Chapter 29 Dylan
DYLAN
Nobody likes traveling during the holidays. Even people who are falling in love. Even therapists who are falling in love with me.
I get it.
She’s never traveled without Noah before. She’s never spent an entire major holiday without him in eight years. I get it. I’m the guy who doesn’t want to leave his kitten alone in a hotel room for five or six hours. Of course I understand why she’d be nervous about being separated from her son.
And she’s meeting my whole family. She’ll be the only one there who hasn’t met everyone. It’s going to be her and me and a bunch of drunk sarcastic assholes. I totally get why she’d be dreading that.
I get why she’d be so nervous that she’d pound three glasses of wine on a three-and-a- half-hour flight.
I even ordered her that first glass.
But she’s being a little turd to me today, and I’m pretty sure it’s not for any of the above reasons.
I think it’s because I had to work late two nights ago.
With Tabitha. And many other people on the set of Funny Business.
But Tabitha was there. The photo shoots and behind-the-scenes interviews took longer than expected.
So I wasn’t able to have dinner with Scarlett and her parents and Noah as planned.
I really wanted to. But I never have any control over that kind of thing.
I also have no control over the fact that Adam Bryce probably missed a lot of family dinners because he was on set later than planned.
With his female co-star he had an affair with and ended up marrying.
I would never do that to Scarlett—I would never do that to Noah or to Mr. and Mrs. Shepard.
I do have control over my dick and my heart, and they both belong to Scarlett.
But she’s doing that thing where she isn’t admitting that she’s pissed off about the other night—probably because she doesn’t want to start a fight right before going to my parents’ house for Thanksgiving.
I get it. But now I’m pissed off because she won’t even tell me she’s mad at me.
I don’t like that she doesn’t trust me. I don’t like that she doesn’t get that I’m not her ex-husband. I’m also not Former Me.
Also, apparently everyone on Earth was traveling through LAX and the George Bush Intercontinental today and half of them wanted selfies with me.
And I had three Jack and Cokes on the plane.
Because I am also nervous about bringing my new girlfriend home to meet my entire asshole family.
And I’m really fucking horny. So I’m ready to fuck and fight.
We barely said three words to each other in the car on the way from the airport to the hotel.
She’s giving all of the attention that she won’t give to me to Mr. Noodles—who has been an absolute tiny angel in her pet carrier.
And she’s wearing tight jeans and a tight sweater under her coat, and it’s just mean to look that hot if she’s not going to talk to me.
We’ve got two hours before we have to leave for my parents’ house by the time we get to the suite.
Noah’s at a matinee with his dad so she can’t FaceTime him.
She’s already used the bathroom, she took a nap on the plane, and I’ve already got my cat’s litter box and food all set up in the living room area, so there’s nothing else for her to do right now except deal with the stupid-ass fight that I’m about to pick with her.
I’m doing it because we need to get it out of our systems before she meets my family, and I’m doing it because we’re both a little drunk and she’s hot and she’s being a turd, and I’m doing because I’m really, really fucking horny.
She’s hanging up her clothes in the closet and putting things in the dresser drawers—solely because it gives her an excuse to slam things.
“If you didn’t want to come to Thanksgiving with me, you could have said so.”
“If you didn’t really want me to come with you, you also could have said so.” She tosses five pairs of panties into a drawer and slams it shut.
“What?”
She glares at me. “You heard me.”
Her body’s all tense, her nostrils are flaring, and I can just feel the heat coming off of her from four feet away. “Yes, Scarlett. I heard the words, but I’m not quite getting the subtext. Would you care to speak more clearly?”
She crosses her arms in front of her chest and arches an eyebrow at me. “Not really.”
Oh, it’s on.
I take a step closer and cross my arms in front of my chest too. “By any chance, do you mean that I could have brought Tabitha with me?”
“Sounds like it’s on your mind.”
“Does it? Because it sounds to me like it’s on your mind.”
“Well, you’re the expert on minds around here.” She rolls her eyes.
Rolls her fucking eyes at me!
“Oh, okay, so your master’s in science says that because I shot a sitcom episode that Tabitha also appeared in and had to work late on set with her and a hundred other people two nights ago—being photographed and answering questions from strangers—because of that I must be in love with her and wishing she were here with me instead of you. ”
“I mean she was your first girlfriend. It would make a great story if you ended up with her.”
“Yeah. Is that the story the gopher in your brain is telling you to believe? Because it’s just a made-up story. It lives inside your head.”
She huffs, spins around, and swats at her suitcase to shut it, zipping it up so violently I feel it in my crotch. “I can’t believe I told you about that.”
“I can’t believe you told me about the Caddyshack gopher—which I love, by the way—but you didn’t just come out and tell me you were mad about me working late and missing dinner with your family. You need to be able to talk to me about these things.”
“I am a marriage and family therapist.” She takes three angry steps toward me and points at me very obnoxiously. “Don’t tell me what I need to talk about in a relationship.”
I grab the wrist of that obnoxious pointing hand and say, “I am a good and loyal boyfriend. I am not your ex-husband. Don’t tell me how I feel and what I want.”
I watch her beautiful, angry face as it slowly dawns on her that what I just said was true and rational.
I watch her beautiful face get even angrier when she realizes how infuriating it is that I’m right about everything.
And I am absolutely fucking delighted when she struggles to free her wrist from my grasp and swats at me like she did to her suitcase.
Because that gives me the excuse to grab her other wrist and push her up against the nearest wall and press up against her beautiful angry body and kiss her mouth so hard until she cries out and kisses me back.
I slide my hands down into her hair, to her breasts and her waist and that ass in those tight jeans. She kisses me with such fury, licks my jaw up to my earlobe, takes it between her teeth, sucks on it, and then bites it. Just a little too hard to be a nip.
“Ow!”
She jerks back and glares at me defiantly. “Take your shirt off.”
“You take it off.”
She huffs again, grumbling as she pulls my shirt up over my head.
I hear the words lazy and pretty boy. She mumbles something about actors when I’m pulling her sweater up over her head.
And there’s nothing but sighs and gasps coming out of that pouty mouth when I dip down to kiss her neck, my hands massaging her hips.
Take that, angry lady. When I start to undo her jeans, I feel her teeth on my shoulder.
She is so feisty.
I tug her jeans down and find the skimpiest little red thong panties. Mocking me. Because they were there all along and I had no idea. My fingers find her clit, and it is so slick with desire. For me. She’s probably been this wet for me all day and again—I had no idea.
“Dylan…”
I’m rubbing with my fingers pressed flat against her clit. I am going to give her the fastest, most intense orgasm.
“Dylan.” She squeezes my arms, and then I realize she’s trying to undo my jeans. “Just get inside me.” She pulls my pants down. “I need you inside me now, come on.”
“Okay.”
She pushes her own jeans down some more, pushes her panties down, and then wraps her arms around my neck to pull herself up.
I press myself up inside her, both of us groaning so loudly, but there’s such a sense of relief.
Finally. This is all we wanted, all we needed, all day.
When we were waiting in lines and stewing and giving each other the silent treatment.
It all comes down to this.
She needs me inside her.
I need her to want me like this.
This is when I know how much I matter to her.
She is so tight around me, and we are both already on the edge.
She kisses me. My neck, my jaw, my cheek, my mouth, and then she holds my face in her hands and looks into my eyes.
Rocks her hips. Clenches and releases. Again and again.
I barely have to move. It’s so intense. She shudders, closes her eyes as her head falls back.
I thrust up into her. Once, twice, eight times.
When I come inside of her, it’s fast and hard and noisy, and it’s the most vulnerable I’ve ever felt as a man, I think.
But I love her.
I know I just came inside of her, but I’m sure of it.
I love her.
She’s gone still, eyes still closed, leaning back against the wall. I’m still inside her when I kiss her. “I love you. I love you, Scarlett. Do you understand?”
“Yes. I love you too.”
“I’ve never brought a girl home with me for the holidays before.”
“You haven’t?”
“No.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah.” I rest my forehead against hers.
She lets out a sad little sound. “I’m sorry I was mad at you.”
“It’s fine if you’re mad. Just tell me next time.”
“I know. I will.” She kisses my forehead.
“The Caddyshack gopher was you, by the way.” Her voice is so soft, just above a whisper.
A little gift she’s offering, making amends.
“Thoughts about you, burrowing through my brain. For three years after I met you at Erewhon, that’s how it felt.
I was Bill Murray trying to exterminate those thoughts. But the gopher won.”
“Damn right he did, baby. Damn. Right.”