Loose Screws (19 page)

I nearly scream. Nick chuckles, his hand poised at the front clasp of my bra. “May I?”

My hands fly up. “Oh, what the hell? Just don't expect them to tumble free or anything. They just sort of sit there.”

“Glad to hear it,” Nick says, struggling a second or two with the clasp. “I wouldn't want things to get—”

Oh,
thank
you Lord, for giving me nipples!

“—out of hand.”

So then we settle in for a nice long kissing and petting session until we're both breathing pretty hard and every nerve cell I have is screaming, “Hallelujah, sister,” and I'm thinking, hmm, I'm having an awful lot of fun here for
somebody who was in love with another man not all that long ago and just what does that say about my character? Well, I'll have to get back to you on that, because right now, all I can think is that I can't get enough of him…and wait a minute—how did we get turned around so I'm the one sitting on the wall—

“Holy cow, Nick!” What sounds like a shout in my head comes out more like a tortured wheeze. I clamp my arms around his neck so hard I'm surprised I'm not choking the man. “I'm going to fall off!”

“No, you won't,” he whispers against my neck. “I've got you.”

Oh, yeah, he's got me, all right. And he can have me. All of me. Preferably very soon.

I force my grip to loosen on one shoulder just long enough to grab his hair and yank his head up to look into my eyes. “This is serious rebound stuff, you realize,” I say. “I mean, on both our parts.”

Speaking of parts. The things he's doing to some of mine…

“I do,” he says.

“I'm…oy…just using you.”

“What are friends for?”

Okay, I can't argue with that one. But then I toss out, “I've never just, um, had sex to, well, have sex.”

“Ginger, for God's sake!” Tortured look here. “If you don't want to do this, if you've changed your mind, tell me. Now. Because in about thirty seconds, it's either fuck you or throw myself off this roof.”

Oh, my God. Talk about a turn-on.

“I didn't say I didn't want to do this. I just wanted you to know I don't
usually
do this.”

A wry smile stretches across his face. “Except with me.”

“You noticed that too, huh?”

His hand slips underneath my dress, my panties, to make unerring contact with the Spot That Knows No Reason. I moan. Wriggle a little.

“Is that a yes?”

All I can do is nod.

Still clutching me to him, he lifts my hips and removes
my panties, leaving nothing between me and the rough brick wall save the back of my dress, nothing between me and sanity except…well, nothing. I hear a zipper being undone, realize he's about to take me—

“Here?”
Yes, that's panic in my voice, since that's a lot of air behind me.

“You on the Pill?”

I nod.

“Then here's as good a place as any, sweetheart.”

My heartbeat is pounding nearly as loudly in my head as it is in…other areas. “But what if Paula or Frank or somebody comes up here?”

Apparently this either doesn't concern him or it adds to his ardor, I'm not sure which, because he's positioning my legs around his waist and murmuring assurances that he will
not
let me go, and then he's inside me—hard and high and full—and I don't care. About anything. About my screwed-up life, about the fact that I'm having sex on the roof with a man I barely know, because this feels good, it feels
wonderful,
and I've never been so terrified or awe-struck or excited in my entire life.

Except then I remember all that air behind me and, well, let's just say we lose the moment.

“So maybe the roof wasn't such a good idea,” he says, breathing hard into my hair, and I mumble something about the idea of falling three stories to my untimely death being kind of inhibiting.

Next thing I know his pants are up and mine are God-knows-where, and I'm being yanked by the hand down the stairs, through his apartment—exposed brick walls, overstuffed furniture, lots of neutral colors, tidy—into his bedroom. A light clicks on: I see a king-size bed with navy-blue sheets. What's left of my clothes (note to self: retrieve drawers from roof before leaving) swooshes to the floor. A scant breeze from an open window licks at my damp skin as he skims his hands along my rib cage, kissing me, almost frantically exploring with his hands, his tongue…surprising me. Tormenting the bejesus out of me.

Suddenly my face is cupped in his hands, his eyes dark and intense. His thumbs skim my cheekbones, gentle and
rough at the same time. His breath is coming in hard, short bursts. “If it kills me, after tonight, you'll forget all about the broom closet. Got that?” he says, and I say, “Okay, sure,” and the next thing I know his clothes are off and I'm on the bed.

Which smells of fresh, clean-just-in-case sheets. I crush a pillow to my nose, throw it at him. “You
planned
this.”

He deftly catches the pillow, even more deftly pins me to the bed. Oh, my. His eyes go dark. Serious. I swallow. Hard. “Hoped, maybe. Not planned. Especially not the roof part.”

I have to admit, mentioning the roof does interesting things to me. Of course, the way we're lying here is doing some pretty interesting things to me, too. But I'm barely working up to thinking about this when Nick starts over again with the kissing and the nuzzling and the stroking, and I keep gasping because I realize I can't second-guess what he's going to do next, not that I care, but this is a guy who doesn't approach sex with a battle plan, but rather makes love as the spirit moves him.

Very nice.

And now he's inside me again, and I'm feeling very sexy and wanton and a whole lot of other very un-me things. My eyes drift closed to better savor the moment.

“No,” Nick whispers. “Look at me.”

“Can't. Eyes might pop out of my head.”

His laughter is warm on my face. “Do it anyway.”

I drag one eye open, then the other. Now, no man has ever looked me dead in the eye during sex before. I'm tempted to feel a little weird for, oh, about two seconds, until I realize I'm about to have one hell of an orgasm.

And a one…and a two…and…

“Ohgodohgodohgod…oh…oh…my…Ga…Ga…Ga… GAAAAOOOOD!”

Told ya.

Seconds pass.

“Damn,” Nick mutters in my ear.

After another few seconds I manage to raise my head enough to look at him, except I'm breathing so hard I can hardly talk. “Damn?”

He lifts himself up on his forearms so he doesn't squish me. “Only once, huh?”

Takes me a minute. Then I let out a flummoxed, “You have got to be kidding.”

He does the male equivalent of a pout. You know, that thing they do when they find out you really
do
have a headache? “I just thought…you know.”

My head flops back on the pillow. “What is it with men and their ridiculous competitive streak? It's not about giving me a double orgasm, okay? It's not even about giving me one—”

“You want me to take that one back?”

I'd smack him, but the blood hasn't reached that far yet.

“It's about,” I say, ignoring him, “being close. Caring.”

Which is when I make my fatal mistake, apparently, because now he's braced himself over me again and we're doing that eye-connecting thing, and I think,
Uh-oh.
Because, yup, there they are. Kids and minivans and a house in Brooklyn.

“I can do close,” he says.

And there's not a single shred of a glint in his eye.

I'll say one thing about me: when remorse hits, it doesn't pussyfoot around. I shove Nick off me and bound off the bed, scouring the room for my clothes. I hear Nick call out as I shoot into the bathroom, lock the door behind me. God, my hands are shaking so hard, I can barely turn the water on in the sink. I should take a shower, I know that, but somehow that seems too intimate, too comfortable. Would take too long. And I have to go find my underpants.

Jeans on, Nick's in the kitchen when I come out. “Here.”

My panties come sailing across the room. I fumble for them, not sure whether or not to excuse myself to put them on. And how dumb is that?

“Thanks,” I mutter.

“I'll take you home,” he says, his voice low, strained. But he's not looking at me.

“No,” I say, slipping on the panties as quickly and discreetly as possible. “I'll take the train—”

“Like hell, Ginger! No way am I letting you ride the subway at this hour.”

“Get over yourself, Nick. I've been riding the subway alone since I was thirteen. At night since I was seventeen. I know how to take care of myself.”

“Yeah, you sure do, don't you?”

The ice in his voice stops me. “What's that supposed to mean?”

“Forget it.”

“No. No, I want to know what you meant by that.”

“No, you don't. You don't want to know what anybody thinks. Not unless it happens to coincide with whatever you've already decided, the way you've already mapped out your life. Jesus, Ginger—why do you fight everything so much?”

“I don't—”

“Yeah, you do. You got a real problem with just letting go and enjoying the moment, don't you? Have you ever been able to just see where things lead without trying to force them to go the way you
think
they should go?”

You know, this would be so much easier if the sex had been bad. Or even forgettable. But noooo, it had to be Grade AAA Superior, didn't it? God, I'm still tingling. I can still, with very little effort, feel him inside me. And God help me, I want him there again. But not like this. Not like…

“Nick, please—this is so not fair to you. We both just broke up with people, we're not ready for…anything. I don't know what planet I was on, letting myself do this. I mean…”

Great. Can't even finish my damn sentence.

Nick gives me one of those stoic looks men are so good at, then goes over to his sink, rinses out some glass that had been sitting there. This should be my cue to leave, but when I open my mouth to say as much, his voice fills the void between us.

“You know, I remember my mother tellin' me something that's always stuck with me. That sometimes, while we're so busy knockin' ourselves out tryin' to get something we think we want, we end up missing out on some
thing better. And that whenever it seems like what we wanted so badly slips outta our grasp, maybe it's because somebody's tryin' to tell us something. And that's the problem with what just happened, isn't it? What just happened tonight didn't fit in with your plans.”

“Don't be ridiculous, Nick. I wouldn't have gone to bed with you if I hadn't wanted to.”

“Then why are you runnin' scared, Ginger? Have I said anything to make you think I've changed the game plan?”

“N-no.”

“That's right. I haven't. I haven't done or said a goddamn thing to threaten you or make you feel backed into a corner.” He crosses his arms over his chest. His voice is calm, his posture casual, but tension and anger radiate from him in hot, brutal waves. “What? The sex didn't live up to your expectations?”

“Oh, God, Nick, no…the sex was great—”

“Then what's the problem, dammit?”

I remember the look in his eyes, hug myself. “It's…complicated.”

He lets out a harsh sigh. “Yeah, I'll just bet it is. Jesus. If I live to be a hundred and forty, I'll never understand why women have to make things so damn
complicated
all the time.”

Confusion makes me lash back. “At least that's better than a kill or score mentality that makes men think all of life's problems can be solved with either sports, violence or sex!”

He almost smiles. “This from the woman on the other end of that I'll-use-you-if-you-use-me conversation. Or is my memory playin' tricks on me?”

Tears bite at my eyes. “No, Nick. Your memory's not playing tricks.”

“Well, that's a load off my mind. So tell me, Ginger, why is everything suddenly so complicated?”

God, I feel like a dork. A stupid, brainless, selfish dork. “I can't explain it. Okay? I'm sorry, I can't. Dammit, Nick—stop looking at me like that!”

“Like what? Like maybe I give a shit and that's messing with your head too much?”

Inside my chest, my heart feels as though it's going to explode.

“I can't do this,” I say, and practically fly from the apartment.

 

And right now you're probably thinking, is this woman nuts or what? I mean, you must be, because God knows I am. Yeah, I suppose I could just go ahead and have an affair with him, isn't that what the hip single woman does these days? Sex for sex's sake? Well, I can't. I mean, I could, but I can't. Not with Nick. He wants more, I know that, but…Nick and me would never work.

He scares me, okay? Not because I think he'd ever hurt me, it's not that, it's…it's not just that Nick Wojowodski views life in an uncomplicated way, it's that
he's
uncomplicated. Everything's right there on the surface, solid and predictable and readable. Me?
Pfuh.
Thirty-one years old, and basically little more than an amorphous mass of estrogen-riddled protoplasm.

I've reached this cheerful conclusion just about the time I get back to my mother's apartment. It's nearly 1:00 a.m. I let myself in with the set of keys I still have, slipping off my sandals, then avoiding the creaky floorboards as I tiptoe down the hall to the kitchen to get a drink of water after the long train ride. As I pass the living room, however, I feel…a presence. As if someone or something's watching me.

My heart leaps into my throat, effectively trapping the scream roaring up right behind it. I turn, willing myself to distinguish between the shadows in the living room, but there's so much crap piled in the room I can't.