Chapter 8
eight
Carrying Isabel across campus back to my car, I was fighting the strangest feelings. Like protectiveness. That was cool. It made sense. I could deal with it. I always had a thing for the underdog. Puppies, tiny lizards on the sidewalk, babies with glasses. They all made me feel protective. So Isabel, quiet, sweet, quirky Isabel, with her head injury, made me want to shield her from pain and suffering and danger. Not a big deal. But I was also feeling something that I was terrified was a lot more like caring. Like genuine interest. That went beyond sexual. I hadn’t even had sex with her and I was feeling post-sex tenderness. It was so foreign it was fucking terrifying.
This was bad. No good. Not helpful. I was losing my edge. Going soft. Sucking at my job. If it had been any other client, I would have just followed them into class, but I hadn’t wanted to embarrass Isabel. Her feelings mattered more than they should.
She was still giggling, which was unnerving. I didn’t get it. I decided to ignore her comment about me putting her to bed.
“What are you thinking about?” I asked. I was curious what went on in that little head of hers. I was starting to realize she had complicated thoughts and was super intelligent. Why hadn’t I ever known she was planning to be a vet? I didn’t want to be like Mickey. I didn’t want to be self-absorbed. I wanted to listen to people, get to know them. I had failed to do that with Isabel.
I wanted to change that, fix it.
“Movies. My mother and I used to always watch anything that could be considered a chick flick.”
Now I wasn’t sure what to say in response to that. I was well aware of the fact that everyone around us was staring, but I didn’t give a crap about that. Being a tall guy in a place where Latin men tended to be more compact, I got stares and lots of passing comments. Let them think whatever they wanted about why I was carrying Isabel, and no one could see her face anyway. I considered and discarded several comments and finally settled on the safe, “What is your favorite chick flick?”
“Love, Actually. Colin Firth is the character who never really wins, you know, and he and the housekeeper fall in love. It’s so romantic. She learns English so she can talk to him.” She sighed against my chest.
Clearly she assumed I’d never seen the movie, and she was right. I didn’t watch a lot of movies. I had some issues with sitting still. “Maybe we can watch it tonight.” I kind of would rather stab myself in the eye with a fork, but I wanted her to be comfortable, happy.
I got to the car, and gratefully dropped her textbook on my car roof. That thing had been awkward as hell to hold while I was carrying her. I set her carefully down on the ground, still holding her at the waist. After opening the car door, I helped her in. She gave me an amused smile.
“I’m okay now. I’m not going to faint or anything. I’m also not that fragile.”
She seemed pretty fragile to me in general. “Okay.”
“You don’t believe me.”
“No. Not really.”
Isabel sighed. “I want a sandwich.”
“I can get you a sandwich.” Publix was right around the corner from my apartment. “Just relax. I need to call my dad.”
Isabel crossed her arms over her chest while I called Mickey as I was working around the front of my car. I didn’t really want her to hear my conversation.
“Hey,” I said when he answered. “Did you learn anything? I don’t see anything out of place at the house.”
“I can’t find anything. None of my contacts know anything. I have the surveillance cameras going back on the exterior of the house, even though Kim doesn’t want them. But I’m starting to think that Isabel just tripped and fell. She’s not the most graceful kid on the planet.”
“Everyone can trip,” I said, and it sounded defensive. “But did you check up on the guy she went out with a few times?”
“What guy?”
“Some dude named Juan Carlos. I think you should run a background check on him.”
“On a Juan Carlos? Are you kidding me, Ryan? There’s only about ten thousand guys named Juan Carlos in Miami.”
“I’ll give you his phone number. Just to eliminate him. I’m sure he’s just some prick she met online but I want to be sure.”
“Sounds good. I’ll put someone on it after you give me his number.”
If someone just happened to have a conversation with Juan Carlos and told him to stay the fuck away from Isabel, I was okay with that. “Talk to you later. We’re going to stop at your place so Isabel can get her dog.”
“Um, not any time soon, if you catch my drift.”
It took me a second. I stood in front of my car and tried to not be bitter that my father got more action than I did. There was just something really wrong with that. “When would a good time be?”
“I may be busy for the rest of the afternoon.”
Well, that was disgusting.
“I’ll bring the dog to your place later tonight.”
That made me forget about my father’s sex life. “No, Mickey. Seriously, do not bring that dog to my apartment. I’m not prepared for a canine houseguest.”
“It’s not a big deal. I’m not asking you to adopt it. It will probably only be tonight. Tomorrow I think Kim and Isabel can go back to the house.”
I sighed. “Fine. But text me before you come over.”
“Why?” Then my father made rustling noises like he was moving around. “Wait. You can’t touch that kid, Ryan, do you hear me? That is not something Kim would be okay with.”
“Isabel is an adult. She can do whatever she wants. And who said I was going to touch her?” It was none of his damn business. He was the one who had embroiled me in his bullshit mess, but he couldn’t dictate what I did with Isabel.
“There are plenty of other girls you can hook up with. Not her.”
That annoyed me. “Are you lecturing me on morality? Nice try, Dad .”
Isabel was watching me through the window and she mouthed, “What are you doing?”
I held my finger up.
“Grow up,” Mickey said. “Keep your dick in your pants.”
“Wow. That’s rich. I’m hanging up on you now.”
“How I raised such a brat is beyond me, honestly.”
“You didn’t. I raised myself.” Annoyed that I’d let him get under my skin, I ended the call without saying goodbye and took a few deep breathes. I opened the door and got into my car. It was stifling hot in there. I should have turned it on and blasted the air conditioning. “I’m sorry. I should have put the a/c on for you.” I immediately did that. Isabel looked pink in the cheeks, her forehead shiny from the heat.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
“I’m fine. Just constantly amazed at how narcissistic my father is. He has a gift for always thinking he’s right. It’s amazing.”
“I’m sorry. I could tell you I don’t think he means to be a bully, but I think you know that. Some people are just amazing at assuming everyone else is on the same page as them.”
“That’s very diplomatic of you.”
“It’s true. It means we either have to just accept that’s who they are or spend a ton of energy being frustrated.”
“I guess you’re more evolved than me, because it just pisses me off.” I pulled away and tugged at my T-shirt. I was sweating. “Let’s go get you something to eat, and then fuck it, we’re going to the beach. You need to rest, I need to keep an eye on you, and my dad says he’s ninety-nine percent sure you’re not in danger.” Plus I wanted to see Isabel in a bathing suit.
“I didn’t pack a bathing suit.”
“There are eight hundred tourist shops and a Walgreens. I’ll buy you a bathing suit.”
“Okay.”
I could feel Isabel staring at me, but I didn’t look over at her. I didn’t want to explain my mood, because I didn’t understand it. I just knew that I wanted to go to the beach. I never did this- just spend time with a woman. I was being selfish and playing with fire, but I felt comfortable with Isabel. She was inclined to like me and forgive my dickheadedness.
I asked her about school and she chatted easily as I drove us back to the Beach. She had a nice voice, Isabel. It was soothing. Seductive. Sweet. She told me about her love of animals and how she was applying to veterinarian school in Atlanta. Listening to her, talking about a normal life, with regular goals, made me extremely happy for her. Restless for myself, sure, but pleased for her. That was her future, and she deserved it.
Some day, she’d meet a nice guy who worked at an accounting office, and she would marry him and they’d buy a house in the suburbs of Atlanta or a similar place, and she would spend her days caring for animals, and her nights caring for him.
And I would be alone. Still in my small apartment. Still angry with Mickey. Still occasionally satisfying my carnal urges with women who wanted nothing more from me than a few hours of fun. That’s the way it was going to be, and that was the way it should be.
It didn’t mean that I couldn’t enjoy Isabel’s company now. And it didn’t mean that I couldn’t be her first. That ten years from now, when she was in that house, with that nice guy, that she couldn’t look back on the past, and think about me. Remember that I had taken the time with her to make her first sexual experience a positive one. She could say she changed her mind, but I wasn’t having that. I wasn’t going to let her wind up going home with some guy she barely knew after a couple of dates and having him wind up being a selfish lover.
At the drugstore, I bought a disposable cooler, two beach towels, and a bunch of food, drinks, and ice. I suggested a bikini for Isabel. Yellow. It had fringe on the top, and I was having a fringe fantasy.
She made a face. “That’s a little too… flashy. And these mannequins are ridiculous. They have like Double E boobs.”
“I didn’t even notice.” I hadn’t. But now that she mentioned it… “Well, this is Miami Beach. And you are not exactly an A cup, Is.”
“I don’t look like that.”
“What, plastic? No, you don’t.” I gave her a grin. “How about this one?” It was an American flag design. Patriotic. Sexy.
“Ryan, how about you go get a bottle of sunscreen and I’ll pick out a bathing suit, okay? I’m pretty sure we’re never going to agree on a style.”
That didn’t make any sense to me. “It’s a bathing suit, not a fashion show.”
“Then why do I need fringe on my ta-tas?” She was giving me a pointed stare.
I could concede that I was caught being a perv. But I wasn’t going to. “So it can double as a cat toy?”
Her jaw dropped. Then she burst out laughing. “Sometimes you surprise me. We don’t have a cat.” She gave me a smile and touched my chest, lightly splaying her fingers across my shirt. “Now go away.”
I would but I bent over and murmured in her ear. “I’ve already seen everything you’ve got, Is. No point in trying to hide it.”
Walking away, I let her chew on that for a minute.
Shivering from his breath tickling my ear, I watched Ryan walk away from me. Damn, he was so hot. Spring Breakers buying potato chips and souvenirs turned en masse to watch him stroll past. The girls were my age, in bikini tops and sarongs, tanned and waxed and polished. He didn’t even glance their way, which gave me more satisfaction than it should. But it was a good thing he didn’t, because I was starving and being hungry did not make me the most rational person on the planet. I tended to waver between wanting to burst into tears and wanting to cuss someone out when I was this many hours out from food.
I felt my hunger in my soul, but even that grumbling distraction didn’t stop me from rejecting the idea of putting on a bikini with an American flag on it. I was not in a Budweiser commercial. Grabbing a basic red bikini I went to find Ryan. He had three different bottles of sunscreen in his hands.
“Are you going for totally skin cancer free forever or for just don’t turn my nose to Rudolph?” he asked.
“Somewhere in the middle. How about SPF 30? I haven’t been out in the sun much recently. Now let’s go before I eat my arm.”
“I can think of better things you can eat.”
I had walked into that one. But I was still flustered by it. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Liar.”
Yes. But I was unnerved by Ryan in the role of flirt. I knew he’d seen me naked. He’d told me as much more than once, and I had my weird hazy dream memory of strolling around with no clothes on, but it was still hard to wrap my head around. Then I thought about me. I thought about who I was, and what I wanted. Why I struggled to pull myself out of the shadows. I didn’t think of myself as painfully shy and I wasn’t necessarily quiet around people I knew. I was just observant, studious, always the one with an opinion that was slightly different from the masses. I could hang out with the girls like the crowd I’d seen ogling Ryan. I had friends. But I couldn’t play those girl games and never had been able to.
My shyness was more the result of me knowing I wasn’t drop dead gorgeous like my mother, with her innate feminine wiles. Men and women instantly warmed to my mother, but that didn’t happen to me. I thought too much about what I was saying, self-consciously weighing my words. It made me unintentionally reserved. But if I wanted Ryan to know me, the real me, I had to just be me. So I took the sunscreen out of his hand. “You’re right. I’m lying. You mean I should eat you? Is that what you want?”
Ryan’s eyebrows shot up. “That’s a good place to start.”
“I want my lunch first. Then maybe we can talk about it. I’ll explain my reasoning for changing my mind.” I wanted to be reasonable, not childish. It had been my idea, then my retraction. He should get to hear the why behind it.
“And I’ll explain all the reasons why your reasons don’t matter.”
“We’re going to debate my virginity?”
He frowned. “I didn’t think that was up for debate.”
“That’s not what I meant. I most definitely am. By the Webster definition.”
“You know the Webster definition? Can you tell it to me because I sure in the hell don’t.”
“A person who has never had sexual intercourse.”
Ryan shuffled a little, clearing his throat and crossing his arms over his chest, beach towels still in his hands. “Got it.”
“Are you embarrassed?” I asked, suddenly amused. “I think you’re actually blushing.”
“I’m not blushing. Give me a break.”
He was so blushing. It made me feel on more even footing with him. Seeing a six foot five man packing a gun, with enough muscles to go a round with a UFC fighter, get flustered from discussing virginity, was comforting. Apparently he could discuss sex all day, but lack of sex? That was embarrassing. Whereas I could openly talk about my so-called “v card” status but got squeamish when we got into details. Together we could find some kind of happy medium.
“You’re very cute when you blush,” I said, reaching up, going on tiptoes, to pat his cheek.
Ryan jerked away from my touch. “Stop saying that. I’m not blushing and I’m not cute. I am not a puppy, Is. I’m the opposite of cute. I was beaten with an ugly stick at birth and then made it worse by having my nose broken.” He suddenly looked amused. “I’d say I have a face only a mother could love, but that’s ironic considering mine left.”
That upset me on his behalf. “That’s not funny. Don’t say that. You’re cute to me, and clearly your mother was just a selfish bitch to walk out on you. I hope she’s miserable.”
I wasn’t in the habit of trash talking someone’s mother, but there was something completely lacking in any parent, male or female, who just left their child. It was against nature and Ryan could joke about it all he wanted, I knew it had to bother him.
His expression softened. He tucked my hair behind my ear. “Thanks for thinking I’m cute. You’re pretty damn cute yourself when you’re being indignant. Now let’s get in line and pay for all this crap.”
I wanted to say more, but I’d said enough. He would shut down if I pushed it. I knew enough about men to know that at least.
Ryan insisted on paying for everything, even though I protested. The cashier told me in Spanish that I should let him pay if he was offering. She teasingly called me crazy. She was probably right.
After a quick pitstop at Ryan’s to change, we walked the three blocks to the beach. North Beach was never as crowded as South Beach, and on a Wednesday in January the crowds were thin. The water was most likely too cold for native Floridians, but the sand was warm. We camped out and the first thing I did was eat my sandwich. I pretty much destroyed everything in the cooler, toes curled in the sand, butt on my towel.
Ryan ate slower than me and I didn’t even care. I was starving. Immediately I felt better. My headache dissipated within the first five minutes of putting food in my mouth, and the tension in my shoulders eased. I sighed as I popped a grape in my mouth. “I didn’t know the drugstore sold food. That’s random, but this works for me.”
“You’re the least high maintenance girl I’ve met,” he said. “If I had to guess, I’d say all you need is food, your dog, and that’s it. You don’t constantly check your phone, you don’t complain about the weather, you eat anything that is put in front of you. It’s nice.”
I was going to take it as a compliment, even though it made me sound very basic. “That does sound like me. But apparently I’m also clumsy and fall down stairs and give myself fake names.”
“Everybody trips once in awhile.”
“When was the last time you tripped?”
“I don’t know. But when I was a teenager I was falling all over the place. My legs and feet grew too fast for me to adjust to my new reality, you know what I mean?”
“That was me with my breasts.” I ate another grape and watched the waves rolling into the shore. “Do you know one time I went to California with my dad and the water isn’t blue there? It’s cold too. I was shocked and disappointed. I thought the ocean everywhere looked like it does here.”
“I’ve never seen snow. It’s a fantasy of mine to go snowboarding.” Ryan was sitting next to me, one knee up, his forearm resting on it. He barely fit on his towel and without his shoes on, I could see how huge his feet actually were. His mother may have not been a great parent post-birth, but whatever she had done while he was in utero it had created a giant.
“Snowboarding sounds like something I would suck at.” I waved away a few seagulls who were getting bold. They were well aware I had food and they were hoping I was a tourist who would feed them. Not a chance. I loved animals, but the seagulls were scavengers. Rats with wings. Once you fed them, they would never leave.
“Tell me what you’re good at.” Ryan had on sunglasses so I couldn’t see his eyes, but it just sounded like a conversational question. There didn’t seem to be any deep hidden meaning to it.
“School. Being on time. Taking care of animals. Cooking. Putting on lipstick without a mirror. Avoiding confrontation. You?”
“Winning fights. Bench pressing. Following my conscience. Interrogation. Laying on the beach.” He turned and gave me a smile. “Giving women orgasms.”
I should have known he would go there. Most guys did. “Interesting,” I said, purposefully not taking the bait. “Who do you interrogate?”
“Women who pretend they don’t want to have sex with me.”
I knew what he meant. It was supposed to be flirtatious. But I wasn’t biting, and honestly, he needed a little help with his delivery. Or maybe all women but me fell for that. But I still felt compelled to state a case for all women. “Then that makes you a creep. No means no.”
Ryan made a sound of impatience. “Okay, that is not what I meant. I am not some kind of sexual bully. In fact, I’m the fucking opposite of that.”
“You’re a sexual pacifist?”
“I’m a sexual savant. And you’re being a sexual brat.”
“Is that what you really think?” I dropped the grapes, admittedly a little hurt. “I’m not trying to be.”
“I know, I’m just giving you a hard time.” He reached over and snagged one of my grapes. “But you did throw sex out there more than once, then took it back. And refused to tell me why. But since I’m not pushy, I’m letting it go. Unless you don’t want me to let it go, which was what you said in the drugstore. But give me a clue here, Isabel, because I’ve never met anyone like you and I don’t know what to do.”
Was I such a great mystery? Maybe I was. But my thoughts seemed so clear and rational to me. “I changed my mind because I didn’t want you to have sex with me because you felt guilted in to doing it.”
Ryan took his sunglasses off so I could see his blue eyes. “I don’t do anything out of guilt. I want to. I want to even though I’m not sure it’s the right thing to do. I’m concerned about hurting you. I don’t understand why you don’t understand that.”
“Because you said so.” Men were the ones who just didn’t make sense. We were talking in circles. “Now can we just drop it?”
He put his sunglasses back over his eyes. “Consider it dropped.”
I lay down and closed my own eyes, dissatisfied. I didn’t want to spend the limited time I had with Ryan arguing about what I had said or hadn’t said and what he had meant or hadn’t meant. I was annoyed with myself for not just enjoying hanging out with him. Instead, I had pushed my own agenda, and now it was complicated. I put my T-shirt over my face, the sun blinding me. But then I jumped when something cold landed on my stomach.
My eyes flew open right as Ryan’s hand spread across my skin. “What are you doing?”
“You’re burning already. I’m putting sunscreen on you.”
There was absolutely nothing sexy about having my stomach touched, in theory, considering I always felt like it needed substantially more toning. But when those jumbo hands slid across my skin, slick with lotion, his thumbs running under the waistband of my bikini bottoms, it was a whole lot of hot. Flustered, I started to shift away, though where the hell I was going I had no clue. He pressed down on me, pinning me on the towel.
“Stop wiggling, Isabel.”
I stopped. Instead, I stared at the top of his head and tried not to imagine what it would be like to have him going down on me, his tongue sliding over my…
My knees came together, tightly. I had spent plenty of time having those thoughts when he wasn’t around. Experiencing them with him present seemed oddly embarrassing. So I turned my head and studied the cruise ships on the horizon, heading out to the open sea. All of those people cruising to Mexico, the Bahamas, Key West. It must be almost four o’clock. That’s when they started rolling out.
Ryan’s fingers shifted the bottom of my top, so he could oil up the underside of my breasts. It seemed more than a little unnecessary and I liked it a little too much. “What are you doing?” I asked him a second time. “I’m not going to get burned where the sun can’t shine.”
“The edge of the bathing suit is where most people get burned. It’s a fact.”
His fingers shifted to the tops of my breasts and that had me sucking in a breath. “Fact: this is making me crazy so stop it.”
Ryan laughed. “Almost done.” He leaned over as he did my shoulders then nipped my earlobe. “It’s driving me crazy too, so we’re even.”
“Take me to bed or lose me forever,” I said, joking.
He furrowed his brow. “What does that mean?”
“It’s a movie quote. Top Gun.” I grabbed his wrist so he would stop slathering me in places he had no business slathering. “Don’t worry about it.” Something was off. We didn’t ever seem to be on the same page at the same time. It was like we were always a beat off of the other’s rhythm. He flirted, I didn’t get it. I flirted, and he was bewildered. I didn’t want to acknowledge it, but it was there. I closed my eyes again, resolutely. I needed to not worry about it.
Yet me not worrying was like the tide not coming in. It wasn’t going to happen.
“The only thing I’m worried about is making sure you enjoy every second with me.”
Even though I was holding his wrist, he was stronger than me, and he raised his hand to my face, running his thumb across my bottom lip. “One shot, I want to make it count,” he said.
For a minute, I was lost in his eyes. He had an intensity that just drew me in and held me there, in his grip. “One shot at what?” I asked, even though I knew what he meant.
“I’m going to make you mine tonight.”
There hadn’t been many moments in my life that were touchpoints, that giving a yes or a no would alter everything. That one decision would affect everything that followed. This was one of them though, and I knew it. A yes here meant that whatever happened later, I would always remember this.
And Ryan would always be the one. My first lover.
So with the sun shining across his face, his body looming large over mine, I just smiled. “Tell me about it. Stud.”
Ryan laughed, a low rumble that was so sexy, so inherently masculine, I knew that by this time tomorrow, I was going to be eternally grateful for falling down the stairs and knocking myself unconscious. Smartest dumbest thing I’d ever done.