What did he mean, though? So long, like for years, like I had wanted him? Or just for hours, just that night? At the time, I didn’t think to ask myself that question, but I’ve wondered ever since.
I wasn’t thinking at all. I could feel his hard-on pressing my belly. It set me on fire. I ground against him. We kissed like thirsty people who finally found water. He clutched my ass, kneaded it and held me tight to him so he could thrust against my belly.
Mick broke the kiss, only to move to my earlobe, which he sucked into his mouth, and then to kiss his way down my neck to the first button of my shirt. He looked up at me, and probably saw that I would let him do anything. He unbuttoned my blouse, kissing along the trail of each button, until he’d exposed my bra. All the while, we were grinding against one another. I could feel my center softening, swelling, becoming sensitive to the friction of my clothes, the seam of my jeans that was rubbing me. The room, the party, all the people, the sounds--everything disappeared and my stepbrother and I were the only ones on earth.
For a minute, he nuzzled my breasts through the fabric of my bra, but this was not enough for him. He opened the front latch of the bra, and pushed the cups back, exposing my bare breasts to the cool air. This was the first time that any man had ever seen my naked breasts, and of course I was self conscious about them. But Mick murmured, “Oh, beautiful,” and kissed one. The left one, right above the nipple. Then he pulled the nipple into his mouth and sucked, making a sound deep in his throat that made me almost desperate with need.
My hands went first to his hair, but I kept feeling his cock rubbing against me and.... I had never seen a cock before. I could feel it, a long ridge, so hard that I understood why they call a hard cock “wood.” But just feeling it rubbing against my belly wasn’t enough. I drew my hands down his back and then, aft
er a pause to gather my courage, brought one around to his front. I pulled my hips back, and with my fingertips only, I stroked him through his pants. This pulled a groan from his throat, and he raised his head from my breast and looked into my eyes. He looked amazed. I became bolder and used more of my hand to rub his cock up and down as he gazed at me. I wanted to see it though, and I reached for his zipper.
He frowned and grabbed my wrist. “Wait,” he whispered. He lowered his head, frowning—he was listening.
My stepdad was calling from somewhere, calling,”Mick!” and then, sounding annoyed, “No, I don’t know where they are, Linda. Mick!”
Mick drew in a quick breath and then seemed to wake up, as if he’d been in a dream. He pulled the two sides of my shirt together. “Damn it,” he said. “Go in the bathroom and clean up. Your lipstick.... I’ll go out there and keep anybody away.” He kissed my forehead and was gone.
I did as he said, and rejoined the party, looking for Mick. When I saw him, he caught my eye and shook his head no. I knew he meant “stay away,” and wondered if anyone had said anything to him about me. Did the parents suspect? I didn’t know. He was surrounded by people for the rest of the party, and then I heard him tell my mother he was going to bed.
The next morning, he was gone. My mom said he’d decided to go back to school early and get some work done. That was the last I saw of him for seven years, until the night of our blind date. He didn’t come home for breaks any more until I went to college, and then he only visited his dad when I was away.
I was crushed. All I had meant to him was an evening of fun, an evening that was interrupted before he got what he wanted from me. After a while, I taught myself to be relieved, even glad that we’d been interrupted and it hadn’t gone further.
But I was still changed. None of the college boys I dated could compare to my mental image of Mick. He would always be the ideal I matched every man against, and of course, every man came up short because my image of Mick wasn’t real. It contained none of his flaws, and none of the pain he’d caused me. I felt like I couldn’t tell anyone about him because he was my stepbrother. Even Shannon, who was as close as a sister, would have freaked out and said I was a pervert.
And now here we were. Dating. Okay, he didn’t know it was me, but our connection was real. Sometimes I wondered if the real Mick was measuring up to the image I still had enshrined in my heart.
Of course the big problem for me was that I was lying, and lying to someone I cared about more and more all the time. I didn’t want to be that kind of person. We’d met for lunch several times, for a drink after work once or twice, and always I had some reason that kept me from being alone with him. Work, or the fact that they were doing major renovations to my building, anything. Because a kiss in public was okay, though our public kisses were getting bolder all the time. A kiss in public could be seen as a sisterly kiss. In a way.
If we were alone together again, I didn’t trust myself not to let things go much farther than a kiss. And then what? I couldn’t keep this secret forever. Part of me was on edge every time we were together, waiting for him to slap his forehead and realize the true identity of the woman beside him. Soon I would slip up. Or someday, if this kept going so great, he’d want to meet my family. It just seemed like it was still harmless if we didn’t have sex. Once we crossed that line, then my lie would become huge. A much bigger deal than if all he’d done was just kiss his “little sister.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Mick
Casey and I were headed out for a big night, and I was in my monkey suit, driving the damn Prius to her office to pick her up. I kept thinking about lying, about the lie I told every minute that we were together, basically. I still hadn’t come clean about my real career and my true net worth. I had just wanted to find a girl who could look past that and see the real me, but what sounded like a good plan had backfired big-time.
When I got to the address she’d given me, I was pretty impressed. I’d expected a little hole in the wall, but this was a nicely-restored old building right on the river. I could see her through the panes of the glass door to her office, peering at a computer screen, tapping away. She was still hard at work, well past five. Good girl.
She stood up when I walked in, big smile on her face. “You look amazing in a tuxedo!” she said, and came around her desk to give me a hug.
Ah, that was relaxing, to feel her arms around me and her body pressed against me. Well, relaxing for a minute anyway, and then it turned into the opposite of relaxing. I wanted to kiss her, but she pulled away.
“I have to finish this grant proposal. I think it will only take another few minutes. Can you hang out for a bit? Soon I’ll get changed and we can go.”