Page 8 of Dirty
I hit the bottle again, then offered it to him. “What does it matter? I was born there. I left there. Now I live in Seattle. Where are you from?”
“Upstate New York. I live in Brooklyn now.”
For some odd, unknown reason, it was a relief to know that Fix lived just about as far away from me as he possibly could. He drank, and I watched the muscles in his throat work as he swallowed. Damn, that was diverting. I had no business being turned on by such a simple action.
When he lowered the bottle from his lips, he asked, “What do your parents do?”
“I haven’t spoken to my father in nearly ten years. My mother’s dead. She used to work for a little insurance company. A little mom ‘n’ pop place. Dealt mostly with life insurance and agricultural liability.”
“Sounds like a thrill a second.”
Melancholy washed over me. I didn’t think about Mom very often. She’d died when I was eight, so it seemed that the few memories I had of her faded more and more as I grew older. It seemed to me that one day I’d wake up and I wouldn’t remember what her face had looked like at all. That eventuality was the saddest thing in the world to me.
Fix didn’t seem perturbed by my somber admission. “How’d she die?”
“God, you ask a lot of personal questions. What aboutyourparents? What do they do?”
“Both dead,” he answered. “Car accident seven years ago. Happened the day before my thirtieth birthday.” Not a twinkle of emotion. It was weird, as if he were completely shut off from what must have been a very traumatic event. Either that, or he just didn’t care.
“Fair enough.” I sighed. “Two dead parents trumps one dead parent. My mom had an aneurism. She was fine one minute, watering the garden. Yelling at me and my sister to come in for dinner. Next thing I knew, she’d keeled over in the grass, dead. When they completed the autopsy, the doctors said hers was the largest aneurism they’d ever seen, the size of Texas. Completely inoperable. They said she’d probably had it for years and never known. Walking around every day, oblivious, with a huge bomb waiting to go off in her head.”
“Better that way.” Fix said this as if it were a matter of fact. “She lived her life without worrying every time she needed to sneeze.”
I’d spent a long time wondering if it was better that she hadn’t known. Would Mom have done things a little differently if she’d been aware her time was limited? She might have pulled us from school, taken us on vacation, spent as much time with me and Amy as possible. She could have sent us to live with her friend Natalie in Utah. She used to talk to Natalie on the phone every day. Sixsmith liked to blame my mother’s death for his raging alcoholism, but the reality was he’d started hitting the bottle a little harder then he should have a couple of years before Mom went. I liked to think Mom would have taken us away from him if she’d known the truth of what was going on inside her brain.
“Hmm. Well, it’s all said and done now. That was a long time ago.” I didn’t want to think about Mom. I sure as fuck didn’t want to think about Sixsmith.
I took another drink from the bottle, and my head started to buzz. I needed to be careful. I could drink people under the table, but I wasn’t immune to hangovers. Tequila hangovers were the absolute worst.
Fix didn’t say anything as he stood up, kicked his shoes off, and threw himself down next to me on my bed. I quirked an eyebrow at him. “Uh…what do you think you’re doing?”
“I’m sure you like your guys servile and meek, Sera, but I’m not kneeling on the floor forever.”
“Then go and lie onyourbed.”
He propped himself up on his elbow and leaned across my body, reaching for the tequila bottle—a pretty bold move for a guy who’d been more than a little frosty toward me in the lobby not that long ago. “How are we meant to pass back and forth if I’m all the way over there?” he said. His feral smile made him look particularly wolfish. This close, I could see the fine details of his face…and they really were fine. Strong jaw line; high cheekbones; long, curled eyelashes.He was the epitome of tall, dark and handsome, and he smelled heavenly. I wracked my brain, trying to pin down the scent to a single origin, but I couldn’t do it. He smelled like winter mornings, and wet grass after rain, and clean sheets drying on a line. His breath smelled a little of the tequila we were drinking, but there was an underlying hint of mint. He’d probably brushed his teeth after his shower.
“You’re staring,” Fix rumbled.
“I don’t have much choice. You’re hovering over me so closely, you’re filling my entire field of vision.”
“Fair point. Can I kiss you now?”
“WHAT?” If he’d tried to kiss me without warning, I would have kneed him in the balls so hard he’d never be able to have children. Since he’dasked, though, I settled on sending him a look so scathing that it was a miracle he didn’t flee the motel room and sleep on that couch in the lobby after all. “Why the hell would I let you kiss me? From the moment we met, you’ve been an asshole. We’re complete strangers. We have nothing in common. You’re just bored and looking for a way to pass the time. I’m not going to be your entertainment, okay? Guys like you are unbelievable.”
“You’ve never met a guy like me before,” Fix said, tilting his head a fraction to the left. “I’m unique. And who said anything about me using you for my entertainment? I’d rather you usedmeforyourentertainment.”
Seriously, this guy. He was striking, there was no denying that, but his arrogance knew no bounds. Unique? His eyes made him one of a kind, but the fact that he thought he could have me swooning over him because he got up close and personal with me made him just like every other guy I’d ever met. “Just…forget it, Felix Marcosa. I’ll drink with you. I’ll share this room with you. But that’s it.”
Fix sank back down onto the mattress, sighing. “My dick’s pretty fucking phenomenal. You should see it.Grown women have been known to weep when they behold it.” He drank from the bottle, long and deep, which was a blessing. Gave me a second to recover myself after that dick comment. I supposed a part of me was curious. He was a giant. His hands were like shovels—strong, powerful and calloused. Hands that had been used to build, create and destroy. What would they feel like on my body? Would their roughness be too much for my skin, or would it make my nerve endings sing with pleasure.
The last person I’d slept with was my ex, Gareth, close to six months ago now. Gareth’s hands had looked nothing like Fix’s. They’d been soft and well manicured—the hands of a pampered, spoiled rich boy who’d never done a hard day’s work in his life. He hadn’t known how to touch me. I’d faked an orgasm nearly every time we got into bed together. The times I hadn’t fake an orgasm were the nights I’d simply been too tired to even pretend.
“I’m sure your dick is magnificent,” I said, groaning under my breath. “I’m sure women across the country have carved wooden replicas of it that they worship daily. It’s probably the most stunning cock to have ever gotten a boner. But I’m gonna pass this time.”
Fix cracked his neck; the action made the muscles in his throat and in his left shoulder stand out. His shirt was tight enough that his chest muscles were straining against the material, too. The guy had muscles fucking everywhere. Maybe he was a professional athlete or something. A football or a hockey player. That would explain the attitude, if he had hoards of adoring fans chasing him down the street twenty-four seven.
He didn’t seem fazed by the fact that I’d turned down his junk. Flopping back down beside me, he pressed the rim of the tequila bottle to his oh-so-perfect lips, up-ended it, and drank. “I think we should shoot the rest of this and kill it. We’re already halfway through.”
