Chapter 21 #3
“I did not.” Aspen pulled back two inches, scandalized, then clearly felt the evidence on her own chin and amended without missing a beat. “That’s dew.”
“We’re inside. There’s no dew.” Maddy wiped her shoulder with mock disgust, which would have been more convincing if she’d been willing to move more than an inch away from her. “You’re a slobber monster. And I let you into my bed.”
Aspen stretched out beside her. “You begged to have me in your bed.”
Maddy lifted her chin. “I have never begged for anything in my life.”
Aspen’s eyebrow went up, and her mouth curved into the smug little shape Maddy had spent five weeks alternating between wanting to slap and wanting to bite. “That’s not what I heard the other night. When I had you on your hands and kn—”
Maddy kissed her to shut her up, which was a mistake, because it just made Aspen laugh and roll on top of Maddy in one easy move. And feeling Aspen’s warm, bare body on top of her made the kiss stop being about shutting her up real quick.
God she really was insatiable.
She got a hand between them and grazed Aspen’s clit barely, just enough, and heard Aspen’s breath catch.
“We’re late,” Aspen said into her mouth, not stopping.
“Very.” Maddy started moving her fingers in slow circles and watched Aspen’s eyes flutter.
“Bunny’s…going to…send a search party.” She said between kisses and breaths.
“Then we’d better be quick.” Maddy increased the pressure and the speed.
Aspen’s hips chased her hand. “Fuck.” She dropped her head, moving her hips faster.
Aspen clutched at Maddy’s shoulders as she continued to grind against Maddy’s fingers, her breathing going shallow, and then her body tensed on top of Maddy’s and she let out a cracked moan with her face buried in the pillow as she came.
Aspen went boneless and flopped onto the mattress beside Maddy, panting. Maddy propped herself up on her elbow and looked down at her, extremely satisfied with herself.
Maddy patted Aspen’s hip. “Come on, we gotta get ready.” She started climbing out of bed before Aspen caught her arm and yanked her back down.
“Whoa whoa whoa, where do you think you’re going? You can’t do that to me and then not let me reciprocate.”
Maddy grabbed her chin and planted a kiss on her lips and quickly pulled back. “Who said anything about not reciprocating? We’ll multi-task in the shower.”
Aspen flung the sheet off of herself and sprung out of the bed so fast that Maddy burst into laughter.
She hadn’t even gotten shampoo in her hair before Aspen had Maddy’s back pressed against the cold tile, leg hooked over Aspen’s shoulder, and her tongue buried in Maddy’s pussy.
She screamed so loud when she came that she was genuinely concerned their family and friends might have heard it from the beach a half block away.
* * *
As they walked down to the beach together thirty minutes later, Aspen’s hand found hers and threaded their fingers together.
Maddy glanced over at her, and almost laughed at how hard Aspen was trying to appear casual about it, and failing miserably.
Maddy squeezed her hand to reassure her she wasn’t going to pull away, and the fear drained out of Aspen’s face, being replaced with a smile Aspen was also trying very hard to contain, and again, failing.
“You know the second we walk up together, everyone’s gonna know, right?” Aspen said without glancing over, her voice a little wary.
“Aspen.” Maddy laughed. “Half that beach watched me kiss you and then drag you off into the dark last night. There’s no version of today where anyone doesn’t know.”
And that seemed to ward off the last of Aspen’s concerns.
They walked up the beach together and Bunny clocked them from her platform mid-sentence, and addressed them through her megaphone.
“Madison Sterling and Aspen St. Claire, ladies and gentlemen! Strolling up at a quarter past whenever they feel like it, forty-eight minutes behind a schedule I laminated.” She turned her attention to the rest of the group.
“Now places, my gladiators, places! We have a semifinal to settle, so we move. Beach volleyball, T-minus six minutes! I want the Sharks and the Amazons on that court, I want footwork, I want digs, I want a match worthy of broadcast—and I want the rest of you to pay attention, because this, my darlings, is where things get gooood.” She rumbled the last word.
As they made their way onto the volleyball court, Maddy’s attention snagged on Noa and Marion standing on the sidelines together.
Noa’s arms were around Marion’s waist and she was leaning in, whispering something in Marion’s ear, then nipped at her earlobe.
Marion let out a small laugh and gently shoved her away.
Well that was new.
“Hey.” Maddy nudged Aspen and tipped her head toward Noa and Marion. “What’s going on there?”
Aspen followed her gaze. Marion chose that exact second to let Noa kiss her on the lips, and Aspen made a small strangled noise. “Oh—nope. I’m not looking at that. I told Noa I didn’t want to hear about it and that includes seeing it.”
“Do you know what happened to her? Noa?” Maddy kept her voice down, her eyes still on Noa.
“I mean, the Noa I knew was the most hopeless romantic on the planet. She used to write wedding vows for fun as a kid. She had a whole notebook of them.” She watched Noa flirt easily with a woman she’d clearly already taken to bed the night before and would probably never call again after today.
“Jake had mentioned she was seeing someone in college and it ended badly, but didn’t have the specifics. Do you know anything about that?”
Aspen glanced at Noa. “Honestly? No. Nobody does.” She shrugged. “There’s kind of a—an agreement, I guess, not to ask about it.”
Maddy turned to look at her. “An agreement?”
“Not, like, a written one.” She paused, and then spoke carefully, looking at the ocean. “When you left the way you did, Maddy—and please know that I’m not trying to make you feel bad when I say this—but it hurt a lot of people.” Her eyes shifted back to Maddy nervously.
Maddy kept her face still and nodded.
“And then a few years later,” Aspen went on, “whatever happened to Noa happened, and she left too. Fast, almost overnight. And everyone was—” She exhaled.
“Everyone had the same thought—that we were about to lose Noa the exact same way we lost you.” She looked at Maddy gently.
Then down at the sand. “But, she didn’t disappear.
She kept texting. She came home for things.
She came back. And nobody wanted to press our luck, so we just collectively decided not to bring it up unless she did.
” A small shrug. “And she never has. Not to me. Not to her sisters. Not to anyone, as far as I know.”
Maddy looked back at Noa, the easy laugh she used to deflect anything sincere.
Somebody had walked into Noa Reyes’ life and ripped the hopeless romantic out of her and left this glossy, untouchable stranger in her place.
Maddy wished she had been there for Noa.
She didn’t know if it would have made a difference.
But Maddy hated that Noa went through it alone.
She also couldn’t wrap her head around who Noa could have possibly fallen so deeply in love with without telling a soul.
Bunny’s megaphone shrieked to life. “SEMI-FINALISTS! Take your places!”
Whatever had happened to Noa, whoever had broken her—that was a mystery for another day.
Right now, Maddy had a Cup to win.