Page 49 of Business Casual
His hand settles on the curve between my thigh and my ass, thumb rubbing back and forth as he yawns again. Everything is muted in the way early morning quiet always seems to be, geese squawking outside my window and the rickety creek of the iron gate on the side of my house that never quite latches right. The floorboards groan and my legs swish beneath the blankets, bare now, my thigh highs draped over the edge of the bed like an ad for debauchery.
“How are you getting back to the farm?” I ask, half into mypillow. I imagine Charlie trudging his way down the side of the long dirt road that leads to Lovelight, shirt unbuttoned and my mug of coffee in his hand. A very long walk of shame. “I can drive you if you need me to,” I offer.
“No, no.” He squeezes my leg. “I left my car at the bookstore last night. I’m gonna head over there now and drive back. Should be early enough.”
“Early enough for what?” I frown at him, but he’s busy looking for something underneath my bed. He emerges with his belt clutched in his hand, some of his dark hair sticking straight up on the left side. It’s unfairly adorable for a man who made my legs shake so bad I could hardly shuffle to the bathroom last night.
“To avoid your brother,” he explains. “He starts his work around five.”
“Oh.”
Charlie watches me as he threads his belt through the loops. “I figured you wouldn’t want anyone to know,” he says.
I shrug and shift beneath my blankets again, everything fuzzy and far away.
“That’s fine. Whatever you want.” I can keep a secret. But I’ve lost the will to hold on to this conversation. I’m exhausted. Bone weary. My eyes slip shut, already drifting again between asleep and awake. I listen as he moves around the room, collecting his things from the chaos we created last night. Socked feet against the floor. The metallic clink of his wristwatch. The gentle thud of the coffee mug against my dresser and a poorly muffled curse when he stubs his toe on the edge of it.
It’s a nice soundtrack. It doesn’t give me the itch that usually blossoms bright with someone in my space. I just feel…content, I guess.
Sleepy.
“Key’s under the mat,” I slur, words heavy. I’m going to sleep for ages. “Lock up when you go.”
Warm lips brush against my forehead, fingertips chasing. My hair is tucked behind my ear and knuckles nudge once at my cheek. “You got it, Nova girl.”
And then I’m asleep.
?“You’re freaking meout.”
“Why?”
“Your face,” Nessa says immediately. “It’s doing something.”
“What is it doing?”
“I don’t know. This dreamy, stare-off-into-space thing.” She drapes herself against the tattoo chair she’s claimed as her own and contorts her face into something ridiculous. “Like that. You’ve smiled more this morning than that time Dad made four different types of pierogies for dinner.”
“Fuck, I love pierogies.”
“I know!” Nessa points at me furiously like I’ve just confirmed something. “Which is why you’re freaking me out.”
Charlie left a Post-it note on my coffee pot before he left this morning, a scribbled “Thanks for blowing my mind” with a smiley face that had me grinning into my mug, robe wrapped tight around my middle. I found my key in the middle of the hallway floor too, another note scribbled on the back of a receipt from Ms. Beatrice’s that he must have found in his pocket. This one said, “Stop leaving your key under your mat” with a frowny face. I guess he shoved it through the mail slot on my front door after locking up.
“I’m just having a good day,” I tell my sister. The marathon sex session last night certainly helped. My body feels boneless in the very best of ways, a pinching ache every time I sit. Probably from the last time, when Charlie bent me over the side of my bed and fucked me so hard I thought we might break the frame.
I press my palm to my cheek and glance over the top of my laptop. Thankfully Nessa is occupied by her phone. When I showed up to thestudio this morning, she was waiting out front, sitting on the step. She said she needed something to do, and I said she could organize the tattoo stations.
Not that she’s doing that currently.
“Everything okay?” I ask.
She blows out a heavy breath and tosses her phone to the side. “Can I set you up with someone?”
“What?” I laugh. “Why?”
She tilts her head. “Because I need something to do.”
“Then organize the stations like I asked you to.”
