I hadn’t felt that way when I’d broken in. Getting Jason to disarm the security system, borrowing Vincent’s lock pick kit,creeping through the house with Manson and texting some creepy messages had just been part of the game. But I’d played my round and the fact that I was still lingering felt far more invasive than having broken in in the first place.
“I’m not the sit-and-talk type. I’m not usually stuck with someone for this long.” She froze for a moment, and I winced. “I didn’t mean it like that. I’m notstuck. We broke into your fucking house.” I sighed heavily, rubbing a hand over my head. “Do you want me to leave?”
Me, not we. I was the odd one out here with my fucked-up hang-ups. Besides, Jess had never liked me. She’d liked the idea of me, sure, that much was obvious. But me? As a person? That was laughable.
But she shook her head, looking at me like I’d suggested something ludicrous.
“How about you pour a little more wine in that mug and come to the couch,” she said. She laid her hand on my arm, squeezing my bicep slightly before she walked back to the living room. Okay, fine, she’d convinced me. I was going to do this aftercare thing even if it killed me.
I returned to the living room, where Manson was lounging on the couch and Jess had flopped down beside him, munching on her cookies. I gave him his wine and took the remaining side of the couch, sitting stiffly on the pristine white cushions. How could someone live with this much white furniture? I’d dirty it up just by looking at it.
“How much was today worth?” Jess said, taking a sip from her glass as she glanced between us. “That was at least a $1500 fuck, right?”
My post-nut clarity must have been broken, because I almost told her it was worth the cost of our cars and more. I had to gulp down a little more wine to drown those words before I said something I’d regret.
“What do you think, Lucas?” Manson asked. “Maybe four or five?”
I shrugged. “I’d say five. I’m feeling generous.”
“Five hundred?” she said excitedly.
“Fivedollars,” I said, then quickly held my wine out of the way as she launched across the couch, swatting her hand at my head. I caught her wrists and pulled them down, hauling her onto my lap. “Hey, hey, watch it! I wasjoking, girl.”
“Almost made me spill wine on your couch,” Manson said, staring down at the crisp white cushions beneath him with a horrified expression. “I feel like if I get a stain on something in here, I’ll be cursed.”
“Oh, you will be,” she said. “My mom can detect a crumb buried in the carpet from ten yards away. I’ve seen her do it.” She sipped her wine, wiggling her feet slightly. She was a tense little ball on my lap, and now that she was there, I wasn’t sure what to do with her.
“Can your mom detect semen on a kitchen table?” I said, and Jess swatted my chest.
“You’ll both get the curse of a lifetime for that,” she said. To my surprise, she leaned across the couch to grab her cookies and the TV remote, then promptly settled back down on my lap. “I hope you like 15th century Gothic cathedrals because that’s what we’re watching.”
She could have told me we were watching a documentary on the bowel movements of elephants and I still wouldn’t have moved a muscle. Manson moved closer from the far side of the couch, and Jess stretched her legs to rest them on his lap. Her back was against my arm and shoulder as she munched on her cookies and stared at the TV. But as the minutes passed, her shoulders slumped and so did the cookies. Then her head sunk down and rested against my shoulder, a soft sigh melting her body against mine.
I glanced over at Manson for help, but damn it, he’d knocked out too. I hadn’t been able to relax a single muscle, but as Jess’s breathing steadied, I dared to wrap my arm around her.
She fit perfectly. Like a puzzle piece tucked against my side, soft and warm. Her hair smelled sweet and slightly fruity, like strawberries.
But my scent was there too.
26
Jessica
Morning greeted me with the sun warming my bare legs and the twittering of birds. I lay there for a while and watched them flutter through the tree outside my window, eyes half-lidded with comfortable sleepiness, warm and drowsy in my blankets.
I had a vague memory of being carried to bed last night. Lucas cradled me up the stairs, and Manson’s hand cupped the back of my head so it wouldn’t get knocked on the wall in our narrow hallway. I wasn’t sure how late it had been. I’d tried to stay awake, but the moment I settled on Lucas’s lap, my eyes grew so heavy that no amount of willpower could have kept them open.
I’d had more sexual partners in my life than I could count, but I’d never had two men at the same time. Out of all those partners, no one had ever gotten it quite right when they fucked me. Some had come close, sure. But my casual flings and one-night stands still left me with an unscratched itch. A need for something more intense.
But Manson and Lucas played with my mind as much as my body. They wound me up, building the tension, taking their time to set a scene. Breaking into my house, hacking the security system, hiding in my closet…and the way Lucas had begged for Manson’s permission to fuck me, looking at me like he wanted torip me apart…
God, why was that so hot? The way Manson exercised control made it feel like the most natural thing in the world to submit to him — natural, except for the fact that everyone I knew would judge me for it if they found out.
Normal people didn’t do that.
Maybe normal people were boring.
But as I sat up in bed, sighing contentedly at the sunny day outside my window, my satisfaction was shaken. I’d felt this perfect sense of fulfillment before, after that Halloween party almost three years ago. But I’d thrown it all away. I’d decided it wasn’t worth taking risks for.