12. Jefferson
CHAPTER 12
JEFFERSON
I have my hand on Harlow’s low back, escorting her out of the restaurant after dinner when I see Zach and a couple of friends lingering by their cars.
I don’t know what they’re doing. It doesn’t matter.
I lean in and say near her ear, “Just so you know, when we get to my truck, I’m going to kiss you.”
She jerks to a stop and looks up at me. “Excuse me?”
I smile down at her, playing the part of adoring boyfriend, having an intimate conversation with the woman he’s madly in love with. I lift my hand and brush her hair back from her cheek. “Zach is out here. So I’m going to kiss you.”
“We don’t have to be kissing and all over each other every time he’s around.”
But I notice that she’s breathing a little faster.
I cup her cheek. “Oh, but we do.”
Suddenly, she gets a sly look in her eye, then flattens her palm on the lapel of my jacket and runs it up and down. From a distance at least it looks like we’re discussing something friendly. “Why is that?”
“Because if you were my girlfriend and your ex was in town and interested in getting you back, I would be doing everything I could to show him that you are very taken.” I slide my hand from her cheek down her neck, then skim it down her back, still loving all the bare skin this dress shows off. When I get to her ass, I cup it and bring her closer.
She takes a quick little breath in.
“Though, if you were my girlfriend, and you were wearing this dress to dinner, I’d be touching you a whole lot anyway.”
“Wow, I was really right about my ass in this dress, wasn’t I?” Her voice is a little breathless.
I love that.
“It’s your ass, your legs, your breasts…” I take a breath. “Your smile, your sense of humor, the way you tease with our friends, the way you take care of our families.”
Her smile fades and her mouth drops open.
I kind of hate that me saying I like all of that shocks her.
She swallows hard. “You think I coddle people and hold them back.”
I take a breath. “I think you love people and…yes, you coddle them.” I don’t want to fight with her. I don’t want to make her feel bad. So I go for light. “That doesn’t change the fact that you have great breasts, and legs to go with that ass.”
She clears her throat. “Careful, that all almost sounded like you might be attracted to me for real.”
Is she fishing here? Is she joking? I don’t care. “Well, let me make that very clear. I find you incredibly gorgeous, and I’ve been itching to run my hands all over you all night. Zach or not. Fake boyfriend or not. That is very real.”
She stares up at me, those words hanging between us.
I wonder if she’s also thinking about how much between us has been very real.
Like all of it.
The “dating” part maybe not, but our conversations, the emotions, the chemistry, even the laughter—and there has been some of that, dammit—has been real.
Finally, she says, “I hope I have garlic breath.”
I chuckle. I would expect nothing less from Harlow.
I kiss her forehead, then turn her toward my truck and continue across the parking lot.
Because of the way the truck is parked, the driver’s side is the side closest to where Zach and his friends are leaning against their cars, casually chatting.
So that’s the side Harlow is getting in on.
“I don’t have anything at your house,” she says to me. There’s no way they can hear us from here, but they can see us.
“I know.”
“So we’re going to have to swing by my house.”
“You are staying tonight, then?”
She rolls her eyes and again I’m glad Zach is too far away to see it. “Phoebe thinks I should. Everyone thinks I should.” She narrows her eyes. “Unless you don’t think I should.”
“Oh, I definitely think you should.”
“Why can’t you stay at my place? You know they manipulated everything so that Zach is staying in a house across the street from yours. We could mess with them and have you stay at my house.”
“Why would we mess with them? They’re trying to help us.”
“They’re enjoying it too much,” she says grumpily.
“For someone who is so sweet and sunny all the time,” I say, lifting my finger to rub right between her brows where there’s a little wrinkle. “Why is it that you suddenly don’t want everyone to be enjoying themselves?”
“I guess I can’t get over how easily everyone is accepting us as a couple.”
“Maybe they see something we haven’t.”
“Maybe there hasn’t been enough drama around here lately, and they’re bored.”
I chuckle. In our parents’ friend group, which has created our friend group, there are simply too many people with too many big personalities for that to be true. And that’s not even taking into consideration the rest of the town.
“Harlow,” I say as I lift my hand to the back of her head and slide my fingers into her silky hair. “Shut up and kiss me.”
Her breath catches and she tips her head up. “ You better not have garlic breath,” she mutters as she goes up on tiptoe.
Neither of us kisses the other. Our lips meet right in the middle and we kiss each other.
At first, it’s just a soft touch. And honestly, that would probably be enough. A guy, kissing his girlfriend in the parking lot, sweetly, romantically, before he takes her home makes more sense than what happens next.
But Harlow sighs, and her lips are soft, her breath is actually sweet. And feeling her hands slide up my chest along my neck and into my hair as her body arches into mine, makes every other thought disappear.
I don’t care about garlic. I don’t care about the chocolate cake and coffee she shared with Ginny. I don’t care about Zach or anyone else who might be walking through this parking lot. Including our parents and siblings.
I just want more.
More of Harlow’s mouth. More of her body against mine. More of the husky sounds she makes that shoot straight to my cock.
I tip my head, drop both hands to her ass, pull her closer, and open my mouth, sliding my tongue over her bottom lip.
If I’d really stopped to think, I would have realized in that moment that Harlow could’ve bitten the thing off.
But she doesn’t.
Instead, she makes a soft moaning sound, opens her mouth, and meets my tongue with her own.
I wouldn’t say the kiss is hungry or carnal, but it is definitely not simply a sweet just-for-show kiss.
It is a sexy, I-want-more-of-this kiss.
Eventually, the sound of car doors opening and shutting, and engines starting filter in.
She pulls back, blinking up at me.
I lift my head.
And we stare at each other for at least ten beats.
Then she closes her eyes and moans. But it’s definitely a different moan than the ones when my lips were on hers.
This is a moan of frustration.
“Dammit, Jefferson,” she mutters.
“What?” That was a damned good kiss and there is no way in hell she can convince me otherwise.
“That wasn’t supposed to be good .”
When she opens her eyes and meets mine, I laugh. “No?”
“Kissing Graham was like kissing my brother. Kissing you was supposed to be like kissing my brother, but a brother I don’t like at all .”
Several thoughts and emotions hit me at once. I’d assumed she and Graham had kissed in the past, but I hate the sharp stab of jealousy that follows that confirmation. I almost equally hate the surge of satisfaction I feel at hearing that it wasn’t good. I kind of like the idea that they did try it, and nothing came of it.
And none of that is as strong as the smugness that I feel at her admission that our kiss was good.
It was great. I haven’t had a kiss like that in a really long time.
“Look at it this way,” I say, trying to keep my grin in check. “It’ll make this week easier.”
“I suppose you think we’re going to do more of that.”
Now I can’t contain my grin. “Oh yes, Lily, we’re going to do more of that.”
She tips her head back with a long, “Uuuggghhh.”
My eyes drop to the long smooth expanse of her throat. I very much want to press my lips there.
“You can’t keep calling me Lily.”
“I definitely can. Of course, I would have a pet name for you. And of course, it would be one that started out annoying.”
Finally, she chuckles and tips her head to look at me directly again. “Started out?”
“As far as everyone else knows.”
“And the fact that it still annoys me is just sprinkles on top, right?”
I squeeze her ass, then turn her toward the truck and lift her up onto the seat. “You got it.”
I watch as she crawls across the console to the passenger side.
“And, girl, you were right. Your ass definitely looks amazing in this dress.”
She doesn’t say anything as I climb up into the driver seat. But I definitely hear her heavy sigh.
It only takes her two minutes to realize that we are headed for my house and not hers.
“I need to get some stuff if I’m staying at your place. Especially if it’s for a week.”
“You can get your stuff tomorrow. Zach is obviously going to be getting to the Dixons’ soon. We’re going straight home.”
“I think it’s okay for him to think that we occasionally go to my house. We’re not living together.”
“You don’t need anything tonight. We’re in a hurry to get home.”
I feel her watching me. “We are?”
“That dress? My jealousy over your ex? That kiss? Yeah, we’re in a hurry to get home.”
“Are we gonna start tearing each other clothes off on the porch for him to see?”
I glance over. “I’m game.”
She chuckles now. “Not fair. I’m like a zipper away from practically naked.”
Heat and desire tighten my gut. “Noted.”
She quickly looks away from my stare.
“I don’t have anything at your house. Not even for a one-night slumber party.”
“What do you need?”
“Pajamas. Toothbrush.” She pauses. “I guess those are the basics. “
“I have extra toothbrushes.”
“And pajamas?”
“You’d definitely be sleeping naked if you were my girlfriend.”
“But I’m not. And Zach isn’t going to be checking what I’m sleeping in.”
I am resolutely not wondering about just how much—or how little—she has on under that dress right now.
If she’s only a zipper away from ‘practically’ naked, does that mean no bra? There are definitely no panty lines…I would have absolutely noticed with how I studied her ass tonight and when I had my hands there…
Okay, maybe I’m not so resolutely not wondering.
I clear my throat. “You can borrow a t-shirt. It’s one night. We’ll get your stuff tomorrow.”
I am not immune to what the thought of her sleeping in one of my shirts does to me either. It’s probably the kiss. Or this fucking dress. Or maybe the fact that even playing her boyfriend for a day has already gotten me thinking about what it would be like to date Harlow.
Fun.
Sexy.
Easy.
Sure, I’d always have to be on my toes, but it would be easy to be around her, and to blend into each other’s lives. Even when we’re not getting along, my heart pounds and I enjoy myself.
And when we are getting along, I just want more and more.
Sure, she’s a pain in my ass. She doesn’t let me get away with anything. She does not think I am amazing. We would no doubt bicker just like this if we were dating.
But it feels fresh. Even though we’ve been doing it as long as I’ve known her. Our relationship is well established, but how we both approach things, how we live our lives, and what we bicker about has evolved. And I think it always will.
Harlow and I would never get boring.
She’s not wrong when she says that I have it pretty easy around Sapphire Falls. People like me. It’s not hard to be liked. My family as well liked, they contribute a lot to the community, and the local economy. Honestly, my siblings are all great. We have a big, influential friend group. And the group is influential because they are kind, generous, hard-working, nice members of the community.
I’d have to be a real asshole to be disliked in this town.
But Harlow keeps it real with me. She makes me actually think about the things I do. Like my job. She’s not impressed with me as a coach. Football—the game itself anyway—is not impressive to her. The number of wins and losses on my record don’t matter to her.
But the way I interact with the kids does make an impression.
And though she may not admit it, she notices.
Maybe not all of them though and I’d love to tell her more. Because I didn’t become a coach just because I love the game. I did want to make a difference.
I am not going to become a Mason Riley who’s curing world hunger and having meetings with presidents and prime ministers.
But I could be teaching someone who could become the next Mason Riley.
And Harlow has seen me in action. We spent a lot of intense time together when it came to Alex. She knows I care. She makes me think. She’s like a constant niggle in the back of my mind asking if what I’m doing is important and if it’s the best I can do.
Sometimes I hate it but most of the time I appreciate it. When I’m working with a kid, or even in front of my classroom or on the field, every once in a while, the thought will float through my mind, what will Harlow think of this ?
For better or worse.
We pull into my driveway, and both get out. My porch light is on, so if Zach is looking out the front window of the Dixons’ house—and yes, I’ve glanced over and noticed his car is in the drive—then he’ll notice us coming home.
I move in close to her, putting my hand on her waist as I unlock the door.
She doesn’t move away. She doesn’t stiffen under my touch. She doesn’t act surprised at all.
Good. We’re already getting past all of that.
Once inside the house she kicks off her heels.
“Guess what number I’m thinking of,” she tells me.
I frown. “What?”
“Just do it. What number am I thinking of?”
“Four,” I guess.
“Nope. That means I get your room and you get the guestroom.”
I laugh. “No way.”
“Graham says that the bed in the guestroom here sucks.”
“Ha. If you want to sleep in the master bedroom, you’re gonna have to share the bed with me.”
“Nice try.”
“Well, you’re not a guest. You’re my girlfriend. No way would you sleep in the guestroom anyway.”
“I am your fake girlfriend, and no one is coming over while we’re sleeping to check what bed we’re each in.”
I shrug out of my jacket and start unbuttoning my shirt as I head for the stairs ignoring the way my body reacts to even the suggestion of Harlow sharing my bed. “Like I said, if you want the nice mattress, you’re gonna have to share.”
“Hey,” she says.
I turn and look back.
“You’re going to bed now? It’s so early.”
“Did you have something in mind?” And I can’t help but think of all the ways I would be spending the next couple of hours if she really was my girlfriend and we had just gotten home from dinner.
“Well…” She looks around the room. “We could at least watch TV or something. It’s way too early for bed.”
She’s not wrong. It is.
But that means Harlow and I are going to spend time alone together. Just us. I don’t think we’ve ever done that. Not for hours anyway. Maybe five or ten minutes at the most. Except when we were out looking for Alex. Or sitting by his hospital bed.
Those were intense hours. Ones I’m sure neither of us want to repeat.
“Yeah,” I say casually. “I’m just gonna change clothes. Come on up and I’ll get you… stuff.”
“I don’t suppose you have any ponytail holders?” she asks, following me up the stairs.
I’m not sure what she wants to hear here. That I do because I’ve had women here before or that I don’t because I don’t date a lot.
“I think there are some in the second drawer in the bathroom,” I say.
“Okay,” she says noncommittally. “Are they Ginny’s?”
I stop outside the bathroom. “They might be.”
I watch her for a moment. Surely it doesn’t bother her to think about women I’ve dated in the past. Women who might’ve spent the night here.
Then she surprises me and says, “I’m going to pretend they are.”
“Jealous they might not be?” I ask.
“Worried about cooties,” she says.
I snort. “Washcloths are in the cupboard. New toothbrushes should be in the same drawer with the ponytail holders. There might be other useful things in there too.”
She tips her head, a tiny smile tugging at her lips. “Useful things like?”
“I think there are makeup wipes. Some bath salts. Tampons.”
Her eyebrows lift. “You have bath salts and tampons?”
“I have things that…people…have brought over that I haven’t thrown away. That drawer is kind of a catch-all. Feel free to dig through it.”
“Well, I don’t think I’ll be taking a bath. And I don’t need any tampons.”
“That could potentially be filed under TMI,” I say, but still have the urge to chuckle.
“If you were my boyfriend, you would totally know that,” she says lifting a shoulder.
“Good point. I’d also know what kind of bath salts you like.”
She wrinkles her nose. “I’m not really into baths. More of a shower girl.”
“Oh, that’s too bad. I do like baths, and I have an amazing tub. And if you were really my girlfriend, I’d make sure you liked them too.”
Why do I keep saying stuff like that? She’s not my girlfriend. We are not getting in that tub together.
Why don’t you just actually date?
My dad’s words come back to me in that moment.
Taking a bath together would be one thing that would definitely convince Harlow that dating me is a good idea.
“Gee, just one more reason we’re not a good match,” she says dryly. But her tone is less biting than usual.
“Yep. Guess so.” I pivot toward my room before I spend any further time thinking about her in my bathtub. With me. I really do like baths, but not solo ones. “Let me grab you a shirt.”
In my bedroom, I take a couple of deep breaths, then rummage in my drawer for one of my bigger shirts. Any of my shirts will be huge on her, but the bigger the better. I step back into the hallway with one of my Sapphire Falls football shirts, in part to annoy her. I toss it to her. “Here you go. I’ll meet you downstairs.”
She holds the shirt up, rolls her eyes, which is stupidly gratifying, and says, “Okay.”
Ten minutes later I’m in the kitchen on my phone, pulling up recipes for spicy popcorn when Harlow walks into the room.
Her hair is up in a ponytail, her make up is scrubbed off, and she’s wearing my shirt. And only my shirt. Which, of course, I was expecting.
But I realize in that moment that my insistence on not stopping at her house and making her feel the fullness of being on my turf is very much going to backfire.
She looks hot as fuck.
She looks relaxed, ready for a night in, but despite the fact that my shirt is huge on her, I am acutely aware of her long, tan, bare legs, bare feet, and that there isn’t much underneath that shirt.
She looked gorgeous in that dress tonight with her full make up on and those heels.
But this is Harlow. The Harlow I’ve known for so many years. The sassy small-town girl I’ve grown up with.
Looking at her, I immediately flash back to so many nights with her hanging out at my house with Graham, before they were old enough to drive and go out on the weekends.
She’d look a lot like this, lounging on the sofas in our basement, or cooking in our kitchen, or goofing around on our back deck.
It also reminds me of so many barbecues, hangouts at the Come Again, street dances, and football games with our friends and family.
And it reminds me of how she looked when we were scouring the county for Alex the night he went missing, how she looked sitting up next to his hospital bed. She’d been rumpled, tired, worried, not caring at all how her hair looked, or what clothes she was wearing. She’d been fully focused on him and what he’d needed.
She’d been so fucking beautiful that night. Her raw emotions exposed, leaning on me, letting me help her.
Harlow can dress up. She can pull off updos and high heels with seeming ease, but this is the real her.
Of course, she usually wears pants.
“I’m ninety-eight percent sure this scrunchie is Ginny’s,” she tells me turning her head so I can see the hunter green elastic that’s holding her hair up. “Do not tell me if you know that’s not true.”
I pull myself together and grin at her. “I’m ninety-nine percent sure you’re right.”
She props her shoulder against the doorframe and crosses her arms, “What are you doing?”
“Trying to figure out what exactly spicy popcorn is.”
She looks surprised for a moment, and I realize I just confessed that I overheard her comment to Ginny and remembered it. And that I am giving some effort to trying to give her something she wants.
But truthfully, if she was my girlfriend, that’s exactly what I would do.
She doesn’t comment on it though and just pushes off the doorframe and comes into the room fully. “You don’t need a recipe. I know exactly how to make it. Where are your spices?”
I point to the cupboard next to the stove. She pads across the room on her bare feet and opens the door, then stretches to reach the higher shelves.
And that is a terrible idea. Heat slams into me as my shirt rides up on the back of her trim, smooth thighs. It still hits well below the curve of her ass, but the move pulls the cotton up against her curves and, a better man might be able to avert his gaze, but not me.
“Is there any chance you have ancho chili powder?” she asks, flipping through the small plastic bottles of spices on the shelf.
I clear my throat. “I can’t imagine why I would.”
She turns holding three bottles. “I guess we’ll make do with these.”
I read the labels. There’s onion powder and garlic powder but she’s also got my chili powder out.
“But it’d be better with ancho and cayenne powder,” she says.
“You weren’t kidding when you said spicy.”
She shrugs. “It’s also best if you pop it on the stove top. Not in the microwave.”
“And you have all of this at your place.”
“Along with scrunchies I know don’t have cooties and—” She glances down. “Pants.”
“We already established that scrunchie is ninety-nine percent cootie free, and I gotta say, you’re pulling off the no-pants look.”
“Thanks, I guess,” she says with a light laugh.
“But,” I say pushing off from the counter. “Because I really am the best boyfriend, I’m going to your house to get the spices and the popcorn.”
“You’re going to leave me here?” she asks. “What will Zach think?”
“I’m going to sneak out the back door and then sneak back in.” I hold out my hand. “House keys?”
“There’s a spare tucked behind my front porch light,” she says.
“Great. I’ll be back.”
“Bring the canola oil too,” she says. “And some pants.”
“Spices, popcorn, oil. Got it.”
“And pants!”
I’m laughing as I pull the back door shut behind me on her, “ Jefferson !”