I Need You (11 page)

And we’d done it once before.

And if anyone was gonna teach me…

When we got down on the beach I slipped my sandals off. All the feelings that had crowded in on me this morning, when I’d touched myself and thought of him, were there, within me, brewing and bubbling up.

We were halfway down to the water when I looked over at him. He was walking about a yard away from me, hands in his pockets.

“Billy…” His gaze lifted to me and I forced the words out. “I want to do it with you.” I sucked a breath back in and held it as the words hit him.

“Lindy…” He sounded in pain, and his hand lifted, along with his eyebrows. It ran over his hair again, then ruffled it to spike it.

“You don’t want to?” I stopped. “Am I really that bad, Billy?”

He stopped too. I tried to catch every little gesture of his body language.

His hand fell and hung by his side. “Lind. It’s not that. It’s just…” His eyes begged me not to ask… like he was in agony. “You don’t really want to… I know… We had this conversation last night.”

“But I don’t want to be on my own forever, and I want to––“

“Lind, you’re beautiful, you aren’t gonna end up alone.” His hand came up then and reached out toward me, and he stepped forward but then it dropped, like he thought better of the idea. It wasn’t comforting.

I didn’t let him see how much that hurt, but it made my voice bitter. “You didn’t let me finish––I want to enjoy sex. I want you to show me how.”

He just stared at me for a moment. Then he said, “Look, Lind, I don’t know what to say to you but I know damn well you didn’t enjoy sex with me, and I am not stepping into that minefield again. I showed you how to get yourself off this morning.”

He turned away and started walking parallel to the ocean, his profile lit up orange by the setting sun.

Great. Like that was the answer. That wasn’t.

I followed him, my sandals swinging in one hand as I hurried to keep up with his longer strides. “I want what Jason and Rachel have… and I want to know why he wasn’t like that with me, and you are the only one I trust.”

His head spun and he glared at me, his eyes angry and accusing, but he didn’t stop walking. “My point exactly. You don’t want to do it with me. I’m just convenient, so maybe that’s what it was for you back in the fall, and I can stop feeling guilty. But if we did it, you’d be thinking of him. I don’t feel like having three in the bed, especially when the other guy’s my best friend.”

“You did it before! When I was with him!” He couldn’t go all judgmental. He’d started it then, and he’d known I’d loved Jason.

He stopped and glared at me. “Yeah, and you thought of him when you did it with me! And you regretted it! I’ve said sorry now. I don’t make the same mistake twice!”

His hand swept through his hair. This time he didn’t ruffle it, to put it right again, but left some of it flattened, turned around and walked on even faster.

On the horizon, the sun began to disappear into the ocean. The shadows around us were becoming more dark blue.

“Ask me the question you’ve been asking all day!”

He stopped dead and turned back. “What?”

“Ask me the question you’ve been asking all day,” I urged him to do it.

He didn’t answer for a minute. But then he sighed out a breath before sucking it back in and said, “So, did you?”

Billy

I didn’t know why the fuck Lindy wanted me to ask her this again. What difference did it make––whatever she answered? So she’d done it. So what? It didn’t mean I was gonna give in and go along with what she wanted. It was stupid. She was still completely wrapped up in Jason. This wasn’t about me.

Her eyebrows lifted and her gaze didn’t move from mine. The first throws of moonlight caught her blue eyes. “Yeah.”

Great. So what?

“And I thought about you…”

Frickin’ shit, what was this girl trying to do to me? I was doing right by her and she was busy putting crazy images in my head.

I turned away, my hand running through my hair. I didn’t want her to know my reaction––I was turned on––but I fought it.

I shut my eyes, but that just made the mental image more vivid.

Fuck.

My fingers clasped in my hair as I opened my eyes, then I ruffled it, ‘cause I was fucking it up, and my hand fell. I didn’t look at her but turned and started walking again. She copied, walking beside me.

“Why?” My tone was bitter. Like she had no right to think about me.

“’Cause I was thinking about when we did it in your SUV––“

“You were stiff as a board when we did it in the SUV, and you were busy blotting out my face and imaging Jason’s.” I glanced at her. “Don’t deny it. ‘Cause I’m not dumb. I know.”

She didn’t answer. I looked ahead and carried on walking. “I knew you weren’t enjoying it, and I don’t want to repeat that. It was horrible… It fucking haunts me.”

I heard her swallow, as if she was gonna start crying. “But that’s not ‘cause of you…”

When I did it with Jason, we did it like that…
That’s what she’d said back at the bar; she hadn’t just been talking about the position. Shit. Everything about her body said that she’d had sex as bad as that with Jason. She was stiff and defensive. They’d been together years! But I’d shared an apartment with them and I’d never heard any noise. They’d also never been touchy-feely, like he was with Rachel. His hands were always all over Rachel.

He hadn’t been like that with Lindy, and they’d never disappeared into their room in the day…

The weight of my cell hung in the back pocket of my pants. I wanted to call Jason and ask.
What the fuck were you and Lindy doing when you were together?

I wouldn’t, though. That would be off the scale of wrong.

My fingers slipped through my hair again, and then I ruffled it to spike it once more.

As my arm dropped, the leather bracelet tied around my wrist spoke its silent call of ownership. I belonged to her, whether I liked it or not.

I sighed as my hand dropped. “Lind, whatever. We’re not going there.”

She turned away, to walk toward the ocean, but I caught her wrist. “Wait.”

Her lips twisted in a “why” look. She was angry but she hurt more.

Great.

“Can’t we just cut this conversation? I know I brought it up last night. But I am not your answer.”

Her arm tugged against my grip. I let her go, and she turned and started walking down to the ocean.

I’d fucked this up.

“Lind!”

Stupid thing was, I had been dreaming about this––her saying she wanted me––for years. But the key word was want. Not make do! That did not entice.

And make do, and thinking about Jason while she did it. That was a completely shit idea.

And I thought about you…

When she’d said that she’d had my temperature rocketing, and my cock twitching, but then she’d added, ‘
cause I was thinking about when we did it in the SUV
.

Shit, that had been nothing to think about it. She could not have been getting off on me.

She was a dark silhouette in the moonlight, her hair brushing over her shoulders and her back. I pictured my fingers settling in the hollow at the back of her neck. Then she bent suddenly, picking something up, flashing a long length of the back of her thighs. The cold breeze blowing up from the ocean swept her dress against her lower body, making the fabric cling to her curves.

I wanted her. I did. There was no denying it. I had for years. Thing was, she didn’t want me. No matter what she said.

My hands back in my pockets I walked up to her. She looked at whatever she’d picked up.

“What have you got?”

She glanced at me, sensing my peace offering. “A shell.” Her pitch was curt, but quiet. “I like shells, I like how smooth they are. This one has a metallic glow in the moonlight.” Her fingers rubbed across it. “I like all the different colors that come through in them in the sunshine, but I have never seen one in the moonlight before. It’s different now… Look, it glitters.” She looked at me. “It looked like a fallen star, lying on the beach.”

I couldn’t work out how the confident, assertive, competitive, yet fun, warm-hearted Lindy I’d grown up with could be this uncertain-angry-self-condemning girl.

But then if her whole thing with Jason had been so badly flawed… It must have been making her question herself for years.

My cell felt heavy again as we turned back toward the apartments and walked on. I wanted to call Jason. He was the only one I could talk this stuff out with. Did he never really like her or what?

It couldn’t be his sex drive. I mean everything about him and Rachel suggested they were at it like rabbits.

I was getting myself caught up in a frickin’ whole pile of bullshit here.

When we got back to the apartments it was still pretty early, but she didn‘t ask me if I wanted to do anything, she just said, “Goodnight,” slotting her door key into the lock.

“Night.”

She glanced back at me before going in, then that was it.

Great.

I hovered outside her door for a moment, but what was I gonna say or do?

Sighing, I headed for my room and then threw myself down on the bed with a grunt of frustration. I was making a mess of this. I’d brought her out here to make her feel better and me less guilty, and things were worse on both counts.

Then I heard her crying through the wall.

Awesome.

I got back up, went out and knocked on her door. “Lind?” No answer. But she stopped sobbing. “Lind? Let me in!”

A couple of minutes passed. I leaned against the wall by the door. “I’m not going away! I know you’re crying. I heard you. Open the door.”

“I’m not going to do anything!” She shouted back.

“I know that. But I want to be able to comfort you.”

“You were the one who upset me!”

“I know! Let me come in and say sorry.”

There was no sound, but then the door opened. She didn’t say anything; just walked away again.

I went in and shut the door, my heart hitting in my chest like my fingers were beating out a drum beat. Fuck. I wanted her. “Look, okay. We’ll just take this slow.”

She sat down on the bed, her eyes red-rimmed and mascara smudged, and her hands tucked beneath her thighs. “What’s this?”

“Whatever this is.” I guessed neither of us really knew. “Look tonight just let me hold you. If it goes further, it does, but I’m not gonna force it.”

She looked up at me, eyes wide, but she didn’t look pleased, she looked terrified.

“Do you want me to sleep in here?”

She sighed. “Yeah.”

“Well then get ready for bed, and we’ll snuggle up and put a film on the TV or something.” She nodded. But she still didn’t look happy.

I sat on her bed as she went into the bathroom, my elbows on my knees, and my head in my hands. I ran both hands over my hair, messing it up totally.

When she came out the bathroom, she’d refreshed her makeup, not taken it off, and was wearing satin pajama bottoms with a little sleeveless tee. She had no bra on and I could see every detail of her breasts through the cotton. She was gorgeous, fucking edible, literally.

I got up. “I’m gonna, go clean my teeth, I’ll be back.”

I used the bathroom in my room, did my teeth, and put on some more deodorant. Then went back to knock on her door. She’d turned the lights out apart from one lamp beside her bed.

“You okay with this?” I checked as I slipped my cell and wallet out of my pocket and she slid under the covers, then shifted across the bed.

“I invited you.”

She had, but my plan right now wasn’t about sex.

I undid a couple of buttons on my shirt, then pulled it off over my head, throwing it onto a low table across the room. She watched, but when I started unbuttoning my pants she looked away, rolling on to her side, with her back to me. Well, then, that said it all.

I slipped my pants and sneakers off and dumped them over by the table. Then I got into bed next to her wearing only my boxers. She didn’t move and didn’t turn.

“Do you want to put the TV on?”

“No, the anti-depressants make me tired.”

Her whole body was stiff, and it screamed uncomfortable. “Turn the light out then slide back against me and let me hold you.”

She reached out and clicked the light off, then shifted back and spooned with me.

I slid her hair off her cheek and kissed her behind the ear. Her whole body jolted, every muscle locking.

She didn’t want to––really didn’t want to.

Slipping my arm about her belly, I just held her, and eventually I felt her muscles relax as she fell asleep.

It took me longer.

Chapter Six

Billy

When I opened my eyes in the morning, Lindy lay on her side, facing me, looking right into my eyes, her breath brushing my skin. I had a hard-on.

“Morning,” she whispered.

It was light outside.

“Morning.”

“Do you want to?”

Shit, my sleep-fogged brain was not up to leading conversations. I guessed she’d misjudged my need for a piss as unconscious interest.

“I need the toilet, Lind.” Rolling away from her, I threw the covers off and went into the bathroom. As I used the toilet, I caught my reflection in the mirror, my jaw was dark with stubble, and my hair riotous, spiked in every direction; a great just-woken-up look.

The image of Lindy’s eyes looking into mine appeared in my drowsy brain. She’d had eye shadow and mascara on, and her lips had been tinted by whatever lip gloss she’d had on them last night. Oh, yeah, she’d got into bed wearing all her makeup.

I’d never seen her without makeup.

Had Jason ever seen her without makeup?

After I washed my hands, I threw some water on my face, to wake up. Then I wiped my face on her towel. It smelt of perfume.

In the apartment, I went over to get a bottle of water, then glanced back over my shoulder. “Do you want a drink?”

She was still in the bed, under the covers. Her blonde hair spread out over the pillow.

She shook her head. “Are you gonna get back in bed?”