Wide Open (9 page)

“Okay, alright. I get it.”

“Caplan,” I add. “Douglas.”

“Jesus! I said I get it.”

“Notton.”

Colt chuckles. “I can’t believe I’m gonna say this, but shut up, Matthews.”

I smile, popping the last of my donut in my mouth.

Lowry nods to Colt. “Hey, we on for the fourth?”

“Every year, baby. Without fail.” He looks at me, hesitating for half a second. “You in?”

“For what?”

“Fourth of July party at my place.”

“Most of the team shows up,” Lowry explains. “A few of the cheerleaders will be there. That whole camera crew is even coming. Only guys with families and kids won’t be there.”

“And you,” Colt accuses. “You didn’t show last year. No surprise.”

“You gotta come this year, man. Party with us. Loosen up. Shake that Montana dust off.”

I lick the sweet taste of sugar off my lower lip, scanning the field. Thinking. “Maybe.”

“’Maybe,’” Tyus echoes. “Yeah, I know what that means. That’s Matthews speak for ‘hell no’.”

“I didn’t know I had my own language.”

“It’s mostly glares and frowns.”

“Some grunts,” Lowry agrees. “A few mic drops.”

I shake my head. “What the hell does that mean?”

“You’re like an old man on his porch trying to keep kids off his lawn,” Colt continues, ignoring my question.

“I’m only twenty-six,” I protest.

“You act sixty-eight. You need to chill. Put down the shotgun and get off the damn porch before you actually are sixty-eight and you feel a hundred and three.”

Lowry holds his hand out, opening his palm dramatically. “Mic drop. That’s what the hell that means.”

“You know what, fuck you guys. I’ll be there,” I tell them, surprising everyone. Including myself.

“For real?” Tyus asks. “You’re gonna party?”

“If I’m still invited.”

“Definitely,” Colt answers eagerly.

“Good.” I put my back to them, heading for the field. “I’ll see you bitches there.”

“Mic drop!” Lowry laughs after me.

HARPER

July 4th

Palmetto Warehouse

Los Angeles, CA

Colt Avery knows how to throw one hell of a party. This does not come as a surprise to me.

Out of all of the men on the team that we’ve interviewed, Colt is the most transparent. He’s blunt but honest, real in a way that’s unnerving. Charming nearly to a fault. He’s funny and crass, but oddly sweet. His endless energy is the center of every situation, especially tonight.

He invited the crew to this party on two conditions; we adhere to the strict bathing-suits-only dress code and we come to party. No cameras, no interviews. Nothing is on the record.

Ordinarily I would have said no. I don’t mix business with pleasure. At least I try not to. But over the last year, hell, during the last
week
, my resolve has been tested and come up wanting. I don’t like feeling this out of control, but the draw is just too strong. That’s what brought me here tonight. The strength of the pull Kurtis Matthews has on me. I don’t even know if he’ll be here, but it’s more likely he’ll show up at Colt’s party than my apartment, so I’ll take that shot. I’ll throw on a bikini and down a couple Mai Tais, all in the hope of falling into those deep, blue eyes.

When we got here I didn’t believe Travis. He said that Colt owns the entire building, something that seemed unlikely considering the size of this place, but I’ve heard it from two other people that it’s true. There are three floors to this old warehouse. The first has stayed a parking garage while the other floors have been converted into apartments, both remodeled to the nines. The third floor apartment is locked up tight and the second filled with beer and booze. We’ve vacated it, though. It was the entry point where you got your first drink, but from there you’re ushered up to the roof. The real party is here where Tiki torches burn, music thumps, and a mass of white lawn chairs are spread sporadically over the honey colored deck. Misters hang from poles at every corner giving relief from the imposing heat that has begun to fade with the sun. The water crackles and snaps hypnotically over the torches every time the wind changes, like firecrackers waiting to burst into life.

“We’ll be able to see some of the good fireworks set off along the river,” Colt explains to me. He gestures with his frothy cup of beer toward the eastern sky. “They’ll be over there, on the other side of those buildings.”

“There won’t be much,” Lilly, his fiancé, reminds us. “The fire danger is pretty high.”

“What’s it going to set fire to on the water?”

“It’s about the sparks and this little thing called wind, Kansas. I know you’ve heard of it.”

“Are you about to make another
Wizard of Oz
dig?”

“I don’t know, Dorothy. Am I?”

“You’re mean, you know that?”

“Yes.”

He leans over in his chair to kiss her forehead lovingly. “You’re lucky you’re cute.”

“So are you,” she laughs.

“You’re lucky we’re still friends with you,” Sloane tells them dryly. “You two are disgustingly into each other.”

“You’re annoyed because they’re adorable. You don’t like adorable,” Trey tells her, rubbing his hand up and down her back slowly.

Sloane leans into his side, studying the couple across the table from her. “That’s it. They’re like baby pandas with their big doe eyes.”

“You don’t like baby pandas?” Lilly demands, shocked.

“They don’t
do
anything.”

“What would you have them do?” Hollis snickers. “Your taxes?”

“I don’t need them to do anything if they stop laying around on their poofy, fat asses eating bamboo and getting some weird amount of credit for it. Babies do the same thing.”

“You shouldn’t be feeding babies bamboo,” I warn her. “Not until their teeth come in.”

Sloane chuckles. “I shouldn’t be allowed to touch a baby, period. We don’t like each other.”

“You mean they don’t like you,” Trey points out, resting his hand on her shoulder. “They scream when you hold them. They can smell your fear.”

Sloane reaches up to pinch his hand sharply.

He yelps, laughing as he shakes it out. “Damn! Easy on the merchandise. I need that hand.”

“I’ll kiss it better later.”

“Can I get an advance on that kiss right now?”

“Baby,” she purrs, turning her face up toward his. “You can have a kiss anytime you want.”

His dark eyes are hooded, hungry, as he looks lovingly at her face. “I want,” he mumbles.

I feel like a voyeur watching them kiss. There’s something very intimate about it. It’s love and lust wrapped into one perfect package being passed between them, and a sentimental part of my heart aches to feel it. To know that kind of intimacy.

“There’s your next documentary,” Hollis tells me with a tip of his beer. “Babies: Super Predators. They can smell your fear.”

I smile. “I’ll pitch it to the crew.”

“Dimitri probably won’t be on board,” Travis warns.

Colt takes a sip of his drink, his eyes lighting up. “He’s the one with the new baby, right?”

Hollis blinks in amazement. “How the hell do you know that?”

“I know everything,” Colt replies with a cocky grin.

“He asks a lot of questions,” I explain. “Most of his interviews are directed at us, not him. He’s almost as good at deflecting as Kurtis is.”

“Now that’s skill,” Trey tells Colt, coming up for air and offering his knuckles for a bump.

Colt immediately obliges.

“He’s also a huge flirt.”

Colt gives me a dramatic glare. “Dude! Be cool.”

“Oh, like I don’t know that,” Lilly calms him.

“And that doesn’t bother you?” Trey asks. “Because Sloane would kill me.”

“Slowly,” Sloane confirms with a content grin.

Lilly snorts. “He flirts with their sound guy. I’m fine.”

“Is the guy hot?”

“A solid seven.”

“I’d be into that.”

Hollis drops his drink down hard on the table. “Are you still watching gay porn?”

“Of course I am,” Sloane laughs.

“What is wrong with you?”

“What is wrong with
you?
It’s sexy.”

“So is your boyfriend. Quit being greedy.”

“Straight porn is designed for men. The girls are hot or slutty or whatever you need, but the guys are usually old or skeevy because nobody cares about them. You guys are tuning them out so it doesn’t matter. In gay porn both guys are young and hot. It’s better.”

Hollis looks impatiently at Trey. “And
this
doesn’t bother
you
?”

“I don’t care what she fantasizes about as long as it’s me she gets real with,” Trey answers calmly.

“Amen to that,” Colt agrees.

“So it wouldn’t bother you two if they were watching lesbian porn?” Hollis demands of Lilly and Sloane.

“I assume they are,” Lilly replies.

Travis lifts his beer. “Amen to
that
.”

Lilly looks past Travis, over my shoulder, at something behind me. Or someone.

Her cheeks are pink, embarrassed, but still she opens her mouth to ask fearlessly, “What about you, Kurtis? What’s your porn of preference?”

I feel him then. I feel him without looking and I wonder how I missed him until now. I should have known the second he walked into the building. The moment he hit the roof. The instant he put his big body within inches of mine. My heart hammers violently in my chest until I can see stars at the edge of my vision. Everyone else has turned to look at him, but I hold very still. I will myself to be calm.

His hands come to rest on the back of my chair, his fingers brushing against my naked shoulder blades, blowing my ‘calm’ plan out of the water. I’m acutely aware of what I’m
not
wearing, of the exposed skin on most of my body, and I make the very real mistake of imaging his hands moving. Of them exploring. Touching. Taking.

His fingers flex restlessly, caressing my skin as though he can read my thoughts. I wonder if it’s an accident.

Then again, I don’t think Kurtis Matthews does anything by accident.

“I don’t watch porn,” he says simply. His voice rumbles low as the bass from the speakers surrounding us, but it cuts through the noise like a knife.

“Bullshit,” Colt accuses laughingly. “Every guy needs to get off sometimes.”

“If I need to get off I get laid.”

“Simple as that, huh?”

He doesn’t reply. Not with words.

His fingertip glides up between my shoulders and back down again, slowly. Over and over.

I can barely breathe.

Trey watches Kurtis patiently, his observant eyes focused on him for a long moment. I worry he’s aware of what Kurtis is doing, even though I don’t know how he could be. Finally he smiles. “You know, I actually believe him.”

“I don’t,” Colt disagrees.

“Rona would,” Lilly mutters.

Kurtis’ finger stops. He stands up straight, releasing my chair. Releasing me.

“I’m glad you made it, man,” Colt tells him happily. He stands to come around the table. “Let’s get you a drink, yeah?”

“Sounds good.”

Colt chuckles in disbelief. “Seriously?”

“Yeah. I could use a drink tonight.”

“Hell yeah! Let’s do it. Anybody else need anything?”

Everyone at the table turns down his offer.

“Harper, how about you?” Colt singles me out. “Your glass is empty.”

“Sure. I could use something cold.”

“What’s your poison?”

“Surprise me.”

Colt grins. “That’s my specialty.”

I didn’t feel it when he arrived, but I feel it when Kurtis leaves. Like the air behind me has cooled and uncoiled. Like I can breathe again.

“You okay?” Travis asks quietly.

The rest of the table has jumped back into conversation. It sounds like they’re talking about how crazy it is that Kurtis showed up. I guess he’s always invited to hang out with the team, but he rarely accepts.

“I’m fine,” I breathe.

“You look flushed. Are you feeling sick?”

I put my hand on the side of my face. My skin is hot from the sun. From the oppressive heat hovering over this roof. From fingers on my spine, rough skin and the softest touch. “How long have we been up here?”

“Three hours at least. Do you need to go inside? Cool off?”

“I think so, yeah.” I push my chair back, standing swiftly. The entire table turns to look at me. “I’m gonna go to—I need to get some air.”

They stare at me blankly. I suddenly realize what I said.

I chuckle at myself. “I mean, I need to get some cold air. Out of the sun. Probably some water too.”

“Second floor apartment is open and the AC is on,” Lilly tells me. “There’s ice in the freezer. You can chill in one of the bedrooms if you need to lay down.”

“Thanks. I’ll be okay, though. Just overheated, I think.”

“Let us know if you need anything,” she offers sweetly.

I smile to the group before heading downstairs. I pass the second apartment, silent and empty behind a solidly locked door. Colt is very open, but his home is something he keeps off limits. A magazine recently asked to get inside and take pictures, but that was where he drew the line. He’ll stand in front of a camera broadcasting to the world with nothing on but a vanilla swirl cone and a smile, but his house is off limits. He owns the place downstairs, but it’s a rental. He makes money off it, not memories. He said not a single thing in the place is his. I guess that’s why the door is unlocked and partially open when I make it down. He simply doesn’t care.

It’s an open space inside. A loft with a lot of leather furniture and high, exposed ceilings. Very industrial chic. Not exactly masculine but not feminine either. Whoever decorated it knew it was going to be rented. There’s not a personal touch to be seen.

I don’t bother with the kitchen or the ice. I know why I’m flushed. I need a minute to get my head on straight, that’s all. A quick trip to the bathroom, some water on my face, a pep talk in the mirror. Keep my cool. No matter what happens here tonight, I need to be smart. I need to move slowly and everything will be fine.

It’s a good lie, one I almost believe.

I find the bathroom just off the kitchen. The door is closed and a quick jiggle of the handle tells me it’s locked.

“Shit,” I mutter.

“Yeah!” someone shouts from inside. “Exactly.”

I chuckle, backing away. “Sorry.”

“Not as sorry as I am! You’re not gonna want to come in here after me, sweetheart! It’s a warzone.”

“Thanks for the warning.”

“It’s the least I can do. You having a good time?”