Meeting Mr. Wright (2 page)

“Hold onto me,” he says. And I do.

Nate kisses me again, and all I can think about is the way he tastes, the way he feels. He slides his hands down the small of my back, down the backs of my thighs, and he lifts me up. I wrap my legs around his waist, anchoring myself to him, not caring about what’s going to happen next as long as he keeps kissing me like he’s never going to stop. He gently lowers me onto the bed, then pulls off my shoes, grinning at me as he playfully tosses them across the room. I help him by unbuttoning my jeans, then he tugs on the cuffs, sliding the denim down my thighs as I take off my shirt.

I lie back and enjoy the view as Nate pulls his shirt over his head and then unzips his pants. They fall to the floor, revealing a pair of boxes with yellow smiley faces all over them. I can’t help but grin when I see them, and I trace the hem that hangs over his right thigh with my big toe.

“Are these your sexy shorts?” I ask.

He seems confused for a second, then catches on to what I’m asking after he looks down at what he’s wearing.

“Hey,” he replies, pretending to be offended. “I’ve gotten lots of compliments on these.”

I don’t even want to think about just how many compliments he’s gotten on these boxers, so luckily he distracts me by sliding them down his hips. And my eyes are glued to him. His body is
insane
. Sturdy. Muscular. Perfect.

“C’mere,” I say, crooking my finger at him, trying to be seductive and sexy and failing miserably. It doesn’t matter, he doesn’t seem to care.

Nate kneels over me on the bed, leaning down and kissing me before he reaches behind my back and unclasps my bra. He kisses my breasts, licking slow, torturous circles around my nipples that make my toes curl. My hands are everywhere, slipping across his broad shoulders and tight muscles, and I can’t kiss him enough. His skin is salty and sweet. I love the little sounds that he makes when I press my lips here, touch him there, and gently slide my palm along the length of his erection. He sighs, resting his head in the crook of my neck.

“Do you like that?” I ask, wanting to be sure that I make this good for him.

“Yeah,” he replies with a breathy laugh that warms my breast, and then his mouth finds its place on my skin. I continue sliding my hand up and down, and he bucks his hips against me as we kiss. When his breathing speeds up and his kisses become a little unfocused, he pulls away and kisses a trail down my stomach to the insides of my thighs. And then, oh.
Oh
.

“Oh my god,” I sigh, and Nate lets out a little hum of a laugh that vibrates against me and makes my eyelids flutter shut. He works magic with his tongue and fingers as I sink back into the mattress and let myself drift. I drift and drift. Sometimes my eyes are closed and sometimes I look down at him while he’s looking up at me and I have this crazy desire to run my fingers through his short hair. To scratch his scalp with my fingernails, because I think he’d like it.

So I do. And he likes it. And I like what he’s doing to me so much that it isn’t long until he makes me come in a warm, lapping wave that reaches out from my belly, cresting against my fingertips and toes.

Nate is obviously pleased with himself as I pull him up for a kiss, but it doesn’t last as long as I’d like because his lips leave mine when he sits up and reaches for his jeans at the foot of the bed. He pulls a condom out of his back pocket, and I’m so glad he wants to be safe. It would be too easy for me to be stupid with him.

He kneels in front of me, my legs on either side of his as he looks down, his eyes locked with mine. I can’t read his expression, can’t tell exactly what he wants me to do next. And it’s killing me, because whatever he wants me to do, I want to do it. One of his hands lightly traces the outside of my calf and the other cups my foot, lifting it until it rests on his shoulder. He turns his head and plants a sweet, gentle kiss on the inside of my ankle.

“You are so beautiful,” he says, his voice very soft and very deep at the same time. I’m lying naked in front of him, so he knows this is a sure thing. He doesn’t need to flatter me, but still…I’m flattered. What am I supposed to say? You’re handsome? I’d like to lick every square inch of your body?

He doesn’t wait for me to figure it out, he just leans down and kisses me as he hooks his arms under mine. I reach up and touch his face, wondering why all of this feels so tender when it isn’t supposed to mean anything at all. Nate presses his forehead against mine as he slowly pushes into me. He sighs and runs his fingers through my hair, and somehow it feels like we’ve been together like this before. He knows every spot to touch that makes me gasp, every stretch of skin to slide his tongue across that opens me up to him. He brings me to the edge of pleasure and pulls me back, again and again, until my whole body is humming and desperate. When I finally fall, I bury my face in his neck. He follows soon after, peppering my face with kisses.

After, we lie there in bed, clinging to each other. Until a kiss turns into more kisses and a touch turns into a thousand more. Until he’s inside me again and my body is wrapped around his and our names fall from each other’s lips. We follow the same pattern all night, over and over again, until we finally drift off to sleep.

I wake up just before dawn, wrapped in Nate’s arms. I’ve never been so comfortable and so scared in my entire life. I don’t want to walk out of this room and never see him again, but more than that I don’t want him to become another Ethan. I’m scared he’ll break what’s left of my heart, and I’ll get so hardened against men that I won’t be able to have another night like this again.

No, it’s better for me to leave things as they are and let this night become a memory.

I get dressed quietly and gather my things, ignoring the nagging ache I feel as I slip out the door.

G
ABBY AND
I sit side-by-side in the bed of her fiancée Ben’s old pickup truck. We’re parked on the top of a hill at the edge of the property that Mr. and Mrs. Wright, Ben’s parents, have owned for the past twenty years. The view is so lush and green and beautiful that I want to spend the rest of my trip right in this spot. It’s still really early—the sun is just beginning to rise—and the two of us are huddled under a thick blanket, thermoses full of hot chocolate warming our hands.

“What’s over there?” I ask, pointing at an incredibly large area of land about 50 yards away that’s cordoned off with bright yellow caution tape.

“That’s where the tent for the reception is going to go. Amy blocked it off so that no one would drive on it and get tire tracks in the grass. She said she didn’t want the pictures to look ‘rednecky,’” Gabby replies.

Amy, Ben’s mother, is quite possibly one of the best event planners that I’ve ever met. Not that I’ve met all that many, mind you, but she’s pretty great at it is what I’m saying. She also happens to be an incredibly sweet woman and she treats Gabby like one of her own children. That puts her up pretty high in my book.

“In a place like this, I don’t think the pictures could be anything but gorgeous.” I take a deep breath as I look up at the stunning purples and pinks in the sky. The sun starts to peek over the horizon.

“You really like it here, don’t you?”

“I do. I’m glad you had the sense to take off the week before your wedding and invite me along. It’s a nice little vacation.”

“That was part of my wedding requirements checklist, actually.” Gabby unscrews the top of her thermos and pours some hot chocolate into two small styrofoam cups. She hands one to me and keeps the other. “Beautiful locale, nice weather, good vacation spot for Callie.”

“And it’s free,” I say, laughing.

“Yes, free is good. We definitely lucked out with that.”

“When is everyone else getting here?”

“Thursday,” she says, bringing her cup to her lips. Tendrils of steam curl into the air around her fingers.

We both look out over the mountains, watching the day come to life. I decide that this might be the right time to tell Gabby about what happened with Nate. As it is she’ll probably want to kill me for not telling her the second that I stepped off the plane yesterday morning. But Ben was there with her, and then the three of us spent the day driving through the mountains. This is the first one-on-one time that we’ve had together since I got here.

“So,” I say, fiddling with the edge of the blanket. “I did something on Friday night.”

Gabby’s expression changes ever so slightly, from content to cautious.

“If I have to find a new maid of honor, Callie, I swear I’ll-”

“What, do you think I committed a felony or something?” I ask, laughing.

Gabby laughs too, and I can’t help but think about what a lovely bride she’ll be. She has flawless mocha-colored skin and shiny, gorgeous hair that comes down to her shoulders in springy, tight spirals. She’s radiant even in the barely there early morning light.

“
Did
you commit a felony?”

“Not this time.”

“Good,” she replies. “It would’ve been difficult to find someone who could fit into that tiny dress of yours on such short notice anyway.”

“We have six more days to focus on the wedding, Gabs,” I say, trying to sound exasperated. “Can we please just focus on
me
right now?”

Gabby bumps my shoulder with hers. “What is it?”

I twist my fingers together, nervous to tell her about this for some reason. But she’s my best friend. If I can’t tell her, who can I tell?

“I, um…I slept with a guy I met at the airport.” I can’t help but cringe as I say it. It’s not that I’m ashamed or anything…it’s just that the words sound wrong coming out of my mouth for some reason. Like I’m telling her about something someone else did.

“Is that why you didn’t come until yesterday morning?” she asks, her eyes wide.

“I came Friday night, actually. Several times.”

Gabby leans forward, clutching her stomach as she laughs. “Oh my god, Callie.”

“Seriously though, there was actually a weather delay. That was how I spent it.”

“I thought you were swearing off men?” she asks. It’s not an accusatory tone, but more of an I-told-you-so. Because she doesn’t think that I can do it, doesn’t think that I’ll stick with it.

“I swore off love, not men,” I remind her. “I don’t need Ethan: Part Two.”

“Was it good?”

I take a deep breath and stretch out my arms, sinking back against the cab of the truck. “It was better than good. It was…amazing.” I know that’s not the right word to describe it, but I can’t think of another one that will do it justice. Maybe there isn’t a word that will do it justice.

“Who was it?”

“Just some guy I met,” I tell her.

“So you just said goodbye and that was that?”

I can tell that Gabby is having difficulty grasping the fact that I’ve done something like this. Truthfully, that it stuns her makes me proud in an odd sort of way. It makes me feel less predictable, like maybe I’m not as boring as I think I am, not boring enough to push Ethan to look for entertainment elsewhere.

“I actually didn’t say goodbye to him,” I admit. “I kind of left while he was sleeping.”

“That is
so
not like you,” she says. She almost sounds proud.

“I know.” I don’t tell her that I regret leaving the way that I did, that I wish I had gotten his number. No good can come from that admission. “I’m just moving on, I guess.” That part is true.

“Really?” She takes a sip of her hot chocolate. “In that case, I need to tell you something, too.”

I know by the tone of her voice that this ’something’ is going to be a thing that I don’t want to hear. She says the words slowly and deliberately, like she’s defusing a bomb.

“Doesn’t the sky look like a watercolor?” I look up, mainly to avoid Gabby’s gaze. I’m an expert avoider.

“Callie.”

“You know, I’ve been thinking. Maybe I should move out here. I like the country, and it’s as pretty as Texas but more temperate. It doesn’t feel like we’ve walked through the gates of Hell when we step outside here.”

“Callie,” Gabby says again, still sounding so patient. She lets me work through things in my own way, in my own time. It’s one of the things that I love most about her.

I stop talking and stare straight ahead. I prefer not to look at the bullet when it’s coming straight at me. I’m pretty sure I know what this one is anyway.