“You look good in my clothes,” Mick said.
Alice smiled. With her face scrubbed and wet hair slicked back from her forehead, she still looked luminous and beautiful enough to stop his heart. She looked a little shy, though.
“Are you sure this is okay?”
Mick pulled back the blankets. “Get in.”
She hopped into bed, scooting over and turning on her side so he could spoon her. He buried his face in her damp hair, breathing her in. His hand fit naturally on her belly, just below the hem of his T-shirt. He was already falling asleep when she spoke.
“Hey.”
Mick yawned. “Yeah?”
“I don’t like it when you don’t call me back,” Alice said after a second or so.
Her voice had been matter-of-fact and low, not confrontational or bitchy. Still, it set him back a little. Mick’s fingers twitched on her bare skin.
“Okay,” was all he said.
Alice was silent.
“I can’t always get back to you right away,” Mick said after another few seconds had passed. “I mean, sometimes I’m busy.”
She shifted to look at him. “Well, yeah. I know that. I’m just saying that in general, I don’t like it when you don’t answer me. I know sometimes you’re busy, we all are. But when you just don’t answer me at all, well, that’s not cool.”
“I always answer you.” Defensive, Mick moved away from her a little bit.
“You didn’t today. I called and left a message for you, and you didn’t answer.”
He thought about that, knowing she was right but still not willing to take blame for what he didn’t think needed it. “I would have called you tomorrow, Alice. You know that.”
“I hope so,” was all she said and tucked herself back against him.
Shit. This wasn’t an argument, but it had the flavor of one. He thought of a comeback and discarded it. Then another. He listened to the soft sound of her breathing slow and felt her relax against him. She was falling asleep, but now Mick was wide-eyed. Not quite with indignation, that was too strong a word for it. But definitely irritation.
“I always answer you,” he said again. “Maybe it takes me awhile, but I do.”
Alice’s breathing caught, and she twitched. Her voice, thick with sleep, rasped. “You didn’t today, and we could’ve had lunch together or something, because you were in York, but you didn’t call me back.”
“I was busy working, Alice, I didn’t have time for lunch.”
She pushed away from him this time to sit up. She rubbed at her face. “Well, I didn’t know that. If you’d called to let me know, I wouldn’t have gotten my hopes up.”
Mick sat, too. “What’s the big deal? I don’t get it.”
“It’s just that … I was missing you. And when you IM’d me, I got excited, I thought maybe we’d get to see each other in the middle of the week, and I wouldn’t have to wait until Friday or Saturday.” She paused. “If you’d called me back and told me you were too busy with work, I’d have been disappointed, but I’d have understood. But you didn’t.”
“We still got to see each other,” Mick pointed out. “You’re here now.”
“Because I called you! Because Jay asked me out for happy hour, and I was close enough to stop here! That’s the only reason!”
This was not the kind of conversation he wanted to be having at nearly two in the morning. And he definitely didn’t want her to start crying or some shit like that, but there were tears in her voice. With a scowl, Mick ran his hands through his hair to keep himself from saying something he’d regret.
“Never mind,” Alice said sullenly. She moved to the edge of the bed, her back to him. “I’ll be out of here by five or so.”
Mick lay back, staring at the ceiling, jaw clenched. Beside him, too far away to touch but close enough he could still feel every move she made, Alice was as still as a corpse. Maybe she’d been able to fall asleep, but there was no way Mick was going to.
She was right. He had not called her back, nor had he intended to. Well, sure, he would’ve called her the next day, but he really hadn’t returned her call today on purpose. No special reason, other than she’d caught him when he was busy and by the time he got home all he wanted was to eat dinner and watch a few hours of TV and crash. He’d thought about calling her, but in the end, he’d been unable to muster the energy for a conversation.
“I needed a break,” Mick said aloud.
From the edge of the bed, Alice made no sound but the subtle, hesitant shift of her breathing.
“I was tired, and I knew if I called you back that you’d want me to meet up because I was so close, and I didn’t have time for lunch, so I figured you’d angle for dinner, and I really just wanted to get home.”
Quietly, smoothly, Alice sat. In the dark, she was only a silhouette, which meant he didn’t have to see her face. Mick wasn’t sure he wanted to.
“I see,” she said.
“I was tired.”
He heard her swallow. “Okay.”
“I would’ve called you tomorrow, Alice. You know I would have.”
“I don’t know that,” she told him, and shit, she was crying, he could hear it. “I hope that you would, but I don’t know that you would. Not really. Because I thought you’d call me back today, and you didn’t. And I thought you’d call me back last week, but you didn’t then, either. So, I get it. You needed a break. Sorry. I shouldn’t have come over—”
“Don’t,” he said as a way to cut her off before this got out of hand.
She shrugged off his touch and got out of bed. “Don’t what? Go home? If you need a break so bad, I shouldn’t be here, right? Let me give you a break.”
“No, Alice, c’mon, that’s not—”
She was already taking off her borrowed clothes, searching for her own, but with only the light coming in from the window, she was having a hard time. Mick watched her for half a minute, then got out of bed. He tried to take her by the arm, but she pulled away.
“I guess it’s fine when your dick is in my mouth,” she snapped. “Then you don’t need a break, huh?”
“That’s a shitty thing to say!”
She whirled on him, wearing only her panties and clutching the rest of her clothes to her chest. “It’s true, though, isn’t it? When I try to make plans with you, you can never manage to give me more than a day’s notice or so. You don’t return my calls or texts sometimes, and now I find out it’s because you need a break. A break, Mick? I see you once or twice a week, and I haven’t ever asked you for more than that, because we live just far enough apart to make it kind of a pain to get together. But guess what, I would make the effort to see you, even if I have to get up at five A.M. to get to work the next day. Or even just for dinner and then we both went home. I’d make it work to see you, Mick, because to me, it’s worth the effort.”
She’d stopped fighting to get away from him, but she didn’t let him pull her closer. His fingers had dug into her upper arms, and he relaxed his grip. He let his hands slide down her arms, then let her go.
“When you love somebody, you should make them worth the effort,” Alice whispered.
She looked at him, waiting. He knew what she wanted to hear, but he couldn’t say it. He could tell her he loved her a dozen times, and it probably wouldn’t be enough, because that was how love worked. You fell into it like a deep, dark pit, and you couldn’t get out.
Mick frowned. “I took you to see my family. Isn’t that making an effort?”
“I liked meeting them. Yes, it was.” She put her clothes on the chair and slipped on her shirt, buttoning it over bare flesh. “And when we are together, Mick, we have a good time.”
“I have a good time with you, too.”
She looked at him. He could barely make out her features, but he could see enough to know that she wasn’t crying. At least there was that.
“It’s not how it feels when we’re together, Mick. It’s how it feels when we’re apart.” Here s
he gave a low and bitter laugh. “When I’m not with you, I’m never quite sure if you’re thinking about me. Or how you feel about me. If you like me or love me or just want to fuck me, I have no idea. And I shouldn’t have to guess that. Not ever.”
“Why does it have to be all or nothing with you?” The words came out angry, and yeah, he was kind of pissed, but more than that, disappointed. Stung. “Why can’t we just have fun?”
“Because this isn’t just fun for me!” Alice’s shout shoved him back a step. “Not anymore. Dammit, Mick, I’m not asking you to tell me you love me if you don’t, but don’t play with my feelings this way. That’s not fair.”
“I do love you,” Mick said slowly. “On some level.”
* * *
Alice had always known she had a temper. Her mother had told her over and over as a kid that nice girls didn’t get mad … but maybe, Alice had learned, nice girls got even. At Mick’s words, “on some level,” two things had happened. One, she’d felt a real and physical pain in her heart as though he’d stabbed her. Two, the rising tide of her fury had swept away the rest of her reasonable thought.
She kissed him hard enough to bruise, then bit his lower lip. Her fingers gouged his shoulder blades, holding him close, though at the sting of her violent kiss, Mick jerked. His mouth opened, and she stabbed inside it with her tongue. One hand went between his legs to cup his balls, then to stroke along his cock through his pajama bottoms. She’d never felt him completely flaccid—every time they’d been together, he’d always been at least semi-hard at her first touch.
Only a few hours ago she’d been on her knees, consumed with the thought of pleasing him. Now, she thought, if she put his dick in her mouth it wouldn’t end well. And yet when she pushed him back toward the bed and followed him, straddling him, wearing nothing but her panties and the misbuttoned shirt she’d worn to work, every touch fanned the fire that never really went out between them.
“Alice—”
“Shut up,” she ordered, half expecting him to protest, but Mick went quiet except for the low groan easing out of him when she ran her nails up his chest.
Alice squeezed her thighs against his hips. His cock bulged in his pajama bottoms, but she didn’t touch it, not even to rub herself against it. Instead, she slipped out of her panties. She cupped her pussy, feeling the heat. She dipped a finger deep. She’d taken a shower but was still slick inside from earlier. Now her fingers slid in and out easily, then up to circle her clit. In the next minute, she moved up over him to kneel over his face.
Without a word, Mick put his mouth on her. His tongue fit automatically to her clit as his hands went to her hips. Alice put her hands on his headboard, her hips already rocking. The unshaven stubble above his lip and on his chin scratched but oh so fucking deliciously against her flesh as his lips and tongue worked on her. She rode his mouth, giving him no time to pause. No room to speak.
Only time and space to give her pleasure.
Earlier, her orgasm had rippled like waves, but this, oh, shit, this time she was going to come like a door slamming. Like a fist punching. This climax rose and rose, ripping and tearing, leaving her breathless. She cried out with it. Not his name, she refused to give him that. A low, wordless gasp, rough and harsh and sharp around the edges.
Before it had even passed, Alice moved down his body to kiss him hard. Their tongues and teeth fought. He bit her, maybe by accident, maybe on purpose. She couldn’t be sure. Didn’t care. She reared back, her hand moving to slap him before his caught her wrist with a thud of flesh on flesh. She was still moving, belly to belly. His cock, rock hard between them even though he’d already come in her mouth earlier. Mick thrust against her, making her shudder, making her hate him even more that he could cause her to react this way even when he made her so fucking angry.
He pushed a hand between them, fingers deep inside and curling, making her hips bump forward. She cried out again, meaning to move away from that magic touch but unable to make herself, not when it felt so good. Oh, so good … She lifted to let him fuck deeper into her, his thumb on her clit. Harder, harder, she would regret it in the morning when she was sore, but oh fuck, right now she was hurtling toward another orgasm.
“Fuck me,” she gasped out, biting at the words, hating herself for saying them but not enough to take them back.
His cock was already nudging her pussy, and at her words he slipped fully inside her. No friction, nothing but sweet, liquid acceptance, her body to his. He moved and she moved, and they moved together like a rolling ocean, like a train on the tracks, like a key in a lock, like they had always been meant to fit together.
He fucked her fast and hard, both of them shuddering and grunting. When she tried to sit up, he caught her by the wrists and pulled her down to make her kiss him. His tongue fucked her mouth in the same rhythm.
Everything, fire. Everything, pleasure. Everything … love.
She came, and this time, Alice said his name. Over and over again, until he answered her. They came together and ended up in a quivering, sweaty heap of tangled limbs. When she could focus and move, Alice still stayed where she was, her face pressed to the curve of his neck, even as he softened and slipped out of her. Only then did she get up and go to the bathroom to clean up.
She would not cry. Would not break. She’d wanted to know how he felt about her. She had no right to complain about the answer, no matter how shitty it had made her feel.
Back in bed, she dove beneath the blankets to breathe herself to calmness. When Mick slid in next to her and spooned her close, Alice didn’t mold herself to him the way she always had before.
“I never understood the concept of hate-fucking before,” she told him.
Mick kissed her shoulder, bare because she’d taken off her shirt and wore only panties. “I don’t want you to hate me, Alice.”
She didn’t. But this morning she might not even have said she loved him, at least not until he’d said it first. Fortunately, she didn’t have to answer him, because the low buzz of his soft snoring told her he’d fallen asleep.
She was still awake when the sun peeked through the window, and she got up and gathered her things. Mick didn’t stir when she kissed him. And that was probably for the best, she told herself when she let herself out the front door. That way, she didn’t have to say good-bye.
* * *
She didn’t call him on Thursday. Or on Friday. And Mick didn’t call Alice, either, not sure if she wanted to talk to him. Not sure he wanted to hear what she might say.
On Saturday, he couldn’t hold off any longer. Two days without Alice, he’d discovered, was two days longer than he’d ever wanted to go without her. Still, when she answered, the cool tone of her voice made him want to hang up.
“Hey,” he said by way of greeting. “What’s up?”
“I’m doing laundry. You?”
“Fun Saturday morning. I’m at the grocery store. Want me to get you anything?”
Alice didn’t laugh. “Chores, everyone has to do them, right? I guess I’d better hit the store later, too.”
He waited for her to ask him what he was doing later. They’d never made plans in advance, something he’d always thought made them spontaneous but now realized had annoyed her. Contrary, he didn’t want to say anything about it now. It was stupid, and he knew it, but his mouth still wouldn’t make the words.
“Did you have fun … did you do anything fun last night?” Lame ass, Mick told himself.
Alice waited a moment before saying, “I went out with my sister and some friends. You?”
“Oh, yeah, got together with some buddies,” Mick lied, sure she’d know right away he was making it all up. “Getting together to watch the game later today. Picking up snacks and stuff. Big game. Gotta get moving.”
Shit, why had he said that? Now there was no way to ask her to see him later. Idiot.
“Well,” Alice said in a clipped voice, “sounds like you’re busy. I guess I’ll talk to you later. Call me w
hen you have some time for me.”
He could’ve asked her to wait, told her he had all the time in the world for her. He could have asked her out for tonight, but Mick hated it when women acted like they were the only ones who got to be upset about stuff. Or that it was only the guy’s responsibility to fix things. His ex Shanna had been like that, always expecting him to read her mind or make things up to her for crimes he hadn’t even known he’d committed.
Alice was nothing like Shanna.
And Mick knew it, too, just like he knew she had a right to be upset with him, even if he hadn’t meant to upset her. But there seemed to be no good way to say so now without reminding her they’d had a fight … sort of … and that it hadn’t been resolved. She’d snuck out in the morning without so much as a kiss, not even a note, and she hadn’t said a goddamn word to him since then, but it was his job to patch things up?
It had taken him about thirty seconds to think of all that, but thirty seconds is a really long time for silence on a telephone call. The soft huff of her breathing sounded pissed off. Well, guess what, he thought. He was still pissed off, too.
“Later,” Mick said, and hung up before she could say anything.
He regretted it immediately. He had no plans for tonight, because he’d assumed he’d be with her. And shit, even if they hadn’t specifically said anything, why shouldn’t she assume the same thing? Why did he have to spell it out for her? If she wanted him to be the guy who showed up for every date with flowers and candy, Mick thought sourly as he passed the chocolate aisle, she had the wrong guy.
“I should never have to guess how you feel,” she’d said, and remembering that pissed him off all over again.
How could she even wonder if he thought about her? Fuck, he thought about her all the damn time. She drove him crazy, that’s what Alice did. Distracted him, made it hard to do anything else but think about her.