Chapter Fourteen #2
“Honestly?” Dylan shook their head. “No.”
Vicky blinked in confusion. “But—I broke your heart.”
“You did,” Dylan said, nodding. “At the time it was definitely the worst thing that’d ever happened to me, and that includes every dress my mother forced me into.
But then, time passed. I got perspective.
Yes,” Dylan admitted, “you hurt me, and humiliated me, and delayed my coming out. But we were so young. And your parents were in the middle of a crazy divorce, like, in court. And ultimately it was my responsibility to come out, not anyone else’s. I forgave you. Years ago, really.”
Vicky couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She stared at Dylan in disbelief. “Wow. I’m sort of shocked. I thought you still resented me.”
“What?” Dylan laughed in confusion. “Vee. I don’t resent you. Yes, you’re still very annoying,” they allowed, “and occasionally bratty and you’re the only person I know who wears pleated slacks unironically, but I don’t resent you. We’re buds.”
“Buds?” Vicky repeated.
Dylan’s gaze flicked to Vicky’s mouth before they cleared their throat. “Yeah. Buds.”
Vicky felt a tingle in her low belly. She was suddenly aware of how close they were to each other. Their knees were touching. “Buds,” she said again, softer. “Okay. Good.”
Dylan’s gaze found its way back to Vicky’s. For a long moment, they just looked at each other.
Joy seeped into Vicky’s veins. Dylan didn’t resent her. Dylan had even forgiven her. What a gift that was. The best gift of Vicky’s life. Vicky wanted to hug them.
Okay, truthfully, she wanted to kiss them. She wanted to pick up where they left off and do all the things they hadn’t done when they were teenage virgins. She wanted to show Dylan exactly how sorry she was.
Vicky tested the waters. “Guess I should go…?”
“Yeah, I should get back to work.” Dylan gestured at their laptop. The tips of their ears were pink.
Vicky reapplied her lip gloss using the ever-present tube in her pocket, buying herself a few seconds and, maybe, making herself a little cuter. (Was it her imagination or was Dylan always staring at her mouth?)
“Thanks for dinner,” Vicky said, getting to her feet. “And, y’know, saving my soul from eternal damnation.”
Dylan chuckled awkwardly, following Vicky to the door. “Not sure if I did that, but no worries.”
They both lingered in the doorway.
Dylan’s gaze was glued to Vicky’s freshly glossed mouth. Still, they didn’t make a move.
“Night.” Vicky backed reluctantly into the hall.
“Night,” Dylan echoed, giving the door a little push until it closed.
Vicky stood in the middle of the hallway, every inch of her skin flushed.
Was that—a moment? A moment they somehow both missed?
She knew she should go back to her own room, but a pulsating one-track need kept her rooted to the spot.
The door whipped back open. Dylan took a decisive step into the hallway, registered Vicky still standing there, and pulled up short. “Oh.”
For a second that felt as long as a lifetime, the pair stood there, the air between them sparkling with enough electricity to power the entire town.
The corner of Dylan’s mouth kicked up. Their voice was a low rasp. “I was coming to find you.”
Vicky was jittery with a fever pitch of need to touch the person in front of her. “I wanted you to,” she whispered.
That was it. The final vestiges of self-protection and denial burned up like tissue paper in a roaring blaze.
Dylan surged forward, until Vicky could grab two fistfuls of Dylan’s tee.
She tugged them to her with a gasp. Their lips met, mouths hot, and Vicky’s body was no longer a body: It was molten lava, it was liquid heat.
This kiss was fresh water after being lost in the desert.
Medicine on a deathbed. It was a kiss twenty years in the making, and it was worth every fucking second.
Dylan’s mouth was salty from the sushi and sweet from the soda, and even as Vicky tasted it, she craved more.
Her hands slid to Dylan’s arms, feeling the warm swell of their biceps, bulging as Dylan’s hand moved, fisting the back of Vicky’s head, holding her in place.
God, these arms. Teenage Dylan did not have these arms. A desperate moan escaped Vicky’s mouth, disappearing into Dylan’s.
Dylan pulled back first. Their mouth was a sexy mess of sticky red gloss. Their pupils were the size of the moon. “Fuck, Vee,” they said with a choke, “are you trying to kill me?”
“If I was, you’d already be dead.” Vicky tried to swallow, feeling lightheaded. “I really thought you hated me.”
“Oh, I do,” Dylan panted, flustered, “in an I-also-want-to-fillet-you-like-a-fish-and-serve-you-for-Sunday-supper sorta way.”
Vicky was momentarily thrown. “What the hell does that mean?”
“I have no idea.” Dylan looked up and down the empty hallway. Their voice was low and a little uncertain. “This is a good idea, right?”
Vicky hooked her fingers into Dylan’s belt loop, pulling them step-by-step back into the bedroom. “Probably not. But guess what?”
Dylan shut the door after them. The air was an unlit Molotov cocktail. One match and everything would explode. “What?”
Vicky tipped her mouth up, lips parted. “We’re gonna do it anyway.”
Dylan let out a low growl, tousled hair falling over one eye, and then their mouth was back onto Vicky’s, kissing her deeply.
Vicky felt like she was being split open—her heart, her lungs, the very center of her being.
She moaned, impatient for more even as Dylan gave it to her.
Dylan’s lips were driving and insistent, pushing Vicky’s mouth wider, their tongue licking hungrily into the kiss, again and again and again.
“God,” Vicky panted, in between kisses, “I can’t believe how hot you are.”
Dylan’s hands dropped to Vicky’s waist, squeezing the curve of her hip. “I can’t believe how the same you are.”
Vicky shoved them, laughing, until Dylan’s mouth reclaimed hers, hot and possessive.
Without breaking the kiss, Dylan spun them both around one hundred and eighty degrees and backed her across the carpet, stumbling over a stray pair of sneakers until she landed against the wall with a thud that surprised them both.
Vicky caught Dylan’s eye and exhaled half a laugh, half a groan.
Her hands were in Dylan’s hair, so full of snapping desire she wanted to rip it out at the roots, pulling too hard.
“Ow,” Dylan broke off, laughing.
“Sorry.” Vicky dropped her hands, panting.
“Bad girl.” Their bodies still agonizingly flush, Dylan held Vicky’s gaze. Without breaking eye contact, they circled both of Vicky’s wrists with one strong hand.
Thrilled, Vicky let them.
Dylan lifted Vicky’s hands up, pinning them to the wall above her head. The feeling of Dylan holding her in place, in charge and able to do whatever the fuck they wanted with their free hand, was almost too much. Vicky’s underwear was soaked. She’d never been more turned on.
Dylan ducked their head close, lips meeting in another scorching kiss.
Vicky shut her eyes to savor the wild heat, the addictive taste of Dylan’s confident mouth.
Dylan’s lips slid down Vicky’s jaw, to the sensitive curve of her neck, biting and sucking her skin.
Vicky groaned, tipping her head farther to the side to give Dylan more access.
Then Dylan pulled back. One hand still held Vicky’s wrists, while the other dropped slowly down her chin, tracing an agonizingly slow line over the soft dip of her throat.
Down her décolletage. Into the dip of her cleavage.
Vicky needed Dylan to touch her nipples, squeeze her boobs.
But instead, Dylan’s finger kept moving south, between Vicky’s breasts, over her tank top, toward the soft mound of her stomach.
Vicky moaned, every inch of her skin on fire.
If Dylan made it all the way between her thighs, she’d come right here against the bedroom wall. “Touch me,” Vicky pleaded. “Please.”
Dylan’s fingertip reached the top of Vicky’s shorts. Take them off, Vicky wanted to scream. Burn my clothes: I won’t need them anymore! Instead, Dylan paused, finger idling at the button. Their fingers tightened around Vicky’s wrist.
Then, a noise. Downstairs. The front door opening. The sound of chatter and laughter spilled in. “We’re home!” Jazz sang.
“Vicky?” Lola’s voice floated up. “Dyls?”
Vicky whipped to find Dylan’s gaze, feeling like she’d just been shaken awake. Every nerve ending was on fire. “That…wasn’t in the script.”
Dylan let go of Vicky, the sexy spell of the kiss fading like the sunlight leaving the bedroom. “I mean, we could…” Dylan tipped their head at the closed bedroom door.
“Stay in here?” Vicky guessed. “Hide?”
Energetic disco-funk blasted from the kitchen. “Got to Be Real” by Cheryl Lynn, one of Jazz’s faves. “What you find-ah. What you feel, now…”
“Yeah.” Dylan crooked an eyebrow. “Live in the now.”
But Vicky shook her head. “No more hiding.”
She leaned forward to touch her lips to Dylan’s in a warm, slow kiss that made her whole body hum. Then, reluctantly, she slipped toward the door, peeking over her shoulder. “Coming?”
Dylan looked tortured. “Hard yes. I’ll meet you downstairs.”
Vicky giggled, her bloodstream still as fizzy as the Diet Dr Pepper they’d had with dinner. With a nudge of her hip, the bedroom door swung shut.
Alone in the hall, Vicky had to steady herself against the wall. She touched her lips, her hair.
Had that really just happened? And, equally important, what happened now?