by Nella Tyler
“Maybe,” I said.
For a moment, it was quiet. We watched each other across the table, and I felt like we were two animals somewhere in nature evaluating the other, determining whether there was interest. I wanted to eliminate the table, eliminate the space between us. I wanted so much more than I could have.
I cleared my throat. “Um, let me get your plate.”
I cleared the dishes into the sink, resolving to do them later. When she went home, I could do them. The night was still young, and I didn’t want to send her home. Judging by the way she leaned up against the counter and looked at me, she wasn’t exactly on her way out the door either.
“Can I get you a glass of wine?” I asked. I opened the small wine cabinet next to the sink.
“That would be lovely,” she replied.
“Any preference?”
“Whatever you suggest.”
I smiled. I didn’t know my wines as well as, say, my father or some of my coworkers, but I knew them better than the average person. I could taste the difference between a seven-dollar bottle of wine and a seventy-dollar bottle, and it was something closer to the latter that I procured from the cabinet.
“Could I get a tour of the house?” Briella asked.
I glanced up from uncorking the bottle. I hadn’t expected her to ask for a tour; if anything, I thought it would be something she’d hate. I didn’t want to flagrantly flaunt my wealth. But she was asking, and I was more than happy to oblige her.
“Of course,” I said. I poured her a glass of wine and one for myself, as well.
“I’d wander alone, but then I wouldn’t know the story behind it,” Briella said. She walked close to me, hand brushing mine, and I took her hand in mine, finally. She smiled; I’d done what she wanted.
“Oh, not too much story,” I said. “Of course, this is the kitchen.” I led her the short distance to the dining room. “The dining room, which goes horribly underused.”
Briella scanned the room with an appreciation that made my heart warm.
“This way is a sort of home office,” I said, walking towards the area. “Although I do most of my work in the bedroom.”
She raised an eyebrow at me, and I laughed. “I have a desk there,” I explained.
“Gotcha.” She grinned back at me and took a sip of wine.
I led her through the bottom floor, showing her the dining room, the office, the music room with the piano and couches, the library, the TV room, and the living room. I led her upstairs next to show her the rest; a few bedrooms, a few bathrooms, another TV room, and I saved the second living area for last.
“This is my favorite room in the house,” I explained before I opened the door. “It’s the perfect place to think.”
She stepped in, and I heard her audibly gasp.
We’d stepped into the window room. It was laid out like a regular room, but it sat out from the rest of the house slightly. Because of the way it jutted out, the sides had been replaced with strong windows. Wherever someone sat in the room, they could look out onto the beach and see the sun or moon setting over the ocean, depending on the time of day. Briella walked up to the far end of the room and stood just in front of the glass, setting her wine glass on the table.
I set mine down, too. The sunset’s glow on her skin made her radiate with a kind of beauty I didn’t feel worthy of witnessing. Carefully, and yet somehow confidently, I set my hands on her waist as she looked out onto the beach.
She turned to face me. I expected a reprimand for my actions, and instead, she leaned up and pressed her mouth to mine.
Chapter Fourteen
Briella
I kissed Dexter with the full intent of perhaps never pulling away. His hands nearly burned on my hips and I pulled myself slightly closer to him, hoping to decrease distance.
I’d only had a half a glass of wine. This wasn’t drunk logic; I was attracted to him, helplessly and entirely, and I could only hope that he felt the same way.
The way he tugged me closer by the waist made me believe that he did. One of his hands moved up and into my hair, and he ran a hand carefully through the curls and tilted my head to the side with his so that he could kiss my jaw. I nearly went weak as his lips found my neck. I expected sloppiness, I expected carelessness. Instead, he stamped careful, strong kisses on to my skin.
I could feel the mark he left at the base of my neck.
My fingers had wound up in the buttons of his shirt by some accident of divine providence, and I undid one to test the waters. He didn’t stop me, and I thought I felt him smile for a moment. I undid another, and he guided me backward.
He sat down on the couch, and I settled unabashedly into his lap. I undid the last of the buttons on his shirt and slid the garment off his shoulders; in turn, he pushed the straps of my dress off my shoulders and ran his hands down my arms. When they met my hands, he held them both away from me and pressed a kiss to my collarbone.
I leaned forward to kiss that jawbone that had so tempted me over the last few days. There was a gentle scruff to his neck, like he’d shaved the day before and it was just now starting to grow back. He found the zipper on the back of my dress and undid it, and I felt cool air hit my bare skin as the dress fell away.
His hands were quick to follow. I wanted to melt against him. He held my waist, ran his hands around to my back, and I stood up for a moment to kick the dress off entirely. When I did, I looked at him, met his eyes.
He looked hungry. His eyes held so much want and desperation that I returned to his lap with a little more confidence than before. I rolled my hips down against his and Christ, I could tell that he had an erection. I unbuckled his pants at the same time that his hands found my bra fastening, and he didn’t fumble at all. I tossed the garment to the side and undid the buckle, the button, the zipper.
I sat back for a moment so that he could get his pants down. The flat of my hand met his crotch, and I palmed his erection through his boxers. The sound he made against my mouth drove a need to my core. His warm hands held my breasts, and I gasped when he pulled my nipples; he knew exactly what he was doing to me. The quiet laugh he made said that much.
I yanked his underwear down and resisted the urge to pull back and stare unabashedly at his dick. I pulled my hips down against his again, and I became a bit worried. We would need lube, probably; I hadn’t had sex in some time. I didn’t want to wait another second to do this, though.
As if he could tell that we were rushing, Dexter started to reposition us. He wrapped an arm around me, holding me close to him, and started to lower me back so that he hovered over me. I felt so small beneath him, but also incredibly safe and protected. He started to kiss my neck again, and I reached my hands down between us.
When I wrapped my hand around him, he groaned against my neck, and I nearly lost my mind. I began to stroke him, firmly but not too harshly, and he went still for a moment. I worried that everything would end too soon, but he continued his trail down my neck. When he met my chest, I couldn’t reach him anymore, so I settled on wrapping my fingers in his hair.
He kissed my breasts carefully, almost politely, and I wondered whether this was where he got sheepish. Instead, he brought one hand up to my other breast at the same time that his other hand slipped beneath my underwear. A moan escaped me, and his teeth tugged at the sensitive flesh on my nipple.
He tugged my underwear away and began to familiarize himself with the territory. I shamelessly pressed my hips up into his hand, and when I did, his fingers brushed against that sensitive button I’d been trying to angle him towards. I jumped, and he backed away for a moment.
“D-don’t stop,” I assured him.
He made slow, trailing circles around it for a time, until I started to grit my teeth. He bit my chest again, and I yelped; then he pulled his finger across the bud in a quick motion that made my hips push up. This slow torture of my body drove me to forget that we were in a room full of windows; the possibility that someone could see us di
dn’t even bother me.
One of his fingers pressed inside me. Then, after a few seconds, another, and my fingers gripped the sofa beside me as he slowly, agonizingly, pumped his digits in and out of me. His thumb would every so often brush my clit and soon, hips bucking, I climaxed, clamping down on his fingers until I’d come down from my high.
We weren’t through. Dexter leaned over and grabbed his pants from the floor; he produced a condom from the pocket, and I couldn’t help but note the cockiness he’d had in keeping a condom on his pants in the first place. It didn’t matter. I wanted him desperately. He rolled the condom over himself and pushed my knees apart with one of his legs.
The balance in the urgent way he handled me and the attention he paid my body wasn’t lost on me. He stroked himself a few times, and I bit my lip, unable to comprehend how unbearably sexy he looked leaned against the sofa like that.
He came back to lean over me again and kissed me. He set one hand on my waist and the other in my hair, knotting his fingers there.
His hips pushed forward, and he slid into me with little resistance.
“Fuck,” he gasped, the expletive lost in the space of our open kiss. I tilted my head back and moaned as he pressed further, and then backed away. He pushed back in, and like this, slowly, he worked his way fully inside me.
Our breathing was coarse, and his pupils were dilated, mouth partly open in complete and total want. I held on to his shoulders, and he began to move, finding a rhythm easily. He moved one of his hands between us to add to my pleasure, and I found myself moving my hips to meet his, our moans accentuating the motions we made, lost to the throes of what this felt like.
“Soon,” he warned me, though there was no need to do so with a condom.
It was too late. I could already feel my pleasure peaking, and when I clenched around him, it triggered his own climax. He shouted into the crook of my neck, nearly pulling my hair too hard as he spent himself.
For a moment, we lay motionless, trying only to breathe. He moved out of me and pulled me to sit up. I sat in his lap, leaned against him, face planted in his chest.
I didn’t know what to say. He didn’t, either, judging by his silence, though he might have also been trying to piece together a coherent thought. I couldn’t remember the last time that someone touched me like that. I couldn’t remember the last time someone held me like this, even though I knew we both needed to clean up.
It was that need that eventually drove him to get up. “I’ll be back,” he murmured, and he kissed my cheek. I knew where the bathrooms were, so I wandered off to go find one, too.
When I looked at myself in the mirror, I shook my head. My hair, for one, was a complete mess. I could already feel a soreness coming on; we hadn’t had the ability to wait, but we ought to have used lube, but honestly, I wouldn’t have changed a thing. The skin on the base of my neck was spotted with hickeys, as were my breasts, and I had marks on my hips where he’d grabbed me.
I felt thoroughly and completely had, and I loved it. I shook my head at myself and my condition. I wanted that again.
My stomach twisted. I turned the sink on and splashed my face with cold water. I wanted that again, and it couldn’t happen. I’d known that going into it, hadn’t it? Everything that we did here was temporary. A fun vacation fling that wasn’t meant to carry on for more than a week or so.
All I could think about was the want in his eyes when he took me. The powerful way he held himself over me.
This was a mistake. I took a deep breath and forced my tears down. This entire thing was a mistake. I shouldn’t have ever gone on a second date with him. It wasn’t wrong for me to want a bit of fun over a vacation, but that’s not what I wanted with Dexter. I didn’t want to leave him behind and never speak to him again. But that’s what I had to do. Anything that I did that prolonged that was cruel to both of us.
I used a washcloth to scrub myself where I needed to be clean. I went back into the room and put my dress on, tucking my underwear into my bra; it wasn’t completely ruined, and leaving it in his trash can would be gross.
I could still get back to my room and save myself from this.
Dexter walked back into the room wearing sweatpants and a T-shirt. His hair was a mess, too, and his face was more relaxed than it had been. “Hey. You’re leaving?”
I bit the inside of my cheek. “Yeah. Um, I had a good time. Thank you for, you know, everything.” I had a good time? Thank you for everything? This guy just fucked you out of your senses and you’re acting like he took you to go see a bad movie!
He balked a little, but quickly forced his face into something more understanding. He was trying to accommodate me even now. “You don’t have to leave. If you don’t want to, I mean. I have some shorts and shirts that might work for one night. You’re welcome to stay.”
It would have been easier somehow to hear him tell me that he didn’t want me there. “Yeah, I just, I should be getting back.”
Dexter’s brow furrowed. His face read confusion and hurt, but he said, “Okay. I understand.”
Without another word, I scuttled out of the house as though I had been caught trespassing.
Chapter Fifteen
Dexter
I woke up the next morning to someone knocking at my door. I hoped, naively, that it might be Briella. She hadn’t left anything over the night before to reclaim, and she’d made it quite clear that she didn’t want to stay, but I still hoped that it was her. My mind was still reeling from that entire exchange. I’d gone from certain that she wanted to stay with me to uncertain that she even liked me, and we’d slept together.
Even knowing that it probably couldn’t be Briella, I got the door. Tyler was there, wearing work clothes, which was odd for him to do on a Friday. He almost always skipped Fridays to go do something with his band or see other bands—I didn’t know the particulars, just that Fridays were usually busy for me because he skipped them.
“Dude, this is ridiculous,” he said.
“Good morning.” I returned. He walked in, and I went to the kitchen to make myself a cup of coffee. I didn’t even really need the caffeine; I felt rested enough. Still, I wanted some kind of routine to start feeling normal.
“Good morning, my ass,” Tyler snapped. “I had to go up to work every day this week.”
“Not every day. Was it Monday you skipped?”
“Almost every day. I’ve been up there busting my ass. Dad’s breathing down my neck about every fucking thing I do.”
I shrugged, unable to be too sympathetic. It was what I usually dealt with, after all. “Sorry, man. Did he set you up with any bullshit accounts?”
“No, I’ve just been getting more work than I usually do and he’s been holding me to a higher standard than usual.” Tyler shook his head. “Yesterday he bitched at me for like an hour about some technical issue I made in an email I sent to a client. I got bitched at for comma usage.”
That earned a cringe from me. I plopped a sugar cube in my coffee and sat up on the barstool. “Sorry.”
“Yeah, you’re sorry. It’s because you’re gone. You need to come back so I can get a little of this taken off my shoulders.” Tyler shook his head again and sat down on a barstool next to me. “Honestly, it’s driving me crazy. I just want to go back to not giving a fuck. What the hell have you been up to, anyway?”
I wondered how much I should tell him. There was a chance Briella didn’t want to see me again, and Tyler didn’t know her or her family, so there was really little risk in telling him about the night before. “That girl I told you about, Briella?”
“Yeah, yeah, the one you’re being insufferable about.”
“Yeah. Fuck off,” I added, as a defense to his insult. “But yeah. She came over last night and we, um, we sort of slept together.”
“Look at you go!” Tyler clapped me on the back. “I’m proud of you, dude. Getting a little from a tourist. That’s risky; I like it. You need to be doing shit like that more often.”
I raised my eyebrow at the predatory tone he took. I didn’t like to think of women as means to act up or as conquests to have, and I even further hated the insinuation that Briella was a conquest or means to act up. Still, I was glad to have Tyler’s approval on the matter, gross as his approval might be.
Something else that he said stuck out, though. ‘Tourist.’ Briella was a tourist. She was on vacation. She was going to go back to Houston, and there wasn’t anything I could do to get her to stay. We were hardly in love, and it wasn’t like I was about to force her to stay with me, but she was going to leave. I didn’t know that I could bear the pain that it would bring when she did. I didn’t want to think about how awful it would be to see her walk out of my life, especially because it would probably be followed be a forced marriage to someone I didn’t like very much.
I wanted to change the subject. “Hey, um, something weird also happened at work recently.”
“What? You had sex with a stranger last night, and you want to talk about work?”
I raised my eyebrows at him.
“Christ. Maybe you and Tiffany would be better off than you think,” Tyler grumbled. “Sure, what’s your story?” he asked with all the enthusiasm of someone watching a documentary on drying paint.
It was actually something I’d been meaning to talk to him about. “There was this account, I don’t remember the name, but this guy came in asking for an investment on something. Dad turned him down, and I couldn’t figure out why.”
“Probably something to do with his credit.”
“It wasn’t, though,” I said. “I checked everything. We’ve approved dozens of accounts and investments just like it, except….” Suddenly it sounded ridiculous, but I was determined to figure out whether or not I was right about this. “Except this guy was black.”
“Okay?”
I sighed. “So, do you think Dad turned the account down because the guy is black?”
“Duh.”
The frankness of the answer caught me by surprise. Tyler didn’t look phased. He looked like he’d just confirmed that the sky was blue. I set my coffee mug down and shook my head. “Wait, wait. Dad’s always been racist?”
