The only place I knew with certainty Reardon and I were headed was to McClellanville to his folks’ place.
I wasn’t even sure about this girlfriend gig, especially after our previous night together.
We’d been having a post-doing-the-deed doze. His toes had nudged mine.
I giggled and nudged back.
He leaned onto his elbow and nudged my rear with something bigger and harder, his expression wicked, but a worried tiredness ringed his eyes.
I’d needed to give him something to make him feel good, besides my rocking body. “Can I bathe you?”
“You want to?”
“Yeah, I really do.”
In the bathroom rivaling the size of my neighborhood, I reveled in each plane and muscle uncovered as he slowly released his dressing gown. Massaging his shoulders all the way down his back, I loved the way he sighed, relaxing inch-by-inch.
Kneeling down, I tested the bathwater. “In.”
He sat up to his chest, his knees splayed in the clear water because I was too greedy for the visuals to add any bubbles.
“Just let me take care of you.”
“Okay.” He’d been so damn unsure.
“Shh
,
baby, this is gonna feel so good.”
Kneading his neck, shoulders, and back, I’d soaped him down, enjoying the play of slick skin under my hands. He’d dropped his head, languidly shifting with my touch. I felt so much for this man who probably hadn’t been cared for since, well, I certainly couldn’t imagine something like this coming from his hex-wife.
I’d eased him back and there he sat, arms on the rim of the tub, body wet and sexy. I swirled the soap on his chest. “You know how you like to throw money around?”
He kept his eyes closed, a smile playing on his lips. “Mmm.”
“I could really do with a camera phone right about now.”
One eye popped open.
“Just sayin’, you’re my fantasy, right there. All soapy and hot and yeah, total
Playgirl
material.”
A pink blush colored his cheeks.
“And that? That is so...damn...” I closed in on his mouth. “Pretty.” I kissed him.
He hauled me into the water on top of him. “You know, I knew exactly what you were doing in the bathtub at DeBordieu.”
Oh!
It was my turn to blush and his to tease, “And that’s just so adorable.”
Flailing in the dress shirt I’d put on, giving Reardon a perfect wet t-shirt shot, I’d struggled to free myself when he smoothly asked if I wanted to get myself off for him again.
Which I did, since he’d said please and all.
At his low-voiced commands to “Show me, feel your breasts, that’s right, ride your hand, darlin’, tell me how good it feels
,
” I rose to my knees. My pelvis jutted in his face, my fingers rubbing inside me.
His eyes trained on my grinding motion, he swiped his tongue over my clit, and I threw my head back.
The wild surge cresting inside me didn’t settle. He pushed me forward until I grabbed the tub’s lip, his fingers digging into my hips. “Need to be in you now.”
Water sloshed over the floor as his cock filled me. I held on and he pumped into me, his hands on my ass. When he’d pulled me up by my hair, his mouth hotly sliding along my neck, his finger nestled over my clit, I couldn’t...I couldn’t…
He’d hissed a long breath and pushed down on my hips, pulsing inside me.
His rippling orgasm made me come again, sucking his final tight thrusts inside.
Slumping in his arms, I’d laughed weakly. The water–what little was left–did its best to calm down, overflowing as my heart.
“Funny?”
“Baby,” I breathed, “you make me feel like ten million butterflies are dancin’ around inside me. Makes me giggle.”
He covered my lips with a murmured, “Good.”
Yeah, it was.
Even better when he’d lifted me out for a long kiss and toweling off that lead to taunts traded and snaps of twisted terrycloth.
His chain had winked against his wide wet chest.
I’d reached for it. “May I?”
He dropped the towel and grabbed my wrist, his change of mood instantaneous. “No.” Placing my hand at my side, he took a few steps away, shaking his head at the floor. “Please don’t.”
“I’m sorry.” My fingers retracted to fists. “I should go anyway, it’s late.” All the fun had drained away with the bathwater.
Closing a hand over the pendant, he turned pale. “Please don’t go.”
“Think it’s best right now.” I sidled past him.
He darted to the door before me. “I know you want answers. I’m going to give them to you, I promise. Can we get through tomorrow, meet my parents first?”
I’d pulled my hand from the doorknob. “Why? Your folks scary?” Visions of a Junior League Madam Queen rather than a jam-jar packing momma worried me.
“No.”
“So?”
He peered at me. “It’s just, you know.”
I shook my head.
“Meeting my parents. I don’t, they haven’t, I haven’t…”
I hoped he didn’t get so tongue-tied in the boardroom.
He exhaled. “They haven’t met anyone since Leila.”
I nodded.
“Was that, okay you understand, or, yes you’ll stay?”
“Both. But only a little bit to the first.”
“Got it.”
“Good.” I walked ahead of him into the bedroom.
He followed closely.
Beside the bed, I whispered, “By the way, about overhearin’ things? I know what Temp said to you the morning after the party. About me.” I peeked over. “And you.” I didn’t add the ‘in love’ part.
Confusion crumpled his brow before he sucked in his cheeks on a long inhale. “I see.”
“Yeah.”
He cleared his throat. “You want to talk about it?”
“Don’t think so.”
Large hands framed my face, his warm body flush with mine. “We’re really fucked up, aren’t we?”
I couldn’t stop my laugh. “Pretty much screwed.”
“Think we can make it?”
At those words, my heart was the thing with ten million butterflies flitting inside. I’d muffled my, “Hope so,” against his chest.
* * * *
The biting remorse manifested to full blown trepidation and those cute little butterflies were obnoxious wing-beating bastards battering my brain by the time I swung into the Tides on the early August morning.
Waiting in the lot, Reardon looked as anxious as me.
Concentrating on his truck–the Z71 bad boy to his BMW roadster–instead of the ‘
we’re so fucked
’ look on his face, I strolled to the back of the beast.
Downright humpable, he flashed a smile and shoved his hands into the pockets of his khakis. “Where you going?”
I squatted as much as I could in my sundress to inspect the bumper. Yep, there it was, the bumper sticker I’d given him last week. The one reading
Women want me, Fish fear me
. “Just checkin’, baby.”
A lopsided grin in place, he ushered me into the cab, one large hand more than helpful under my backside. “Your chariot.”
“Well, it’s a ride.” I let my legs dangle out. “But I can think of another I’d like to test-drive.”
“Shay.” Though his voice was curt, a dangerous smile derailed his mouth.
“You gonna greet me properly?”
His fingers curled into my hair; his mouth moved deliciously over mine.
He pulled away and I smoothed a palm along his jaw. “Nothin’ proper about your kisses, mister.”
Soon as he shut us in the truck, the flirty mood was replaced by futility.
Reardon’s face–bland and expressionless–was unrecognizable.
I fidgeted, flicked my lighter, pulled the deck of cards from his glovebox and shuffled them.
He did a double take on my fingers. “You took off your rings.”
“For today. Girlfriends aren’t usually married.” When I glanced at him, he looked as crushed as me. “I don’t have to come if it’s freakin’ you out.”
His chin jutted forward. “I want you to be there.” But his half-assed attempt at a smile fell short of his eyes, and he had the ten-two thing going on with the steering wheel instead of his casual southern boy wrist-drape. Defensive, and not just his driving.
Reardon downshifted at a stop sign way out on 17 North. I curled sideways in the seat. “We got time to do some bog runnin’ on the way?”
“You want to?”
I nodded. Anything to see the stern businessman turn into a boy.
It was fun, until we rolled up to the Boone homestead to an earsplitting screech. “Reardon Dade Boone!”
“Oh shit.” He said it, and I thought it as he parked in front of a pretty, rambling house sitting on high stilts overlooking a small salty delta.
He kissed my cheek before getting out to the full wrath of Ma Boone.
“I oughta beat the tar outta you for takin’ her on a mudrun. Look at the state of your car, boy! I can only imagine what Miss Shay must think of you now.”
With the woman running out of steam, he bent way down to plant a kiss on her forehead below the pussy willow fluff of her hair. “I know. Sorry, ma’am.”
She slapped him away. “You gonna leave your date in the car like that? Boy, it’s hot enough to boil peanuts on the blacktop, and you already cut the engine in there.”
“It’s an SUV, ma’am, not a car.”
“I don’t care what it is, Day-Day. Now start actin’ proper.”
Ma’am
tucked her flyaway hair behind her ears and straightened the waist of her functional skort, all the while muttering to herself.
Opening the door, he rolled his eyes and dimpled endearingly at me.
“Day-Day?” I mouthed.
He brought his face so close I could have licked his lips. “Not a word, Shay.”
“But it’s so cute.”
I swear I was as nervous as his mama when Reardon put me in front of her. I even performed a Princess Di-style curtsy.
“Oh, just look at her.”
“Ma, I’d like you to meet Shay Greer. Shay, this is Charley.” His cheeky dimples lent him a devilish little boy look.
“Oh, I hate it when he does that. My brothers used to call me Charley when I was flat as a board and a tomboy to boot. Charlotte Daisy, dear.”
“Pleased to make your acquaintance, Mrs. Boone.”
When she grinned, she had a wide gap between her top teeth, adding to her girlish appeal, even while she gave another good hell-raising to her son. “And her all prettied up. Boy!”
“She asked for it.”
“Oh, I’m sure she did, because every gal wants to be taken to the swamps and cricks. A real dream date, ain’t it? Y’all come inside.” Taking my arm, she started us up the steep outdoor steps to the porch above. “Not you, Day-Day. You can take a hose to your car first of all, and then you better wait for your daddy.” She puffed her cheeks out. “I don’t know where he is...oh yeah, I do. Out on his bike. Now then, Jane and Cash and little man Max are here, darlin’. Y’all already met them?”
“Well, not Max, but–”
“And the Admiral is expected too.” She stopped at the first landing, fanning herself. “My, that Ellegee, now
he knows his manners. ’Course you gotta meet my handsome Ransome too.”
“Uncle Reardon!”
A dark-haired bundle bolted through the screen door, letting it bang closed. “Maxwell Norris Sloane!” Dang, it really was a day for recitin’ from the birth certificates. Miss Charlotte’s shout cut the boy’s escape short. “You forgettin’ something?”
He stomped back.
“Thatta boy, a smile wouldn’t hurt none either.”
His pained grin made me pity him. Hunkering down, I offered my hand. “Pleased to meet you, Max.”