Something flickered in her eyes, her mouth parting slightly. This time she didn’t lean, she slammed into me. Pulling her up, she wrapped her legs around my waist as I held her up with one hand and blindly let my tailgate down with the other. I set her on the tailgate and yanked her toward me by the hips as we kissed, and sucked, and tasted one another. I couldn’t get enough. She gripped the back of my belt, then pulled me closer making me hiss against her lips.
“Damn,” she murmured as I nipped at her jawline and kissed down her neck. Pushing my chest again, she created distance between us as we caught our breath. Why was she stopping? “I’m sorry,” she panted. “I…I don’t usually do that.”
I needed a breather. Taking a step back, I put my hands on my hips attempting to calm myself. I hadn’t expected, of all women, for her to get so lost like that. I liked it. A lot. And not because I’m a man and all things led to sex, but I liked that once again she’d shown me she could get lost in a moment, that she didn’t always overthink everything.
“I’m sorry about that,” I told her. As much as I had enjoyed it, I never wanted to make her feel pressured or forced, or taken advantage of.
“Don’t be sorry.” She scowled. “I was in it, too. I wanted it, too.”
I wanted to ask her why she’d stopped, but I didn’t. She got spooked too easily. She wanted to let go. Get lost with me. Then she’d stop, not giving herself permission. Her hands were gripping the tailgate, her legs dangling over the end as she peeked up at me. Our stares locked, a soft and nervous smile lighting up her features. Seeing how I felt through the expression on her face felt good. Too good. I knew she wanted me as much as I wanted her. I couldn’t help it, the urge was too strong, I had to taste her one more time. Leaning in, I kissed her once more; a soft and lingering brush of her lips. It would have to be enough.
As I pulled away, her head remained tilted up, her dark lashes resting against her pink cheeks as if she were relishing the moment; absorbing it, like someone who hadn’t seen the sun in days and was lifting their face to the sky to feel the warmth. She was stunning. But she wasn’t ready. When I gently brushed the back of my knuckles against her delicate cheek, her eyes fluttered opened, the smile on her face matching her gaze. “I had a good time tonight,” I told her.
“I did, too.”
It was one of those moments you hated to see end. I could have stood in that parking lot all night and kissed her. But it was time to say goodnight. She saw our connection. Had felt our chemistry. If she wanted more, she’d say so. “I’ll call you tomorrow?”
Her face tightened, her smile becoming more forced than natural as she looked away. “Yes,” she said before clearing her throat and sliding off my tailgate. “That sounds good.” When she took a sidestep to move around me, she pushed some hair behind her ear. I narrowed my eyes at her, wondering what had just happened. It almost seemed as if she’d recoiled; shut down. Shit. Was I reading the signs wrong? If I kept going, she’d stop. Yet when we stopped, she’d grow quiet. If this kept up, I was going to be in a world of hurt in more ways than one.
“Be careful on the drive home.” She waved a hand and turned to head to her car. I stared after her for a moment feeling like I should call after her, but what would I say? Hey, why’d you just get weird like that? In the end, I decided not to question her about it, hoping maybe it was just me reading too much into it. I waited until she was safely in her car and driving away before climbing into my truck and pulling out of the lot myself. She was a hard one to figure out. Looking to my right, I growled. “Shit.” I’d forgotten to give her the damn scarf back. Picking it up from where it sat balled up in the passenger seat, I held it to my face. Yep. It still smelled like her.
Tossing it back in the seat, I inhaled deeply and gripped my steering wheel tightly. Why did I keep smelling her scarf?
“Keep it together, Wren,” I mumbled to myself. “Keep it fucking together.”
“Start writing, no matter what.
The water does not flow until the faucet is turned on.”
-Louis L’Amour
“Looks like all the hens are clucking tonight,” Allen jested from the screen of Deanna’s laptop. He’d just Skyped her from his hotel room in Dallas to check in and say hi to all us “hens.” A calm ladies’ night was what was in order as I waited to hear from Wren.
“We’re in full force,” Kate agreed as she raised her wine glass.
“What’s the latest gossip tonight, ladies?” Allen inquired. He wasn’t really asking because he was a guy and couldn’t care less, but more he was making fun of us.
“Mostly just the weather,” Courtney replied. “Deanna did go on a bender about how huge your penis is right before you called.”
I had just taken a sip of wine and choked on it, coughing and sputtering out a laugh.
Allen grinned awkwardly as we laughed, his face reddening a little as Deanna shook her head grimacing.
“And on that note, I think I’ll say goodbye,” Allen murmured.
“Have a good dinner, babe,” Deanna told him as we all cackled in the background. “We miss you,” she added as she rubbed her belly.
“One of you ladies kiss her belly for me,” he demanded. Courtney was on her knees in a heartbeat planting a firm kiss on Deanna’s stomach. Glancing at Kate, I made a frowny face because he was so sweet it melted my heart. Allen was too cute. We all said bye and Deanna closed the laptop, grabbing her mug of tea and taking a seat at the table with us.
“You guys are so disgustingly adorable, I don’t even know what to do with you,” Kate informed her.
“What can I say,” Deanna said. “I got lucky with that one.”
They were both lucky. Allen and Deanna Bronson were a storybook romance—high school sweethearts that fell in love their freshman year. Neither of them had been with another person—I don’t think it even occurred to Deanna how rare and awesome that was. They went to college together, got married, bought an amazing house, and now…they would have their baby. All of their dreams had come true and they deserved every bit of it. I was so proud of them.
“He didn’t do too bad himself,” Courtney added.
“How are you feeling?” I asked her then took a sip of my wine.
“Better. Been a little nauseous in the morning, but other than that I feel pretty good.” Lowering her head, she peeked up at us, her mouth twisting to the side as if she had a thought she wasn’t sure she wanted to share.
“What’s that look?” Kate asked.
Deanna scrunched her face up before letting out a huff. “I wanted to ask you guys, or Courtney and Kate, more specifically,” she cut a look to me that said sorry, though I had no idea what she’d be sorry for. “Did Will and Mike get kind of…I don’t know…weird about being physical when you guys were pregnant?”
Kate and Will had a two-year-old daughter named Willow, and Courtney and her baby-daddy had a son named Turner. Realizing I had absolutely nothing to offer on this subject, I leaned back, wine in hand, and readied myself to listen intently.
“Mike was a little standoffish at first, but things went back to normal after the first few months,” Courtney replied with honesty.
Kate chirped in, “Totally different for me. Will was all over me. He couldn’t get enough.”
Deanna sighed, seemingly not soothed by their responses as she tapped her fingers on the table.
“Is Allen not…in the mood these days?” I asked, gently. I didn’t think this was a soul-crushing subject for her, but I didn’t want to sound like I thought it was funny, in case she was more bothered by it than she was letting on.
“We’ve always had sex,” Deanna answered. “Often. Like we can’t get enough. But since we found out I’m pregnant, Allen just doesn’t seem inte
rested.”
“Have you spoken to him about it?” Courtney asked as she popped a chip in her mouth.
Deanna’s mouth moved as if she were about to smile, but she stopped herself. “He says he’s afraid he’ll hurt the baby.”
Courtney choked on the chip as Kate and I fought the urge not to chuckle. “So he thinks his junk is so big he’ll hurt the baby?” Kate chortled causing Courtney and I to laugh.
Deanna finally let go and let the smile she’d been fighting seize her features. Holding her hands up as if to stop us, she said, “I know. He’s ridiculous.”
“So us telling him you were telling us how big he was probably wasn’t helpful?” Courtney managed to get out as she laughed. “Whoops.”
Deanna stood and grabbed a plate of brownies from the counter, placing them in the center of the table. “Definitely not. He probably thought you were joking, making fun of him. And I’ve tried to tell him he has nothing to worry about, that he can’t hurt the baby, but it hasn’t changed,” she huffed. “I know he loves me, but he won’t do it. I’m dying over here. And the less I get it, the more I want it,” she whined. We were all chuckling—with her—not at her. Okay, maybe a little at her. It was so unlike Deanna to talk candidly about her sex life, even with us, her best friends, so we knew she must be really frustrated.
“So you guys really haven’t had sex at all since you found out? Not even once?” Kate asked.
Deanna poked out her lower lip. “No.”
“Damn,” Courtney added. “Not even four months along and baby Bronson is already a huge cock-block.”
The three of us laughed while Deanna smirked, fighting the urge to join us. “That’s a terrible thing to say,” she finally murmured quietly before biting her lip. She may not have laughed, but the glimmer in her eyes said she thought it was just as humorous as we did.
Her gaze fell for a moment before she perked back up. “So how was your date last night?” she inquired, clearly ready for a subject change. Crap… Courtney and Kate turned their stares to me, making me the full center of attention. Double crap.
I wasn’t one to overshare, but I couldn’t stop my mouth from quirking up in a half smile as I reflected on kissing Wren.
Most first kisses are exciting, but this one had been different, mostly because I hadn’t expected it to be stellar. I mean, it was the kiss of all kisses. If there were a checklist for the things a man should do prior to and during a first kiss, Wren had marked off every box. Even if you put aside the actual kiss itself—firm but gentle—and simply focused on everything else, it would still rate highly. His body language was nothing short of perfection—he was postured toward me as if he were fighting the urge to pounce, but practicing impressive self-control. I felt it—the way he wanted to, and it made every inch of me tingle with anticipation. But when he didn’t make a move, I questioned myself, wondering if I’d read it wrong. I hadn’t done a first kiss in a while. But again, Wren came through when I moved away, grabbing me and taking what he wanted. I liked that. I really liked that. Then there was the second kiss, which was something else completely. When he’d said he could still taste me with his heated gaze fixed on me, something in me broke loose and I reacted. I needed his mouth on mine. When he lifted me and set me on his tailgate, that moment where we both lost sense of where we were and what was going too far, it was…amazing. It had been so long since I’d let go like that and even though it had only lasted a minute or two, it felt like a drug that sent me rocketing on the best high. I wanted more.
When I finally pushed him away, as I panted for air, I made myself take mental notes. I knew these moments weren’t rare for everyone or in the world of dating, I knew these kinds of heated moments between two people new to each other happened all the time, if you were lucky, but I wanted to memorize everything about it that I could. I would write about this one day, in some story, and I wanted to write as authentically and as real as I could. So I memorized everything I could.
Heart pounding.
Breathless.
He smelled like a mix of light, manly sweat, cologne, and baby powder.
His body was hard, firm against mine.
His hands in my hair.
His lips were soft, but the kiss was hard.
His beard and mustache tickled my face in an arousing manner.
My cheeks were warm.
I ached…down there.
I did all of this while he stared at me.
I began to relive the moment. “I’m sorry about that,” he’d managed after a beat, drawing me from my thoughts of memorizing it all. He was apologizing? Why? Because he thought I hadn’t wanted it? He’d definitely wanted it. I could see it in his eyes.
“Don’t be sorry,” I replied. Did he think I was the kind of woman that would just let something like that happen? I’d been an equal participant. “I was in it, too. I wanted it, too.”
“You going to give us some details, or just sit there smiling like a goon?” Courtney waved her hands in front of me to get my attention.
“We kissed,” I admitted.
All in unison, my friends’ mouths gaped into big O’s. “And?” Kate pressed.
Dropping my gaze to my wine glass, I smiled as I remembered the last kiss Wren and I had shared. It had been gentle and slow, but simple, too. I’d closed my eyes, cataloguing the moment, writing it in my head.
“He’s a great kisser. It was more than I expected,” I answered.
My three friends shared glances at each other as they grinned. “Anything else happen?” Kate waggled her brows.
I rolled my eyes. “Of course not. He said he’d call today, but I haven’t heard from him.”
I let out a sigh as Courtney glanced at her cell phone. “It’s only eight. He’ll call.”
I shrugged, trying to appear indifferent to it. I hadn’t really let myself think about it, knowing if I did, I’d end up driving myself crazy wondering. But it was there, in the back of my mind, like that first tickle of a sore throat that wasn’t enough to call off from work, but enough to bother you.
“Oh, he’ll call,” Kate added obnoxiously, her blue eyes lit with mischief. “He’ll call because he wants,” she paused as she held one hand up like she was holding someone’s ass and motioned her other hand like she was tapping it, then finished with, “dat ass.”
We all laughed. Kate was always the jokester and smartass of our little group. Luckily, the conversation moved on and I was grateful. Not only for the subject change, but for my friends. They meant the world to me, and out of everything I’d lost in the past year or two, I hadn’t lost them, and I knew I never would. And that meant something. It meant everything. They were my family. I didn’t know what I’d do without them. But I had a feeling I’d never have to find out.
My fingers tapped the keys on the keyboard of my laptop as I typed frantically, holding my lip in a death grip between my teeth. I was focused. Totally in. And it felt amazing. I didn’t exactly have a storyline in mind when I’d started writing, just more of a scene. A funny one. A scene where a woman goes on a terrible date and then maces herself in the parking lot. Courtney had been right…it did make for an excellent scene in a story. Perhaps my misfortunes would result in my comeback novel.
“What are you smiling about?” Taz asked as he poked his head in my office.
I hadn’t even realized I was grinning. In the story, my heroine had just looked at herself in the mirror and seen how awful she looked after the hero brought her home. “Just writing a funny scene,” I answered him as I hit save on my document.
“So the writing juices are flowing again, eh?”
I nodded. “At least for today they are.”
“Well keep it up.” He winked at me then disappeared, and I closed out my document and pulled up the Internet. I didn’t know what made me do it, why I even thought about doing it, but I Googled Wren. Maybe I did it because after our second date, which I thought had gone extremely well, he’d said he’d call me the next day. He didn
’t. It was eleven by the time I’d crawled into bed after getting back from Deanna’s, and I’d just pulled the covers up when my phone had dinged. He’d sent me a text saying he’d had a crazy day at work and had just gotten home. I didn’t know how to respond. On one hand, he’d taken the time to text me and at least say something; on the other, he’d said he would call and he didn’t. If he could text, then he could have called as well. But I’d decided to not sweat it. At least not to him. I texted back, telling him I hoped he slept well, but I hadn’t gotten a response. So either he was weird, or I’d read the signs wrong and was hopeless.
The search engine revealed several links and photos and I raised my brows, surprised. I had assumed something would show up—links to his social media pages and address information, but this was beyond that. There was a plethora of sites and links all related to Wren. “What the…” I mumbled to myself.
I clicked on several of the links, reading articles about Wren and his work with Wounded Warriors. He’d been showcased in many magazines and even interviewed on television for his compassion, determination, and hard work with the foundation. As if that wasn’t impressive enough, I watched a few videos he’d created himself, tributes to our country and his fellow brothers-in-arms. The videos were top notch, full of beautiful and tragic images that tugged at my heart. He was good at this. Leaning back in my chair, I squinted my eyes, feeling perplexed. He hadn’t mentioned any of this during our encounters. Not one word. Why hide it? It was amazing. It bothered me a little because clearly, he was incredibly passionate, but I would have never known had I not looked online. Was he just modest? Humble?
