Fifty First Times

  Rick wants me to come to San Jose today for his birthday, and he graduates next week, which means another trip. We’ve gone out a few times on the weekends when he’s come home, but it’s always been to places where there weren’t very many people and I knew none of them.

  This feels different.

  He wants me to meet his friends. He wants me to put me out there in front of everyone he knows.

  I’m not sure I’m ready.

  It’s the first time in the two months Rick and I have been “together” that I think I can’t do this. I’m still terrified of something setting me off. I don’t want do anything crazy and embarrass him in front of his friends. I don’t think I could take it.

  But last weekend, he caught me in a moment of weakness and got me to agree to go. It was the way he kissed me when he asked. It left me dazed and confused. I didn’t understand what I was agreeing to.

  I stand and pull the towel off my head. My hair is getting longer, and yesterday I got it trimmed into something that looks intentional. I fluff it with my fingers, then go to my drawers and grab a pair of cotton underwear. I start to tug them on, but then change my mind and root for a white lace thong and matching bra—just in case. I pull jeans and a T-shirt over them and look again at the image on my computer. Making a decision, I move to the family room.

  Mom mutes the TV when I walk in. “Are you sure this is a good idea, sweetie?” she asks for the hundredth time. “I mean, if something were to happen there . . . if you got lost or—”

  “She’ll have her phone,” Dad says, standing. “Are you ready?”

  He thinks a day out will be good for me. For the last few weeks he’s been trying more and more to nudge me out of my comfort zone.

  “Um . . . in a minute.” I turn to Mom. “Would you . . . I was thinking about putting on some makeup. If you’ll help?”

  For a second, she just sits there, and I wish I could read her expression. It’s the first time since I’ve been home that I’ve asked her for help. “Of course,” she finally says, pulling herself up.

  Dad settles back into the sofa with a sigh and Mom follows me to the bathroom.

  I get out my makeup bag. “I was thinking just a little foundation and maybe some blush and mascara.”

  “Whatever you want, sweetie.”

  I pull the foundation bottle out and hand it to her.

  “This boy . . .” she says as she smoothes it on. “Do you have feelings for him?”

  “Mom,” I say, feeling my face scrunch.

  “It’s just, he’s very attractive, Rene. I’m worried that maybe he’ll . . .”

  “Get sick of the ugly blind girl?” I finish for her.

  “No, I didn’t mean . . .” But as she trails off, it’s apparent that’s exactly what she meant.

  I blow out a breath. “I get that you’re worried. Honestly, I’m not sure exactly what Rick sees in me either, but he’s been amazing these last few months, and I . . . I guess I just want to see where it leads, even if it’s to a broken heart.”

  I hear her sigh. “After everything you’ve been through, I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

  “I know.”

  She brushes on some blush and finishes with mascara.

  “You are such a beautiful girl,” she says, lifting my chin and looking me over.

  I hear tears in her voice and my throat thickens. “Thanks, Mom.”

  She wraps me in a hug and I hug her back.

  When we emerge into the family room, Dad clicks the TV off and stands. “If we wait much longer, traffic’s going to be a bear.”

  “Rick will bring me home tonight, but it might be late,” I tell them.

  “I’d prefer if—” Mom starts, but she catches herself. “Just have fun and be safe. We love you.”

  Rick wanted Dad to drop me at his apartment, but I told him things would probably go smoother with the parents if apartments weren’t involved . . . at which point he gave me a sexy laugh and a kiss that made me hope apartments will be involved.

  Then he gave me directions to Municipal Stadium, where the San Jose State baseball team plays. I call him on the way and he meets us there when Dad drops me in the lot.

  It’s a bright day, and I hear music waft out of the stadium. The smells of roasting hot dogs and summer hang in the warm air.

  “Hi,” he says, pulling me into his arms after Dad’s gone. “This is different.”

  It takes me a second to realize he means the makeup. “Better, different?”

  There’s a pause. “No.”

  I shove him away. “What do you mean, no?”

  “I can barely see your scar.”

  “And that’s a good thing,” I say, throwing my hands in the air.

  “Not to me. I like you just the way you are.”

  “Ugly?”

  He gives me a slow shake of his head, his lips brushing over my forehead. “You’ve never been ugly to me, V. You’re the most beautiful woman I know. You were before, and you still are. And the kicker? You’re even more beautiful inside. It’s like the one-two punch. You leave me totally dazed.”

  I want to rage at him, but what he said tugs at my heart. Instead, I press up on my tiptoes and he leans in and kisses me.

  “I really have to do this?” I ask, tipping my head at the stadium.

  “No. You don’t have to do anything. But if you’re up for it, some of my friends really want to meet you.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I keep telling them how incredible you are, and they want to see for themselves.” He takes my hand. “Okay?”

  I blow out a breath. “Okay.”

  He walks me toward the stadium gates, and there’s no line. He shepherds me through a darkish corridor and we emerge into the bright sun again just as the announcer says something about the top of the seventh.

  “I didn’t know I was so late,” I say as he navigates us out of the tunnel. “Sorry.”

  “I wasn’t expecting you to sit through the whole game.”

  It sounds like there are about twenty people in the stands, and Rick guides me toward a small group of them. He knuckle bumps two guys and a girl who are sitting in the first row on what I realize is the third base line when I look out over the field. “So, everyone, this is Rene. Rene, this is Jema, Nick, and Brian,” he says, pointing his way down the row.

  I give them a lame finger wave and fight to keep my hand off my face.

  But a loud crack from the field makes me jump. I never realized until this second how much a bat hitting a ball sounds like gunfire.

  Rick slips an arm around my waist. “Okay?” he asks low in my ear.

  “At least I didn’t scream this time,” I mutter into his shoulder.

  We slide onto the bleachers and they all shoot the shit and heckle the third baseman, who, apparently, is Rick’s apartment mate and the reason we’re here. It turns out his name is Cory, and after the game we wait for him, then go out for pizza.

  When Cory plunks down in the chair next to me and Jema sits astride his knees, it becomes clear they’re together. “So, Rick says you were in Afghanistan?” Jema asks.

  “Um . . .” I flash Rick a glance. “Yeah, for eighteen months.”

  “It must have been rough to be away so long. Especially after you got hurt.”

  I can’t read her face, but the way she says it surprises me a little, like it’s no big deal. My injury is always the elephant in the room. No one ever talks about it.

  “Yeah,” I say warily, not sure which direction this conversation’s going to go.

  But all she says is, “That sucks. You want a beer?”

  “Um . . . I’m only twenty, so . . .” I answer as Rick hooks the leg of my chair with his foot and drags me closer.

  “Well, it’s your boyfriend’s birthday, so we’re going get him shit-faced, if it’s all right with you,” Cory says, shifting Jema and looking past her at me.

  “Uh-uh,” Rick says, wrapping his arms around my middle and pulling m
e off my chair and onto his lap. “I don’t get enough time with my girl to spend any of it passed out.”

  The pizza comes, and I turn to Rick, leaning close to his ear. “You’re my boyfriend?”

  We’ve never really defined our relationship, even before I was injured, but the thought of him thinking of me as his girlfriend—that he thinks of us as “official”—causes a tingle under my skin.

  “Unless that’s a problem for you.” I hear the tease in his voice and can’t stop my smile.

  We eat, and Jema talks my ears off about stuff I only half hear over the music, and the guys, who are already onto their third pitcher, are still trying to get Rick to drink. No one stares, and when Rick goes to the bar to get us both another Coke, Brian actually hits on me. He backs off when Rick comes back and threatens to rip his still beating heart out through his mouth.

  “You ready?” Rick finally asks me.

  “To go home?”

  He leans closer and lowers his voice. “I was hoping for some alone time before I had to drive you back.”

  Butterflies stir in my belly as he stands and tells his friends we’re heading out. They give him shit, but he ignores their catcalls as he leads me out the door. He takes my hand as he drives.

  “Happy birthday,” I say, leaning against him. “I didn’t get a chance to go shopping so . . .”

  He lets go of my hand and wraps his arm tightly around me. “I’ve got everything I want right here.”

  When we get to his apartment, he leads me in. It smells like dirty socks and stale pizza, which makes me wonder if he ever eats anything else.

  He barely has the door closed before he’s pressing me up against the back of it, kissing me as if his life depended on it. “There’s only one thing I want for my birthday,” he says, his voice rough. “I want as much of you as you’ll give me.”

  I’m shaking, three parts from anticipation, and one part from fear. “You’ve always had all of me, Rick,” I whisper against his lips.

  He lifts me by the hips, and I wrap my legs around him as he carries me to his bed. My heart pounds as he lays me across it.

  He starts to lift my shirt, but I grasp his wrist.

  “Okay?” he asks.

  I don’t let go. “Um . . . there are . . . more scars . . .” I lift his hand to my tingling stomach. “. . . here . . .” I slide his hand over my T-shirt to my right breast. “. . . and here.”

  He nuzzles my neck and his hand stays on my breast even after I let it go. “They’re part of who you are, and I love every inch of you.”

  My heart beats everywhere, making my body pulse with its rhythm, and the swell of emotion nearly chokes me.

  His finger traces the scar on my face, then he undresses me slowly. As his hands and mouth find my scars, before he kisses each one, he asks, “Okay?”

  I lose myself in his touch and his taste, and my fear fades into a growing need to be closer. And when he pauses for the condom and I have a second to think, I’m surprised to find, lying here naked, all my flaws exposed to him, I’m not self-conscious.

  His warm body presses against mine and he kisses me again, then his lips glide to my ear. “Okay?” he breathes, his fingertips whispering down my face.

  “Okay,” I answer without hesitation.

  He rocks into me and I feel electric. Totally alive. When I tip my head back in an attempt to contain the raw emotion rising from deep in my core, he drops kisses up my throat and my jawline to my ear, where he kisses away my tears and whispers, “I so fucking love you, Rene Vargas.”

  His firm pressure moving inside me fills my universe. It’s not my first time, but it feels like it. I’m not the person I was before. I’m starting to realize Rick is right. I’m not broken. I’m not pathetic. I’m not ugly. I’m customized, and unique, and from here I can be anything I want to be. He makes me feel beautiful. He makes me remember who I am, out from under everything that’s happened. And most of all, he makes me want to live.

  I’m done hiding from the world and from myself. And I never really could hide from Rick, even when I tried.

  About the Author

  LISA DESROCHERS is the USA Today bestselling author of the A Little Too Far series, courtesy of HarperCollins (where Rick makes his first appearance), and the young adult Personal Demons trilogy from Macmillan. She lives in Northern California with her husband, two very busy daughters, and Shini the tarantula.

  Find her online at www.lisadwrites.com, on Twitter at @LisaDez, and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/LisaDesrochersAuthor.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.

  Once Bitten

  COLE GIBSEN

  CAREFUL TO BREATHE through my nose, I picked at the edge of a piece of masking tape stuck to a butcher-papered bundle. A dark spot stained the bottom. I tilted the package toward the ground so the blood, if it spilled, would soak into the grass instead of my jeans. Blood was a bitch to get out of clothes.

  The sound of tires crunching over gravel pulled my attention away from the package. I looked up to find a black-and-white police cruiser rolled up my driveway. My stomach clenched and I groaned. “Oh, God, please no.”

  Two weeks earlier, while getting my hair cut, I heard a rumor that not only was he back in town, but he’d acquired a job on the force. With ten officers in the department, surely the odds were in my favor that whoever was about to exit the vehicle wouldn’t be him.

  However, when the door opened and I was met with a pair of melted chocolate–colored eyes, I realized luck had never been my strong suit. “Shit,” I murmured. I turned my eyes away from the sandy-haired man approaching me and instead focused on the hunk of flesh in my hand. It took everything I had to keep from flinging it in his face.

  “Avery Brown.” Even without looking, I heard the smile in his voice. My jaw clenched in response. “How long has it been?”

  I pressed my lips together. You mean how long has it been since you left for boot camp, deleted your Facebook account, and stopped calling and texting me?

  Four years.

  Four years since prom when you gave me a ring and promised the army wouldn’t change us.

  Four years since you broke that promise and shredded my heart into pieces.

  I would have thought I was over it by now, but the way my heart skipped at the sound of his voice proved I was anything but.

  “I don’t remember.” Forgetting the tape, I ripped into the butcher paper with my fingers. “What do you want, Officer Wade?”

  “Avery.” His lips pinched into a frown as if I’d hurt him. Good. “You can call me Tanner.”

  I met his eyes, trying my best to ignore the thousands of memories they resurfaced. “There are a dozen other things I’d like to call you. But in order to keep this civil, let’s stick with Officer Wade.”

  A smile twitched the corner of his mouth. “Fair enough.” He motioned to the deli package in my hands. “Am I interrupting your lunch? Looks a little rare.” A ghost of a dimple appeared, only to disappear just as quickly.

  A knot rose in my throat and I struggled to swallow around it. If I closed my eyes I could remember what it was like to kiss that dimple. I knew what it felt like to have his sandy curls twist around my fingers as I ran my hands through them. I could almost feel the heat of his skin as it bled into mine, and the ripples of his chest and the way I used to trail my fingers down to his stomach where the hair grew darker and thinner and . . . Damn it!

  I shook my head, hoping to dislodge the memories. Why would my body betray me by wanting something my brain so clearly knew was bad for me? I didn’t realize my hands were shaking until I looked down and saw the package trembling. Hoping Tanner hadn’t noticed, I peeled the last of the paper back and revealed the bloody mass underneath. “This isn’t lunch.”

  He wrinkled his nose and stepped backward. “What the hell is it?”

  “Pig skin.” I pinched the hunk of meat between my fingers, lifted it from the paper, an
d jiggled it in the air. Thank God for pig skin. Nothing could extinguish the fires of attraction faster than a hunk of bloody flesh. Feeling much more like myself again, I deposited the skin inside a water-filled mason jar and screwed the lid on tight. I set the jar down in a particularly sunny spot on the sidewalk and glanced skyward. “Lots of sun. That’s good.”

  He folded his arms across his chest and looked skyward. “Why is that good? And just what the hell are you doing with pig skin, anyway?”

  Just what the hell are you doing here asking me what I’m doing? I wanted to ask right back. Instead, I shrugged. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing how much his absence, and his return, affected me. “I’m making cadaver juice.”

  His skin paled. “What?”

  I couldn’t help but smile at his discomfort. “How much do you know about forensics, Officer Wade?” He opened his mouth but I cut him off before he could speak. “Did you know the closest you can get to the smell of a human corpse is decaying pig flesh?” I walked to the side of a building and grabbed a jar I’d left sitting out for a month. The skin inside had turned from bright pink to a sickly gray. The flesh itself appeared swollen and torn in papery layers. Carefully, I unscrewed the lid and set the jar at my feet. “Some dog trainers will pay for a pseudo cadaver scent. But I found there’s no substitution for the real thing.”

  Tanner made a noise that suspiciously sounded like a gag. He quickly masked it with a cough. “That’s disgusting.”

  “Exactly why I like to work alone.” I squatted down in front of the jar, careful to keep breathing through my mouth. One whiff of what sat inside the jar and I’d be bent over the bushes showing Tanner what I had for lunch. It didn’t matter that I’d been training search and rescue dogs for over three years—ever since I graduated high school. The smell of death was something you never got used to. “I train dogs to find missing people. And as much as I want my dogs to find them alive, they have to be prepared for the alternative.”

  I dared a glance up to find him looking at me appraisingly. Turning back to my task, I had to remind myself I didn’t care what he thought of me, anymore. My junior year, though only four years passed, suddenly felt like an eternity ago now that the person I’d given my heart to showed up out of the blue and wanted to play “Guess the Hidden Meaning of My Expression.” I was too old for that shit. Still, I dared another quick look. Goddamn did he fill out that uniform.