10. Chapter 6
Chapter 6
Stone
“ H old still,” Lucy commands, her minty breath too close for comfort. It elicits memories from last night when I had the best kiss of my life, and that’s saying something considering I’ve kissed a lot of women.
I suspected Lucy knew how to kiss, but I wasn’t expecting to have my world turned upside down. And what was with those images of us getting married and moving into my house and having babies? The explosions, I understand. Her kiss was dynamite to my self-control. But the rest?
No way.
What happens in Dasher Valley stays in Dasher Valley.
“What are you thinking about, Pebbles?” I can hear the smirk in her voice. “Your face is getting pink.”
“Pebbles? You’re sticking with that?”
“You call me by my author name. And then you gave me the nickname ‘Little Lion.’ It’s only fair you get one, too. ”
“You can’t choose another variation of my name? Pebbles? Like I’m a caveman from The Flintstones? ”
She snickers, patting me on top of my head. “Pebbles was the girl. You’re thinking of BamBam.”
“Great, so I’m a cave woman. Noted.” I try to sound offended, but honestly, I’m enjoying this light, playful side to her. If she wants to call me Pebbles, so be it. As long as it makes her smile and not look like she’s the blue emotion, Sadness, from Inside Out. Since we’re talking cartoons and all right now.
Lucy’s shallow breaths (I can tell she’s trying to hold her breath as her face is near mine) once again reminds me of the twenty minutes we spent making out on the floor of the porch last night.
I want to open my eyes and see if desire swims in her hazel eyes as it pools in my gut, but right now, I’m forced to rely on my sense of touch as I sit on the toilet seat in the small bathroom I once shared with my older sister.
Lucy’s finger brushes underneath my eyes as she rubs in arnica cream that she swears will assist in a quicker healing of my bruised eyes. She had given me a tub of it before we left her apartment yesterday, and I’d been applying it as she instructed. She took on the task right now, however, because she’s going to apply makeup to my face to lessen the visibility of the bruising for the wedding. She apparently has this fancy concealer for covering tattoos that also works for bruises. When I asked her why she needed something strong enough to cover bruises, she laughed and said that it was due to job hazards. That’s when I remembered she got a black eye a few months ago while at work.
I wince as she presses a little harder .
“I’m sorry,” she says in a high-pitched voice. “I’m making sure the cream is soaked into your skin before I apply the concealer.”
I don’t reply because she once again brushes her finger under my eye, but she does so more gently this time as her palm cups my face. I hold as still as a living statue.
There is nothing like this feeling. I thought having her clean my face off after the crab incident was a feeling that couldn’t be topped.
Nope.
Kissing her was a Fourth of July fireworks experience, but having her touch me while my eyes are closed, never knowing when the next touch is going to come, is deliciously excruciating. Lucy’s touch brings a heat to my body like I’m once again on the football field in the middle of summer drills. At the same time, it grounds me like I’m an electrical current and she’s the metal that absorbs my shock.
Too soon, her warmth is removed. Instead, something prickles my skin. I crinkle my nose and open my eyes.
Lucy is right. there.
She’s focused, the red in her hair highlighting the green flecks in her eyes. The freckles across her nose provide a warm contrast to her cool skin as she tilts her head to get a better angle. She has some sort of brush in her hand, making gentle strokes right above my cheekbones.
“Does it hurt?” she asks, leaning back and grabbing something that looks like an artist’s color palette. She mixes a brown powder into a liquid that resembles the color of vanilla ice cream.
“No. What are you mixing? ”
“Just adding a dash of bronzer into the concealer. Where I could scare a ghost if I happened upon it, you are the color of a bronze trophy. Especially since you’ve been in the sun this summer. You were paler back in February.”
My lips twitch upward. “You’ve been watching me that closely for that long, Little Lion?” The brush she was circling slowly on the palette suddenly stops, but she keeps her eyes fixated on the color mixture, her shoulders raising just a hair. “I watch everything and everyone. Don’t feel special. You’re a person in my close sphere of living. Of course I watch you.”
“I’m still going to feel special,” I jest. “Being watched by you is simultaneously nerve-wracking and thrilling.”
She snorts a laugh as she turns her attention back to me. “Just close your eyes and tilt your head up, will ya?” The brush circles within her mixture once more, then she holds it up in front of me while her eyebrow hitches as if to question why my eyes are still open.
And the answer to her unspoken accusation is that I have to see her reaction to my next words. I’m testing the waters since we haven’t addressed what happened last night. We woke up, silently moved around the house like nothing happened, exchanged knowing glances across the breakfast table, and then I asked her if she knew of a way to cover the black around my eyes since she’s the one who put it there.
“If you want to kiss me, Little Lion, at least allow me to stand so I can wrap one arm around your waist, stitch you to me, and run my fingers…”
The vile taste of concealer touches my tongue as she slides the coated brush across my mouth, a bewildered look painting her face. I spit into my hands and rub at my tongue, completely aware I look like a disgusting, uncouth pig-man right now, but hey… it’s her fault.
“What was that for?”
She holds the brush, eyes wide as saucers. “I–I,” she stutters, glancing from me to the brush in her hands, then she rambles. “I’m sorry! I don’t know what came over me. You started talking about kissing me again and I got nervous and what happens on Monday when we’re back at work? Will people know I kissed my boss?”
I wipe at my mouth once more as she continues spewing her worries aloud. I let her get it all out. If you’re curious as to what concealer mixed with bronzer tastes like, it’s something akin to what you’d taste if you licked the floor of a chemical factory. And the taste seems to be getting worse as I attempt to rid myself of it.
Lucy stops her anxious maunder then fishes around in her makeup box.
“Take this.” She holds out a tissue, which I snatch, causing it to tear in half. She drops the half remaining in her hands onto my lap then walks out of the bathroom. I wipe my hands and face, not enjoying the taste of tissue either.
“Lucy May,” I growl, jumping to my feet and walking out into the hallway. “This tastes disgusting, you know?” I stop a foot in front of her when she darts out of my sister’s bedroom with a half-empty bottle of water.
“Here. Drink this.”
“It’s opened. ”
She shrugs. “I know. It’s my midnight water. Now drink it or continue tasting my concoction.”
“Do you even know what horrid taste you just shoved into my mouth? Water is not going to make it go away.”
“No,” she says, averting her eyes and crossing her arms after I take the bottle from her and take a swig. She’s becoming defensive, and I can’t help myself. She’s hot when she’s feisty.
She continues talking, a bite to her voice. “I tend to keep my makeup on my face. And you would have, too, if you wouldn’t talk nonsense about kissing me. We’ve done it already. It wouldn’t be smart to do it again when we have to go back to normal come Monday.”
I drop the bottle and step closer to her, re-angling myself so that she’s forced against the beige wall. Through my smirk, I whisper, “‘It wouldn’t be smart?’ Who said anything about being smart? You said what happens here stays here. Besides, I think you should know what your makeup tastes like. For research. Who knows? Maybe you can write this scene into one of your books.”
She glances at her feet then back to me, firmly setting her jaw. “You don’t have the brush. You can’t do anything.” The trembling challenge dripping in her voice is something I can’t back down from.
I laugh quietly and place my hands on either side of her head. I want her desperately…
Our foreheads touch, and she tilts her chin up ever so slightly. “The taste remains on my lips, Lucy May.” I slide my tongue across my top lip. “On my tongue. ”
She whimpers, black-coated eyelashes fluttering closed while her pale pink lips part.
And in all transparency, I mutter a curse word.
“Lucy,” I growl her name again as I ball my hands into fists against the wall. She might have been trying to be polite in saying no with her smart phrase earlier, so I have to know for sure before I let myself lose control. “Say the word and I’ll stop.”
She sighs, practically undoing me. “Don’t stop.”
I suck in a breath before closing my eyes and start removing her lipstick with my mouth. The moment her lips touch mine, I know last night wasn’t a fluke. The woman tastes like she was tailor-made to my liking.
Her hands slide up my waist, across my chest, and then tangle in my hair as she tugs me closer. Or maybe she’s pulling herself closer to me.
I can’t tell.
All I know is that my hands have wandered on their own accord, and I hoist her against the wall. Her legs instantaneously wrap around my hips as I deepen the kiss. The minty taste of her cleanses away the chemical compound flavor with every passing second while also rewriting the code of my brain.
My control completely snaps.
I pull back from the kiss, groaning her name through another curse as I carry her the short distance to my childhood bedroom. I set her down on top of the unmade gray bed sheets, watching in building anticipation as her back hits the bed. I lean over her, holding my weight with one arm while my other hand runs up her bare leg. I thought seeing Lucy in athletic shorts and an oversized t-shirt was a treat earlier this morning since she’s usually dolled up. Now I’m extra thankful for the attire.
She moans my name, and I never want to hear it said any other way again. Wrapping her arms around my neck, she drags my lips down to hers.
H ow can—
I mean—
That was—
Whoa.
Feelings. Massive feelings. Hit-with-a-baseball-in-the-eye type feelings. Tackled-by-a-250-pound-linebacker type feelings. Cast-iron-skillet-to-the-face type feelings. Feelings I can’t even begin to dissect or name.
I continue to spin and reel as I put my t-shirt back on. How can a person do that to another person? Make someone feel like a detonated bomb? Sure, the books dramatize kisses and intimate moments with that sort of language, but what transpired between me and Lucy was not fiction.
That was very, very real.
And terrifying.
Who knows what would have happened had my mom not burst through the front door downstairs and announced her presence, sending Lucy darting from underneath me like a skittish little lion.
Oh, I know. I would have claimed her as my own right there on my childhood bed. Claimed her in more ways than I already had.
Mom and Brother Johnny put groceries away downstairs, and I feel an inkling of guilt creep in. We didn’t go all the way, though, so I shove it down and head to check on Lucy.
Knocking on the bathroom door, I ask her if she can finish covering the bruises under my eyes. When she opens the door, I can’t help but smile at her frazzled but pleased state. Her eyes shine with new light and the trace of sadness that had been as a rain cloud over her aura for a while has evaporated.
I did that to her.
“Is my hair okay?” she whispers.
I lean towards her and whisper back. “You’re beautiful.” I nibble her earlobe as she playfully swats my arm. “Now make me beautiful, please.”
Lucy kneels down in front of me with the brush in her hand as I sit on the closed toilet seat. “Close your eyes,” she whispers.
I do as she says.
The coolness of the brush seeps into my heated face as she works to conceal the bruises around my eyes. Within moments, though it feels like a lifetime of her fingers brushing across my skin, she says she is finished.
She’s still knelt down in front of me with doe eyes and a satisfied smile, and I can’t resist the longing racing through my veins at the new memories made only half an hour ago. I reach out and cup her face, drawing her lips to mine. She bends to my will easily, her mouth moving in tandem with me. The fiery passion from before is tamed this go around, but it’s replaced with something sweet and enthralling.
“Stone,” she says in between breaths. “What are we doing?”
“I believe we are making out. What would you call this, Miss Romance Writer?”
She spurts a laugh. “This is fake. It’s all fake.” She repeats the phrase a few more times as if to convince herself of its validity.
“We can say this was a practice round for when some drunk relative decides they’d like to see us kiss. Sound good? Nothing more attached to this moment.”
Now I’m trying to convince myself that I didn’t just have two of the most outstanding kisses of my life. Kisses that scientists would marvel at if they caught wind of the new discoveries I’ve made in the confines of my mom’s house.
She nods her head, though she doesn’t hide her frown.
Does she want this to be something? Surely not. She was adamant beforehand. And I—
“What happens in Dasher Valley stays in Dasher Valley, right?”
It’s my turn to laugh even though I can’t hide the traces of disgust at myself sinking in at the worry in her voice. “Again. We will call it practice. This will not happen again if you don’t want it to, okay?” My stomach drops at the thought of her lips nevermore meeting mine, of never putting my hands on her body again, but I press on. “We practiced well. Very well. No one will doubt our relationship now because we will deliver upon the best PDA kiss the world has ever seen.”
She laughs, her frown transitioning to a pleasant smile. I smile, too, hoping hers is genuine. So many emotions linger beneath the surface right now. I’m not sure I could tell which way is up and which way is down.
“Lucy, I do have one question before we put this behind us.”
She swallows, pushing her bangs out of her eyes. “Yes?”
“All this time you’ve been adamant about not dating me when I’ve flirted with you at work. You’ve acted like I repulsed you, and you wanted nothing to do with me. Can you be honest with me? Do you like me?”
Her eyes cut down as she fiddles with a silver ring on her left thumb. “I’ve always found you attractive, yes. And I see so much good in you. But I know you cycle through women faster than I write stories, and it wouldn’t be wise of me to even attempt to go there with you.”
I nod in understanding, my heart faltering over the feeling of taking advantage of her physical attraction to me. I’ve got to be more in control of myself…
Closing my eyes and releasing a breath, I take a moment to steady myself. Then I open my eyes and say, “I can’t commit, so you are wise to set that boundary. I’m sorry I kissed you… among other things.”
“It’s okay. Truly. At least I know what it’s like to be kissed by you. Among other things…” she teases.
“And what’s it like?”
Lucy laughs with a swift shake of her head. “For book research purposes, I’ll just say it was explosive.”
Holding my tongue from speaking of the strange visions from yesterday that involved explosions, I nod and flash her a flirty grin. “That it was.” I’ll work through all these weird feelings and guilt later while I’m in bed. Alone. Without her entrancing presence. “Let’s finish getting ready for this wedding. Thanks for covering up my raccoon eyes.”