19. Nolan
Nolan
I began tonight with the best of intentions, everything clearly defined under friendship. We had friends to make it a group event, the theater to make it public, and an early ending to make it appropriate.
Maybe it’s because I haven’t seen her in two days that has me feeling starved to hear her laugh and tell me about her day, what she’s been cooking, how she solved the prank and more about how her speech went.
Maybe it’s the trusting way she leans into me, or the fact her gaze has dropped to my mouth half a dozen times in the last ten minutes that has me throwing my previous intentions out the window.
I grab my phone and send out a series of texts checking and confirming details before nudging Hadley with my elbow. “Time to go.”
“What?” Hadley whispers.
I cock my head in the direction of the empty aisle, motioning for her to follow me.
“What’s wrong?” Luke asks, leaning forward in his seat to look at me.
I shake my head. “Nothing. You guys have a good time.” I grab Hadley’s hand. “See you next week,” I tell him.
Hadley gives him a small wave as she follows me. “Where are we going? Are the others coming?”
“I told you; we’re going to celebrate.”
“Those are vague details.”
I grin, pushing the door that leads to the parking lot open. Outside, autumn teases the air. Hadley shivers beside me, prompting me to drape my arm around her shoulders and pull her close.
“ Where are we going to celebrate.”
“I figure, we’d let the night take us where it wants.” I stop at the passenger side of my truck and open the door for her.
She gives me another side-eye but doesn’t hesitate to hop into my truck.
I flip on her seat warmer and crank the heat up as I back out of my parking spot. “What did you think of your second college tradition?”
“How did you find out about tonight? I must have asked a hundred people, and no one had any idea what I was talking about.”
“That’s classified information.”
“How do we find out about the next one?”
“It’s on Halloween.”
“You already know?” Accusation coats her voice. “Where is it? What does it involve? Is it as secretive as this one tonight?”
“You don’t want to know,” I tell her.
“I do. I want to go.”
“You like the surprise,” I remind her.
“We nearly missed tonight. If a couple of girls hadn’t walked by us, we never would have made it.”
“I was supposed to be there. If the last meeting hadn’t been called, I would have been there.”
“What if you have something else come up for Halloween? A hot blonde invites you to casually date that night?”
I cut my eyes to her, trying to gauge her tone, only sardonic enough for a quip not quite to DEFCON jealousy. “I’ll be there.”
I turn into a neighborhood that has Hadley leaning forward, peering at the houses.
“Wow. They went all out.” She points at a large brick house, the front yard filled with Halloween-themed inflatables and skeletons that nearly reach the third-story roof.
Cobwebs are strewn across every shrub and most of the porch which has gruesome body parts hanging from the eves.
“I don’t think I would have been brave enough to approach that house as a kid.
Lanie loves scary stuff. Horror movies, horror novels, haunted houses—she’s there for all of it. ”
“Not you?”
She shakes her head. “Halloween was always my favorite holiday, but I liked the pumpkins and corn mazes and apple picking.”
“So you were born eighty is what you’re telling me?”
She laughs. “Or with a great sense of survival. What’s your favorite holiday?”
“Thanksgiving.”
“Really? Because your grandma made you chocolate crème pie?”
I glance at her, surprised she remembers the detail.
“My mom grew up on a farm in southern Indiana as one of six kids, and that’s where we’d go every Thanksgiving.
All our aunts, uncles, and cousins would come.
They have five hundred acres of corn, so we’d go out and play in the stalks, scare each other shitless, and then go inside and watch football and eat until we had to be rolled to bed. ”
“I don’t know what is more shocking, the idea of five hundred acres of corn or someone not liking pumpkin pie.”
I sputter through my laugh. “What did your family do?”
She shakes her head. “The complete opposite of yours.”
“No cornfields?”
She grins. “Holidays were an extra day for my parents to work and my mom hates cooking, so we usually ordered food or went out.”
“No parade? Football? Breaking the wishbone?”
Hadley shakes her head. “As we got older, Geoff, Lanie, and I would go to the movies and then hit all the sales for Black Friday at midnight.”
“Christmas?”
“No one does Christmas like Vegas,” she says. “My favorite tradition was going to The Strip and walking through the casinos when the decorations were set up for my birthday. It felt magical.”
“You’re birthday’s around Christmas?”
“The week before,” she tells me, then turns her attention to the windshield as I pull to a stop at the curb of one of the biggest houses on the block. Pumpkins line the front steps and cornstalks are tied to the bottom rails. “Where are we?”
I shrug. “I don’t know, but I see a pool.”
Her eyes snap to mine. “Are you crazy?”
I grin. “Consider it an appetizer for your days of bungee jumping.”
“What part? The time I’ll be spending in a six-by-eight cell or the fountain pen tattoo I’ll be forced to get?”
My laughter belts out of me as I open my door and hop out.
“Nolan!” she hisses, sliding out of the passenger seat, ducking as though it will prevent her from being seen. “This is a terrible idea.”
“Is it?”
“Yes. If you want to celebrate, let’s go do something normal. Find one of those millions of Halloween parties, chug a beer, get a cake…”
“Normal is boring.” I turn to the house. “Look. All the lights are off, and no cars are in the driveway. Worst case scenario, they’re asleep, best case, they’re not even home.”
Hadley’s gaze shifts to each darkened window. “What are we even going to do? I don’t have my bathing suit.”
I raise my eyebrows with a silent dare and continue to the wrought iron fence, holding the gate open as Hadley silently debates whether to follow.
“What if the neighbors call the cops?”
I point to the wall of shrubs that block the view. “They won’t be able to see us, and if they do, how will they know we don’t belong here?” I stop at a lounge chair, and tug off my tee, dropping it to the chair, then kick off my shoes.
Hadley swings her gaze from the pool to me. “You’re serious?”
“Come on, Cutlass. Let’s live a little and celebrate your win.”
She glances back at the water, illuminated to make it the same cerulean shade of blue as her eyes.
“How do we even know if it’s treated? Do you know how much bacteria lives in sitting water?”
“Cutlass…” I taunt, releasing my belt, and then the button of my shorts.
When I glance up, Hadley’s staring at me, her expression torn between so many emotions it’s difficult to read any of them.
I drop my shorts to reveal my boxer briefs and set them on the lounge chair.
Her gaze lowers, taking all of me in with one long stare.
“I showed you mine, now you show me yours.”
She blows out a laugh. “Is that how all your casual dates start? How could anyone resist?”
“Lucky for you, no one’s forcing you to resist me.”
Her gaze slips to my chest. I wish I were closer to see what reaction follows, if her pupils dilate or her heart rate is increasing. She’s so poised, I can’t tell a damn thing from here.
Hadley turns to the chair nearest her and toes off her shoes, then grabs the hem of her black shirt in both hands and pulls it off, revealing a light pink bra.
The sight of her has my cock stirring and my heart racing.
She unbuttons her jeans next, and every drop of blood seems to rush south, desire my only thought.
She tugs them down, revealing bright red underwear, covered in little white hearts.
“Did you wear those with me in mind?”
She scoffs. “Did you not hear me say the first three times that I didn’t think you were coming tonight?”
“Selective hearing is a gift.” I jump backward then, turning in a backward somersault before landing in the water. The pool is heated to feel like a bath. I remain underwater, swimming nearly the full length of the pool that takes me to the edge beside Hadley. When I surface, she’s staring at me.
“Your turn.”
She grins, and then races straight toward me, plugging her nose before she jumps over my head, tucking her feet against her butt as she falls into the pool.
When she rises out of the water, her smile is radiant. “That jump of yours might have been more impressive than your abs,” she tells me.
“What about my pecs?” I ask, swimming toward her.
“What about them?” she asks, swimming on her back in the opposite direction of me.
I laugh aloud. Hadley rarely cuts me down, but she also rarely talks about my physical features, complimenting me instead on the pranks I pull, my reactions, football, and even the paper I asked her to proofread for me.
I’m never quite sure if it’s because she’s working to fight the attraction between us as avidly as I am or because she’s resigned me to the friendzone, which Palmer would say is the silver bullet.
“I was worried the water would be freezing.”
“Another fear down to celebrate you kicking ass and overcoming public speaking. What other fears can we break tonight?”
She shakes her head, stopping when she can touch the bottom. “I don’t know that we’ve overcome my initial fear. The night’s still young. Plenty of time for cops to come and haul us off to jail.”
I remain a couple of feet back. “Tell me more about the speech. Did you feel good about it?”
She pulls in a breath, the hollow of her throat drawing my gaze there and then lower, her body distorted by the water.
“I don’t know if she gave me a pity pass, to be honest. I really was the only one stuck on the introduction speech.”
“Have you always hated public speaking?”