Naked

“I know how you like it,” Evan said, softer this time, without the attitude.

“Who doesn’t?” Alex laughed, low and slow and a little drowsy.

If it makes me a pervert to get excited watching two people fucking, then sign me up and send me the T-shirt.

More soft, wet sounds. I was sort of soft and wet myself at that point, and the only thing stopping me from reaching between my legs was that I was frozen in place with fascination—and of course, knowing I wasn’t watching some surreptitious gay porn, but real live men getting off.

I squeezed my thighs. Wow. That felt good. I did it again, putting pressure on my clit that wasn’t as good as a fingertip or a tongue would have been, but the slow and steady clench of muscle nevertheless started the buildup of pressure inside me I recognized.

I blinked, my eyes adjusting further to the darkness. I could see the flash of Alex’s eyes as he looked down at Evan, then the gleam of Evan’s smile as he pulled away from Alex’s cock. Alex put his hand on Evan’s head again. Evan got back to the business of cock sucking.

Alex moaned.

Evan made a muffled noise that didn’t sound nearly as nice. I heard more shuffling. The floorboards creaked. Another dull thump on the wall made me open my eyes, and I watched Alex’s silhouette arch.

He was coming. I had to close my eyes, turn my face. I couldn’t watch this, no matter how sexy it was, no matter how kinky and perverted I was. I wasn’t cold anymore, that was for sure.

“No,” Alex said, and I opened my eyes.

Evan had stood. There was distance between them, a space of light in the darkness of their two shadows. I watched Evan’s move forward again, a little, and Alex stepped to the side.

“No?” Evan repeated, voice querulous. “You’ll let me suck your dick, but you won’t kiss me?”

Zip. Sigh. Alex’s shape moved in what looked like a shrug.

“You’re a fucking asshole, you know that?”

“I know it,” Alex said. “But so did you before you brought me out here.”

Evan, incredibly, stamped his foot. Even Patrick at his queeniest never stamped his foot. “I hate you!”

“No, you don’t.”

“I do!” Evan opened the door and I shut my eyes tight against the sudden spilling of light. “You can just forget about coming home!”

“Your place isn’t home. Why do you think I took all my stuff?”

Ouch. That stung even me. If I were Evan I’d have hated Alex, too, just for the smug tone.

“I fucking hate you. I never should’ve given you a second chance!”

“I told you not to,” Alex said.

Evan swept out. Alex stayed behind for another minute or two, his breathing heavy. I kept as still as I could with my heart pounding so fast it made stars behind my eyelids. I was sure he’d hear me, but he didn’t.

Alex went inside.

I discovered I didn’t need coffee to keep me awake.

Chapter Two

Patrick pounced on me in the kitchen, his expression fierce. “Where were you?”

I gestured at the back porch. “I went looking for your coffeepot.”

He crossed his arms over his chest. “It’s right there on the counter.”

The party was still going strong, but I’d had enough. Too much drama for one evening. If I hadn’t had a few too many glasses of wine, screw the drive, I’d have gone home to sleep in my own bed. As it was, I was coming down from the adrenaline high and could barely manage not to slur my words.

“You know I can’t use that one. Too complicated.”

He eyed me. “Are you drunk?”

“No. Just tired.” I hugged him, surprising him for a second, I think, given the way he jumped. Only for a second, then his arms went around me. Held me tight until I pushed him away. “I’m going to bed.”

“Already?”

“I’m wiped out!” I knuckled his side and Patrick tried not to laugh, but gave in. “What is your problem, anyway? Why’d you come in here like the back end of your broom was on fire?”

My joke annoyed him. “Very funny. I was looking for you, that’s all. You disappeared.”

“Uh-huh.” I yawned behind my hand. “Well, here I am. No big deal, Patrick, sheesh.”

He grabbed my hand and squeezed it. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay, Liv. Is that so wrong? Making sure my best girl’s all right?”

“You haven’t called me that in a long time.” My fingers, trapped in his, twisted. He let me go.

“I mean it, and you know it.”

If you’ve ever loved someone for too long to stop, you know how I felt just then. Standing in the kitchen Patrick shared with someone else, bleary from exhaustion and red wine, I refused to give in to melancholy. I kissed his cheek instead and patted his ass the way I always did.

“I’m going to bed.”

I went up the back stairs. Narrow and steep, with a sharp bend halfway up, they were difficult to navigate even clearheaded. The sound of the music faded but the bass thumpa-thumpa continued as I climbed the stairs and went through what Patrick and Teddy called “the back room,” which had one door leading in and another leading out, and down the long, narrow hall. Like the stairway, the hall had a jog in it, sharp to the left. I loved old houses for their nooks and crannies, and this was no exception. It had been cut into apartments when Patrick and Teddy moved in, but they’d been renovating back into a single dwelling. I touched the wallpaper in the hall, revealed when they’d stripped off a layer of tacky 1970s paneling. In the dark I couldn’t see the tiny sprigs of lavender flowers against the pale yellow background, but I knew they were there.

Once I’d taken a photo of the view down this hall. The light from the window at the end had sketched shadows beneath the light fixtures, which weren’t fancy enough to be considered antique, just old. I’d captured a misty, fuzzy figure in the corner, something like the shape of a woman in a long dress, her hair piled high on her head. Trick of the light, perhaps, or optical illusion. It was just out of focus enough for me to never be sure. But nights like this, when I thought I might stumble from weariness or too much cheer, I imagined I felt her comforting hand helping me along.

I went from doorway to bed in a few steps, shedding my clothes and diving onto the soft mattress with its mound of covers and pillows. I tossed them on the floor without ceremony, knowing Patrick would squawk, but too tired to pile them neatly on the trunk beneath the window. I reached to the nightstand and ruff led around inside, past the box of tissues, the lip balm, and found the small square box of earplugs I kept in there the way I kept a spare box of “girl” things under the bathroom sink.

In half a minute I had blessed silence, though an occasional surge of bass from downstairs still vibrated my stomach a little. I pulled on an oversize T-shirt from the bottom nightstand drawer and snuggled beneath the heavy comforter, the extra pillow tucked firmly between my knees to alleviate the pressure on my aching back. I couldn’t hear my sigh, though the dull thud of my heartbeat still sounded in my ears.

I couldn’t sleep.

My sophomore year of college, I shared a room with three other girls. The dorm I’d chosen had been overbooked. I’d been given the choice of living in a different building, farther away from my classes and the cafeteria, or moving into a converted study lounge for the semester. It hadn’t been so bad. The larger room meant we’d all had a bit more space, and the lounge was in the corner of the building, so instead of the one small window the regular rooms had, we had four large panes of glass. The downside was the complete and utter lack of privacy. Forget about having a guy over; it was impossible even to masturbate without an audience.

I don’t know about the other girls, one of whom was a devout Christian whose missionary position had nothing to do with sex, but I have always been, and suspect I always will be, an avid fan of getting myself off. I’d learned the trick back then of rubbing off on a pillow tucked between my legs, just this way. Of using the slow, steady push of inner muscles to bring myself close, slowly, and finishing myself off against the pillow. I hadn’t come that way in a long time—I lived alone now and could strip down naked and do it on my dining-room table, if I wanted. Not that I ever did.

But I hadn’t forgotten how to do it, how to press and release and inch my hips forward and back, just so. I gave half a second’s thought to embarrassment and tossed it aside in the name of orgasm. After all, I hadn’t burst in on them, or sneaked up to peek through a window. The show on the porch had been dropped in front of me like nondenominational holiday gift, and I’ve never been one to return a present just because it didn’t fit quite right.