“Yes, but you have the messages he left you,” James argues. “People find out what he said and he’d never come back from it.”
“I don’t want people to know what he said,” I plead. “It would follow me for the rest of my life. It would be this thing … like my mom’s poster, but far worse. Something nasty associated with my name from now on.”
That, for me, is far worse than anything Edward could ever do to me. But I can tell, watching his face, that James does not agree.
**
We both manage to get released from our shifts early. I slide toward him the second we’re in the car and he lifts me right into his lap. We sit there, making out, parallel parked on a busy street, like teenagers. Well, I suppose one of us still is, technically.
He groans and pulls away. “Let me drive home before I get us arrested. I’m pretty sure an indecent exposure charge won’t really look so good for you on the cover of a magazine.”
“Good point,” I sigh, returning to my seat.
“But tonight I want you to stay with me,” he says.
“I always stay with you,” I reply.
“No, I mean all night. I don’t want you sneaking off and I don’t want to wake up and not find you there. And I want to repeat last night about five times, too.”
I laugh. “Five times?”
“What?” he asks. “You don’t think I could?”
“No,” I reply, and my breathing begins to change just thinking about it. “I’m sure you could.”
His hand roams, and is inside my cut-offs by the time we hit our street. “Jesus,” he groans. “You’re already wet.”
The words “keep driving” rest on my lips as we pull up to the house, and they remain there, because we are both rendered speechless by what we see before us.
Our driveway is full of people. People who appear to be moving in, based on the amount of stuff they’re unloading. We can’t even park because two extra cars sit there already, with a few guys pulling stuff from the trunk. And Max helping.
James removes his hand from my leg and gets out of the car. “Max,” he says in a voice that scares even me, and he’s not mad at me. “What the hell?”
“Dude,” says Max. “I told you my friends were coming into town.”
“No, you didn’t,” James snarls.
“Oh,” shrugs Max. “Sorry. I’m gonna put the girls in my room, and the guys can crash in the living room, so you mind if I’m on your floor?”
“Are you fucking serious?” asks James.
“Yeah,” says Max. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
“How long?”
“How long has there been something wrong with you?” Max begins. “If I were to venture a guess I’d say … ”
“How long are they staying?” James hisses.
“Just two nights,” Max replies.
James is coiled like a spring. I maneuver him away from Max. It’s pretty big of me, I think, considering that I want to punch him too.
Chapter 45
Thus begins our excruciating weekend. Between Max’s friends and our housemates, James and I are never alone. When I go to the deck with my coffee in the morning, three people are already there. When James and I walk into town, someone decides to come with us. We think we’ve managed to escape by ourselves to the beach, and we don’t even have our towels down before they are there too, cheerfully wedging their towels between us. If Max had hired a crew to keep us apart they couldn’t do a better job.
And the timing of it is what makes it hardest, because what we did on Thursday is something I really, really need to repeat.
“You shouldn’t have forced me to sleep with you,” James grumbles quietly behind me when we’re at work.
“Did you really just say I ‘forced’ you?” I gasp, rounding on him, but he’s grinning.
“Maybe ‘forced’ is a strong word,” he says, pulling me behind the freezer with his hands at my hips. His lips find mine, and he tugs at the bottom one with his teeth. “But I’m thinking about it at 20-second intervals now, and I need someone to blame.”
“Blame Max and his friends,” I breathe, as he pushes me back against the counter.
“I am going to do such bad things to you once they’re out of here,” he promises. His kiss is harder this time, his hands roaming, finding the hem of my shirt and sliding beneath it. He could convince me to do about anything right now.
“This is the first time I’ve ever wished they made us wear skirts,” I sigh.
He groans. “Thanks for that visual, Elle. I was already painfully hard.”
Footsteps approach and we part, reluctantly.
“Just one more day,” I tell him. “We can live until then.”
**
But the next day I get home from the lunch shift, expecting them to be gone, and find them all on the deck, throwing back beers, getting ready to grill out. James sits with them, looking decidedly unhappy.
“Um, I hope one of you is the designated driver for tonight,” I say.
“Why?” asks one of the guys. “Where are we going?”
I look toward James and realize the source of his sour expression. “I thought you were going home today.”
“I convinced them to stay,” says Max, with a little gleam in his eye.
“How are you able to miss this much work?” I ask.
He shrugs. “I can miss a day or two.”
I go back inside before it becomes obvious how intensely disappointed I am by this information.
I’ve never been so happy to see eight people leave as I am when they shout their goodbyes the following day.
“Good riddance. Now get your shit out of my room,” says James the moment Max walks in from seeing them off.
“When did you turn into such a grumpy fucker?” asks Max, heading into James’s room. “I’m going to have to buy you some female companionship if your dry spell keeps up.”
“Yes,” I grin at James when Max is out of sight. “We wouldn’t want your dry spell to continue.”
He pulls me toward him by my waistband. “My dry spell is about to end in a big way,” he says against my ear, his low voice initiating that small spasm it does in my stomach. “Go get ready.” We are going back to Lewes for dinner, a dinner that will end the moment we’re sure Max has left for work. I run upstairs to shower, and put on the dress I bought at the start of the summer.
I bounce downstairs and come to a screeching halt in the family room. Max sits in the recliner, looking utterly dejected, and James looks distraught. “Oh my God,” I whisper. “Is everything okay?”
James meets my eye. “Max got fired for not going in all weekend,” he tells me. His shoulders sag. I’m a little surprised by James’s empathy, since he’s spent most of the summer telling Max he should be looking for a real job. He looks as depressed as Max.
“I’m so sorry,” I tell Max. “I’m sure you’ll find something else.”
He nods gravely. It’s the longest I’ve ever seen him go without cracking a smile or a joke. “I’m so glad you guys are off tonight,” he says. “It sounds lame, but I just don’t want to be alone.”