Unbreakable (28 page)

During one lull in the conversation, we watched a Cincinnati player step up to bat. Cory put two fingers in his mouth and loosed a piercing whistle. “Hey, batter!”

“They must love that,” I laughed.

“Get even closer to home plate and you can see them give you the stink eye.” Cory whistled again and then took my hand in his and rested our entwined fingers against his knee as if he had done it a hundred times before.

I felt a pleasant shiver shoot up my arm and down my shoulder blades. I glanced down at our clutched hands and then at him.

Cory realized what he’d done and let go of my hand with a sheepish laugh. “Sorry. I wasn’t thinking…I just…” He ran a hand through is hair. “I’m a sap, remember?”

“No, it’s fine,” I said. “It’s…nice.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

I reached out and took Cory’s hand. He looked down at our entwined fingers, that crooked smile gracing his lips, and then let them rest on his knee again. My pulse quickened and then settled. I felt good. Content.

Cory held my hand for all of the sixth inning, letting go only to fish his cell phone out of his pocket to answer a Happy Birthday text from Vic. My hand felt empty without his, and then he finished texting and took it again, that small, quiet smile on his lips.

This isn’t a good idea,
I thought.
Too many little gestures will lead up to one big gesture and I can’t let it go too far.
My cheeks burned, remembering the interlude in the bank.
You’ve already gone too far.

I glanced at Cory sideways, taking in his handsome profile. Everything I felt tempted to do with him, I’d already done. I’d already laid kisses along his strong jaw, had already tangled my fingers in his soft hair, had already kissed him and clutched him and taken him inside me, and yet now it seemed all brand new. Like a new horizon waiting to be discovered if only I had the courage to take the first step.

Can I?
I wondered.
Can I tear down six years with Drew for this? This contentment? And if I did, would it last? When the pain and terror of the bank robbery finally faded, would I still feel the same? Would Cory?

Distantly, I heard the crack of a bat and the crowd around me issued a collective cry of excited surprise, rousing me from my thoughts.

“Foul ball!” Cory surged to his feet, taking me with him.

“What…?”

I watched as the ball rolled foul of the first base line, straight toward me. The Reds’ first baseman gave half-hearted chase.

“Get it! Get it! Get it!” Cory cried.

Without thinking, I bent over the rail, reaching for the ball, though I knew it was futile, and I’d never reach it.

Then I felt Cory’s hands on my waist and I half-laughed, half-shrieked as he hauled me over the side until I was hanging nearly vertical. The only thing keeping me from falling face first onto the field was his strong grip on my hips.

He’ll never let me fall.

The ball rolled to the wall and bounced off. My fingers closed around it before it could escape and Cory lifted me up, face to face with the Reds’ first baseman.

“That’s Donald Lutz,” Cory whispered in my ear, like a star struck fan.

“Hello, Donald Lutz,” I held up the ball. “I think I’ll keep this.”

He tipped his cap. “Sure thing,
Red
,” he said with a wink, and trotted back to base.

I raised the ball in victory and the fans around us cheered. Cory lifted me off my feet in a bear hug, laughing, and before I knew it, his lips were on mine in a celebratory kiss. As if it was the most natural thing in the world.

The cheering grew louder, and I realized we were still standing with half the stadium watching. I broke our kiss, but gently, and quickly took my seat with an exhilarated sigh. When Cory took his, I laid the ball in his hand.

“Happy Birthday, Cory.”

#

The drive home was slow and silent, but not entirely uncomfortable. As we sat in post-game traffic around downtown, I wondered if he was thinking about the kiss as much as I was. He’d done it impulsively, I knew that, but it felt right. Just as holding his hand had felt right. More than right. I was forced to admit that when I was with Cory, the world felt ordered and calm, the chaos of the robbery felt muted and distant.
The separation anxiety,
I told myself.
It’s not that being with him is so…perfect. It’s that
not
being with him brings on the anxiety.

If that was true, then what was the cure?

I glanced at Cory sideways, trying to study him without letting on that I was. It didn’t help matters that he was so damn handsome. Or that he was kind and thoughtful and stubborn and s
exy…God, he’s sexy
.

Cory turned on the radio and scanned for a station. “Take Me To Church” by Hozier came on.

“Is this okay? I like this song.”

“So do I.”

The lyrics to the song were beautifully poetic but so sexually charged I had to lean against the glass to cool my skin, which was suddenly flush and hot.
If Cory could sing, this is what his voice would sound like. And these are the words I’d want in my ear as we fucked.

The thought was startling but the rush of sensation between my legs that came with it was far more shocking. I bit my lip and closed my eyes, letting the song’s raw sensuality wash over me until I felt saturated.

And then I couldn’t help myself. I opened my eyes, watched him, just drank him in as all sorts of erotic thoughts danced in my head.

He glanced at me once, then twice—a double take that I found to be extremely adorable. “What’s that look for?”

“Nothing,” I said. “I’ve just had a really nice time tonight.”

“Oh, yeah,” Cory said. “Me too.”

“I’m so glad,” I murmured.
But the night’s not over yet.

Cory

I watched Alex out of the corner of my eye as I drove. The look she’d given me, and that smile…It was almost…
Seductive.

I brushed the thought aside, and fast, before I had an accident. I tried to concentrate on driving but the air between us was now charged. Like lightning was about to strike. The hair on my arms stood on end.

This damn song doesn’t help.

I’d always liked “Take Me To Church” but now the words were seeping into my skin. I looked at Alex, now curled away from me, eyes closed, listening with a look on her face that stole my breath away. Hozier sang of his and his lover’s gentle sin, and I thought of the bank. Of those precious minutes where Alex had been mine.
That was a sin,
I thought,
but there was nothing gentle about it. And if I had another ten minutes with her, I’d sin again.

Mercifully, the song ended and a commercial—loud and obnoxious—came on. I listened hard to the car dealership ad to help erase the lyrics from my mind and cool my burning blood, both to no avail.

When we pulled into the bungalow’s driveway, Alex turned in her seat before I’d even shut off the truck’s engine. “It’s only ten o’clock,” she said. “I don’t know about you, but I’m not tired at all.”

A thousand hidden meanings behind those words burst in my imagination.

“I was thinking we could fire up the hot tub,” she continued. “You fixed it, right?”
“Uh, yeah,” I said. Sirens blared in my mind. “It’s ready to go.”

She smiled that sultry smile again. The kind that made it hard for me to breathe. “Good. Then let’s go.”

#

I started the jets while Alex went to change into a bathing suit. For my own sake, I prayed she bad a one piece. Or maybe a burqa
.
I watched then, in slack-jawed dismay, as she appeared in a black string bikini, held on at the hips with two tiny little bows. Her breasts were covered only with thin triangles of black material. She carried two towels tucked under her arm and two bottles of beer.

“Got it working?” She handed me a beer, ignoring or missing what must have been a thoroughly moronic expression of base lust on my face. She inspected the water and the steam rising from it. “Perfect. You coming in?”

I muttered something about changing and went to the living room to dig my swim shorts out of the duffel I’d been living out of since I’d moved in.
What is she doing? What am
I
doing?

If I knew what was good for me, I’d call it off, plead exhaustion, or say I wanted to be up early for the test. Instead, because I was a raving masochist, I put my suit on and joined her in the tub.

“Feels nice, doesn’t it?” Alex said as I climbed in.

I nodded, grateful the water covered her up to her collarbone. But even that wasn’t enough. I couldn’t drag my eyes from the graceful curve of her neck, or the lean muscle of her shoulders from God-knew how many yoga sessions. She had dunked her head under the water, and her red hair—dark now in the dimness of the porch light—was slicked back from her face.

I couldn’t stop staring, though I’d noticed, through my fog of lust, how her eyes had taken me in as I’d climbed into the sauna. How they’d lingered on my chest with an unabashed hunger. Or at least I thought that’s what it was.
Hoped
that it was. When it came to Alex, I had a lot of hope and not much else.

“Your tattoo is really beautiful,” Alex commented, referring to the Santa Muerta art on my left shoulder. “But I don’t think she likes me very much.”

I took a swig of beer. “She doesn’t like anyone.”

Alex smiled faintly. “Can I see the other? On your back?”

“Uh, sure.” I turned my back to her, striving to keep loose, casual as she drew near. And still I flinched when I felt her fingers trace the lines and whorls of ink.

“It’s not conventional,” she remarked. “Very unique.”

I felt her fingertips trace the curve of the tattoo on my right shoulder blade: half of a clock with Roman numerals, like a half-moon, cradling a Greek goddess, a leaping rabbit, and a cloud shaped like an old man’s face, all sketched in black ink and artfully connected so that one image flowed and blended with the next. I felt Alex’s fingers find the only color: a red heart to the bottom right of the clock, blood-splattered and dripping.

“You drew this, didn’t you?” she asked, awed.

“Yeah,” I said. Her fingers were still on my skin. I could feel them, hotter than the water around us. “I wanted something meaningful so I drew my own.”

“It’s meaningful?” Alex mused. “Let me guess.”

I felt her fingers touch each figure in turn.

“Georgia is the goddess, Callie the rabbit, your father the man in the clouds. The clock represents the hours and days and years of your life, and the heart…” She traced the dripping blood. “Pain.”

“Georgia’s not the goddess,” I said quickly. “She thinks it’s her, because the lack of color makes the woman look blonde. But it’s not her.”

“Who is it then?” Alex asked, and I could feel her fingers tracing the goddess’ sword.

“I don’t know yet. My partner. Whoever she is.”

Alex said nothing. Her fingers kept going, down to the white seam where I’d been shot.

“And this…”

Now both her hands were on my shoulders, and I felt her lips touch that scar, feather light, in a gentle kiss. I suppressed a moan, grateful the swirling water concealed me below the waist.

“What are we doing, Alex?” I breathed, and felt her glide away, to her half of the sauna.

“Sitting in the hot tub, enjoying the summer night,” she said. “And your birthday. Happy Birthday, Cory.”

“You said that already.” I turned, wondered if she was drunk, even though her eyes were as sharp and clear. “You also said we had to be careful.”

“I remember.” She sipped her beer. “We’re doing a terrible job of being careful.”

“Yeah,” I said. “The hot tub was a bad idea. You in that bikini was a very bad idea.”

She took another sip, a thoughtful expression on her face. “So let’s not.”

“Let’s not what?”

“Let’s not be careful.”

Alex set her beer on the edge of the sauna. She faced me from her half of the roiling water, her eyes locked on mine, unflinching, but when she spoke there was the smallest quaver in her voice.

“Tell me what do.”

“Tell you…?” I laughed to cover the pleasant shiver that skimmed along my skin, for my body knew what she was saying before my mind could comprehend. “What do you mean?”

“Tell me what you want.”

“Is this some kind of game?”

“Maybe.”

“Alex…”

“I know and I don’t care. Not tonight. Tonight I want you to tell me what you want. What you like.” She cocked her head at me, doubt creeping into her voice. “You don’t want to?”

Of course I did. My body was begging for hers.
But the voice of caution told me—
screamed
at me—to be careful. We’d already given in to the attraction that connected us like a live wire, but Alex had contained it, chalked it up to the trauma of the bank. But now…There was no uncertainty in her eyes. There was only want. And a challenge.

I called her bluff.

“Take off your top.”

I watched, transfixed, as Alex immediately reached to untie the string bikini behind her back. Then she reached under her hair, her eyes never leaving mine. No hesitation. The top of the suit fell away, her naked breasts concealed just below the surface of the water.

She wasn’t bluffing.

“Show me,” I said, my voice thick.

Alex rose up from the steam and my breath caught at the sight. Her beautiful breasts, full and round, her nipples growing hard right before my eyes in the cool air.
Dear god.
Beneath the water, I was hard as iron. “Come here.”

She obeyed, smoothly closing the distance between us until she was mere inches away. I longed to touch her everywhere, but instead I held her face in my hands, traced the line of her lips with my thumb.

“Why are you doing this?” I asked.

Her sky blue eyes grew cloudy with desire though they never wavered from mine.

“I’m tired of being the one who asks. I’m tired of feeling humiliated for asking. I’m tired of never knowing what he wants,
if
he wants me.” She put her hands on either side of my chest, trailing her fingers up, along the slope of muscle between neck and shoulder.

“I’m tired of feeling alone in my bed even when he’s a foot away. I’m tired of wanting fire and feeling cold nothing instead.” She moved closer, pressed herself against me, her knees resting on either side of the bench I sat on beneath the swirling water. Her fingers curled into my hair at the base of my neck. Her lips were so close, brushing mine as they moved.

“Do you want me?”

“You know I do.”

“I want to be wanted. So tell me, Cory. Tell me what you want me to do…and I’ll do it.”

Desire raced through my veins, carried on the currents of my blood, pumped by a heart that crashed against my chest. I knew what it was to ask, to wonder. In the past, even when Georgia initiated sex, she’d frequently become annoyed or impatient, and more often than not it all boiled down to just getting it over with. Like Alex, I wasn’t used to being desired and if that warning voice in my mind would just shut up, I’d give in right now.
But what happens after?

“An affair,” I breathed. “That’s what this means.”

“Yes.”

“Once…the bank…You might chalk it up to fear or shock. But twice…”

She nodded. “I know. Tomorrow it may hurt, but not now. Not now.” She leaned in, kissed my earlobe then whispered hotly in my ear, “Tonight…I’m yours.”

Tomorrow it may hurt
. That was the goddamn truth. Tomorrow Alex was going to be wracked with guilt and turn a cold shoulder to me, maybe even kick me out of her house for ruining her future with her incredibly rich and successful fiancé, and then where would I be? More than hurt. It was going to fucking wreck me and I knew it.

But that’s tomorrow,
I thought recklessly.
Tonight, she’s mine…

I grasped the back of her head with one hand, making a fist in her hair. “Kiss me,” I commanded. “Kiss me like there’s
no one else
.”

Her mouth was hot and wet, with none of the chaste softness of the hospital kiss. Her lips parted for me readily, eagerly, and my tongue stroked hers, dueled with hers, a battle of lust that I knew would end only when I’d had her completely. But the old alarms were not so easily silenced.

Don’t do this! She’s using you to get back at Drew. It’s not you she cares about, it’s not you she wants.

But she did. It was there in her eyes, in the breathy little noises of desire she released into my mouth as we kissed. She straddled me, her bare breasts pressing against my chest and her hips rolling against mine. Only two thin pieces of material—my suit and hers—separated us, and she ground hard against my aching erection. And if I suspected all of that was an act, I had only to touch her to know it wasn’t.

No woman responded to me the way she did. My hands went everywhere, and though the water was hot, she shivered and writhed and trembled at every touch. My hands surged back into her hair. She moaned as I pulled, exposing her long white throat to me. I swirled my tongue along the soft skin, wet with chlorine water but still delicious.

More warnings, my own self-preservation’s last gasp...
She’s been deprived. She’s using you for her own pleasure...

Maybe. But just then, I couldn’t give a damn if she paid me after. I wanted her
.
More than that, my heart ached for her more strongly than I was willing to admit, stronger even than the lust that coursed through me—as impossible as that seemed—if only I had the courage to speak the words.

“Tell me,” Alex said between our rough, biting kisses. “Tell me what to do.”

My hand was on one full breast, kneading it. I ran the ball of my thumb over the hard nipple. The recklessness was taking over, fueled by lust, hers and mine.

“Give it to me,” I said.

She clutched my neck and rose up out of the water so I could suck and lick and bite. And I did, cherishing her every mewl of pleasure as a victory against my enemy: her fiancé, who was stupid enough to neglect her instead of worship her.

I would. Every night.

“Ah, god…” Alex cried, her back arched to give me more, as much as I wanted.

And I wanted her. All of her. Right now.

“Get out.” Despite the harshness of my tone, she knew what I wanted. She climbed gracefully out of the water and faced me, waiting.

Her glorious body, honed by years of yoga and spas and pampering…she stood before me, dripping wet and with plumes of steam curling off her porcelain skin as if she were burning from within. Only the bottom half of her skimpy string bikini remained to cover her.