Back for more, p.11
Back for More, page 11
“Let’s go!” she says as she takes Alecia’s hand and they run for the exit, leaning into each other and laughing.
Neal just nods his head at me and says, “You good?”
“All good. You?”
“Good times.”
Earlier tonight, when I was at his house and we had a rare moment of quiet when the kids were busy entertaining themselves, Neal had only said, “So. Lily’s your assistant.”
To which I’d replied, “Yeah.”
And then he’d said, “Yeah…not gonna say a word.”
It was perfect.
And I suppose I told Lily another little white lie when I said that Neal wanted to surprise Alecia tonight. It was my idea to come here. I just did a good job of making him think it was his idea. No one’s going to regret this night, I’ll see to that.
When we get outside, I spot Alecia and Lily huddled together about half a block down, and when I happen to look up the block, I do a double take when I see a familiar face and get a whiff of Axe body wash.
Douchebag Dan is bounding toward the club, like a fighter about to enter the ring, surrounded by some invisible cheering crowd. It looks like he poured a bottle of olive oil onto his hair. I wish I could take a picture for Kate.
“Hey, man!” he says. “What’s it like in there? Is it hot tonight?”
“Hey, Dan. I’m sure you’ll find what you’re looking for in there. Thought you only frequented clubs in neighboring towns.”
“Getting tired of all the driving.” Which is “Recently Separated Man” speak for “I’ve finally given up hope that my wife will forgive me so I might as well start hooking up locally.” His brows knit together when he looks past me, down the block. “Hey, is that…?”
“Have you met my buddy Neal?” I ask him as I step to the side, trying to block his view of Lily.
Neal shakes Dan’s hand vehemently. “Hey, man. Great to meet you. Smokin’ hot buffet of women. You gotta get in there before the good ones are taken!”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah!” Neal practically shoves him past the bouncer.
I’m pretty sure Dan didn’t get a good look at Lily, but I won’t be mentioning it to her regardless.
I walk over to my truck, which is parked pretty close to where Lily and Alecia are standing. Neal pulls Alecia to their car. We drove here separately. Lily looks over at me, abandoned by her friend.
“You want to go with them?” I ask casually.
She watches Neal and Alecia grind on each other, backed up against the minivan. “I don’t think they’re actually going to make it to the bar.”
“They’ll get there. Eventually.”
I open the passenger-side door for her.
She tilts her head and smiles so sweetly, touching her heart. “Aww, you still have the same truck?”
“I have a car for work, but I will always have my truck.”
“I love this truck.” She runs her hand along the hood of my black 1970 Chevy pickup, and she may as well be running it up my thigh. “You’ve kept it in good shape,” she says, eyeing the white roof. “Looks good.” That flirtatious tone is back, now that she’s had a minute to get her distance from me.
“I take care of the things I care about,” I say.
She gives me a slow blink, resting her hand on my shoulder as she climbs inside and gets settled into the seat. “Yes. You do.”
This lounge is more my speed, and it’s the only bar I come to when I go out for drinks in Belford. It’s got a mellow, sexy vibe—not too hipster, not too classy, zero douchebags and, strangely enough, the best tacos in town.
“Mmmm! These tacos are fantastic!” Lily says with her mouth full. I so rarely get to see her eat, it’s nice to know she can enjoy food. “These are as good as anything I had in LA. How long has this place been around?”
“Three years, maybe.”
The four of us have settled into a booth near the back of the not-too-crowded room. Alecia’s sitting on her husband’s lap across from me, and Lily is at my side. There’s some bearded-guy band playing over the speakers, and I’m just watching Lily eat like it’s a sexy nature show on TV.
“Char’s obsessed with the wig you brought her,” Neal tells Lily. “She didn’t want to take it off when I put her to bed. I was afraid she’d turn her head and suffocate in it or something, so I let her hold it like a stuffed animal. And Spencer played with the baby laptop all night.”
Lily sits up so straight, so proud, you’d think he was presenting her with an Oscar. “Really?” she says. “I’m so glad! I had to have big thick curly blonde hair in a commercial a couple of years ago, and they let me keep the wig. I sewed the cap to make it smaller. I had a feeling she’d like it. And I thought the laptop toy was cute and not too big or noisy.” She looks over at Leesh.
“You did good, Auntie B-face. You did good.”
“Leesh decided to display the cock and beaver on our bedside tables.”
Alecia grins and shrugs. “Just to remind us that we have them.”
Neal and Alecia start kissing again, making it difficult to believe they need a reminder. I guess it’s rare for them to be alone with each other. Not that they’re actually alone, but Lily and I know better than to tell two young parents to behave themselves in public.
Our eyes meet, and we laugh. This is what it would have been like if we’d all hung out together years ago when they were dating. I can tell this is what Lily’s thinking too. When the waitress comes by to ask if she can get us anything else, Neal and I are good with our beers, and Alecia orders a Cosmopolitan. I give Lily a look, trying to silently suggest that maybe she’s had enough to drink tonight. Maybe if she could keep a clear head, we could both enjoy the night a little longer…
She knows exactly what I’m thinking. “Another vodka Greyhound, please,” she says, refusing to meet my gaze. After about a minute of trying to avoid staring at Nealecia’s make-out session, scanning the room, and checking her phone, she finally acknowledges me again. She attempts a defiant expression—one she’s flashed me many times over the years. But I’m not going to push her. If she’s still nervous about us, I’ll make her not nervous.
“So,” I say, stretching my arms out along the back of the vinyl booth seat. “You’re gonna have the mansion to yourself next week.”
“I am?”
“When Vicky’s not there, I mean.”
“Is my dad going somewhere?”
“He’s going to a conference in Seattle. Do you not check his online calendar?”
“No. It never occurred to me.”
“Well, you’ll have to get into the habit of checking all the executives’ calendars. When I need to talk or meet with them, you should be able to tell me—” She puts her hand over my mouth, and I immediately stop talking.
“I will. Leave it at the office,” she reminds me.
“Consider it left.”
When the waitress brings the ladies their drinks, they clink glasses, and Lily guzzles her cocktail—bypasses the straws and just gulps it down. As soon as the waitress passes by again, she orders another one. “I swear, the grapefruit juice just tastes better up here. That doesn’t even make sense, but it does. Everything tastes better.” She shrugs. “I like being around all the evergreen trees again,” she sighs. “I missed the trees. I liked Los Angeles. A lot of interesting people out there, believe it or not. But not very interesting trees.”
Fuck, she’s cute when she’s trying to hide how tipsy she is.
She’s polished off another Greyhound by the time Alecia’s finished her Cosmopolitan—and that’s saying something. Alecia can drink. Lily, I’m not so sure.
“You haven’t given up on acting, have you?”
“I haven’t given up on anything. I’m too stubborn to give up.” She’s trying so hard to be articulate and ladylike. She speaks slowly and has just a hint of a fake English accent, chin tilted up as she looks down her nose at me. “I am gaining expertise in a new area and exploring my options.”
I lean toward her and say, “Excuse me, Madonna, can I speak to Lily Barnes, please?”
She laughs and slaps my arm. “I do not sound like Madonna! This is my Madonna impersonation.” She changes her posture, widens her eyes, flares her nostrils, blinks many times, puffs up her lips, licks her upper lip, and makes her voice more nasal. “It really is good to see you like this now, Wes Carver.”
“Like what? In a blazer?”
“Absolutely. Yes. It’s very good to see you in a blazer.” She starts using her hands to gesture. “But I mean, you know, all grown-up. And an executive. And a success. It’s very impressive. It just makes me want to wear leather and whip you and drizzle candle wax on your bare chest.”
“Okay.”
She drops the impression, covers her mouth, and snort-giggles. “Hang on. I think I have a ball gag in my purse.” She shakes her head. “Nope. Not funny. What time is it?”
“We should probably head out, actually,” Neal says to me. “Let your dad get home.” It’s clear, from the looks on his and his wife’s faces, that they are going to have a quickie in some parking lot in about five minutes.
Alecia puts her hand on Lily’s shoulder. “Is that okay? Do you want us to give you a ride home?”
“Um, no, I don’t want to be in the car with you while you’re humping.”
“You can wait outside the car,” Neal quips. “It’ll only take a minute.”
“Literally,” Alecia says.
“I’ll get a cab,” Lily says.
“I’ll drive you home,” I say as I get up to pay our waitress.
Lily doesn’t respond, but she doesn’t refuse me either.
By the time I’m back at the table, Neal and Alecia have already cleared out, and Lily looks tense.
“You okay?”
“I don’t want my dad to see me like this,” she says. She’s sitting on her hands and biting her lower lip. She looks so young.
“You can stay in my guest room.”
She looks up at me. “Would that be weird?”
“Probably. Would it be weirder for your dad to see you this drunk?”
“I’m not that drunk!” she yells—so loud that everyone else in the place looks at her. Then she slouches down and composes herself before pushing herself up out of the booth. “I don’t even remember how much I’ve had to drink.” She loses her balance when she gets up.
“Whoa there.” I steady her with my hand. “A little too much, I’d say.”
“I’m fine.” She widens her eyes, shuts them tight, and then opens them again. “I’m fine.”
I put my arm around her anyway. “Off we go, then.”
I’ve been driving for about five minutes, and Lily has been sitting perfectly still and silent the entire time.
“Are you okay? Do you feel sick?”
She doesn’t shake her head, but she’s holding on to the door handle with both hands. “I never throw up. Ever—Wait. Pull over.” She covers her mouth.
I pull over immediately—fortunately there’s no one driving behind us. She flies out the door and throws up in a bush by a parking lot, holding her own hair back before I even have a chance to get out and do it for her. “Don’t look at me!” she calls out in between retches. I decide she’d probably prefer it if I wait in the truck. She’s a very quiet and elegant barfer. Figures.
I hand her a Kleenex box when she returns.
“Feel better?”
“Mmmhmm. I didn’t throw up.”
“Good.”
“Can I have that water?”
I pick up the water bottle from the cup holder and hand it to her. She takes it, opens the door, and goes outside again. I watch as she gurgles with the water and spits it out into the bush that she hurled into. When she gets back into the truck, I have an open tin of Altoids waiting for her. “Not that you have any reason to freshen your breath, but would you care for a curiously strong mint?”
She laughs and nods her head. “I would indeed, thanks ever so much.” She pops a mint into her mouth and sighs. “Fuck this night.” She punches the passenger door.
“Hey. Don’t punch my truck.”
“Sorry.”
“Why fuck this night? I like this night.” I step on the gas pedal again, driving very slowly.
She covers her face with her hands.
“You feel sick again?”
Her voice is muffled. “I’m embarrassed.”
“Why? Because you got sick?”
“Everything.”
“You don’t have anything to be embarrassed about.”
She nods her head.
“Not with me.”
“Only with you. Because of you.”
I pull over to the side of the road again. Not because I expect her to vomit but because I need to give her my full attention. “Lily.” I touch her hand, the one that’s closest to me, and try to pull it from her face. She resists. “What are you talking about?”
She finally uncovers her face and rests her head back against the headrest, looking up. I can see that those brown eyes are about to spill over.
“Talk to me.”
“It’s you…”
“Yeah. It’s me.”
“No, I mean…you do this to me. It’s humiliating. I feel humiliated because…” She sniffles and wipes her nose with the back of her hand. “I don’t know why, but…” She swallows hard before continuing. “You make me feel more like me than anyone else I know. You know?”
“Yeah. I know.”
“And I hate that.” She laughs and wipes her nose with the back of her hand again.
I hold up the Kleenex box for her again.
She swipes at a tissue and groans. “God. This is not hot.”
“Would it be weird if I said it is?”
She blows her nose into the Kleenex while laughing. “Yes.” She balls up the Kleenex in her fist, leans against the headrest, and finally looks over at me. “I just…” Her voice cracks. “I just feel like every decision I’ve made since I met you has been wrong.” Her head snaps away from me again. “I can’t believe I’m saying this.” She rests her elbow against the door and covers half her face with one hand. “Why do you do this to me?”
“Whatever it is that I do to you, Lily, you do the same to me. Probably even more so.”
“I doubt that very much.”
God, I want to kiss her. I want to reach over and put one hand on the back of her neck and turn her face toward me with the other, and I want to give her a soft, tender kiss that will make her feel wanted and beautiful and perfect, but I know that it would only make her feel worse because she just tossed her cookies. And she’d want our first soft, tender kiss to be perfect.
So I will kiss her softly, and tenderly, with words.
“I promise you. Anything you’ve ever felt, I’ve felt it too. If it was a mistake for us to deny those feelings, then we made mistakes. If it’s a mistake for us to act on those feelings sooner rather than later, then we’ll make those mistakes too. But you don’t ever have to be embarrassed about being yourself with me. I know you.” I grin. “And I like you anyway.”
Tears are streaming down her face. I don’t know what it is about this truck that makes this girl cry. I don’t know what it is about seeing this girl crying in my truck, in the moonlight, that makes me feel this way, but I know now that I’ll do anything for her. I’ll build her a gazebo, a home, a garden, a family. I’ll tear down every wall she’s ever built around herself so she can see that she’s not alone.
The unfurling of her blossoms may be a little awkward and uneven, but it’s time for this Lily to bloom.
Later, I turn on the lamp on the bedside table in the guest room, finally leading Lily to the bed after following her all over the house while she stomped around, trying to find the cat, like a stubborn toddler. Then I’d waited outside the guest bathroom while she was in there gargling with mouthwash for what felt like half an hour, because I was afraid she’d fall asleep on the floor or something. When she came out of the bathroom, she had asked me to text her dad from her phone to tell him that she’s spending the night at Alecia’s house. Then she asked if I had any gluten-free cookies. I don’t.
She collapses onto the bed and lifts her leg in the air. “Can you take off my shoes?” The sudden switch to a seductive tone catches me off guard. She stretches her arms overhead and points her toes as she smiles at me lazily, her eyelids heavy.
I step forward and wrap one hand around her slender ankle, bending her leg to rest the bottom of her shoes against my chest. I hold her gaze while unbuckling the thin strap. When I pull the shoe off her foot, letting the shoe drop to the floor, I stroke the skin on the arch of that pretty foot with my fingers and watch her quiver. As I massage her from her heel to the ball of her foot, she moans, squeezing her thighs together and writhing around. I repeat each action with her other foot, silently cursing her for drinking so much, because if she was even half this intoxicated, we’d both be naked and doing fantastic things to each other right now.
She reaches behind herself, raising her lower back so she can unzip her tight skirt. When it’s unzipped, she looks up at me again and waits for me to pull it off her. I take hold of that skirt at her waist and tug down quickly, causing her to gasp and then bite her lower lip. My knuckles drag along the sides of her long, toned legs as I pull it down to her ankles and then place the skirt on top of the bed beside her.
Her panties are white and lacy, and God help me, they are staying on her as long as I’m in this room.
She sits up and raises her arms in the air. Her top is tight and scoop necked, and the only reason I’m going to help her take it off is that I know she’s wearing a bra under there. I peel it up off her torso and over her head, ripping it off like a Band-Aid. Her bra matches her panties, and her pink nipples are hard and poking at the white lace, and fuck me I’m getting out of here. She just can’t stop torturing me.
She brings her arms in close to her sides and thanks me. I hand her a glass of water and an ibuprofen, which she swallows dutifully.
I pull the comforter and sheets down, and she crawls under them, cozying up to the pillow, and then I turn off the light because I can’t look at her anymore.
