“Oh,” I say, as my brain offers an image of Andi in very short cutoffs, a bikini top, and a cowboy hat. I don’t know why the hat. I can examine that later.
“If this dress pissed her off, imagine what those outfits would’ve done,” she goes on, that sharp note back in her voice. “Imagine if she’d seen us the other night in the movie theater.”
I take a deep breath and clear my throat, glad it’s physically impossible for me to blush any more. The movie we saw was terrible and the theater was practically deserted, but instead of leaving like the thirty-something adults we are, we stayed in our seats near the back and made out like teenagers. By the end of the movie Andi’s bra was unhooked and I’d nearly come in my pants, which would have been embarrassing if it weren’t so exhilarating.
“I’d rather not think about Beth seeing that, actually,” I say, and I sound impressively steady.
“Why, she wouldn’t approve?”
“That, and I wouldn’t want my sister seeing us in—that state,” I say, and Andi laughs.
“Good point,” she says, and puts one foot on the dashboard, her knee almost knocking the window, her head back and her throat exposed and her dress puddling into her lap, hiking up higher on her left leg, too.
It’s dark outside, and she’s lit by dashboard lights and the backward-reflecting glow of the car’s headlamps on the road in front of us. My mouth’s gone dry and I can feel her watching me. I glance over every couple of seconds.
“You know what I think?” she says, and her hand’s on her inner thigh, right where her skin is softest. Where I left a mouth-shaped purple bruise by accident a few days ago. It’s half-faded now, and she circles her thumb around it.
“That we’re seven minutes from my house?” I say, voice low. I accelerate a little.
“That if your family’s going to treat me like a whore, I may as well act like one,” she says.
Fucking absurd that my first instinct is to say no, they don’t, thirty-two years of conditioning bubbling to the surface, the urge to defend them stamped into my hindbrain somehow. I tighten my grip on the steering wheel.
“Now?” is the only thing I can manage to say, and Andi laughs.
“I could wait until tomorrow,” she says. “If that works better with your schedule.”
There’s a soft gasp at the end of that sentence, and in the corner of my vision, I can see the heel of her hand sliding over her underwear.
“Six minutes,” I say. “Five, maybe.”
“Okay,” she says, voice neutral, and then lifts her hips off the seat and slides her panties off.
I swerve, ever so slightly, onto the shoulder, and we both jostle.
“Gideon,” Andi says, and it’s warm and teasing and still a little sharp, and she winds her underwear around the gear shift. “Please drive responsibly.”
“How am I—” I start, then glance over at her, and she’s got her seat back a little and her hand between her legs, moving beneath her skirt, her seatbelt still on. “You can’t wait five minutes?”
“I bet I can get myself off first,” she says. “I’ll race you.”
Jesus. Fuck. She’s going to kill me. She’s going to kill both of us, or at least embarrass us a whole lot when I have to call a tow truck because I ran off the road and into a tree. I don’t want to find out what an airbag deploying can do to an erection.
“Andi,” I say, and it comes out ragged.
“No speeding,” she says, and I can see her move her hips again at the edge of my vision. “Eyes front. Hands at ten and two. Oh. Watch the road.”
I shouldn’t be driving with this little blood in my brain. My skin is hot and all of it feels too tight, like I might split it open at any moment. The heat’s on in here and I have no idea how to turn it off. I’m lightheaded, my heart is beating out of rhythm, my knuckles are white on the wheel and then Andi groans softly.
“Fucking Christ,” I say through my teeth. Andi laughs breathlessly, and I steal another glance.
“Goddamn it,” I whisper when I do.
“Focus,” she says, half-whispering. “On the road, not me. Pretend I’m not even—mmm—here.”
She is torturing me and I am going to die. There are headlights in the distance, and I hold my breath until they pass us, Andi breathing faster, harder. The double yellow line sears itself into my retinas because I can’t look away, not for anything. It’s silent except for road noise and the tiny, slick sounds Andi’s making as she rubs herself.
“Is it good?” I finally ask, my arms shaking from how hard I’m holding the steering wheel. Two more minutes, just a stop sign and a curve and a straightaway—
“Yes,” she says, sounding a little bit strangled. “You’re really hot like this, you know.”
I have to remind myself to breathe.
“Like what?”
“Holding back,” she says. “When you’re all uptight and stern and using self-control.”
“That’s all the time.”
“Not like this.”
“You’re not usually getting yourself off in my passenger seat where I can’t even look at you,” I say, executing a technically illegal rolling stop.
“Fuck, Gideon, it could be arranged,” she says, and shudders out a breath. I feel like my hair’s standing on end. “We could do this all the”—she gasps and makes a noise and oh God—“time.”
“We’re almost there,” I tell—her? Myself? Who fucking knows. “Just down this hill and around that bend.”
Andi turns her head toward me and I catch it in my periphery.
“Don’t come yet,” I tell her.
“We’re racing,” she says, all shaky. “I’m about to win.”
“I forfeit.”
There’s a sharp, whimpering gasp from the passenger seat, and I swallow. I can feel sweat trickling down my neck.
“Please?” I ask, barely more than a rough whisper, and Andi exhales hard.
“Fine,” she whispers, and in the corner of my vision, she pulls her hand away. “Because you asked nicely.”
“You don’t have to stop,” I say. “You can go slow. You could make more noise, if you wanted.”
“What if I make myself come by accident?” she asks, teasing and raspy. “I’m pretty close. Anything could happen.”
“You won’t.”
“I could.”
“I did say please, Andi,” I tell her, and slow the car to turn into my driveway. There are oncoming headlights, and the wait for them to pass might be the longest five seconds of my entire life. “You like it when I say please.”
“Such good manners,” she murmurs as I turn into my driveway at last. I take it at a fairly reckless speed and she reaches her left hand out to stroke my beard. It smells like her musk, and I clench my jaw even harder. “So polite. Fuck.”
“Not yet.”
“I’m not.”
“Almost there,” I say, and reach up to catch her hand in mine, pressing a blind kiss to her wrist. “You’re so patient. Thank you.”