Chapter 18
eighteen
ZEKE
Ahazy stream of sunlight hits my face and I roll over, flinging an arm over my eyes. It can’t be morning already, can it? I just need five more minutes. Five more… minutes…
I breathe deeply, settling back into the warmth of the pillow, when the scent of coconut shampoo wafts over me. My memory stirs, and my eyes flick open, pulling me back into reality.
Autumn’s sitting on the edge of the bed in only her lacy bra and that sweet, sweet thong.
As she pulls her discarded t-shirt from the night before down over her head, the last of my sleep dissipates and everything comes flooding back to me.
Autumn’s tongue on my stomach, my teeth sinking into her ass cheek.
How soft and pale her neck looked as I yanked her hair and made her scream my name.
I grin to myself, just thinking about it.
“Sorry,” Autumn says, seeing that I’m awake. “I was trying not to wake you. I’ve got to get to the store. It’s already nine fifteen.”
“You were just gonna leave?”
Autumn shrugs. She gives me an embarrassed kind of smile. “You were sleeping really soundly.”
As Autumn starts to shimmy into her jeans, I’m instantly aware that I woke up hard. My cock’s like the freaking Washington monument under these sheets, and watching Autumn pull those jeans up around her thighs is… pleasing to look at. To say the least.
I know she’s gotta go to work, but I can be fast.
Still under the sheets, I slide across the bed toward her, hooking my finger beneath the top of her thong and giving it a gentle snap. I raise my eyebrows at her, flash her my naughtiest smile. “Give me ten minutes. I promise I’ll get you good and awake.”
Autumn shoots me the kind of placating look a parent might give a toddler who’s trying to butter them up for candy. She ignores the thong snap and pulls her jeans up over her gorgeous ass.
“Ouch,” I say, feigning a grimace that’s more real than I’d like to admit. “I thought I did good work last night.”
“You did excellent work last night,” Autumn says.
She stands, buttons her jeans, and moves to sweep her hair up into a bun in front of the mirror.
“But now it’s morning, and I’ve got stuff to do.
I’ll let you know if the ghost shows up again—but everything feels better in the light of day, so I’m staying optimistic. ”
She surveys her hair in the mirror, then, with a satisfied nod, makes her way to the door.
I’m still sitting up in bed, trying to hide the tent of my cock beneath the folds of the sheets, just grinning at her like some kind of seductive fool.
I’m really not used to being turned down, and I’m not gonna lie—it kinda stings. I need to get myself together.
“Right,” I say, swiping a hand through my hair. It’s all I can think to do. “And speaking of—is next Thursday good? To, uh… re-film?”
Autumn gives a curt nod. “Sure. We’ll be in touch.”
“We’ll be in touch,” I agree, echoing her phrasing even though I hate it. It sounds so… distant. Like fucking LinkedIn or something. Not like two people who just devoured each other eight hours ago.
On her way out the door, Autumn pauses. She looks back at me, pink creeping into her freckled, porcelain cheeks. “Oh, uh—could we maybe keep this between us? Last night, I mean.”
I’m caught off guard, but plaster on a grin, anyway. “You think I kiss and tell?”
“No, no,” Autumn rushes to say, clearly embarrassed. “No, it’s just—I wanted to be on the same page. Like, for Will and Lydia’s sake, I don’t think anyone should find out. It might be weird.”
I wave a hand. “You’re good, hot stuff. I’m not gonna tell.”
“Great,” Autumn says, beaming. She blows me a kiss and pulls the door shut, leaving me sitting on the bed, surrounded by rumpled sheets, and sporting a boner that could poke someone’s eye out.
Does she really think I’m going to go spread this around?
And to who? All the little old ladies of Hawthorne Bay—the ones I’m so tight with?
Get real. I’m pretty sure if Will finds out I screwed Lydia’s best friend, he’ll haul my ass out of town and beat me himself—because he knows how I am.
He knows what I do to girls. Although, honestly, I’m not even sure he could catch me.
I’m pretty quick on my feet and he’s all massive and bulky.
It’d be like a rhino trying to chase an ostrich.
Anyway, whatever. That’s not the point. Autumn doesn’t need to worry. I’m not going to go around bragging that I banged her. But now that she explicitly asked me not to—while blushing, no less…
I don’t love it. It makes me feel like I’m… I don’t know. Something to hide.
Like she’s embarrassed she slept with me.
Which—now that I think about it—is not that weird.
Autumn Carroway is out of my league. She’s got a fancy-ass lake house, owns the land it sits on, and spent five years married to a guy who probably owns a Bentley and flew her around the world first class.
Add to the mix that she’s an insanely talented fashion designer who knows what the hell she wants and… yeah. I get it.
I’ve got nothing on any of that.
And having it get around that we fucked is probably not a good look for her reputation, or her brand, or whatever. I’m not exactly the classiest nut in the ball sack.
Nah, I gave Autumn a great time in bed, and that’s where it ends. Which is good. I’m definitely not here for commitment.
I roll over and pull my phone out from under the pillow.
Three missed calls. It’s only now that I realize I never let Jenny know I wasn’t coming over last night after all.
I’m about to text and offer to come over tonight instead and make it up to her, but I stop.
That shit feels a little gross, even for me.
It’s not like she would know I’d been with someone else last night, but… I’d know.
And if I’m being honest, the thought doesn’t really excite me anymore. I’m not sure why. Maybe I just need to chill with her again, see where things go.
So I text her:
Hey, sorry!!! Stuff came up last night. Couldn’t make it. You going to the clambake at Hawthorne Point tomorrow night??
Even just texting another girl while lying here in the bed I just slept in with Autumn feels a little weird, but hey. I’m a free man. Jenny knows we’re just fuck buddies. And Autumn was in quite the hurry to get out of here—it’s not like she’s expecting us to be some sort of item.
Ha. As if. Autumn, with her Mercedes Benz and Prada sunglasses, ever trying to be exclusive with me. Even the thought makes me laugh.
Nah, I’m good with sex. I always am.
The coconut scent of Autumn’s hair is still on the sheets.
As I breathe in, letting the subtle sweet scent carry me back to last night, when Autumn was on her hands and knees in front of me, my hand finds my dick.
I start to tug, remembering how warm and wet her cunt was, stretching around me as I pulled her onto my lap in front of the mirror.
The way her lips parted, her hair falling around her face, as she watched me run my hands along her gorgeous body.
How she melted into me when I told her she was perfect. She looked… radiant.
I roll off the bed, my hand still working my shaft, and go to start the water in the shower. I won’t tell anyone that I had sex with Autumn, but I’m sure as shit going to fuck my hand while thinking of how perfect she is. Outside and inside. In all senses of the word.
Because I meant it when I said that—that she was perfect.
I just hope she knows it.