23 | Taylor
Taylor
I stare out of Cassie’s spare bedroom window into the void of the ocean.
A sense of freedom always washes over me when I leave St. Claire.
Not freedom in a tacky American dumping-tea-into-the-Boston-harbor type way, but freedom in the sense that I can go outside and not have to worry about security and press.
Obviously, I don’t hate the country I’m the prince of.
I like St. Claire. We have good drinking water and air quality.
Our national animal is a phoenix, which isn’t a real animal.
I’m not sure who messed that up, but it’s pretty badass.
We have a lot of things going for us, I just want to walk into a room and not be the center of attention.
Though I try not to voice these opinions out loud because no one wants to hear the winner of the generational wealth lottery whine about being too famous.
Thankfully, the rest of the world only seems to care about one royal family, and it’s not mine.
This is all to say I’m in a rare good mood today, and Melina is the cherry on the top.
I look down to see she’s reading a book on a chaise longue by the pool, her tan skin glowing in the sun.
I should probably go bother her. She looks way too peaceful reading out there with her comically large sunglasses.
Climate change has made it a warm day for early October, it’d be a shame if I let it go to waste.
“Is that one of your novels about the bedless society?”
Melina flinches at my voice from behind. “I don’t actually read a lot of romance.”
Romance? I thought she was reading dystopian.
I sit in the chair next to hers. She’s wearing a skirt today. It’s a muted green with tiny white flowers on it. I fucking love skirts.
“Do you think the one-bed-trope will happen before or after the quadruple murder?” She shows me the cover.
In Cold Blood by Truman Capote.
“Do you read true crime as well?”
She nods. “I only read love stories when I need a fluffy break from my usual murdery endings. What are you doing?”
I take the joint Cassie gave me out of my lips. “Sorry, didn’t know you were the type.” I gesture it out to her. “Ladies first.”
She scoffs. “Oh, I don’t seem like the type?”
Just as I figure she doesn’t want me to smoke around her, Melina swipes the joint from my hand and coughs as soon as she inhales. My point stands.
“I don’t think I took it,” she says, inspecting the paper between her fingers.
I steal it back before she can make a classic mistake. “Wait first,” I say, exhaling the smoke, then setting it down on the small table between us.
“So how often do you do this then?” she asks.
“Maybe a couple of times a year on particularly stressful days, when I get more uptight and insufferable even for my own good.” I could tell her I was a bit of a stoner at university, but I don’t want her to ask me about my piece-of-shit, chronically-in-need-of-a-haircut, sex-hipster college days.
“Thomas told me you cook when you’re stressed.”
“Sometimes there’s no time for cooking.”
“But there’s time for baking?”
I laugh because she’s very funny.
“Hey, can I ask you something?” She shuts her book, then pins me with a look above her sunglasses. “Did you carry me to bed last night?”
“Yes. You fell asleep on my shoulder in the car. You’re very peaceful-looking when you’re not all talky.”
She puts a manicured hand on her chest. “How did I not wake up? I’m a deep sleeper, but I didn’t think it was that bad.”
“I have no idea, but you were all floppy and boneless.” I take her arm and wiggle it for demonstration.
Melina hums. “So you just picked me up from the car then?”
Does she not think I’m strong enough?
“Yes. Darling, you weigh like a hundred pounds. You’re very portable.” I know she weighs more than that, but it’s always better to round down with women.
“Yeah, a hundred pounds.” She shakes her head into the sky. “I just can’t picture in my mind you carrying me.”
Now she’s asking for it.
I pivot and shove my arms under her back and knees. As I pick her up, she makes a delightful squeak.
“What are you doing?!” she yells while hanging an arm around my neck for balance. Her book drops on the ground behind me as I walk toward the edge of the pool. “What the hell do you take me for?”
“A pile of limbs and a torso.”
This is easier now that she’s not all limp. And I can smell the lemony scent of her hair without feeling guilty about smelling the hair of an unconscious woman.
She hooks her sunglasses to her shirt. “You know what? This might be nice. I could get used to being carried everywhere.”
I could get used to carrying her. I didn’t take into account how sensual this would be now that she’s all bare-legged. By her smile, I can tell she’s enjoying my hand gripping her thigh, my fingertips dipping just below the hem of her skirt.
Until now.
She looks down at the water below, then up at me with panic-stricken eyes like her fate rests in my hands. Well, it does rest in my hands.
“Don’t you dare,” she bites out. “Unhand me.”
“If you say so.” I let her slip from my arms a bit in malicious compliance. I’m obviously not going to throw her in. I just like the way her face gets scrunchy when she’s mad at me.
“Taylor!” she pleads in a low voice I’ve never heard from her before.
She tightens her grip around my neck and pulls herself closer to my chest, scooting her butt into my palm that’s now encapsulated by her skirt.
Her cotton panties are thin, but thankfully fuller coverage than the ones she gifted me, still, enough to make a man blush.
And maybe do other involuntary things that men do when their hands are up women’s skirts. That might be happening too.
“Uh—”
“If you throw me in this pool, I’ll take your head off,” she says, grinning like she couldn’t care less if my hand is on her ass or in Casablanca. “They used to do that to you people, you know. You’ll be like Louis the—” She squints and snaps her fingers.
“Sixteenth. Did you know that the last person to be guillotined was just in 1977? Some argue it’s a more humane form of corporal punishment than lethal injection, but is killing someone ever really humane?”
I try to think of more philosophical topics I can stall with. Anything to keep her in my arms a little while longer. I wish my hand could feel color. I wonder if they’re black like her present or blue to match her nails.
She groans and peeks at the water again. “I’m serious now, I can’t swim.”
I step back and pour her out of my arms so she’s vertical, my forearm also getting a taste of what’s under her skirt, the lucky bastard. “Why didn’t you tell me that? Now I feel like an ass.”
She adjusts her waistband and throws her sunglasses onto the grass. “I don’t know, so you’d freak out when I do this.”
I back up from the splash by instinct before my brain kicks into overdrive. It takes me a millisecond to process the four facts of the situation.
Melina jumped into a pool.
Pools contain water.
One has to swim to not drown.
Melina can’t swim.
Fucking Christ, Melina can’t swim.
I jump in after her. The chlorine stings my eyes I stupidly kept open. I fist her shirt to pull her toward me and put my arm around her waist to keep her afloat. Except she keeps trying to push me away.
Oh.
I let her go after realizing she’s been yelling, “Stop it, I know how to swim!” this whole time. To my surprise, Melina isn’t sinking, flailing, or drowning. In fact, she’s right in front of me, smiling and treading water just fine. “God, Taylor, I wasn’t sure if you were going to fall for that.”
“What the hell is wrong with you? Did you—did you just lie?” I sweep the sopping wet hair from my eyes. It feels very strange swimming fully clothed.
“Yes, I’ve been practicing! A few days ago, I ordered takeout, and I told the girl my name was Stacy. It kind of backfired because her name also happened to be Stacy, so I had to have like a thirty-second long conversation with her about how both of our names are Stacy.”
I look at her like she’s crazy, because she is. Her floating head looks like something out of a horror film as it maniacally cackles through tears of black makeup. She swindled me.
“You’re a swindler.”
“What is going on!” Cassie yells from the patio door.
“Taylor fell in the pool!” The slander rolls right off her tongue.
I don’t know if I should be proud or terrified.
“I’ll get some towels!” Cassie shouts back.
Melina swims toward the pool steps, and I follow her to dry land. I’ll pretend like I don’t see the red bra through her now pointless white t-shirt. I pull off mine because I hate the feeling of it clinging to me. She inspects, maybe ogles, actually, more eye-fucks me as she wrings out her hair.
I snap my fingers in front of her face. “Would you stop it? I run a lot.”
“To where?” she mutters. “China?”
I put a hand to my chest in feigned offense. “Exactly how long have you had the hots for me? This wasn’t like a childhood crush thing, right?” She told me I was attractive, she had to have predicted I wouldn’t let that go.
“ The hots? ” She leans back. “Trust me. I wasn’t reading any Prince Taylor fanfiction as a teenager.”
“Please tell me that does not exist.”
“How should I know? My childhood crush was Justin Timberlake, and when I was feeling old school, the dad from The Sound of Music.”
I blink. “Captain Von Trapp? Austrian father of seven?” I guess I remember him being a bit DILFy.
“You seem to know a lot about that movie.”
“My mom liked it.” She loved musicals. I never understood why. All the singing shit gets in the way of the plot.
“Everyone’s mom likes it. That movie is like crack for moms.”
I step closer.
She shuffles backward.
“Not that this would be a metaphor for anything,” she starts. “But I think I got the hots for Captain Von Trapp when he became all soft for Maria.”
“Oh, you think I’m getting soft for you?” I inch forward again like she’s a skittish animal. “Don’t expect me to know how to play guitar.”
She rests her hands on my bare chest. She can’t help but touch me. “You’ve always been soft for me. Soft like a kitten.”
I peer down at her blue fingernails and envision them scraping down my back, maybe leaving marks for the next morning. “So you can flirt with me, but I can’t with you. Seems unfair.”
Her easy smile drops, and her hands form into balls. “You’re right,” she says and walks past me.
“Hey, Melina, I was kidding.” I grab her wrist before she goes too far. “Why are you denying yourself?”
She exhales. “I don’t want to feel like your interim fun.”
“What do you mean interim ?”
Her eyes close. “Don’t make me say it out loud.”
“Well, I am. Say it out loud.”
“Don’t you have to have kids and, you know, court a wife soon? It’d feel like you’re wasting your time with me. I’m not really a hit-it-and-quit-it type girl. Or at least, uh, not anymore.”
I grab her other hand. “You’re not a waste of my time. Why would you—” I look up to the sky to collect my thoughts. “Not to sound like a complete douchebag, but I’m pretty efficient with one-night stands. If I wanted one, I would’ve asked already.”
Melina stiffens. I might’ve scared her.
I grab a fluffy white towel from the table.
Cassie must’ve brought them out, and I didn’t notice.
I wrap it around her shoulders, then pull her snug.
She looks up at me with those big brown eyes.
Even when she’s a wet mess, I have to do everything in my power not to kiss her.
She probably doesn’t want that right now.
“You think too much,” I say instead. “You’re too good for this world to be thinking too much.”
I succumb to leaving a peck on her hairline before walking away.
Maybe I should lay off for a while.