Paper Kisses (4 page)

“Thank you for that oh so lovely
picture, Kev,”
CeeCee
said.

“Anytime.”

“Like this is
safer?”
Alannah questioned.
 
“You
can’t even shift gears without banging
Cee’s
legs.”

“That’s the idea,” Kevin said,
grinning.
 
“I’ve been trying to bang her
for years and this is the only way she’ll let me feel her up.”

CeeCee
slapped his head.
 
“Pervert!”

“Don’t do that,” Alannah said,
slightly panicked when the truck swerved.
 
“He’s driving.”

“Hey, you reminded Sky about today,
didn’t you?” Kevin asked.

“Yep,”
CeeCee
replied, nodding.
 
“Yesterday.
 
He caught Alannah speeding and pulled her
over.”

“Caught it on the police scanner?”

“Of course.
 
As usual he threatened to confiscate it.”

“I didn’t think scanners were
illegal,”
Alanna
said.

“They aren’t…” Kevin answered.
 
“But, Sky doesn’t like anyone knowing his
business.”

Alannah’s eyebrows went up.
 
“Are we talking about the same man who wanted
to videotape himself doing a Rain Dance naked for his history report?”

“Oh yeah!”
CeeCee
said through laughter.
 
“I forgot about that!
 
Well, after he came back from college he was
a very different person…very private.
 
I
dunno
why.”

“Hey, how come you two never hooked
up?” Kevin asked her.
 
“As I recall, you
two spent an awful lot of time together at East Park.”

“Yeah, well, that time was devoted
to his bashing of Traci or Shelly, or whichever girl he happened to be seeing
at the time.
 
Lucky me, I got to hear all
the explicit details of how they pissed him off.”

Kevin laughed.
 
“Oh no, what a loser!
 
Babe-bashing to a babe.”

“Well, I guess I was the last
person standing,” Alannah said with a shrug.
 
“I mean you were off studying sheep or
something, and
Cee
was…well,
Cee
.
 
I guess Sky felt I was the only one he could
talk to.”

“Ah ha!”
Kevin exclaimed gleefully.
 
“But you
don’t know what he and I used to talk about when you weren’t around.”

CeeCee
shot him a speculative glance.
 
“Really, Kevin Michael Ramsey?
 
And what might that have been?”

“Did you and Sky talk about me and
Cee
?”

Kevin groaned.
 
“Oh no, I was just teasing.
 
Don’t you two gang up on
me.
 
All we talked about was, you know, girls and
shit.”

CeeCee
looked
at her and she saw the devilment in
Cee’s
blue eyes.
 
“They talked about our bra sizes.”

Alannah nodded.
 
“How utterly immature,
Kevin.”

She saw Kevin’s face flush red as
he studiously ignored them.
 
She poked
CeeCee
in the side and winked.

“So…who do you think is bigger?”
Alannah asked him.

“Yeah, me or
her?”
CeeCee
chimed in as she thrust out her
breasts.

They dissolved into giggles when he
gave them a horrified look.

The rest of the trip they played
nice and Alannah got her first glimpse of Lake
Wappapello
in twelve years.
 
In high school the four
of them had come up here every weekend through the warm summer months, which
was why she was fighting off the nostalgia tears.
 
The only thing that had seemed to change
were
the danger notices of undertow and moccasin snakes, and
the big sandy man-made beach sporting a volleyball net.
 

The woods felt peaceful, the sun
hot, and Alannah tumbled out of the truck as soon as the door opened.
 
As
CeeCee
helped
her up, Kevin took off running for the water, tossing his clothes in every
direction.

“Well, I see nothing’s changed with
him,” she said sarcastically.

“At least he’s wearing swim trunks
now.
 
Other than that, yeah, turning
thirty didn’t seem to
phase
him one bit,”
CeeCee
agreed.
 
“Come
on,
let’s get
our picnic set up.”

Since Kevin was otherwise occupied,
it took them several trips to bring all the food and drink from the back of the
truck to the table.
 
CeeCee
tossed a ball onto the sand near the net, claiming it, before setting up the
food and coolers.
 

“Excellent!” Kevin replied as he
approached, covered in water and grinning from ear to ear.
 
“We’re here before anyone else.
 
Ladies, let’s crack us open some beers!”

“It’s eight o’clock in the morning,
Kev,” Alannah said, a bit shocked.

He kissed the top of her head, some
of the cold lake water splashing onto her.
 

“It’s the weekend, it’s going to be
a beautiful day, and I’ve my two favorite ladies all to myself.
 
It’s time to party.”

Alannah chuckled as she wiped away
the water droplets.
 

“Kevin, darling,”
CeeCee
called out.
 
“Before this wild party of three gets too out of hand, start up the
grill.”

“What a party spoiler,” he
whispered.

“I heard that!”

It was about an hour later when
cars began arriving with people dressed in shorts and bathing suits.
 
Someone set up music, which helped relax
Alannah as she greeted some people she knew and shook hands with others she
didn’t.
 
The atmosphere was young and
carefree and she almost felt like a teenager again, almost like twelve years
hadn’t just passed in a blink of an eye.

She could almost pretend she’d
never met Bryce Burns, that he hadn’t called her boring or frigid.
 
That he hadn’t utterly destroyed her self-esteem.
 

Alannah forced the memories away.
Somehow, somewhere between there and this, something had gone all wrong so
she’d come back to Dexter to relax and have a good time.
 
Find the girl she used to be in the body of
the woman she’d become.
 
She didn’t know
how she was supposed to accomplish that, but all she could think to do was
start over.

Around noon she grabbed some food
and a beer and settled at table to eat and watch the volleyball game going
on.
 
Three girls she knew from high
school sat with her, although she’d never been close with them.
 
In Dexter, though, everyone knew everyone.

“
CeeCee
told me you were an interior designer,” Yvonne said to her.

“Well, I still am.” Alannah
corrected her.
 
“I used to have my own
business with my husband.
 
Ex-husband.”

“Divorced, huh?”
Marzie
chimed in.
 
“Been there myself.”

“Actually, she’s
been there twice,” Amy, the third and final of the group, replied.

Marzie
blew a puff of smoke from her cigarette toward her friend to show her
annoyance.

“I live in Cape Girardeau now,”
Yvonne said, seeming determined to keep the conversation going.
 
“I’m an accountant.
 
Amy’s a teacher here in Dexter and
Marzie
works for an apartment complex.”

Alannah smiled at them.
 
“That’s great.
 
What grade do you teach, Amy?”

“Second,” Amy replied with a
sigh.
 
“I never realized how early in
life brats develop.
 
It’s such a shame
spanking is taboo nowadays.
 
One good
crack to the monsters would make me feel better about my job.”

Alannah blinked, wondering if she
was serious.
 
When the three of them
began to laugh at her expression, Alannah relaxed and laughed with them.

At that moment, another truck
pulled up and Alannah watched Skylar step out of the cab.
 
He was out of his uniform today, wearing a
t-shirt that stretched across his broad chest, outlining every muscle
obscenely, and blue jeans so tight she could see the nice bulge at his groin,
which was where her gaze went directly to, of course. It was at eye level.
And big.

She
really
had to think of a different adjective.

“Wow,”
Marzie
murmured appreciatively.
 
“Now there’s a
body to drool and lick your chops over.”

Alannah silently agreed.
 
Licking sounded pretty good to her.
 
And slurping.
 
And sucking.
 
Heat flushed through her, the kind not from
the sun, and caused her juices to run into her bikini bottoms.
 
Crap.
 
She so didn’t need to get turned on right now.

“I can’t believe how good looking
he turned out,” Yvonne said.

“I know,” Amy added.
 
“He came back from college and suddenly he
was this hunk.”

“Made me vote for him at election
time,”
Marzie
replied.

“I thought he ran unopposed,”
Alannah remarked, remembering her conversation with him.

“She usually doesn’t vote,” Amy
explained.

As if he heard them talking about
him, Sky looked over and her gaze locked with his.
 
Something deep and primal shifted inside her
as if the world suddenly forgot to spin on its axis, and the feeling threw her
for a loop.
 
This was the same person
she’d grown up with, had known since kindergarten.
 
He had the same face, the same
smell
, for god’s sake, but the challenge
shining out of his eyes wasn’t Skylar Randall at all.
 
The man he’d become was different.
 
Harder.
 
Sexier, for damn sure.
 
And all her female parts answered with a
purr.
 
And then he was heading toward her
and her stomach clenched, causing a thousand butterflies to all flitter about
at once.
 

“Ladies,” he greeted in a soft,
super seductive voice.
 
How’d he pack
such a panty wetting inflection in one word?

Alannah listened to her companions
fumbling for something coherent to say and failing miserably.
 
It would’ve made her laugh except she
suspected she’d be in the same boat if she opened her mouth.
 
So instead, she rose, grabbed her empty plate
and walked away, making a beeline for the nearest trash can before heading off
into the woods for a quick walk to get her equilibrium back.

It was almost surreal being back
here, hearing the splashes and laughter from the partygoers.
 
She knew once night fell that a bonfire would
go up and everyone would settle around with beers and blankets to swap
stories.
 
Some would head off for a
little privacy.
 
Some wouldn’t give a
shit about privacy.

“Having fun?” Sky asked from behind
her, startling her so bad she almost tripped.

His arms caught her around her
stomach and hauled her back just in time, and she sagged in relief until she
felt all of him touching all of her.
 
Good god almighty, there wasn’t padding under those clothes.
 
His chest cradled her back and his groin fit
in the curve of her ass.
 
And then, holy
moly…his cock went from relaxed to hard in the blink of an eye.
 
He was poking her.
 
Literally.

All the breath swooshed from her
and before she realized what she was doing, she’d wiggled her ass against
him.
 
She was rewarded with a groan right
before Sky bent over to nuzzle his nose against the curve where her neck met
her shoulder.
 
His breath was warm and it
tickled the fine hair at her nape.
 
Her
libido began to hyperventilate, her mouth began to salivate, and suddenly all
she wanted to do was turn around and ride him into next Sunday.

Holy shit.
 
Where’d that thought come from?

Panicking just a little, because he
used to be her best friend, she pulled away and spun, panting like she’d just
run a marathon.
 
His blue eyes were deep
and stormy and they looked at her with good old-fashioned lust.
 
She felt an answering need pulse through her
clit so she silently gave it a warning to back the fuck down.
 
This was Sky…
 
She couldn’t possibly want to fuck him.
 
Could she?

Would she if he asked?

Oh, she was in so much trouble.

“Alannah?” he asked, wary.
 

“Yes?” she squeaked.
 
She cleared her throat and tried again.
 
“Yes?”