Chapter 8
I roll to the right of my car and slide my legs to the ground, so I’m shielded from Caleb’s view while I adjust my shorts and panties. My thighs are wet from pleasure, and my heart is pounding from the jolt of adrenaline that rushed through my body the second Rowan said we had company.
Caleb saunters into the garage as I move to stand by the passenger door, maintaining a full ton of metal between us. It’s bad enough having to endure his glare.
“You had to bring your car back already, huh? Hope this guy gave you a warranty on his work.” Caleb’s tone is obvious, but if he wants to go at this with lies, fine. I’ll play along.
“Actually, his work was so good I thought I’d have him do some more,” I say, letting the double meaning float in the air between the three of us.
Rowan coughs out a hard laugh, but Caleb’s reproachful glare only narrows on me.
“You know what, though? Another time, maybe. It looks like you two need some alone time, so I’m gonna . . .” I turn my back to them and march to the workbench where I left my crossbody then snag the keys out of Rowan’s hand as he dangles them out for me to take.
I open the driver’s side door and slip inside, holding my breath the entire time.
The stale air burns my lungs until I crank the engine and allow myself to exhale as my gaze flits to Rowan, whose lips are raw from pleasing me.
My neck warms and I can feel the blush creeping up, so I back away from the shop—and the Anderson brothers—before I start to tear up from embarrassment.
It's not so much that I care about being caught, or potentially caught, in an intimate moment. It’s the layers of the situation—that it’s Caleb, and that it was with Rowan.
And I know I shouldn’t care because it’s not like Caleb gave two shits about my feelings at our graduation party. Or, fuck, maybe ever.
I need a voice of reason, but since the person I used to go to for emotional advice is now my ex and part of the problem, I decide it’s time I get Cami up to speed. She’s going to lose her mind.
The call rings through the speakers of my car when I push her contact info, and I redial her twice before she finally picks up. It’s close to one in the afternoon.
“What, Mom? I’m up. Gosh!” She whines like a teenager. I have serious doubts about my friend making it through college without me. She has zero discipline. Her brother has his shit together at least, and thankfully, she’s staying local so he can keep an eye on her habits.
“I don’t know how you expect to become a nurse from bed,” I say, glancing over my shoulder as I merge onto the highway.
“I’ll work nights. It will be fine. Besides, I have like a million years of school, so I’ll be ready when the time comes.”
I roll my eyes at my friend’s dramatics.
“If you ever get up for school. You know I worry about leaving you alone in two months,” I say.
“So, stay. Go to school with me. We can join a sorority, hit all the parties, date some football players—live the dream!”
I laugh silently.
“I think you’re missing the point.” I follow my words with an audible sigh. My friend mumbles something about me not being any fun.
“Are you on the highway? Your car is super loud,” she groans. I picture her finally stretching her body awake and rolling out of her bed. The only reason she can get away with the lazy life is because her parents both work in healthcare and leave the house at four in the morning.
“I’m heading back from your brother’s shop, actually.” I snap my mouth shut and wait for my friend to pick apart my story while I barrel toward her house.
“Something wrong with your car?” She yawns through her words.
“My ac, you know . . . it’s cold now.” Cami’s always complaining about riding in my car. The vinyl seats and zero air make for a sweaty ride.
“That’s good. Miggy hooked you up? He didn’t say anything.”
I don’t respond, and it takes only a few seconds of my silence for my friend to make the connection.
“Shit! Rowan fixed your car? Did you stay the whole time while he worked on it? Did he take his shirt off? Why didn’t you call me and take me with you? Bitch! I need photos of that man working on a car. It’s creepy for me to take them myself when my brother’s hanging around.”
I chuckle at my friend’s spiral, then suck in a long breath and brace myself for the storm I’m about to brew.
“I didn’t exactly watch him work on the car.” My body hums with a rush of tingles from my mere insinuation. The way Rowan makes my body feel, even from memory. My God.
“Saylor, don’t fuck with me. What are you saying? I need you to give it to me straight. Did you? Are you hooking up with Rowan Anderson?”
I nod vehemently because I know Cami can’t see me, but I manage to temper my voice when I respond.
“We’ve done . . . things. Let’s just say my air is working and so is Rowan Anderson’s tongue.”
“Bitch!” She squeals into the phone, and I laugh at her tirade. I know she’s not truly jealous, and I know she’s going to want embarrassing details, specifics that are going to require a few drinks before I share.
“Get your suit on and grab your club pass. I think we’re overdue for a pool day, and my mom’s membership still covers me until I leave for school in August.”
My friend orders me to put the pedal to the metal and get my ass to her soon before we end our call.
I’m going to have to endure some probing questions for the next hour for sure, but once I get Cami up to speed, maybe she can help me figure out how to navigate what the fuck all of this means and put the whole brothers aspect into perspective.
I don’t want to feel ashamed for having a fling with a hot older guy, but I also can’t help but feel like a chess piece on an unfair gameboard.
And I need someone to help me see the play for what it is, so I don’t end up losing more than I bargain for.
“And Caleb was just . . . there?”
It took about an hour to download all the details to my friend.
Thankfully, the Arcadia Club’s pool isn’t very crowded this time of day, because Cami insisted on revisiting each aspect about a dozen times, and her questions were not even remotely close to modest. At one point, I had to flat-out hold her hands and meet her eyes as I said, “No, I have not seen Rowan’s dick. ”
But I want to. I kept that bit to myself.
“My two cents? Caleb is not the same goofy junior high boy you hung out with at the mall. Maybe you two made sense in high school, you were that couple people wanted to see together. He was the popular jock, and you’ve always been—”
I roll my head against the back of the lounge chair and pull my sunglasses down to give my friend a hard glare.
“Always been what?” I know she’s not going to say popular, because I never really hung out with any crowds, in or otherwise. I swam. I hung out with Cami and Caleb. I got good grades and was kind to everyone, but I never really let people in beyond those two.
“Sexy and mysterious, I guess?” My friend scrunches her nose, and it pushes her glasses up.
I chuckle and shake my head as I turn my focus back to the ripples in the pool. A few guests have shown up with kids, and I heard one of them say the word cannonball. I pull my legs up and run my palms over my knees, and the memory of Rowan pushing them apart warms my tummy.
“Is it weird that I’m doing things with Rowan? Not just because he’s Caleb’s brother, but because—” I turn back to my friend and lift a shoulder.
“Because when he was eighteen, we were playing with Barbies?”
I cup my palm over the instant O my mouth forms and shake with a silent laugh.
“Fuck, we really were,” I admit.
That warm feeling hasn’t left me, though.
If anything, Rowan’s maturity draws me to him more.
The physical traits are appealing, the way his body is fully formed, the life lived on his skin with intricate tattoos and hard-earned muscles.
There’s a scar across one of his hands, probably from working with them, and a deep texture to his voice that’s a far cry from the boyish tone of his brother’s.
It’s easy to see why any girl would desire Rowan Anderson’s attention.
But there’s something else that has him stuck in my thoughts.
Sure, there’s the way he makes me feel—sexually.
And maybe that’s all this is, part of my grand awakening, a moment in time to send me off to college to fully become the woman I’m meant to be.
I just can’t seem to shake this premonition, though.
Rowan is peeling back my layers, and it feels like they’ve been waiting to bud for him and him alone.
“Look, babe.” Cami sits up and shifts her legs to the space between our loungers, then pulls her sunglasses down her nose. I take mine off to meet her eyes.
“Caleb was the one who called it quits. And as much as I think he’s an arrogant tool, he was right about this being the time to learn who you really are.
And if the person you are is someone who feels confident and beautiful when she’s around Rowan, then that’s where you should be. So, he’s Caleb’s brother.”
Cami shrugs, and I try like hell to feel just as casual about the idea as she is.
Besides, maybe I’m twisting myself into knots for nothing.
It’s not like Rowan and I are a couple. We’re messing around.
I’m still going off to college and living the life my mom wants me to.
And I’ll probably meet some pre-law student who checks all the boxes.
What harm is there in indulging my teenage fantasy for a little while?
If it bothers Caleb so much, then maybe he’s not as ready to be single as he thought he was.
The cascade of water from the rotund, pink-skinned pre-teen soaks my friend and I from the waist down, and we both rush from our chairs with screams.
“I guess pool time is done,” Cami huffs, running her hands down her hair, then wringing the ends out. She’s wet, but it’s not like she took a trip in the dunk tank.