Offensive Behavior (Sidelined #1) (20 page)

She was
beyond obsession now. She was the sacred temple at the top of the ziggurat. She
was the complex algorithm that sorted good from bad. All the independent bricks
he’d built his life on crumbled to silt as he put his lips to her belly and
closed his hand over her breast.

When
her breath snagged, when she grasped his hair and dragged his head up so their
lips met, he stopped trying to calculate this, there was no wisdom in it. It
was a kind of insanity to want something so much, to be given it so freely and
to fear its loss before he’d even experienced the moment.

She was
all those things, the past he hadn’t lived in his body, the present he feared
was as much a lucky charm as a curse, and the future he’d failed to anticipate.

“Please,”
she said, between kisses that drained him of any ambition that wasn’t to be
inside her. “Reid,” she said, and he put his self-belief in her hands and
willed her to do whatever she wanted with it. “I need,” she said, as she flexed
her hips into his hand. And he needed too, the wonder and challenge of her, the
strength and yield of her, the silken skinned, thready-voiced, wet, rippling
lock of her.

He got
rid of his jeans. He took her ankles and slid her to the edge of the table
where it fell like a solid waterfall of glass to the floor.

“We’re going
to make a mess,” she moaned, her foot to his shoulder. She glistened from where
he’d played his fingers.

It
would be art, design, architecture, music. He lowered his mouth to her pussy. It
would be hot chaos and cool awe.

“I love
this table. Oh, God. Reid. Don’t stop.”

Not
till she was incapable of words. Not till her writhing, her gasping, the flood
of her juices told him she was beyond thought and reason, driven all the way
into the tight corner of pleasure so screamingly deep she was flying again. And
when she was, he threw her higher. He caught her body up and flipped her,
draped her over the table’s smooth curved end and held her hips tilted up to
him.

“Now. Fuck
me now.”

She was
revelation when he drove into her, absolution when she bucked greedily against
him, and divinity when she shook through another release, her inner muscles
clamping down on him, bowing his back, liquefying his neck, forcing a stream of
curses from his mouth, and sending him rocketing into a paradise of sensation
with Zarley as his wings.

EIGHTEEN

It was Reid’s plan, but Zarley agreed to it, as much for him as for
Cara, because although Cara loved her brother, and new baby nephew, the loss of
her job, her sewing machine and their apartment had hit her hard.

They’d
been allowed in to the apartment, but there wasn’t much worth scavenging, and
since there was an arson investigation pending they weren’t getting the place
back any time soon. There was talk of compensation from the building owner, but
it wouldn’t be quick to come. Everything was sooty, wet and smelled appalling. Zarley’s
books were sodden, falling apart when she tried to pick them up. They rescued
some kitchen stuff, knickknacks and clothing that might eventually not smell of
smoke, and they hauled Cara’s sewing machine out, only to find it wouldn’t
start when they cleaned it up and plugged it in at Kathryn’s place.

Reid
did the hauling and a trailer-load of resenting because Zarley refused to stay
with him. She’d made her peace with Kathryn’s borrowed air-mattress and Reid
was sucking it up, none too gracefully.

It
should’ve annoyed her, the peremptory way he was after less than three weeks of
knowing her offstage, but after an initial debate about her reasons for not
wanting to stay with him, which were admittedly limp: he had space, it clearly
wasn’t an imposition, his place was within easy distance of both college and
Lucky’s—he’d clenched his jaw and backed off.

He even
refrained from teasing her for the argument that living with him was a quick
way to kill their thing, because he didn’t buy it and neither did she.

Their
thing was hot and strong and about to go glamor.

He was
taking her to a formal function for Plus’ tenth anniversary. It was a genuine
red carpet-ish moment and Cara was making her a dress. Reid had offered to buy Cara
a sewing machine, but Cara picked up a second-hand one and hit him up for
fabric instead. He had no idea what he’d agreed to, the fabric she wanted was
eighty-five dollars a yard and she needed five yards to make a Hollywood-style
gown that Zarley was dying to wear.

She’d
never worn an article of clothing that could be described as a gown before. Not
so quietly she wondered if she could pull it off, but Cara was thoroughly into
it and it was a more interesting project than apartment hunting, and Zarley
refused to put pressure on Cara about that.

Cara
needed a job before they could commit to rent, so they’d entered a suspended
sentence of homelessness, alleviated by the requirement for a truly red carpet-worthy
dress of which portfolio-style photos could be taken to help Cara attract more
customers, and Zarley’s continued fascination with Reid.

She
tried and failed to sell herself on the concept that the thing with Reid was all
about the transcendent sex. The high she got from the coach, student basis of
their relationship. But that was a load of old bull. Reid still played the
first timer, got overexcited and all out went for her like she was the last
stop for pleasure on a long desolate sexless highway to hell. But she wasn’t
much better. He frayed her control, tested her body’s limits and blasted all
her expectations of getting off into a new dimension.

It
wasn’t just the sex. He was like double-sided tape. Smart but naive, funny and
moody, awesome and fearsome, solitary and reaching out, and it didn’t matter
which side she turned the tape, she was stuck on him.

She was
supposed to be at study group. But Saturday night’s event was a long way from
hump day and she’d had three dress fittings, but no sex for a whole thirty-nine
hours. She might not make it to the Cinderella stage. She sent Reid that full-frontal
pic. No warning, just a sext in the middle of Wednesday afternoon.

He
called. “Where are you?” He had the gruff, barely holding it together tone that
made the hair on the back of her neck stand up.

“I
could be at your place in thirty minutes.”

“Too
long. I’m coming to get you.”

She
laughed. “I’m at Kathryn’s and I can walk to—”

“I’ll
be there in ten.”

“Reid,
I.” She laughed. He’d hung up.

She met
him in the street. He hadn’t bothered with his helmet. It was still clipped on
the back of the bike with hers. His hair was damp and full of wind, and his
shirt buttoned oddly. He made her heart turn flick flacks in her chest. The
look he gave her was indecent, as if she was standing there naked, fingering
herself. She wore a flirty summer dress that’d survived a good scrubbing, a
pair of now off-white Keds, and her hair was piled on her head in a messy bun.

“Not
bike ready,” he barked.

Bike ready
meant jeans and sleeves, appropriate footwear. “I was walking, remember.”

“You’re
not now.”

She
almost said, you’re not the boss of me, but he was, in this moment, disheveled,
intense and possessive, he owned her, body, mind and soul.

“Take
me somewhere.”

“Unless
you change, we’re going home.”

It was
a five-minute trip to his garage door. He’d risk that. “Take me somewhere we
can fuck on your bike.” He groaned. She felt it between her legs. She swung a
tote bag, borrowed from Kathryn, nonchalantly, as if she wasn’t dying to climb
on behind him and have her arms and legs around him while the classic old
Harley vibrated under her. “Either that or I’m walking.”

He
snatched her off the pavement and deposited her on the seat, thrusting a helmet
at her while he grabbed for his own, and still he protested. “It’s not safe.”

What
she planned wasn’t. They could get arrested for what she planned. She ignored
him standing there and tucked her skirt under her thighs. “You don’t want
inside me while we’re outside,” she stroked a hand over the seat where he’d be
sitting if he had any sense, “with this beast as our bed?”

“You’re
dangerous.”

“I’m
also skipping a class and I have to work tonight. Get your ass on this bike
now.”

He
shoved her forward and got on behind her, caging her with his arms and legs,
putting the heat of his chest at her back. She showed a lot of leg as they
nipped through the city. He headed for the green expanse of Niles. They’d scare
the dog walkers. She laughed inside her helmet, running her hands over his
knees and shins.

At the
park they ditched the bike. Where they could park was too public. They took a
walking trail. Zarley skipping out front, Reid following, a look of pure terror
on his face. She picked a spot. A huge tree, a broad trunk to hide behind, a
stand of other trees behind it making a corridor. On the weekend there’d be
hundreds of people picnicking in the clearing on the other side of that tree,
throwing Frisbees, drinking beer and chasing toddlers. They had it to
themselves. But now she had him here, what did she want from him? He’d go to
his knees if she asked. He’d let her take him that way if she wanted it.

He
walked into view and she knew she wanted it all with him, rough and smooth,
lazy and dangerous.

“You’re
reckless, Flygirl.” He stopped in front of her and her tree. “We can’t do it
here.”

“Scared,
Back Booth?”

He
pushed both hands through his hair. “Fuck yeah. Imagine the headlines if we got
caught. My image has taken a bashing, getting nabbed for indecent exposure might
make it hard to convince Plus backers to stand with me.”

“Oh
Reid.” She walked into his arms. “I wasn’t thinking. I’m sorry.” And getting
caught with her, hell—it was one slightly exaggerated claim away from him doing
a hooker. The thought almost cooled her ardor. “I get carried away.”

She
titled her chin up and he bent to kiss her. It wasn’t an I’m worried about
public decency kiss, because his hand went under her dress to cup her ass and
drag her closer and his tongue was wicked. He didn’t have an I’m worried about indecent
exposure bulge behind his zipper either. Nor was he especially worried about it
when backing her into the tree and feeling her up. Her dress was strappy and
didn’t need a bra and he made quick work shoving the shoulder strap down her
arm and getting his mouth to her nipple.

“You
make me crazy,” he said, spinning her so she was face to the tree, hands
planted on its rough trunk, standing higher than he was in the grassy mound
that covered tree roots. Her mind crash-landed into that scene they’d had on
the dining table. He’d been behind her then. He’d been all over her body and
deep inside her head. And afterward, he’d taken her to bed and kissed her to
sleep and she’d lost a little more of her casual resistance to him. All he was
doing now was bracing her, one hand at her hip, strumming his thumb over her
nipple but she couldn’t stop shaking or the moan that was so loud it frightened
a bird from the branches above them, startling them both.

“It’s
your fault I’m like this.” No struggle left. She was in this complication of
him all the way.

He
pinched, while his lips went to her neck, his teeth in play. “Can’t be my
fault. I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m someone else with you.”

She pushed
her ass back into his lap, loving her height advantage. He could be Donald
Trump right now and she’d want him to take her. And he did know what he was
doing. He was writing over her vow to stay detached and recoding her will to
court heartbreak with him.

Hand
under her dress he pulled her panties down her hip, smoothing his hand over
newly bared flesh. “All these firsts with you.” He swapped sides and yanked and
she heard fabric tear, but the elastic held and her panties caught on her
spread thighs.

“Oh!” Her
skirt fluttered over her butt and the wall of Reid receded. She twisted her
head to watch him unzip, head bowed, his hair dry now and fluffed as though
she’d had her fingers in it. “Reid.”

He
looked up, eyes wide, blown out like spotlights. “I’m going to die if I don’t
have you.”

“Yours.
I’m yours. Do it now.”

He put
a hand alongside hers on the tree and she pressed back as he guided himself
inside her. They both stilled when he was fully seated. He spoke into her ear,
“Is it always this madness?” his voice was hushed and cracked.

She was
too full, too open, too everything at once to know how to answer him. She rocked
back and he jerked forward. Tension swirled in her gut, heat made her legs
shake, nonsense sounds poured out of her mouth. Reid’s hand went to her hip,
then dipped under her dress where his fingers sought and found the madness in
her.

She
shook so hard she might push the tree over. She felt so deeply she might break
its roots with her toes. The whole park couldn’t contain the pleasure she felt.
The ponds would flood, the grass shoot, the seasons cycle from fertile to
fallow and back again, all within the time it took for orgasm to rip though her
body, for Reid’s to chase it, catch it midair and ground her with his mouth to
her throat.

Out of
breath they held each other up. Reid curled protectively around her, his chest
heaving, his head tucked in the nook of her shoulder. She put her hand to his hair,
threaded her fingers though his overlong locks. This thing between them kept
getting better, more intense. But it had to be the game she was making of it,
his willingness to go all in and play to win.

“You
okay, Flygirl.”

“Still
flying.”

“Me
too.”

And
then a dog barked.

No two
semi-undressed people put themselves together quicker, both of them laughing.

“I
ripped your—”

She
wiggled into her underwear. “Not completely.” But enough they weren’t fit to be
worn again. The bike ride back would be a little more breezy.

“Sorry,”
he frowned, contrite, looking down at his hands.

“I
loved it.”

He
stared at her, disbelieving. “I was too rough. I get, I lose—”

She
used her height advantage and brought their faces close, a hand to the back of
his head to hold him there. “I loved it.” She brushed gentle kisses across his
cheek.

“Don’t
skip study for me. Don’t. It’s important.”

She pulled
back to look at him. The laughter gone, a shadow over his eyes. “Okay.” She
couldn’t not give him that and he was right. To rebuild her life, study came
first, but it was hard to prioritize in the light of the joy she got from being
with Reid. It was like tumbling on a sprung floor, spinning on a pole, without
fear of the score or the ramifications of making a mistake.

Don’t
let this be a mistake
.

He
dropped her back to Kathryn’s in time to get ready for work. They wouldn’t see
each other until Saturday and there were simply too many hours, too much class,
work, air-mattress sleeping to be done before then.

He
kissed her with a lazy lushness that made her knees go soft. She stood on the
pavement, he sat astride the Harley and neither of them wanted to say goodbye.

He
groaned. “Why didn’t I do women before?”

She
didn’t mean to hold her breath but it felt like a threat. Why wouldn’t he
regret the time spent without sex and close companionship? “You have time to
catch up.” And it’s not like she’d promised anything more than what they had
now.