Chapter 19
Zoe
Bennett can’t keep his hands off me.
I didn’t expect him to be so hungry, but he can’t seem to get enough, and as soon as he touches me, I don’t want to stop. We did it on Saturday morning, after lunch…and again after I got home from dinner.
Being wanted by a man like him? It’s exhilarating.
Sunday morning, when I wake up in his bed for the third time in a row, he holds me from behind. His erection is unmistakable, but when he plays with the edge of my underwear—the only clothing I’m wearing—I turn over.
“Not this morning,” I say. “I’m sore.”
His eyebrows draw together. “Did I hurt you?”
“No, and I very much wanted everything we did. But I’m all sexed out for now.”
Worried he’ll get out of bed, I put a hand on his hip. I don’t want him to go anywhere.
He runs a hand through his hair, mussing it up in an adorable way. “I hadn’t had sex in quite a while. I guess that’s why I’m…”
“Insatiable?”
The corner of his mouth lifts. “Yeah. Plus you’re—”
“Extremely hot?” I wiggle my ass.
“You are.” He pulls me closer, and certain parts of me begin to respond, but I don’t have the energy. I just want to lie here with him.
“What’s ‘quite a while’?” I ask.
“Three years.”
He answers my question without hesitation, but he doesn’t elaborate. Doesn’t tell me about the last person he was with—did they break his heart?
I know nothing of Bennett’s past. Not that part, anyway.
I know a little about his family. Thanks to some googling, I know how long he’s been CEO, and that he first worked for T it’s just weird to think of him with another person when I’m nearly naked in his bed on a Sunday morning.
“You know,” he says, “that’s actually very close to how I met the last woman I slept with, though I can’t remember whether my tie was loosened. Unlikely.”
“Really? She didn’t pretend to be your girlfriend and move in with you because she had nowhere to go?”
“No, this is a first.” I don’t expect him to say more, but he does. “She was out with her friends to celebrate her divorce finally being official, and I was drinking alone at a bar.”
“A swanky one?” I ask.
“I suppose you could say that. She approached me.”
“You had a one-night stand?”
“No, we’d see each other once or twice a month, on the weekends she didn’t have her kids. But it was just casual.”
Like me and Bennett. I have no right to think of anything else, but as I lie here with him, I feel a flicker of desire to have more. After everything that happened, it’s a ridiculous urge.
He twists a lock of my hair. “Unlike you, she was older than me. By almost ten years.”
“Ah. You were her boy toy,” I tease.
He pulls back and gives me a look. It’s a little stern, and there’s certainly nothing boyish about that expression.
I’m glad he told me something—quenched my thirst for knowledge, so to speak—but I still feel like he didn’t tell me anything important.
“Did you kiss her on the lips?” I ask before I can think better of it.
“No,” he says shortly.
And I get it; I’m not going to pry. That’s his business, not mine, and he’s very generous with his mouth in other ways.
I rest my head on his shoulder. When I first met Bennett, I certainly didn’t imagine that we’d end up snuggling on a Sunday morning.
“What are your plans for the day?” I ask.
“Dim sum with my parents. I have some work to do in the afternoon. And you?”
“Not much of anything, to be honest. I’ll probably make some more decorating plans for my new apartment. I’m hoping to find a whole set of llamacorn dishes.”
When he grimaces, I tickle his sides—at least, I try to. He flips me onto my back and pins my hands to the bed in a flash, and I giggle.
“And later,” I say, “maybe…”
I press myself against his cock, and he groans.
Yes, this is definitely a good weekend.
After Bennett leaves to see his parents—I suspect Clifton won’t join them today—I pour myself a second cup of coffee, recline on the couch, and open the group chat.
Me: I slept with Bennett.
Fiona: And???
Me: We did it 6 times in 48 hours.
I think I need to stretch because my legs aren’t used to being spread so much. But I don’t type that.
Karina: It must have been good.
Me: He’s very enthusiastic in bed.
It amuses me to use “enthusiastic” to describe Bennett, but it’s definitely accurate here.
Fiona: I’m going to assume he goes down on you a lot.
Claire: That’s what I assume too.
Fiona: I’m very happy for you.
I feel myself blush. Yes, he’s quite talented with his tongue.
Claire doesn’t say anything about being careful, about how sex can complicate things, but when I see her name on the screen, I remember her previous warning.
But everything’s okay. Bennett and I are just having fun together, and if I want to know him better…well, that’s because we’re friends.
I’m about to respond when I get a call from my mother, which is effective at dousing my good mood.
“Zoe!” she barks.
Why does she already sound annoyed?
“I’ve been going through your old boxes in the basement,” she says.
“I thought we cleared out all the school stuff?”
“This isn’t school stuff. Some drawings from when you were small. I don’t know why you drew me with such a big head.”
Um, probably because I was, like, four and knew nothing of proportions?
“There are also a few diaries,” my mom says.
I manage to cover my mouth so she doesn’t hear my yelp.
Please say you didn’t read them please say you didn’t read them please say you didn’t read them…
It’s an invasion of privacy, but my mother doesn’t care about that. Not when it comes to her daughter, at least.
“You were nine when you wrote this one,” Mom says. “You were mad because I wouldn’t let you go to a sleepover. You didn’t understand that bad things can happen at sleepovers, and I barely knew the parents.”
Yeah, over twenty years later, I can appreciate a mother’s reluctance to let her daughter go to a sleepover. I don’t blame her for making that decision, but I do blame her for being upset with me now.
“Let me read some of it to you—”
“No!” I say.
“Why not? You wrote it. You didn’t know how to spell ‘prejudiced.’” She sounds very disappointed in me. I was nine!
I’d ask why I was using that word—did I claim she was prejudiced?—but the last thing I want is to encourage her.
“Also,” she says, “you wrote ‘revenge’ in gel pen and underlined it three times.”
Huh. Apparently, I did think about revenge when I was younger. I’m a little curious about what else is in these childhood diaries, though I’m not sure I want to read them. It might be too painful.
But not nearly as painful as hearing it over the phone.
“Please don’t read the diaries,” I say. “I’ll pick them up soon.”
“Eddie is coming tonight.”
“Great! Give them to him, and he can give them to me.”
Mom clicks her tongue. “You could visit, too.”
I’m really not in the mood for that, and I was hoping to spend time with Bennett.
“I have to look at an apartment,” I lie.
As soon as I end the call, I text my brother. This takes precedence over the conversation with my friends.
Me: Mom found my old diaries. Please pick them up when you visit her tonight.
Eddie: Was she reading them to you over the phone?
Yeah, my mother is predictable in some ways.
I extract a promise from Eddie that he’ll pick them up and not read them.
My brother is, fortunately, more trustworthy than my mother, although I do expect him to tease me about the covers of the diaries.
If I recall correctly, one of them has two pink ponies and sheds glitter everywhere.
So, yeah, there might be some good-natured sibling ribbing, but he won’t read every word and get annoyed with what I thought about the world two decades ago.
I don’t tell Eddie that I’m sleeping with Bennett. There are some things my brother doesn’t need to know. He hasn’t asked about Bennett in a while anyway. When nothing bad happened in the first few weeks, he seemed to relax, and I no longer text every night to assure him that I’m safe.
And in a few more weeks, I’ll be gone. But before that happens, I’ll attend the birthday dinner for Bennett and Clifton, and I’ll get to see my ex squirm even more. The thought makes me cackle in delight.
I frown. Am I turning into my mother, who’s mad about things I did when I was nine?
No, holding small stuff from your daughter’s childhood against her is very different from wanting revenge on your cheating ex. I’m still capable of forgiving lots of things, but why should I forgive Clifton for a betrayal that happened less than two months ago?
But because I’m terrified of becoming my mother, anything that makes me feel even the tiniest bit like her gives me pause.
This really is different, though.
Besides, I’ve moved on. Sure, sleeping with my ex’s brother could be seen as some sort of revenge, but that’s not why I’m doing it. We genuinely have good chemistry. I didn’t plan on this happening; it just happened.
While I don’t want to make too many comparisons, Bennett is definitely better in bed. That thing he does with his tongue…
Okay, I need to stop getting myself worked up. He won’t be back for another hour or two.
Still, it’s hard to completely remove him from my mind, and I find myself wondering what, exactly, he and Clifton hold against each other. Have they had a cold relationship for years because of silly childhood shenanigans? Or is it something more?
I have to believe it’s something more. Clifton is a jerk, after all, and Bennett wouldn’t…
Except I don’t know Bennett Chung as well as I wish I did.
I know his routine. I know how he likes his coffee.
I know he doesn’t like colorful mugs. I know he rarely shows a lot of emotion on his face, but when he does, it’s a beautiful thing.
I know he has a convertible, which he rarely drives.
I know he gives out full-size candy bars for Halloween and can be persuaded to participate in a costume competition.
I know he has amazing forearms and even likes to tease me with them—I wonder how many people see his playfulness? Maybe, in some ways, he does show me quite a bit of himself. Things I suspect he doesn’t show to a ton of people.
I wish I knew more.
Feeling the need to be productive, I start a load of laundry, and since Christmas is coming up, I order something to help Bennett celebrate the season. It should arrive by the end of the week.
I’m in my room, folding my laundry, when I hear him return. I head downstairs.
“Hey,” I say as he takes off his shoes. “How was it?”
“The usual.” He pauses. “Except my parents asked questions about you.”
I don’t know why, but I enjoy watching him put on slippers when he gets home. It’s a sign I get to see a side of him that not everyone does.
And, as of a few days ago, I get to see him naked, too.
He touches my arm, something he wouldn’t have done before we started sleeping together. Not quite like this.
The touch excites me.
“How was your morning?” he asks.
I shrug. “It was fine.” I don’t want to get into the whole my-mother-started-reading-my-diaries thing. “Better now that you’re home.” I walk my fingers up his arm, then freeze.
This is his home, not mine. I’ll be leaving soon.
But until then…
I pull my shirt over my head. I’m wearing a lacy black bra underneath, and Bennett’s gaze immediately drops to my chest.
“Want to have a little fun before you get to work?” I ask.
In response, he tosses me over his shoulder like I weigh nothing, and I giggle as he carries me up the stairs.