Page 48 of Mr. Not Nice Guy

“No.” I crash my mouth down onto hers and pick up my pace, thrusting deeper and more urgently. “It’s what’s right.”

Her thighs clamp harder around my hips, and she anchors her fingertips into the muscles of my back, her quiet mewls increasing in decibel level and intensity, and now that I’ve come right out and said it, I can’t stop myself from saying it over and over and over.

“I love you, Scarlett. I love you. I love you.”

She gasps and moans against my neck, and I don’t even need her to say it back. The fact that she let me in and let her walls down the way she did amidst her overpowering grief speaks volumes, and besides—sometimes it’s not about what someone says or does for you. Sometimes it’s about what you do for them, and the fact that they trust you enough to let you do those things at all.

The walls of her core flinch and shudder and clamp around me, and she cries out my name, and pushes me over the edge to take that explosive flight of pure ecstasy right alongside her.

She whimpers quietly while she rides out the waves of her climax, and she clings to me even tighter. Slipping my arm under her waist, I hold her close and take her with me as I roll on to my back. We lay in quiet stillness while I trace her spine with my fingers and she nuzzles her face deep into the crook of my neck.

After several beats of silence, her quiet voice pierces the atmosphere. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

And that tells me everything I need to know.

14

Scarlett

Ihave never felt more like a circus pony than I do right now.

After Francisco spent an hour curling and teasing and molding my hair into a mass of shining, wavy, vintage perfection, the makeup artist is putting the finishing touches on my face. Staring at my reflection, I can’t help feeling like I look a little like a Pagliacci clown. You know, those vintage clowns with creepy, happy-face makeup, but with a big, fat, sad frown underneath.

Today, my single released, and Frenchmen Street Records is throwing a big party at which I will be expected to put on a super fun, super sexy, superchippersong-and-dance for all one hundred-something people in attendance.

I don’t feel like doing this at all.

“Close your eyes real quick,” the makeup artist directs me, cutting into my thoughts. I compliantly lower my eyelids before she spritzes my face with a setting spray that will keep the facade from cracking for the entirety of the day that I would much rather spend in bed.

Opening my eyes again, I cut a glance to one corner of the mirror in which I see the reflection of August on his phone, focused and pacing around the salon behind me. He’s got a lot on his plate, very busy, very diligently handling everything down to the smallest detail, and I appreciate that. After we actually stopped fighting with each other, I’ve been able to see how good of a manager he really is.

But I don’t really want him acting like a manager right now. I want him with me in the bed I’d much rather be spending the day in, but that’s not on the agenda.

Despite wanting to do nothing but spend the day in bed with him, this whole thing between us is still new enough for me to be a little skeptical. He dropped the L bomb on me only a couple of days ago and followed up by taking care of all the ugly nuts and bolts you have to deal with in the aftermath of a death, and don’t get me wrong, it iseverything. But all of this happened in the midst of the chaotic official beginning of my career, and I’m just…skeptical.

What are we doing?

I have alotof feelings right now, and it’s so many all at once that I don’t know what I feel about him andus. There isgoodtangled up in this mass of feelings I’m having, but it all feels a little like a hurricane. All this shit swirling around a tiny, little eye ofgood, and that eye ofgoodfeels like it’s never actually going to reach me.

August is very busy right now, so I stop staring at him and turn my gaze to my hands. Granted, he’s busy taking care of shitfor me, just like he did with all the stuff I had to deal with immediately after Maw-Maw passed, so I can’t let myself be too pouty about it. Still, I wish neither of us had to deal with any of this crap so we could just focus on figuring out what the hell it is we’re doing with each other.

And the fact that I’m wishing that at all seems to be flavored withgood. If it wasn’tgood,I wouldn’t be wishing for it right now. Right?

“Can you guys give us a minute?” August’s voice cuts through my thoughts.

Francisco, the makeup artist, and the handful of wardrobe stylists file out of the salon with a chorus of, “Sure!” and “Take your time!” and “Perfect timing, I’m dying for more coffee.”

I find myself staring at them in confusion as they leave, like they’re something foreign despite the familiarity I’ve developed with them over the past couple of months.

It’s just strange to watch the world carry on as if nothing is different; as though your own world hasn’t been completely gutted and turned upside down by losing someone who made up the entirety of your world for as long as you can remember.

Considering this for the umpteenth time since Friday causes my eye rims to sting and forces a lump to the top of my throat.

There’s a sound of metal scraping against linoleum, and August appears in my peripheral vision as he drags a stool next to me, sits down, and then spins the salon chair so I’m facing him.

He picks up my hands and kisses them. “All you have to do is say the word, honey.”

I swallow the lump in my throat. “What word?”

---