Sixteen
“Oh, my.” She traced
her finger over the fresh, orange-sized bruise he had on his left
hip. “Did you forget to wear your safety equipment?”
“After what just
happened, I should definitely get some,” he agreed.
His hair was
adoringly rumpled. (Adoringly? Hair can be adoringly rumpled? If she had heard some other
ninny say it, she would have laughed herself sick.)
He glanced down and
saw the bruise she was gently stroking. “Oh, that. Yeah. When you
had your crying jag in the Starbucks at Barnes—”
“It was not a
jag.”
“I got up to go with
you and knocked into one of those big old display
cases.”
“Ouch.” She took a
closer look; it was closer to grapefruitsized than orange-sized.
“That must have hurt.” She had great respect for injuries suffered
by those not of the Pack. How could they tolerate days and days of
healing? Wasn’t it maddening? Agony? The continual pain, the way
the marks took so long to go away, the incapacitation . . . and
they had to eat medicine! If it was a
terrible injury, they had to eat medicine or they would get an
infection and die. Infection sounded
like a terrible thing. She didn’t know how they tolerated it. “Do
you need a doctor?”
“For that?” He
laughed, a cheerful, sunny sound. Strange to associate sunny with Edward when right now, at close to
midnight, it was anything but. “Jeez, Rachael, I’m a severe wimp,
but not that big a wimp.”
She sat up so
abruptly he nearly went sprawling. “Who called you that? Where are
they?” She glanced around the dark room as if looking for the
insensitive bullying moron who dared . .
. who would actually call someone so wonderful . . . call
them a . . .
“I called me that.
Whoa, calm down. What? Didn’t bother me any. You should see my
friend Boo. Did you ever see Zombieland
?”
She shook her head.
She liked the way he was staring at her breasts while speaking
casually. She liked the way she could smell his desire flare up
when seconds earlier it had been barely banked coals.
“No? Deprived woman!
Okay, we’ll Netflix it. I haven’t unpacked all my DVDs yet. Anyway,
there’s a character in Zombieland,
Tallahassee, and he’s described as a guy who ‘sets the standard for
not to be fucked with.’ That’s my friend Boo.”
“Hard to imagine
ferocity from someone named Boo.”
“That’s the trick,
y’see. Nobody ever sees her coming. She likes it like
that.”
She started to ask if
she would meet his friend, then thought, Why
would I? We’ve only just met. We have lives waiting for us in
Massachusetts. We probably won’t see each other much now that we’ve
scratched our itch.
Then she thought,
We reside in the same area now, and when we go
back to our lives, we’ll also live near each other. Does it mean
something?
She shoved the
thoughts away—long-term relationship planning was not generally a
Pack strength unless a pregnancy was involved. The imperative to
start and raise a family was strong, even more so than for humans.
“And you?” She was trailing her fingers from the bruise, across his
stomach, up his ribs . . . “What do you like?”
“Uh . .
.”
Over his nipples,
back down his stomach, following his dark blond treasure trail (a
description she had always found silly but apt), down into the
thatch at his groin.
“Edward?”
“Sorry, I can’t hear
you over the rush of blood in my ears.” He shook his head as if to
clear it and she laughed again. She couldn’t remember the last time
she’d laughed so much, or been so physically satisfied. “The harder
I get, the more I can actually sense my IQ dropping. It’s kind of
cool and terrifying at the same time.”
But how satisfied was
she, how sated, if she was ready to go back for seconds? If they
both were?
Maybe it’s about more than scratching an
itch.
And maybe not. “Ah, the trials and tribulations of
walking around with a penis.”
“I know! You have no
idea what we menfolk endure.”
Maybe he’s your mate. Oh, now there was a silly
thought. They barely knew each other. And yes, other Pack members
occasionally took non-Pack to mate, but it was rare. And Edward . .
. they’d eat him alive, so to speak, if she brought him
home.
Maybe this is home now.
It isn’t! This was never meant to be a permanent living
situation! I have a life, a job, family to return to. Anything
else—everything else—is just a distraction.
She forced a smile.
“You’re not fooling me, you know.”
“Huh?” His voice was
getting thick with desire.
“I know you want
me.”
This time he was the
one to laugh, and she loved how his joy affected the urgent tang to
his scent, like strawberries and balsamic vinegar. You’d never
think the two would pair well, but the result was surprisingly
strong.
And
sweet.
“What gave it away?
When earlier I said, ‘Oh my God, oh my God, you’re so wet’ or when
I applied my penis to your—”
“Oh, God. Please stop
that.” She covered her face. “Applied? Don’t ever say applied when discussing mating.”
“Don’t do that.” He
gently grabbed her wrists and pulled them away. “You’re way, way
too gorgeous to ever cover that face.”
“That’s irrelevant.”
And it was. She had no power over how she looked. It seemed silly
to get credit for something she had nothing to do
with.
“Don’t you know,
Rachael? Didn’t anybody tell you? You’re so beautiful.” He stroked
his thumb across her right eyebrow and tucked a strand of hair
behind her ear. “You’re just so beautiful.”
“Irrelevant,” she
said again, feeling the blood climb into her face. Blushing like a ninny, very attractive. Next you’ll
swoon. “But you’re sweet to say so.”
“In your lexicon,
sweet translates to stud, right?”
“Oh,
yes.”
“Called it! And I’m
standing by my implication that figuring out you’re making me
massively horny doesn’t exactly qualify you for
Mensa.”
“Just for that,” she
teased, “no oral sex for you.”
“Nooooooooo!” He had
shaken his fists at the ceiling, startling the shit out of her.
“Like that? That’s my Darth Vader nooooo! and did you notice that I did it a hundred
times better than stupid Hayden Christensen? Hey, I wanted the guy
to do well, okay? I wanted him to nail it. But he
just—”
“Please stop talking
about Darth Vader and fuck me.”
“Wow. Torn between
two lovers. On the one hand—yeeek! Oh, you’re gonna pay for that
one.”
“I hope
so.”