Unrequited(55)

We lay there, sprawled on the top of his desk, papers everywhere—some even stuck to my chest and face—like wrecked ships. The insistent tone of my phone broke through my haze. Reluctantly Finn leveraged himself off me. He came back with paper towels and a water bottle.

"All I've got, sweetness," he said apologetically. He wet the cloths and then wiped my legs down, careful not to rub my tender parts too roughly.

"Why do you do that?" I asked. I'd never had any guy so interested in aftercare.

He rose to his full height, close to the ceiling of the trailer. "Because I love you and want to make sure you're taken care of." I gasped and covered my mouth. Luckily for me, he didn't take offense. "Surprised you, did I? You shouldn't be though. I'm not fucking around with you. You're first wife."

Then he winked. I launched myself into his arms and assaulted him with kisses, saying everything I was too terrified to give voice to. I was saying it though. In my head, those were the only words I was saying.





19





FINN


The evening in the trailer was about the last time I had Winter to myself. Her phone kept ringing. Of course it was Ivy, who needed Winter to pick up some ice cream on the way home. Ivy had a craving. I did too, one that required Winter to come home with me where I could take her in my bed.

But she was too happy for me to make a big deal out of it. I figured I'd see her the next night or the next. But between my work, her new apprenticeship, and Ivy's near constant demands on Winter's time, I was lucky to see Winter an hour a day. Sometimes we had lunch, which more often than not ended up being furtive finger banging and dick sucking in the backseat of my truck.

I couldn't convince Winter that no one would see us having sex, and we didn't have enough time to leave and go to either one of our respective apartments. To say I was sexually frustrated was an understatement, but even beyond that, we just didn't have enough time to spend with each other.

Ivy was acting like an asshole. Today she'd come in and tried to shove her tits in my face.

"I drove by your house the other day. Pretty sweet place you have there. And this." She waved her hand, gesturing toward the row of plaques on the wall. "Best General Contractor four years running, according to the Business Record. Think you'll hit that magical fifth year now that you're at the helm?"

"You're a big button pusher, aren't you?" I could tell she wanted me to start yelling, and despite the sting from biting my tongue, I managed to keep a civil tone. She didn't respond right away but sat back in her chair, looking me over and over as if trying to assess me.

Something shifted or clicked in her head, and she lost her ill-temper like a dog shaking off water. Instead, she smiled at me—a thousand watt, plush-lipped smile—that I think was supposed to cut me off at me knees. I crossed my arms and waited for act two.

She leaned forward, crossing her arms. The gesture had the effect of lifting and pushing her breasts together. The V-neck of her T-shirt, which looked identical to the one Winter had been wearing and I'd had my hand up last night, gaped so that I was treated to a view of her cleavage. She was curvier than Winter—taller, bigger breasts, blond hair. For a while that had worked for me, but I realized my tastes had completely shifted. I preferred hair as dark as the midnight sky and eyes a deep brown. I loved Winter’s small breasts, her fat nipples, and slender body. She fit me perfectly, not just physically, but in all the other ways that mattered a hundred times more.

Her tender heart and her patience with me, even when I was short-tempered and rude, were attributes I didn’t know I needed until I’d begun spending time with Winter.

"You certainty found the buttons to push that night." Her voice had become husky and inviting. On an objective level, I could appreciate that Ivy Donovan was an attractive package. Her hair was honey blond, bordering brown, and it was carelessly tousled in a way that I remember a couple of my girlfriends complaining took hours to achieve.

"Is that how you remember that night? Because I remember being passed out drunk and waking up to you being passed out drunk." My own recollection was a complete blank. No matter hard I tried, my night ended at the parking lot of the children's aquatic center that sat across from the Woodlands. The next thing I remembered was waking up next to her at about one in the morning. I'd called Adam. He'd come and picked me up, and we’d drove Ivy to some random address out north that she'd given us when we finally shook her awake. It wasn't the apartment that she shared with Winter. A small girl named Tanya had answered the door and allowed us to carry Ivy in and leave her on the sofa.

When I got home, I’d immediately inspected my dick. It looked soft and unused. And to be on the safe side, I took myself to the clinic the following day. Results mailed to me three weeks later indicated I was clean of anything.