Riding Curves (7 page)

I shrugged, embarrassed to say the
number. Without realizing it, I had fallen irrevocably in love with
Aiden while I played the beard for Kevin. None of the guys in my
circle at college had stood a chance against the man sitting next
to me.

"Any, baby?"

When I remained mute, he sighed
heavily and withdrew his hand from my cheek to rub at his forehead
like I had just given him the world's largest migraine
ever.

"So Saturday was your first kiss, your
first finger--" He strangled on the statement before he could reach
the finish. His hand dropped to cover his face.

"Thumb," I corrected, the word
distracted as it left me. "But I kissed a boy or two before
Kevin."

I wasn't about to tell him those two
times had occurred during a dumb game of spin-the-bottle and both
boys had complained about having to touch their lips to bacon. That
would only make Aiden feel worse and widen the distance between us,
a distance I feared was already too wide to breach.

He gave a little nod and I could see
that he only half believed me. "I'm just saying, to be your last,
there should be someone in between."

"Aiden!" His name left me in a grunty
shriek. I could not believe we were back to that point again. "You
seriously want me to fuck someone. You expect me to believe
that?"

I barreled my way out of the vehicle,
reaching in the back seat for an instant to grab my bag before I
slammed the door. I stomped around to his side as he stepped onto
the curb.

"How many am I supposed to fuck?" I
poked him in the chest with each word that left me. "One? Three?
Does it count if they're all on the same night? What if they each
take a hole, or are we talking strictly vaginal to make the
requisite body count?"

Thirty plus pokes in, he lost his
patience and grabbed me by the shoulders. He spun until my body was
wedged between him and the rented sedan. He growled, the sound
feral and sexy at the same time, and then he pressed against me.
His breath blasted warm against the sensitive skin of my throat as
he leaned in.

"Baby, I'm saying you should figure
out whether you want to." He took a light nip of my ear and I could
feel the tension vibrating through his hands as he fought the urge
not to grip me more tightly. "If you do, it will be a long time
before we have another chance, love."

Love…

The bastard undid me with that one
word. I buried my face against his shoulder and started crying. My
hands fisted his shirt and I jerked on the fabric. "Why are we
having this conversation? I want you, I've wanted you for the last
decade--"

"Because I don't want to have it
another decade from now." His fingers knotted in my hair and he
tugged until I was looking up at him through tear-filled eyes.
"When our children are in the next room hearing us fight. Hearing
you say I never gave you a chance to live."

The way my chest constricted, I knew
Aiden was my only chance to live happy, but I couldn't overcome the
fact that, once upon a time, he was the child on the other side of
the wall, that he jerked with a child's terror with each glass or
plate thrown, that he saw one parent walk out of his life forever
and another who paid attention to him only when she had no other
emotional crutch available.

Relaxing my grip and melting into him,
I nodded. I lightly head butted the broad chest blocking my
tear-streaked face from view. "Couldn't we have at least stopped
along the way?"

I head butted him a second time when
he didn't answer.

"Baby," he groaned and cinched me
close. "If we did that, you would have been lucky if I let you
return to finish the semester instead of tossing you over my
shoulder and taking you home so I could fuck you straight through
to New Year's."

That was exactly what I wanted him to
do, but I wasn't the one paying the tuition. "Can I at least have a
proper good-bye kiss?"

He chewed at his bottom lip and I
could see the urge to relent heat his gaze, but in the end, he
deemed another chaste kiss on my cheek to be the only proper
good-bye.

********************

A week later, still waiting for my car
to be repaired and thus waiting for a shuttle so I could return to
campus after an interview across town at the convention center, I
met Harold Hayes.

Technically, I re-met Harold. I
already knew him from a social media class we had in our third year
of undergraduate, in which we had partnered on a project. He had
since graduated and spent a year working at an accounting firm
before returning to Auburn to get a graduate degree in
mathematics.

Yes -- a graduate degree in
mathematics. And people thought I was weird because connection
algorithms excited me. Harold actually knew how to craft those bad
boys.

Running into him as I left
the interview, it was like we had started a conversation earlier
that afternoon and he was just waiting for me to return so we could
finish. Instead of waiting another half hour for the shuttle, I let
him drive me back to my dorm. When he discovered the communications
department was holding a special screening of the
The Social Network
on
Friday so all the graduate students could pretend to have a life
afterwards by tweeting about it for the billionth time, he asked if
he could go with me for old time's sake.

Consenting, I realized I had landed
smack in the middle of one of those things some people referred to
as a date. Fine by me. I had no chance of breaking Harold's heart
by having just one date with him. Hell, I could have had a hundred
dates with him and I was pretty certain he would have shrugged off
my saying good-bye as if it had just been the one.

What I was really interested in was
compliance and working toward some undefined quota of life
experience with the opposite sex that would satisfy the man I
wanted to spend the rest of my life with. I just hoped that Aiden
didn't want me to prove there was also no possibility that I liked
girls. I was pretty sure I was covered on that point because I had
spent plenty of "date nights" with Josephine and a few other girls
in the dorm, and I never wanted them to paint more than my toe
nails.

Not that there was anything wrong with
that. I just knew I liked cock -- one very special cock attached to
a frustrating and frequently obstinate male.

So we agreed on a date, Harold and I.
We went on one, too. The experience mostly reminded me of sitting
in class with him, the way he would lean over and whisper something
very close to my ear. Or those soft finger taps against my arm to
draw my attention, the smile when he caught it and the inevitable
pointing out of someone or something he wanted me to look
at.

No big deal, I thought as he dropped
me off at the dorm. I had date number one under my belt. Maybe
after date number two, I would be able to think of a girl who would
make a better match for Harold -- one who wasn't in love with Aiden
Perry.

That was the single thought running
through my mind when Harold stooped slightly, cupped my cheek and
surprised the hell out of me with a kiss just east of my
mouth.

I stiffened a little, neither afraid
nor offended, only slightly bemused. "What was that?"

He gave a nervous little throat
clearing then smiled at me. "I thought I'd better get one in before
you turn me down when I ask you out again."

I rolled my eyes at him. "I have no
intention of turning you down for a second date."

I was surprised that he wanted one and
that he had kissed me. Astounded, actually. I wanted to touch his
forehead and make sure he wasn't running a fever. Especially since
he looked a little clammy.

"So, tomorrow around seven? We could
do pizza and trivia at Johnny G's?" A more confident smile framing
his lips, he waited until I nodded my acquiescence and then he did
it again. Kissed me, that is -- dead center of my mouth and both of
his hands cupping the sides of my rounded face. "Great, I'll pick
you up at the front desk."

A little numb, I smiled without
comment and retreated into the dorm building. Trying to assess
whether the experience outside with Harold was pleasant, I missed
the staircase. Doubling back, I shook my head. Harold was a nice
guy, of course. Academically ambitious, nonthreatening, and in
possession of just the right mix of personality that prevented my
lips from tingling at the contact with his but didn't make me want
to scour my face with Lysol, either.

Bursting into the room I shared with
Josephine, I plopped down on my bed and told her everything --
Harold, the kiss and, most of all, what had happened with
Aiden.

********************

Saturday evening, at a quarter to
seven, I was sitting quietly in my room for the final minutes
before I went down to greet Harold. Mostly, I was brainstorming
ways to deflect more kisses, then debating with myself on whether I
should deflect them. How could I know I didn't really want Harold
kissing me unless I let him kiss me more thoroughly?

Only, I knew I didn't want more. What
I was uncertain of was the reason. Maybe I just didn't want Harold
kissing me, even if there was no Aiden. I flung myself back, tossed
my arms above my head and rooted around on my bookshelf for Hildy.
Hildy might have looked like a stuffed hippo but her secret
identity was a Magic 8 Ball.

Sort of. Only whenever I looked into
her plastic eyes with their huge pupils and pink irises, I always
received the same answer.

I dunno. Figure it
out.

Sighing, I crushed her to my chest
just as my cell phone rang. Figuring Harold was early, I abandoned
Hildy on my pillow, grabbed my cell phone and started to leave as I
answered with what I hoped was a second-date voice.

"Hey, Harold, I'll be down in just a
minute."

Silence greeted me from the other end.
I tilted my phone a few inches from my face and realized my
mistake.

"Aiden!" His name bounced up from my
chest before I realized I sounded like some nine-year-old who just
got a pony for her birthday. Tempering my voice, I followed with
the even pithier, "What's up?"

I heard a short click, but the sound
was fleshy -- like something had snagged at the back of his throat
before he answered.

"I'm bringing your car tomorrow,
Cecelia."

I grimaced at the use of my
first name. Whether it was mere distance or a reprimand, it wasn't
what I wanted. I wanted
baby
or
love.
Yeah, I wanted to hear that last one most of all.
But I had no idea how to tell him that, so I responded with a
hesitant, "Okay, what time?"

"Two," he answered. "I'll pick you up
at the dorm."

The detectible edge in his tone
worried me. I wondered if it was because I initially thought he was
Harold and so he knew I was meeting a male that evening. I hoped
that was the reason because I had an answer for that lined up at
the edge of my tongue. I was only doing what he wanted -- he merely
had to want me to do something else and I would have. But a louder,
bigger part of me worried Aiden's distant tone would have been
there regardless of my date with Harold.

Floundering for something to say, I
blurted out a question. "Will you need me to take you to a rental
agency after?"

"No." There was a long pause following
that simple response and I felt like I had lost him yet again. But
I didn't hang up or say anything and he continued eventually. "The
agency is dropping a car off at my motel room."

Motel room…

My nipples instantly puckered at the
potential import of his words. If he arrived by two, Aiden would
have plenty of time to return home without staying the night. So
why was he getting a motel?

Why
was exactly what I wanted to ask, but I took a more indirect
approach, afraid to get my hopes up. It was enough that he was
coming tomorrow and I had a chance to make his stay with me more
than a quick drop-off.

"You rented a room," I prompted and a
rush of pride swept through me at the fact that I managed not blurt
or audibly tremble.

"Yes."

Another simple, complex-as-hell single
syllable answer. The man wanted to drive me insane. I wrinkled my
nose at the phone, the gesture invisible and lost. Too
inexperienced in that dance, I traded him two syllables for
one.

"Okay." I realized that was not quite
enough because I sounded like a dolt as it left my mouth.
Swallowing, I fought a stammer. "I'll see you at two,
then."

"It's a date." He paused and I was
almost ready to hang up when he sent me over the moon with a
possessive growl. "Oh, and, baby, don't have too much fun
tonight."

I let the words and the growl soak
into me, warming me from top to bottom -- but mostly in the center,
where the sensual undercurrent of his timbre had made me
wet.

"I won't," I promised and hung
up.

********************

Story of my life -- Sunday wasn't
anything like I imagined it would be all through my painful date
with Harold and a sleepless Saturday night. At one sharp, my phone
rang. Hoping Aiden had made good time, I grabbed it and discovered
my dad on the other end of the line.