Olivia (51 page)

“
Never!” I squeal, grabbing the
marshmallows and running the rest of the way back to the campfire.
He has some audacity... but that’s one of the things I’ve always
liked about him. We’re both laughing when we meet back up with the
families.

We sit next to one another on the flight back home,
playing games on my computer. It feels normal again, and I’m
relieved.

As soon as we land, I unbuckle my seatbelt, ready to
hop out of the seat as soon as the flight attendant gives us the
go-ahead. My purse is already poised on my shoulder.

“
Dad, can you take my laptop bag?”
I ask him, handing it to him across the aisle before he can
answer.

“
Slow down, Contessa,” he says,
slightly annoyed with me. “You’ll save, what, a minute?”

The best part about first class seats is being the
first off of the plane.

“
I can’t wait to see him,” I
explain. Jon’s flight had arrived an hour before mine, but he had
planned to wait at the airport for my plane to land. My parents
were fine with me spending the afternoon with him. They gave me an
early curfew so I would have time to unpack and get ready for
school in the morning, but I don’t care.

“
You’re in a public place,” Mom
reminds me, her look intending to make me feel silly, but I don’t.
She smiles, watching me bounce on the balls of my feet, waiting for
the doors to open.
I don’t care.
I wave
goodbye to my parents, cousins, aunts, uncles–and Finn–and
half-skip, half-run through the terminal to baggage claim where Jon
is meeting me.

The airport is swarming with other spring break
revelers, so I apologize politely as I push through the crowd. I
pull my sunglasses on and position my hair over my face a little in
an effort to hide my identity. I see Jon before I pass through the
security gate. He sees me as I exit it, before I have to shout out
his name, which I was just about to do.

He stands in place, but drops his bags, holding his
arms out for me. We kiss quickly, but our smiles make it awkward.
He pushes my hair back and takes off my sunglasses to see into my
eyes. He looks down at me, and while my heart rate should be
returning to normal, and my breathing should be slowing, neither
are happening.

He glances down at my shirt. It’s the shirt he gave
me before he left. “That shirt can come off now,” he says. “I’m
home, baby.”

“
What, here?” I ask him, releasing
him to grab the bottom hem of the shirt flirtatiously. He wraps his
fingers between mine and kisses me again.

“
There are your parents,” he says,
nodding behind me. He lets go of one of my hands to wave at
them.

“
We don’t need to wait for them,” I
say. “We’re getting a cab, remember?”

“
And Finn is coming this way,” he
mutters quietly, ignoring me. I look over my shoulder at him
approaching us. His smile is cocky. It normally is, but it’s meant
to sting this time, I know. He doesn’t know I told Jon about our
kiss.

“
Jon,” he says, reaching his hand
out.

“
Finn,” Jon says, extending his arm
as if he’s going to shake his hand. At the last minute, though, he
balls his hand into a fist and punches Finn in the gut. It’s not
hard, just enough to catch him off guard and make a
point.

Finn covers his stomach with his arms, looking first
at Jon, and then at me. We both smile at him, and all of a sudden,
Jon’s got one hand on my lower back as his other hand cradles my
head, his thumb rubbing my temple. Drawn to one another, ignoring
everyone around us, we kiss again.

“
Public place,” I hear my mom
whisper in my ear as I feel a hand on my arm. Both Jon and I pull
away, blushing. I have no idea how long we were kissing, but it
wasn’t long enough. I look around, remembering my surroundings and
see Finn, who’s just staring at us with surprise.

Jon raises his hand to Finn’s cheek, and pats it
lightly. “That’s how it’s done, kiddo,” he says. Finn rolls his
eyes and turns around, heading toward the rest of his family. “Can
we please go?” Jon says softly, his bottom lip dragging along my
earlobe as he talks. I nod my head as I turn to my mom, barely
lifting my hand to wave goodbye to her.

“
Eight o’clock,” my dad’s voice
rises above the crowd. “And hello, Jon,” he adds. We both stop, and
Jon turns around to greet my father. It’s obvious his mind isn’t on
proprieties right now.

“
Jack,” he says, acting surprised
to see him. “I’ll make sure she’s home by eight.”

“
Thank you.” They shake hands as I
tug on Jon’s arm, pulling him away. I just want him all to myself.
I put my sunglasses back on, not wanting to be recognized by the
cabby because I intend to kiss Jon the whole way to his dorm. Jon
grabs his bags, handing me the smaller one so he can put his arm
across my shoulder to guide me out the doors.

“
Do you want the good news or the
bad news?” Jon asks as we settle into the backseat. I sit so close
to him that he helps me arrange one of my legs in his his lap. He
rubs my inner thigh slowly.

“
Bad,” I say, pulling his face to
mine for another kiss.

“
Denver’s having a snowstorm,” he
says, pulling away only long enough and far enough to deliver his
news.

“
So?” I ask in a breath.

“
So Fred can’t get a flight back
until tomorrow morning.” He stops kissing me so I can process what
he said.

“
That sounds like
good
news,” I say.

“
It’s
very
good news,” he confirms, raising his eyebrows.

“
I feel like it’s been
years.”

“
Hasn’t it?” he asks. “Hours, days,
years. It’s all too long. In fact, these minutes...” he says,
checking his watch. “How much longer?” he asks against my neck
before his lips find the hollow beneath my ear and his hand slips
up my skirt. My breath hitches in my throat, and I wait a few
seconds before moving it back down to my knee.

As soon as we get to his dorm room, he drops his
bags and stands behind me as I walk over to his bed. “Shirt,” he
says. With my back to him, I pull the t-shirt over my head and
throw it over my shoulder. I begin to glance back to see if I hit
him, but he’s too quick, and his cold hands on my stomach startle
me before I can even look for him. He kisses my bare shoulders as
he unfastens my bra and slides the straps down my arms.

“
I love you,” he whispers in my
ear. I turn around to face him, our lips meeting immediately before
I can return the affirmation. He starts to unbutton and unzip his
pants while my hands slide up his chest. He slips out of his shirt
first as I push his jeans down. He steps out of them, and I check
out his muscular back in the mirror.

“
Turn around,” I tell him. He does,
bending slightly as I kiss his tattoo. I peek up at him in the
mirror. He’s watching us, his eyes heavy and lustful. I move in
front of him, facing the mirror. His hands slide to my waist,
unzipping my skirt. His eyes dance back and forth from the real
thing standing inches from him and my reflection a few feet ahead.
I feel him push up against me, and I close my eyes, tilting my head
back and offering my neck to him.

Brushing my hair away with his nose, his tongue
tastes the skin across one of my shoulders and the nape of my neck.
Impatient, I finish undressing and turn around to face him. He
strokes my long hair, his eyes intently focused on the mirror
now.

“
Oh, god,” he says, letting go of
my hair, moving his hands down my body and grabbing me hard,
pulling me into him. One hand slides down my leg, raising it until
his fingers reach behind my knee. He pulls my leg around his back,
leaning me against the dresser. He teases me, pressing against me
in his underwear. It excites me and frustrates me at the same time,
and I find myself clawing at the elastic of his boxers, trying to
push them down.

“
Did you miss me?” he asks with a
laugh.

“
Yes,” I half-whine. “I want this,
so badly.”

“
I can tell.”

“
Please?” I plead with him. He
pulls away from the dresser and finishes undressing. I take two
steps forward, filling the space between us. We kiss hungrily, but
he breaks away periodically. I realize he’s still watching us in
the mirror. It seems to fuel his passion more, because every time
he returns to me, his kisses are harder and deeper, his fingers dig
further into my skin. “Can we lie down?” I ask him the next time he
gives me a chance to breathe. “This is driving me crazy.” I try to
pull him over to the bed, but he doesn’t budge, and instead pulls
me back to him.

His eyes are alive with need and want. He can’t seem
to decide whether he wants to catch his breath, or lose it again by
kissing me madly. He seems torn, and it all just feels like he’s
teasing me.

“
Please?” I beg again.

He shakes his head a little, not taking his eyes off
of me. “I want you, Liv. I want to... I don’t know, I want to
possess
you.”

“
Like, put me under a spell, or,
like own me? Because I think you’re already well on your way to the
first one.”

“
Own you,” he sighs. He swallows,
and I look at him, anxious and curious. I dig my fingers into his
back harder, steadying myself under his intensity. His skin is
sticky with a light sheen of sweat.

“
What do you mean?” I ask, moving
closer, tasting the saline on his chest with my tongue.
“
Own
me?”

“
Does that turn you on?” he asks,
putting his hands on my ears and tilting my head upward to look at
him.

“
A little,” I admit. He groans as
his mouth attacks mine. Obviously my admission does something to
him, too.

His lips move away from mine down my jawline, down
my neck to just over my left breast. Over my heart. “Jealousy does
strange things to a man,” he says, his voice sounding distant and
his attention focused on my body.

“
What do you mean?” He moves his
hands to my ribcage, feeling the rise and fall of the air entering
and exiting my lungs.

“
I’m not thinking very clearly
right now, Olivia. But even when I was... even in those moments in
the past week when I was, I wasn’t,” he says, breathless, kneeling
in front of me, kissing my stomach and curling both arms around
me.

“
You’re not making much sense now,”
I tell him.

“
I know,” he says, trying to take a
breath. He looks up at me, his head tipped a little so I have to
look through his lashes to see his eyes. “Olivia, I want to do
something with you that I’ve never done with anyone
else.”

“
Okay,” I say before I can really
think about what he wants. I’m not sure what he’s implying. “Will
it hurt?”

He shakes his head first, then answers confidently.
“No.”

“
You’re sure?”

“
Positive.”

“
Will it feel good?” I
ask.

“
I hope so,” he says with a smile.
“No, I know so,” he laughs out lightly. He stands up and puts his
fingers on the nape of my neck, pressing in on pulse points that
relax me. My head falls back a little, my mouth open, waiting for
him. His tongue runs over my upper lip before finding
mine.

I still don’t know what he wants to do, but I don’t
really care at this point. I want... I want
everything
.

He tucks his head onto my shoulder breathing
heavily, taking a break. I don’t want that, and move my hand down
his body to provoke the reaction I
do
want. He looks up at me and grins. “Just a second,” he says,
bringing that hand up to his mouth and kissing the back of it.
“Okay?”

“
Okay.”

His eyes dance back and forth from mine as words
dangle precariously from his lips. “Have you missed any pills?” he
asks quietly.

I shake my head, looking confused. “No.”

“
You take them like you’re supposed
to?”

“
Faithfully, every night before
bed,” I vow to him.
I do.

“
Do you have them with
you?”

“
In my purse,” I tell him. He lets
go of me and steps around me to pick my bag up off his bed. He
hands it to me. “Why?”

I find the package in my purse, waiting for his
answer. He takes it from me slowly, once again meeting my eyes
before he very briefly shifts his focus to the pills. He snaps the
lid shut and sets them down on his nightstand, smiling at me.

“
Why?” I ask again. He looks at my
forehead and moves his thumbs to my eyebrows, rubbing them, as if
trying to make the confusion go away. He kisses me in between them.
“Do you not have any protection?”

He bends slightly, reaching into the drawer next to
him and producing a small box of condoms. He pulls one out, opens
my palm and sets it there lightly. “I don’t want to wear it,” he
admits. We both stop breathing, and I swear I can hear his heart
over mine.

“
And you’ve never done that with
anyone,” I state, putting two and two together. I stare at the
condom instead of him, my body still throbbing with
anticipation.

“
No,” he whispers, closing his hand
around mine with the condom keeping our palms from actually
touching.