Chapter Eighteen
Ivy flipped her pillow over for the ninth time, hoping the cool side would solve her insomnia. But even an ice-cold pillow couldn’t calm her swirling, racing thoughts.
She’d almost kissed Grant. Thought of a flimsy excuse and everything. They were within a ten-foot radius of mistletoe, so they had to kiss, right? It was a law, like gravity, as natural and unavoidable as the rotation of the Earth.
The Earth had certainly moved when he’d stroked her finger during the movie.
He’d been tracing the outer edge of her index finger, but it felt like new territory of her body she didn’t know existed until he touched it.
Then the pads of their fingers had rubbed together, and he might as well have been rubbing her clit for all her body knew or cared.
She’d felt that innocent touch between her legs and on the sensitive tips of her hardened nipples.
She was reading too much into it. She had to be.
Because after they’d been interrupted by that mother and her child squeezing past them, Grant hadn’t tried anything else.
Not a hand on her knee or an arm around her shoulders.
Not a whiff of desire between them—just calm, competent, confident Grant asking her about her job and about Boston, both very safe questions nowhere near “Would you like to sit on my face until I suffocate?”
If Piper hadn’t shown up, would she have finished leaning in? Would she have found out if his lips were as soft as they looked, if he tasted like every letter she’d written to Santa and every birthday wish she’d ever made, all coming true at once?
What if he had pulled away and told her she had it all wrong?
Ivy stared up at the kaleidoscope of Christmas light colors on her ceiling. Sleep felt further out of her grasp than ever.
What if she let herself pretend he wouldn’t have pulled away and told her they were only friends and could only ever be friends? What if he’d kissed her back?
Ivy sighed softly and let her body relax into the world of What Ifs.
If she’d kissed him, Grant might have been surprised for a second, too stunned to do anything but receive the press of her mouth.
Right when she started to worry she’d horribly miscalculated—because she couldn’t escape her anxiety, even in a fantasy—he’d have kissed her back in a way that left no room for interpretation about how much he wanted her.
His tongue would’ve slipped past her lips, and they’d have moaned because it felt so good.
Ivy let her legs fall open. Her hand slid under the waistband of her pajamas.
If she’d kissed him, Grant might have picked her up, wrapping her legs around his waist and gripping her ass tightly to carry her into the house.
In her fantasy world, her parents weren’t home and wouldn’t be home, so when he stumbled on the stairs, too distracted from kissing her, he’d lay her down on the carpet runner because a flight was simply too long to wait.
As fantasy Grant unbuttoned her jeans and yanked them down her thighs, real Ivy caressed herself and was surprised at how wet she was. If this were real, Grant wouldn’t have been able to help but comment on the state of her, so she let him in her make-believe world.
“You’re soaked,” he’d say, dragging his thumb from the bottom of her opening through the heat of her, using her own wetness to lubricate his finger before he pressed against her clit, rubbing the sensitive nub in firm circles.
Ivy whimpered, the noise resounding in reality and fantasy both.
“That’s it,” he coaxed, increasing his speed. She lifted her hips, trying to get away from the intense sensation and chase it at the same time.
She kicked off her pants and spread her legs wider.
“Better,” he said as she had the same thought. Then he buried his face in her cunt.
Ivy gasped. The line between his phantom tongue and her furious fingers was whisper thin.
Every movement propelled her closer and closer to an edge she couldn’t quite reach.
Desperate for relief, she grasped her breast and pinched her nipple through her cotton shirt.
Spasming satisfaction rocked her core. Ivy involuntarily curled into a ball, her muscles contracting rapidly, and moaned into her pillow.
Slowly and reluctantly, she returned to her body, sated and a bit sleepy. Her nerves hummed and her heart hammered as she closed her eyes.
One thing was clear: she either needed to get over the Underwood boys—or under one of them.
“What time did you get home?” Ivy asked Brad as she poured herself a cup of coffee.
Brad had tucked himself into the breakfast nook, wearing a serene but very sleepy look on his face.
“That is none of your business,” he said with his eyes closed, “but it was before the sun came up.”
“Did you get any sleep?”
“A nice nap after I got back.” He opened one eye. “What about you? You scurried out of that bar with Grant real quick.”
Ivy slid onto the bench seat next to him. “We took Austin home because he was too drunk to stand. Not the sexy end to my night you’re imagining.”
“You deserve an award: Most Likely to Blow an Opportunity.”
“I almost kissed him,” she blurted. That woke Brad up.
“Almost? What do you mean almost? Spill.”
“Well,” she began, “we put Austin to bed in the bathroom—”
“Classic.”
“And then Grant insisted on walking me to my door.”
“Romantic.”
“Then I pointed out there was mistletoe on the wreath…”
Brad’s supportive smile faltered. “Oh god, how did you fuck this up?”
Ivy sighed. “His sister came home. I panicked and ran inside.”
“Okay, so maybe the new rule is no kissing Underwood boys on the porch. It always ends with you running inside like a scared baby deer.”
Ivy groaned. “I know! I know. It’s… I was so confused the entire night about if it was a date—”
“It was.”
“And he’s always been such a polite guy that I can’t tell what he’s thinking.”
“Do you want me to text Tony to tell Grant to stop being such a gentleman?” His hand was halfway to his pocket.
Embarrassment threatened to burn her to a crisp. “No! The last thing I need is you texting Tony to tell Grant that I want him to impolitely fuck my brains out.”
“So you admit it. You want him to fuck your brains out.”
“Yes!”
Brad smugly picked up his coffee cup. “So what’s the problem?”
“Everything after.” She slumped in her seat.
“It was easy to understand that I liked the idea of Austin more than I liked Austin. If I slept with him, that would have been all it was—sex. But Grant…” She covered her face with her hands and pressed her palms against her eyes.
“I don’t know if it could be just sex. And if it can’t be just sex, we run into so many problems, like the fact that he lives here and I live in Boston. ”
“We have flight benefits,” Brad reminded her.
“Which is fine for a while, but then we have to make a decision about who’s going to move because we can’t live in different cities indefinitely.
The obvious answer is that I move here because I could commute and his job is here, but my parents are literally moving to be closer to me.
They’re selling their house so they can see me more.
How do I look them in the eye and say, ‘Hey, Mom and Dad, remember that nice house you had that was basically paid off because you bought it in the nineties for a nickel and some bubblegum? Remember how you sold it and moved because of me? Well, I’m getting dicked down good enough that I want to move back to the place you just left, so if you still want to live near me, you need to move back there, too, where housing prices have definitely gone up. ’”
Brad stared at her, his coffee cup halfway to his mouth. “Wow. That was…a lot of information.” He held up a finger for her to wait while he took a drink, then asked, “Have you considered asking your parents to hold off on their move until you know what’s going on with your life?”
“I can’t ask them to put their lives on hold so I can get laid.”
“Okay, but it’s not like the house is going to sell tomorrow. You’ve got time to fuck around and tell them to pump the brakes if you need to.”
Ivy laid her head on the table. “How are you not freaking out? You got your guts rearranged last night.”
“And it was fantastic. Ten out of ten, would recommend. But I’m also being reasonable and taking this one day at a time.” He patted her back. “Since when do you need a five-year plan in order to get laid?”
“Since he got me a Diet Coke with Sprite, Junior Mints, and took me to the Muppets.”
“A real triple threat.” Brad squeezed her shoulder. “What if he’s a bad kisser? That would solve some problems.”
That remote possibility simultaneously cheered and depressed her.
The front door opened and Sophie called out, “We’re home from church! Time to get up!” There was the age-old shuffle of boots, coats, and scarves being removed, and then her parents came into the kitchen. “Oh! You’re awake!”
Brad held up his coffee mug in greeting.
“How was the movie?” Paul asked. “Are the Muppets still Muppety?”
“I don’t think they’re quite awake,” Sophie said to him. She waited thirty seconds, then asked, “So what’s on your agenda for the day?”
“Since you’re both home today, I was thinking we could work on packing,” Ivy suggested.
“Or,” Paul said, dragging the word out, “we could take Brad to the holiday market. He’s never been.”
“He’s been to the holiday markets in Germany. I don’t think the one at the Grange Hall is going to compare,” Ivy said.
“It’ll be fun,” Sophie chimed in. “We can get hot chocolate and pie. He can try some real Wisconsin cheese. Oh! They’re bringing back the brats this year. They haven’t had them for a while.”
“It hasn’t been the holiday market without the brats and sauerkraut,” Paul chimed in.