Before she can answer him, the sound of a car door outside has her scrambling off of his lap and straightening her dress, which had ridden up nearly to her ass. Trevor pulls a pillow over his lap, and I slide closer to the edge of the couch as the three of us exchange looks.
Lindsey and Kelly come in, and even though I’ve never met them, I know who is who just from having heard Autumn talk about them. Autumn introduces the two women to me, and I’m reminded that they already know Trevor from when he was here last night stripping for all of them.
With wide eyes and arched brows, the roommates look from Autumn to Trevor to me, and back again. Their expressions of disbelief are so extreme, it’s almost comedic.
“What are you all doing here?” Lindsey asks.
“Just hanging out,” Autumn says with a false tone of pleasantness.
Her two roommates gape for another moment before they finally exit up the stairs.
“Maybe you’d better go,” Autumn tells us. She looks disturbed now, as if it bothers her that she almost got caught, or maybe she’s waking up from a haze she was in, and this whole situation now feels strange.
That’s how it feels to me, anyway, though I don’t want the night to end.
9
Autumn
“Are you up for lunch today?” Garrett asks, sticking his head into the cubicle where I’m setting up a monitor for a new salesperson who’s starting tomorrow.
His voice sounds relatively normal, but his eyes are cautious.
I’m relieved that he’s asking, because I don’t want things to change between us, even though I know things already have changed.
“Sure,” I say, aiming to keep my tone light. “I’ll be ready in a minute.”
We opt for the Chinese buffet today, and I notice that neither of us fills our plate as much as we typically do. At the table, we’re both quiet as we eat, until he says, “Are you okay?” at the same time that I ask, “Is everything okay?”
The coincidence of timing is the tension breaker we needed, and we both laugh, our eyes meeting and holding for an extra beat.
“That was weird last night, wasn’t it?” I say once we’re quiet again.
“Every single minute,” he says with a familiar smile that helps to calm my nerves.
“I never expected any of that.”
“But you enjoyed it?” he asks.
After taking a drink of my iced tea, I say, “I think I was just worked up after watching the show at the club.”
He gives a short nod. “You don’t regret anything, do you?”
I’m quick to answer. “No, but I have been wondering how far things would have gone if Kelly and Lindsey hadn’t come home when they did.”
Again he nods, and I get the impression that he’s been wondering that too.
His tone is careful when he asks, “Would you have wanted things to go further?”
I’ve been tortured by that question. So many years a virgin, and wanting my first time to be with a special person, but I was so caught up in it all last night that I’m afraid I might have let things progress anywhere the men wanted to go, and I’m pretty sure I would have enjoyed it all very much.
At the same time, I’m embarrassed about having an orgasm right in front of Garrett. Who does that? And in the way it happened … I can’t even bear to think about it.
“I don’t know,” I say finally. “Further feels like a big step, though I could have seen myself getting carried away.”
Garrett sets down his chopsticks and looks at me, his expression serious. “This may or may not be the right time to tell you, but I have always … had a thing for you. Ever since you started,” he adds.
Ever since I started? “Why didn’t you tell me?” His kiss was pretty amazing, and I’m immediately saddened by the thought that we could have been doing that for the past two years.