and dumped my stuff on the bed, then collapsed onto it.
She was talking again. Something about drinks. Tonight.
Why couldn’t I hear her?
My pulse was slamming through my body and all I could feel was Cary’s tongue on my clit. His finger working inside me, pressing into me, setting off fireworks. I was all wet. My panties were soaked.
I needed a shower.
And yes, a drink.
But I told her, “Uh, I can’t tonight. I didn’t sleep well last night. I need some sleep, I think.”
“Oh. Sure. Is everything okay?”
“Yeah.” I rolled onto my back, staring at the ceiling. “Just sleeping in a new place, you know. Hard to fall asleep.”
“Are you comfortable there? How is Cary? Is everything going well? I was hoping to grill you over drinks tonight.”
“Yeah, everything’s good.”
“That’s good.” She sounded unconvinced. Concerned. “You’re liking the job?”
“Yeah. Definitely liking the job…”
I wasn’t exactly ready to tell her what just happened. I couldn’t yet fathom it myself. And my intimate parts were still humming from Cary’s touch.
I needed to get off the phone. I wasn’t sure why I’d answered it in the first place. “I’m gonna eat dinner here. Let’s do drinks on the weekend or something.”
“For sure. I’ll call you.”
“Great. Let’s talk later.”
I hung up, barely remembering what I’d said to her. My head was reeling. I felt dizzy.
And fucking wonderful.
And mildly terrified.
Because that was so fucking hot, I could get very, very addicted to it.
I wondered how I was ever supposed to look my boss in the eye again without jumping on him. Was I now allowed to jump on him? What were the rules here?
And how the hell were we getting any work done in that studio now that we’d crossed the mouth-to-pussy line?
And why did I run out on him like that?
I left him on the floor on his knees. And something told me Cary Clarke didn’t often get on his knees for people.
I grabbed my hoodie and lifted it to my face, smelling it. It smelled like Cary.
I draped it across my face, breathing him in, as I lay there with my head spinning.
Chapter Eleven
Cary
Capsized
That night, I found Taylor watching TV in my living room again.
I stood watching her for a minute from the shadows.
The lights were off. The volume was low. Onscreen was the menu, where she appeared to be flipping through shows. Her hair was up in a messy, sexy knot with some pink strands around her face. She looked like she’d washed off her makeup. She wore her giant Metallica hoodie, her bare legs tucked up on the couch next to her. And cozy socks.
She looked like a dream come to life. A dream I once thought would never come true again.
Let go of your ghosts.
I practically heard Gabe’s voice in my head. I could still hear his voice, sometimes, and the things he used to say to me whenever I was afraid to move forward. When panic reared its head. When my fears paralyzed me. He said all that shit was my ghosts, and I just needed to set them free.
Ghosts don’t haunt us, man. We hold onto them. We drag them around like shadows.
You’ve got to let that shit go.
I’d learned, over the years, how right he was.
Right there, between Taylor and me, I could feel the old ghosts stirring in the dark. The shadow of my best friend. The shadows of the people who’d abandoned me while I was grieving his death.
I was terrified of getting close to anyone again.
I was terrified of this girl. Because I wanted to get close to her.
“Bill Burr again?”
She looked up and found me in the doorway, watching her. “I was just flipping around. I haven’t picked anything yet.”
“How long have you been doing that?”
The corner of her mouth twitched because she knew she’d been busted. She wasn’t watching TV at all. She was either pretending to in hopes I’d come around, or she was trying to but was too distracted.
“A while,” she admitted.
“Something on your mind?”
“You could say that.
“Me, too.”
I went over and sat down next to her on the couch. On the edge of it. I took the remote and turned off the TV, and we sat like that, in silence, in the near-dark. Me, leaning on my knees and not facing her, looking at the coffee table, afraid to relax and find out I wasn’t welcome. In my own living room. Her, curled up in a ball at the end of the couch.