Page 30 of The Way We Fell

“So, you’re babysitting the CCTV then,” I say.

“Eh, mostly. I get to wander around with an earpiece looking important, and I’ll be involved in any big changes to the buildings or procedures, but mostly I’m just dealing with the security guards. Sometimes I get to travel to other sites, assess their processes. Liaise with local management. It sounds a lot fancier than it is.”

“It’s always nice to have a big title for little work,” I tell him. “Getting paid the big bucks to put my feet up and stare at a camera feed for the evening? Oh, the dream.”

“Not quite all it’s cracked up to be, Princess,” he chuckles. “Pretty boring, really.”

“Tell me you’ve never read a good book without telling me you’ve never read a good book.” I wink at him and his eyes flare, darkening to a rich espresso shade, whilst the green rings around his pupils flash from clover to forest. Laughing with Jay is so easy, when he lets it happen. Times like this—when he lets those walls down—being with him is easy. And the little tug in my chest says I might want to do it more.

His throat works hard as he swallows, and I find myself wondering what the heavily stubbled skin would taste like under my tongue. I want to trace those tattoos where they disappear under his shirt.

This is a really,reallybad time to develop a crush on my best friend’s brother.

We spend the rest of our lunch trading work gossip: me telling Jay about some clandestine affair I overheard in the staff room last week, and Jay telling me about his ragtag team of security guards who need whipping into shape.The way I’d like him to whip me into shape.By the time we stand to leave, an ominous cloud layer has descended over West London, and both Jay and I opt for a bus rather than walking. Our homes, though relatively close together, are on different routes, so we part at the bus stop with the promise of another lunch next week, and I head back home with a smile on my face.

There’s nothing quite like an overcast Saturday afternoon with no plans. When I was in college, having no plans was my worst nightmare. It meant that Ruth and Amie were off doing something else, and I’d end up spending the time alone. That’s when I found myself with a book in my hand, learning to lose myself in my imagination. And now, having no plans never means having no plans. It just means I have time to visit one of my favourite fictional places.

I carry a steaming mug of coffee and a snack plate into my living room, setting them on the wooden tray on the footstool. I have a delicious assortment of small snack cheeses, olives, tiny crackers and a couple of chocolate truffles, along with two homemade cookies left over from a baking afternoon with Maisy earlier in the week. Outside, it’s chilly, and I haven’t bothered to put the heating on, so I tuck my feet up on the sofa and pull a fuzzy pale pink blanket over my legs. I reach for my e-reader, and then change my mind.

An afternoon like this calls for some nostalgia, and a real, tangible paper-and-ink book in my hands. I throw the blanket off me and pad over to the bookcase, selecting an old favourite romance novel. The pages are worn and slightly fluffy from having been read so many times, and there are hundreds of coloured tabs peeking from the edges. I pick up a small case and take it back to the sofa, opening it to retrieve more tabs, a pen and a set of coloured highlighters. I snuggle under the blanket again and crack open the book.

I lose myself to a fictional ranch full of sexy ranch hands and beautiful damsels, where the weather is perfect until a storm rolls in, and the horses are always ribbon-winners. Four hours later, my coffee is gone and the snack plate is almost empty. I’ve added plenty of new notes and highlights to the book, and I’m clenching my thighs as I read the steamiest, most delicious scene in which the cowboy finally gets his girl and the enemies finally become lovers. Because, of course they do. Because who wouldn’t want a love like that, with a man like that?

Iwant a love like that.

I don’t need him to be a cowboy. I don’t need him to ride a horse or work on a ranch; I don’t need him to fill out a pair of Wranglers, although I certainly wouldn’t complain if he did. I just want him to see me. To believe in me. To support me and lift me because he wants to, not just because he should. I want him to respect me, trust me, love and protect me, let me make mistakes and be there to hold me. I want him to be himself with me, to share everything—the good, the bad, the exciting, the mundane. I want him to be the first one I want to call when I see something dumb on the internet. I want him to be the first one I call when someone cuts me off in traffic. The first one I think of when I wake and the last one before I sleep.

I think I want a man like Jay.

Oh, Jesus Christ. This is bad.

Hours later, I sink down into a hot bath, dropping my shoulders below the waterline and pointing my toes, stretching out as many muscles as I can. One of the best short girl perks is having plenty of space in bathtubs, and one of the things that drew me to this house when I bought it was the spacious bathroom with its enormous, freestanding tub.

A thick layer of foam covers my chest, filling the air with the scent of more warm, spicy fruits, much like the eight lit candles placed strategically in various nooks and corners, flickering and glowing around the room. On the wooden tray across the top of the tub, a stemless wine glass holds half a glass of Sauvignon Blanc. My e-reader is also on there, three pages into another new romance novel.

I can’t focus on the words. I only manage a sentence or two before my brain gives up, and floods me with thoughts of Jay. Of his haunted eyes, his stony glare, his set jaw. But it also offers the almost-dimple when he smiles, the deep rumble of his laugh. The way electricity zaps through my body when his skin touches mine. The warmth in his gaze, those brown eyes with a hint of green, like spring. The very last eyes in the world that I should be thinking about as I slide a hand over my breast, slowly pinching my nipple and rolling it between my fingers until it’s pebbled and hard.

He’s my best friend’s brother. He’s off-limits, and Ruth told me as much. So why can’t I get him out of my head?

I run my hand over my wet skin to my other breast, pinching and rolling again. My breathing quickens, blood rushing through my ears and crashing like the water around me as I shift in place. Warmth pools low in my belly as I close my fingers around my breasts, squeezing them, imagining hands much larger, more calloused, more experienced in their ministrations.

My left hand slips further beneath the water, fingertips ghosting over the soft curves of my hips before dipping between my legs. Despite the bathwater, I can tell how wet I am already, just at the thought of him, and at the thought of hands that aren’t mine roaming my body.

“Oh, fuck, please,” I grit out as his fingers probe at my folds. He presses them to my flesh, testing and teasing, but never fully entering.

“Begging for me, Princess? Is that how desperate you are?”

His breath is warm against my skin. I can feel the movement of his lips against the shell of my ear, feel his tongue as it darts out to trace the curve. I shudder involuntarily as a sweat breaks out over every exposed inch of skin.

A whimper falls from my lips as he continues to tease at my entrance, before filling me all at once with three thick fingers, twisting and curling and pressing against every magical, mythical spot I never knew existed. I moan out loud, the sound echoing off the bathroom tiles and mingling with the splashing of the water as his fingers slip easily in and out of me. If this is what his fingers do to me, his dick might just end me. I’m scrambled. I’m falling, panting and practically feral with my knees bent and feet braced against the side of the tub as he works me expertly, like he’s been doing it all his life. Like he was born for it. My body is no longer mine. It is no longer under my control as my hand joins his, fingers strumming against my clit.

“That’s it, Princess. Touch yourself. Make yourself come.”

“Oh, god,” I whine, stretched full with fingers flicking and twisting inside me.

“The only name on your lips is mine, Princess, you hear me?”

“Oh—god—fuck—”

---