Riley's Pond (New Adult Romance) (17 page)

When Barney called to tell me I could have the job I’d begged for before summer started, I almost turned him down. The timing sucked. But, he promised to work around my soccer schedule and give me every other Saturday off. Luckily, the place closed Sundays. I just had to suffer the humiliation of
serving
my friends on Friday nights, instead of hanging out.

Damn. I needed the money, especially with my goal to accomplish a miracle and graduate early. I’d have to help with expenses if I wanted to go to a decent college. Maybe someplace close to Harvard? Close to Taylor, whose company I needed on a daily basis in order to breathe. Whose lips and tongue playing inside my mouth I would miss tonight because I had to
work.
My first Friday night without Taylor. I hated the job already.

Only a couple of weeks remained before school started and I wanted to spend every second with her. Spending my nights and weekends spraying the insides of stinky bowling rental shoes or busing tables didn’t fit into my current plan. However, my bank account had nearly dried up with no sign of being replenished any time soon.

I wanted to get Taylor something awesome to remember me by when she went back to Boston. My mom’s business partner and best friend from high school, Pam, who lived in New York and did most of the buying for Mom’s boutique, told me about these cool sterling silver charm bracelets the girls were into. The damn thing took my last hundred dollars and I hadn’t even bought the heart charm to go on it. That was another hundred dollars because it had a real diamond in the center.

Pam kept the bracelet for me so Mom wouldn’t find out and lecture me about expensive gifts, diamonds for girls, or whatever other guilt tactics she could use to keep me from giving Taylor the bracelet. Too bad. Taylor held my heart and I wanted her symbolically to take it with her. Besides, Michael would see it.

Michael.
I fought to beat down the jealousy that flew to the surface every time I thought about him asking Taylor to marry him. And more frightening, her actually thinking about saying
yes
to the “King of Virtue.” I wondered if he had a small penis and that’s why he acted like some pompous idiot. Taylor confessed that day in her grandma’s driveway that she’d never touched a guy, so she wouldn’t know until it was too late.

If he demanded Taylor be a virgin
,
no one probably handled his precious
jewels
either. Or did they? Did Michael
,
who I’d chosen to call “needle-dick” if for no other reason than to boost my own self-confidence, believe himself above the rules of chastity? Maybe he spent his time sampling the “buffet table” before settling down with the “main course.” The thought made my stomach roll, and not because Taylor existed as the main dish, but because she deserved someone who thought she was everything from hors d’oeuvres through dessert.

My cell phone chimed, swirling my thoughts to present, but not far from where they’d traveled. Taylor. I pushed my murderous thoughts aside. Taylor loved me, not Michael and I had to start believing that.

“Hey baby? Missing me?”

“You only left here thirty minutes ago,” she laughed, the sound of her voice musical. “But, yeah, actually I am. What time’s your dinner break? I have this unbelievable craving for French fries. Maybe I’ll even stick around until you get off...
work
that is.”

“Vicious and beautiful. I have to work until midnight, so you
getting me off
tonight isn’t happening unless you sneak out.”

“Not an impossible task. You could text me when you’re leaving and I’ll meet you.”

“After what happened the other night? You and I may be put in cages.”

Last Friday night when I took Taylor home at promptly 11:59, I’d barely climbed into bed with all my steamy thoughts and the taste of her lips still on mine, when I received
the
text.

Can you sneak out? I’m thinking there’s a full moon, a sky full of stars qualifying as heavenly candles, and well, maybe tonight…

I certainly didn’t need a second invite. My jeans were on, a fresh splash of cologne and my teeth brushed in record time. I tiptoed down the stairs, avoiding all the floor boards Jax showed me squeaked, sneaking out the back patio door to avoid Lucky, sequestered in the laundry room.

By the time I drove the mile stretch between our houses with my headlights off, I’d developed perfect night vision. Parking my truck around the bend in the street in case her grandmother looked out the front window, I walked back and kept close to the hedge edging the property, out of view of the outside lights. Once around back and verifying no lights burned on the main floor, but Taylor’s bedroom still glowing, I sent her the text.

I’m here.

She looked out her bedroom window and I waved my open cell phone so she’d see the light. Maybe a minute passed before she crept out the back sliding door and tiptoed across the wooden deck until her bare feet hit the grass. She took off on a run and jumped into my open arms, wrapping her legs around my waist, and proceeded to devour my face off.

We tumbled to the ground, behind the two pine trees framing the back corner of the yard. My hands made a once over her chest to verify nothing other than the knit camisole came between my fingers and her boobs. Meanwhile, her hand made sure
Riley Jr.
was awake and responding to her gentle squeeze.

Dear God, let it be tonight before my balls explode
.

My T-shirt disappeared fast, or maybe ripped apart by Taylor’s fingers, clawing at the fabric. Her mouth bathed my chest with wet kisses and she purposely lingered a few seconds over a couple of spots, sending my eyeballs rolling in their sockets.

I kissed her hot lips with a savage demand, relishing the feel of our tongues darting in and out of each other’s mouths, twisting, sliding from tonsils to teeth. My skin prickled with so many nerves splayed open and raw. I pushed her camisole over her head. Her hair spread across the grass in a sexy halo around her head. Her skin smelled fruity, tasted both salty and sugary, and felt like expensive silk in my hands.
Delicate…
wonderful.

Taylor’s fingers raked through my hair as I ravished her mouth, kissed the pulsing spots on her neck, nibbled earlobes, licked the salt from her skin every inch I tasted and touched with hands and lips, sometimes soft—teasing, other moments losing control and selfishly taking.

I pulled back, needing to fill my lungs with air, stop my heart from exploding, but the sight of her body shimmering in a damp sheen under the moon light from where my mouth sampled, drove me near insanity. She was beautiful and about to be mine completely
.

Trying to be suave while out-of-my-mind horny, I clumsily tugged down the cotton pajama bottoms covered in tiny green frogs, and swallowed my tongue when she lay there wearing only pink lacy panties. It took everything I had to slow down at that point and not rush the moment—the moment I’d prepared my entire teenage hormone crazed life for. A single fragment of time that would change both our lives.

Taylor popped the snap open on my jeans and tugged my zipper down. When her hand slipped over
Riley Jr.
through the knit fabric of my boxers, there was no more slowing down. I could feel my heartbeat pound in every cell of my body. I tore the corner off my
lozenge
with my teeth when she pushed my boxers off, so I’d be ready—
responsible.
Her hands locked behind my neck and she pulled me back to her.

I slid my hand over her panties, the rough edges of my fingertips snagging the fabric. She moaned in my mouth and arched to fit my touch.

Shit.

Shaking, I peeled the last layer away. Her body shuddered beneath me when I eased on top of her and I stilled, committing the moment to memory—the feel of her warm satiny skin running the length of mine, her eyes dark and mesmerizing, lips full, damp and open, with breath smelling of minty toothpaste and panting hot against my cheek.

Time stood still, locked until we turned the key. I trembled with anticipation—
fear.

“Are you sure?” I whispered over her ear, barely able to speak the words.

Taylor drew a short breath, “Yes, I’m sure. I want this. You.”

Her lips pressed mine, the kiss tearing down all the cautionary walls, erasing the boundaries, and giving permission. Her leg wrapped my hip and I fumbled through the blades of grass and clenched the foil packet.

“God, I love you, Taylor, “ I declared, taking her mouth, her body rising to meet me.

My mind swirled deliriously as we explored each other with tentative fingers, bruising our lips in hungry, demanding kisses and at times breathing so hard I felt dizzy and then…not breathing at all.

A sudden flood of light washed through the pine needles, reeling both of us back into bodies that felt alien. Taylor quickly pulled up her pants and I flipped on my back, tugged my jeans on and carefully zipped over a very painful throbbing. Damn! My fourteenth birthday all over again. At least Taylor didn’t know.

She walked into the light to face the enraged woman stomping across the back deck, deflecting attention from me. I could barely stand, let alone run, but I had no choice. I grabbed my sneakers, shoved my boxers in my back pocket, and balled my T-shirt in my fists, then slipped behind the hedge.

Several burrs punctured through my socks and pricked the bottom of my feet by the time I’d walked the property line back to my truck. I waited in the black silence, watching out the back window for a “shotgun wielding” Lydia Daniels. Suddenly, my body convulsed from the adrenalin rush, and I threw up in my T-shirt.

After twenty minutes passed, I saw the upstairs bedroom lights shut off. Whatever happened was over. I took the back road and circled back home on the highway, a six mile diversion, but with headlights. When I pulled back into the driveway I debated whether to text Taylor, but decided against it, in case her grandmother took her cell phone. Lydia Daniels was too old to spend life behind bars for a double murder.

**

Taylor’s voice in my ear evaporated the sultry memory, pulling me back into the conversation, but not without consequence. I adjusted in the driver’s seat to find a more comfortable position without much luck. I’d just have to wait it out and hope I could drive with crossed eyes.

“Grammy still doesn’t know you were with me. She thinks I went out to stargaze because I couldn’t sleep, which isn’t a total lie.”

“She had to know, Taylor. I must have trampled a dozen tomato plants making my getaway. Plus, she gave me the stink eye in church. Did you ever check out there to make sure we didn’t leave anything behind?”

“Why? You missing a body part? I know I yanked pretty hard when I jumped.”

Taylor laughed, but I didn’t. That
yank
deflated my macho image of holding off until
I
decided to let go. Taylor controlled
everything
in my life.

“Very funny.
Riley Jr.
is not detachable.”

“Too bad.”

I paused a beat in shock.

“Where has my shy, but insanely sexy girlfriend gone?”

“Girlfriend? Really?”

I started my truck and backed out of the driveway, hoping no one patrolled this part of town right now. Driving the speed limit
and
getting to work on time wouldn’t happen.

“Yeah.
Girlfriend
…at the very least. I get a thirty minute break at 6:30. Wear something low cut so I can chuck fries into your bra for a late night snack. Love ya, babe.”

Eighteen

DECIDING FACTORS

Taylor

I yawned wide.

“Well, about time you woke up ‘Sleeping Beauty’
.
Spend the night texting that Martin kid instead of sleeping? I thought once he started working, you’d settle down.”

“What do you mean by that? I’m
settled
fine, thank you.”

“Like hell you are, cupcake. Want waffles?”

Grammy started pouring batter into the waffle iron so it would be useless arguing.

“Sure.”

I’d meet Riley for lunch later. It sucked he had to work on a Saturday, but at least with the day shift, we could do something later tonight. Our half hour dinner date last night and a steamy kiss goodbye left my body restless all night.

“At least you haven’t snuck out to meet him anymore.”

My inner alarm pinged. “What are you talking about?”

“The other night? When you came out from behind the pine trees with some story about watching the moon? I got suspicious when I noticed your top on backwards, but when I didn’t see Mr. Martin’s truck I dismissed my paranoia to you getting dressed in the dark and not paying attention. Until the next morning when I found this.”

Grams reached into her robe pocket—the only robe she owned—the robe she wore when she dang near caught Riley and me in our compromising position. She slapped a ripped red
lozenge
package on the table next to my plate. A vague memory of Riley fumbling with the package with one hand while torturing me to the brink of insanity with the other, slipped into my head, flushing my cheeks hot.

“Doesn’t look like he got a chance to try it on for ‘size’
.
Please tell me that’s because I stopped you and not because things got out of control too fast.”

I felt her burning gaze, but I didn’t turn around. I just stared at the crumpled package on my napkin.

“Nothing happened,” I confessed in a small voice.

We ate breakfast in silence. When she took my plate to the sink to rinse off, I slipped the embarrassing proof in my pocket and walked up to my room. I’d almost hit the last stair when the phone rang.

I wanted to race back down the stairs to grab it in case it was Riley, to spare him the humiliation of another one of Grammy’s self-righteous lectures. She answered cheerfully, so I trudged up to my room, partially upset it wasn’t Riley, but relieved at the same time. However, that momentary rush of relief ended with her next statement.