14. Jasmine
14
JASMINE
H ot air blows across my face in time with the telltale wheeze of a mouth breather. I open my eyes, only to be confronted by the owner of the morning breath.
“Where’s Nicky?” a small child asks.
I reach behind me, patting the mattress in search of a warm body. “He’s right?—”
A screaming streak of brown hair interrupts me. “UNCLE NICKY.”
The carpet banshee lands on the bed between us, followed by at least three, perhaps five more noise terrorists.
“What the fu?—”
A warm hand clamps over my mouth, cutting off my profane tirade. “What the fluff is up, chicken nuggets?” Nick yells. In my ear.
I squeeze my eyes shut tight. Is this how I die? Woken too early by a family of yellers? I shove his hand off my mouth and flip over, discovering the bed now overflowing with Nick’s niblings. He is absolutely gleeful, smile full and eyes disgustingly bright, surrounded by multiple, impressionable witnesses.
Tilly knees me in the butt as she clambers over me to plop herself down in his lap, all the while glaring at her cousins for infringing on her turf.
“Everyone say good morning to Jasmine.” Nick holds out his arms, presenting me like he’s a gorgeous bottle blond from a game show.
“Good morning, Jasmine,” they all say in creepy unison. One of them, with a flop of straight black hair in their eyes, snuggles against me.
Absolutely not.
I roll out of bed and land on my feet in a move only previously seen in Rambo movies. Nick leans against the headboard, his hands behind his head. Smug bastard.
“I have to call my sister.”
He grimaces, almost like he’s disappointed.
I rip the charger out of my phone and scurry out the door.
“Bye, Jazz,” he calls, and before I can take another step, the children are laughing and squealing again.
“It is an ungodly hour, Jasmine. What the ever-loving fuck.”
“Good morning, sissy,” I sing, adjusting my earbud. I found an office down the hall from Nick’s room. It was empty and has a door that closes so it’s as good a place as any to get some peace and quiet. Though, I’m not sure I’m supposed to be in here. From what I can see, it’s the junk drawer of rooms; there are mismatched office chairs, a printer covered in dust, a computer tower but no monitor. Three decorative baskets are stacked one on top of the other in the corner, the windows have no treatments, and the computer chair behind the desk squeaks ominously as I settle into it. The room is also exceptionally cold. Already, I regret not grabbing a pair of socks or a sweater in my haste.
“Why are you awake?” The familiar sounds of Jade slapping at her sound machine comes through my earbud.
“Nick has niblings,” I say. “And they love him.” I try not to let my passive-aggression bleed through the phone line. “They woke us up.”
Jade yelps, then there’s a rustle of sheets. “Wait. What?” I can picture her hair, wild and spiky as she sits up in bed. “Were you in the same room as him? Did you sleep in the same bed?”
She sounds a little too scandalized for a person who requested I get “dicked down” less than twenty-four hours ago.
“It’s not a big deal,” I mumble. The last thing I want to do is admit what happened to Jade. For years, I was the one getting her to school on time, packing her lunches, making her dinners. I made sure she went to bed at a reasonable time and booked her doctor’s appointments and reminded her to floss. Even if our relationship is more sisterly now that she’s an adult, and despite how much she loves me and wouldn’t judge me, I can’t admit to her that Nick is one giant dupe, that I even fail at fake relationships. Not to mention that if I have to admit all that then I also have to admit how disappointed I am that he’s not my near perfect match.
The worst part is, I can’t even explain the dejection plaguing me. After meeting him, I thought the algorithm had gotten it wrong, so knowing that he’s not my match should be a good thing. He’s nothing like the men I date, so maybe the real Nick is. I told myself I’d trust in the process, so why can’t I do that now?
“Tell me about your night. What do you have planned this weekend?”
Jade chats away as she moves around our apartment, the creak of the hardwood signaling her entrance to the kitchen, the squeak of the springs that she’s on the couch. I only hear every other word, though, and she asks me if I’m still there twice.
“Sorry.” I curl my toes into the rug to warm them.
“Distracted by your good deep dicking?”
“ Jade Elizabeth .”
She’s cackling in my ear as a knock sounds on the office door. A heartbeat later, Nick opens it, holding a steaming mug in one hand and a pair of socks in the other. With a tentative smile, he tosses the socks to me.
“Jade, I have to go.”
“Text me when you’re on your way home, okay?”
“I will.”
Children’s screams of delight—I’m assuming—reach us from downstairs.
“Thanks.” I set down my phone and hold up the socks. They’re the thick gray work boot kind with white and red trim. They’re worn and soft and obviously Nick’s.
It feels far too intimate, especially now, to wear his clothes.
“I don’t know how you take your coffee.” He sets the mug beside me.
“Black is good. Thanks.”
He lingers in the doorway. His hair sticks up on one side and his T-shirt has a hole in the shoulder. His facial hair darkens his jaw. “Everything alright?” he asks.
He looks handsome, if not tired.
“Fine.” Anger flares in my chest as I regard him with a frown. It doesn’t matter if Nick is handsome. He’s still a liar.
“Are you hungry?” he asks, ignoring my snark. He rubs his knuckles over his jaw. Maybe I’m imagining the scratch of his stubble as he does it, but real or not, that sound alone sends a shiver down my spine. It takes nothing for my mind to leap from the sound of stubble on his knuckles to what that stubble would sound like against my skin. Against my thighs.
I growl, grunt. An awkward, silly, ridiculous sound. One I would typically save for when I’m alone and mad at myself. As furious as I am at my reaction to him, as warranted as the berating is, I’m not alone.
He cocks his head. “Excuse me?”
My face gets hot and probably turns the color of a nice ripe tomato. I search the room for a weapon. It will be awkward, but I can probably bash my brains in with the old computer tower.
“I was holding in a sneeze,” I say in my most prim voice, being sure to hold my chin high.
“Cool. Well,” he says slowly. “You’ve got about a half hour before my mom comes searching for you. Then she’s going to feed you, make you wait thirty minutes”—he ticks each item off on his fingers—“and then make you come swimming with us.”
“Right. The indoor pool.”
He nods. “The indoor pool. Unless…” He checks behind him before stepping further into the room. “Are you sure you don’t want me to take you home?”
I stand up from the desk, doing my best to right my pajamas so I can look somewhat proper, even as my heart and stomach ache. “Do you want my help or not, Nicholas?”
Hands held up in surrender, he steps back. “Just checking.” He turns to leave, then turns back again, one of his charming grins on his charming face. His stupid, charming face. “Have I told you today that I’m sorry?”
I throw his socks at him.
As promised, a half hour later I am herded downstairs, fed, and kept in my chair until another thirty minutes have passed.
“Nicky can walk you over to the pool once you’re changed. You brought your suit, right?”
“I did.” A nice green jewel-toned one-piece bathing suit with front zipper closure all the way up to my collarbone and full bum coverage.
Mindy beams. She has this innate ability to make everything a little less terrible. Is this what moms who give a crap about their kids are like? I wouldn’t know.
As I climb the stairs in the now quiet house, I find myself surprisingly excited. I’ve never been in a private indoor pool before. When Nick exits the ensuite, I avert my gaze, worried he’s naked again. I let out a relieved breath when I catch sight of him in my periphery. He’s already dressed in his bather and a T-shirt. But I’m not looking anyway, so it doesn’t matter.
I brush my teeth and put my hair up, wash my face.
Is there a Jacuzzi? God, what I’d do to relax in hot water with jets pointed at my back. Just the thought eases the tension in my muscles. Though as I continue considering the situation, I can’t imagine finding peace with children shrieking and screaming in what I assume is a vast tiled space.
When I pull out my bathing suit, my stomach plummets to the floor.
“Shit,” I whisper, holding it up in front of me. “Shit, shit, shit.”
I rummage through my bag again, pulling out one article of neatly packed clothing after another. But it’s not there. My modest, sweet, full coverage bathing suit, best suited for swimming laps, has vanished.
Nick chooses this moment to bang on the door. “Jasmine. Let’s go.”
Shit.
“Uhhh, just a second.” My voice is high and tremulous as I scramble to pull my suit on.
“What’s wrong?”
My heart lodges itself in my throat. How can he tell???
“Um. I…I can’t…” I rack my brain for a reasonable excuse but come up with nothing. “I packed the wrong bathing suit.”
“Oh.” He pauses, then laughs, sounding relieved. “I thought you were going to say you were on your period.”
Menstruation was right there, you dipshit.
“Why? Is that like, gross or something?”
A loud thump comes from his side of the door. “No, Jasmine. It’s not.”
“Well, I still can’t go swimming.” I grab a towel to cover myself. From myself.
“I’m sure it’s fine.”
“It’s really, really not.” I’m starting to get shrill.
“Listen, I realize this will make me sound like a dick, but you need to calm down,” he says, his tone drier than an overbaked sponge cake dry as a desert and muffled like he’s speaking right up against the door. “My parents don’t care about your bathing suit, Jazz. Pretty sure they love you more than they love me.”
I open the towel and peek down at myself. Boobs everywhere. Ninety-nine percent of the time I love my breasts, their size and shape. I even love them in this bathing suit, with its low-cut neck and lower cut back. It shows off the very best of my augmentation. Even so, this suit is best displayed poolside, on vacation, surrounded by strangers. Not in front of Nicholas’s parents and siblings. Not in front of children.
I can scream about the unfairness of judgment until my boobs fall off, but there will always be people who say particularly nasty things about women who have implants.
“Let me see,” Nick says.
“ No .”
“Open the door,” he says in the kind of tone that brooks no argument.
Fine. With a shaky hand, I unlock the door. Then, turning back to the mirror, I grip the towel tighter around my chest. Just in case he tries to snatch it away.
In the mirror, I’m hit with the perfect view of him. His swim shorts are short and red with white piping and his quads are… wow . The sight of his leg hair is as overwhelming as my internal panic about this stupid bathing suit. Nick stands behind me, frozen, until I force myself to meet his gaze in the mirror. His faded Arcade Fire T-shirt brushes softly against my shoulder blade, causing goose bumps to skitter down my arms. I close my eyes. What kind of fabric softener has the power to make his clothes so distractingly soft?
“Come on.” He jerks his thumb over his shoulder. “Lose the towel. Let’s see this thing so we can get down to the pool. I promised Tilly we’d chicken fight.”
I’ve never mentioned my surgery to him, but I’m sure he’s noticed considering we’ve been pressed up against each other more than once. The wise crack he hasn’t made is like a third, very loud, naked person shaking their tits at us from the corner. I take a deep breath, close my eyes, and drop the towel.
Nick stays a silent presence behind me. When I open my eyes, he’s gripped the marble counter with one hand, his knuckles white with tension. His face is slack and his focus is zeroed in on my chest.
“Told you.” I cross my arms and frown at his reflection, wishing the floor would open up and swallow me whole.
“No, no, no, no.” Gently, he pulls my arms away. He abandons leering in the mirror for the real thing, moving to the side to see all of me.
Rounding my shoulders, I fight the urge to snatch my towel from the floor and cover myself. “You’re being gross.”
“You’re being…” He drags his hand over his mouth. “What was the question?”
“ Nick .” I punch him in the shoulder.
He grins, unaffected. “You’re a rocket, Jasmine. What do you want me to say?”
“I’m starting to feel a little too objectified.” I cross my arms over my chest to cover myself again.
“Sorry.” He shakes himself. “You’re right. If you don’t want to go swimming, we don’t have to.”
“Just go without me.”
He arches his eyebrow. “And leave you with Grandma? Nah.”
He’s got a point. The old bat pretended she couldn’t hear me at breakfast but had no problem hearing anyone else.
And Tilly’s exuberance for her Uncle Nico this morning tugged at heartstrings I thought were long dormant.
“Maybe I can wear one of your T-shirts. That could hide all…” I circle a hand in front of me, gesturing to my chest. “This.”
“Or you could trust me when I say that truly…” He rests a hand on my shoulder, his palm warm, the touch both comforting and electric. “No one will be paying attention to your bathing suit.”
I shake my hands out, my worry a knot in my abdomen, pulling tighter and tighter. I want not to care, like Nick does, but the code in his genetic makeup that gives him that ability is one I’m lacking.
“The only person who needs to care about what you think is you,” he says, like he can read the thoughts on my face. “Do you like how you look, Jasmine?”
“Yes,” I say quietly, heart thudding against my chest. “I do.”
The pipes in the wall make a whooshing noise. One of the niblings, a straggler, yells as he runs down the hall outside our room.
“Do you?” I keep my tone casual. I shouldn’t care. I wish I didn’t. I want to not.
His irises are almost black as he homes in on my face in the mirror. “Since you’re asking, I do. I think you could blow our cover. I’ve never brought a girl home as beautiful as you.”
I pick at my cuticles to hide the flush. “You’ve never brought a girl home at all,” I remind him.
“Are you really nervous?” he asks. Not like he’s skeptical. Just checking in.
I nod. My hands twitch with the need to fix this, but I’m not sure I can.
“What can I do to make it better?”
It’s like when I played that word association game in the high school cafeteria with my friends: What’s the first thing you think of when you think of Todd?
Kissing.
What can he do? The first thing that comes to mind is lying beside him last night, how my skin vibrated at his proximity. The way he kisses, like it’s the most important thing he’ll ever do.
Jade’s voice is in my head, entreating me to let him dick me down.
Maybe he sees the flush in my cheeks or how I sneak a glance at his hand, still gripping the marble, because Nick straightens behind me and places his hand gently on my hip. Then he asks again, “What do you need, Jasmine?”
It’s not about what I need. Maybe it’s about what I deserve. I think of him on his knees, his lie. The way he played me for a fool.
I clear my throat. The hairs too short for my ponytail tickle the back of my neck.
He presses in behind me.
The words are stuck in my throat. For once, I don’t want to be the uptight girl, high-strung, in her head. “I need a way to… I need to relax a little.”
This bathing suit doesn’t leave much to the imagination, but he looks at me like I’ve hidden secrets beneath my skin.
“How do you want to relax?” He’s quiet, yet his voice still echoes in this pristine marble bathroom as he watches me through the mirror.
I should not let this man, the fake Nick, the wrong Nick, touch me. I should ask him for a mug of warm water and lemon. Get my phone. Call Jade. But if I spoke those words aloud, each one would be a lie.
I hate to lie.
The mirror gives the illusion of distance between us when I say, “You could get me off. If you wanted.”
Nick is a blanket of heat against my bare back, his T-shirt the kind of soft that girlfriends steal and never give back after breakups.
“Are you sure that’s what you want?” he asks, eyes wide.
“Yes,” I say, my voice breathy. My pulse hums in my throat and wrists, between my legs.
Nick’s jaw is tight, a shallow V forming between his eyes as he brushes his knuckles down my front, over a peaked nipple. He splays his hand over my belly.
“If it’s not working,” he says into the back of my neck. “Tell me to stop.”
I shake my head. “It will work.”
It already is. My blood pumps warm and loose through me. I’m using him, that’s what this is. Using him, like he’s using me, like I used him first. I’m prepared for him to be mechanical about it. Nick makes a joke out of everything; there’s no way he’ll interpret this for more than it is, more than it needs to be. Nick kisses me, his lips velvet soft on my neck. His mouth open on the side of my throat. A shock of lust and surprise moves down my spine.
“Is this okay?” he asks into my skin.
Eyes closed, I let my head fall back onto his shoulder. The moan that escapes me could only be described as wanton. In any other situation, my desperation would be embarrassing.
He doesn’t move until I swallow through my next breath.
“Yes,” I say, chest heaving, already struggling to take in air. “You’re okay.”
He ghosts his fingers those last few inches, then presses softly over my bathing suit against my pussy. There’s nothing rote or mechanical about Nick’s hands on my body.
He’s gentle, passionate.
He slips his other hand between my arm and hip, brushing his fingers over my breast. In the gentlest of rhythms, he presses between my legs. Leaves the lightest kisses along my shoulder. He plays me like a finely tuned instrument; he could make me sing. With one leg, he urges me to spread mine, his leg hair tickling my skin. We look obscene in the mirror. His head bent over my shoulder, his dark hair a mess. His hand moving slowly between my legs. I never want to forget this image.
“Can I?” he asks, slowly slipping his fingers beneath the wide strap over my breast, his other hand hooking into the hip of my bathing suit.
“Yes,” I whisper, attention locked on our reflection as he slips the rest of the way under my suit. The fabric of the suit stretches over his hands as his warmth soaks into me. I guide his mouth against my skin as I tilt my head to one side to give him access to more.
I moan as he pushes two fingers into me. I flush with embarrassment at how wet I am.
“Shhhhh,” he whispers, sending goose bumps along my skin. “You tensed up. What just happened?”
I shake my head, squeeze my eyes shut. The knot tightens in my stomach.
“You’re perfect, you know that?” He kisses me between words, drags his fingers up and down the lips between my legs. “Warm and so fucking wet and soft. You surprised me with this velvet soft pussy. But I should know by now, shouldn’t I? You’re always going to surprise me.”
He slips his fingers inside me again and I gasp his name.
“Perfect,” he praises, smiling against my cheek. “You like when I say that don’t you? You’re perfect now, Jasmine, and you’ll be perfect when you come all over my hand.”
My knees hit the cabinet beneath the counter. His words alone might be enough to send me hurtling over that cliff. Nick takes his time, moving his fingers in slow circles against me, until I chase his touch with my hips, until the heat in my core hurts and I have to press my lips together to keep from begging him.
I get by on quick glances of us; that’s all I can take. But Nick stares at where his hands move over and inside me, his eyes shot black, his cheeks pink. He presses hard into the curve of my ass. I whimper desperate sounds against the rough stubble on his cheek. Try to squeeze my legs closed around him, but his legs on either side of mine keep them apart. I pull at his hair, grip his wrist where his hand disappears between my legs. Anything to pull him closer to me as the pleasure becomes too much.
My orgasm spills like oil down my back, a trickle at first then faster, stronger, more, until I’m coming with a gentle moan against his ear.
“Nick?” his mother calls from the bedroom door as my orgasm melts through me.
I yelp in surprise, but like it’s nothing to hear his mother outside his door while his fingers are inside me, Nick slides a rough palm over my mouth, the second time today.
He kisses my cheek once, the scratch of his beard almost pulling another moan from me. “We’ll be down in a minute, Ma.”
“See you soon, honey,” she calls through the door.
My entire body beats with my heart. “Holy,” I whisper.
“Perfect,” he says with the confidence of knowing he was right. He continues to stroke me lazily until I squeeze his wrist in a silent request. With a smirk he stops. Then he drops three kisses along the curve of my shoulder before he looks at me in the mirror. We’re flushed and wild eyed. I’ll have to redo my ponytail.
“Good?” he asks.
“I…what?”
Nick pulls his hand out from beneath my bathing suit. My legs tremble, fawn-like. He doesn’t take his hands off me until I lean against the counter to hold myself up. Only then does he wash his hands, like he’s just stepped behind the bar to start a shift.
“Relaxed?” he asks, inspecting his fingernails.
Words mean things. I can’t think of what, but they do. The bulge in the front of his swim shorts looks uncomfortable. The sight of it is all it takes for the logistics of this moment to fully hit me, how usually these kinds of favors are reciprocal.
“Do you need?” I press my hand to my throat, unsure what I’m even asking. I’m doing my best not to dissolve into a puddle on the heated tile floor.
Nick grins down at his cock as he dries his hands and readjusts. “We’re good. That’s not what this was about.”
My heart stumbles at his earnest expression. “What was it about?”
“You,” he says simply, one brow arched. “How do you feel?”
The tips of my fingers buzz. Not even the threat of his mother walking in on us could ruin what he just did to me. “Relaxed,” I say when I know I won’t sound so breathless.
With a kiss on the cheek, he rests his hand on my hip, another casual gesture like he’s done it every day for years. “You look beautiful when you come, Jasmine.”
My breath stalls, my lungs seizing.
That teasing expression he’s so fond of has reappeared. “I’ll meet you downstairs. In five minutes, Jazz,” he warns, striding out of the bathroom.
“I haven’t forgiven you yet,” I say, shuffling to the threshold. It feels important to make that distinction.
He nods, a quick jerk of his chin, and leaves.
This changes nothing. Nick’s not my match.