The Outskirts

  two words, Josh was telling me we could move on. All of us.

  Together.

  “Are you going to try this?” I nodded to Sawyer’s wine glass.

  She looked down into her glass and sniffed it. I knew she hadn’t been lying about never having tasted wine before when she picked up her glass with two hands and lifted it to her mouth.

  The three of us watched her intently.

  It was damned adorable the way she looked at me over the rim of her glass like she was asking me if she was doing it right.

  I offered her a reassuring nod.

  Sawyer took a large gulp and swallowed. She made a face like she’d bitten into something unexpectedly sour. “This,” she looked down into her glass and grimaced, “is really disgusting.”

  We all laughed, including Sawyer, and the sound carried over the table and struck me right in the chest.

  “You’ve really never had wine before?” Josh asked, pouring herself another glass.

  “Nope,” Sawyer said, taking another small tentative sip. “This would be the first time.”

  “Oh really? What else haven’t you done before?” Miller wagged his eyebrows suggestively. Josh and I exchanged knowing side glances, Sawyer frowned, not fully understanding his unique brand of innuendo.

  “There are a lot of things I haven’t done. Some days I feel like I haven’t done MOST things.” Sawyer leaned forward in her chair.

  The breeze picked up and blew a lock of hair in her face and I was mesmerized by the pure beauty that was Sawyer.

  Then, as if she was reading my mind, she tucked the strand behind her ear.

  “What is on your list? What would you like to do?” Josh asked, steering the conversation back into the PG zone.

  Sawyer bit her bottom lip and her eyes lit up. She looked whimsically at the stars as she thought over her answer. “Mostly it’s little things.”

  “Like what?” I found myself asking. I sipped my beer, staring at Sawyer over the bottle.

  “Well, I’d like to read any book I want without it being approved. Which is why I wish the library was still open. “

  “If it were, I’m pretty sure you and Finn would be the only people going there,” Josh said.

  “Finn?” she asked, glancing up at me.

  “Didn’t you know? Finn here has read like every book ever,” Miller said, stabbing his fork into a cheese cube.

  “At least he knows how to read,” Josh muttered.

  “I know how to read,” Miller argued, pointing the cheese at Josh. “Maxim has more than just pictures, you know.”

  “What else?” I prompted, curious as to what else she could possibly have on her list. What else I could give her.

  How else I could make her smile.

  “Well, now that I’ve tasted wine…” Sawyer chuckled, taking another sip and grimacing all over again.

  “It’s an acquired taste,” Josh assured her.

  She smiled and sucked in air through her teeth. “Everything. Everything is on my list. I want to taste and experience everything life has to offer. It’s too short to waste and I’ve spent twenty-one years wasting it.”

  “So, you’re saying that you want to commit crimes and rob banks?” I teased.

  “Sure, why not?” she answered back. Holding her wine glass without drinking from it.

  “Nah, I don’t think you’ve got it in you,” Miller said, with his beer paused at his lips.

  Sawyer’s smile was spreading, she set her wine glass down. “I did steal.”

  “Really? Oh, this is going to be good. What did you steal?” Josh asked, pouring herself another glass.

  Sawyer smirked, popping out the dimple on her cheek. “I stole money from my father. Technically it was the church’s money. I took it before I left.”

  “So, what? You took like twenty-bucks from the collection plate?” Miller scoffed, belching loudly.

  Josh kicked him under the table.

  “Ouch, baby. Next time you’re going to hurt me make sure you do it when we’re naked.”

  “Try nineteen thousand dollars from the weekly church donations,” Sawyer corrected, sitting straight in her chair.

  I tightened my grip on the arm of my chair and almost spit out my beer.

  The table was silent until Josh chimed in. “No way. You’re lying.”

  “It’s true. He asked me to make the deposit. Instead, I took it when I left.”

  “What did you do with the money?” Miller asked curiously, hanging on Sawyer’s every word.

  “On the way here, to Outskirts, I stopped and donated half to a battered women and children’s center and the other half to a suicide prevention call center.” Sawyer started to giggle midway through her sentence, by the time she was done she was in a full-blown bit of laughter.

  “Bad ass!” Miller exclaimed, raising his beer in salute before finishing it and slamming it back down on the table.

  “What’s so funny?” I asked Sawyer. Laughing along with her although I didn’t know why except that Sawyer’s laugh was infectious.

  “I made the donations in my father’s name.”

  Then we were all laughing along with her. The sound of Sawyer’s laughter carried straight to my heart where nothing but joy and pride were causing it to beat erratically.

  Noticeably absent, was my old friend guilt.

  “Wow, that’s ballsy.” Josh gave Sawyer a fist bump, which she awkwardly returned.

  Sawyer’s eye caught mine like she was waiting to hear my response to what she’d done. “I’m impressed,” I said.

  She beamed.

  And I was. My innocent girl had done something that took a hell of a lot of guts. Come to think of it, everything she did took a hell of a lot of guts.

  I reached out and grabbed the arm of her chair, sliding it as close to me as possible. I planted a soft but firm kiss on her plump pink lips and looked her right in her eyes, cupping her cheek in my hand. “That’s my girl.”

  A throat cleared. “Your girl, huh?” Miller asked, raising his eyebrows.

  I answered without breaking eye contact with Sawyer who was still smiling up at me.

  “Yeah. MY girl.”

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Sawyer

  My girl.

  I was downright giddy when I excused myself to go inside to grab the pie I’d baked. When I came back out onto the deck the three old friends were laughing about some memory from their childhood and although I had no idea what they were talking about I smiled and laughed right along with them. I couldn’t remember ever having this much fun during a meal.

  Miller was still talking as he put a pink pill on the table and started crushing it with the back of his spoon before using a rolled-up dollar bill to snort the powder up his nose.

  Finn looked unaffected by his behavior, like he’d seen it a thousand times before, while the look on Josh’s face was that of disapproval and annoyance as she glared down at Miller who was snorting lines off the table.

  “What?” Miller asked when he noticed Josh was watching him.

  Finn chuckled and squeezed my knee.

  She waved a hand over the powder on the table.

  “Oh that?” Miller asked. “It’s just Ritalin. It’s for my ADHD,” he nodded at his own statement and snorted another line with his eyes defiantly glued to Josh’s.

  Josh snatched the pill bottle from Miller’s pocket. She tapped a nail against the label. “Oh yeah, it says right here to crush three tablets twice a day and snort with food,” she said sarcastically. “Can you at least pretend you have respect for the fact that I’m a cop.”

  “Yes, as soon as you can show some respect for my chosen profession,” Miller said, with his powder covered nose in the air.

  “Your profession?” Josh questioned.

  “Yes, well, one of them anyway.”

  “Drug dealer?” Josh chimed in. “You mean that one?”

  “I like to consider myself more of a sommelier of narcotics.” He sniffled
. “I don’t see you giving Finn shit about smoking weed.”

  “Because it’s WEED you moron. It’s legal in some states. And please. Remember one thing, I’m giving you SHIT about it. I’m not arresting you for it.”

  “Well, that is a good thing because…” Miller started.

  “YET,” she interrupted, pinning him to the back of his chair with her hardened glare.

  “You wouldn’t,” Miller whispered dramatically, drawing out the words slowly as he leaned away from Josh.

  “Try me.”

  I pressed my lips together so I wouldn’t laugh.

  “If you arrest me I’ll take that to mean we aren’t getting married and having babies,” Miller said.

  “You talk a big game, but you do realize you’ve never so much as asked me out,” Josh announced suddenly, stunning everyone at the table including Miller who looked downright offended.

  “I have too!” Miller argued.

  Josh rolled her eyes. “Oh please, inviting me for tacos, tequila, and anal isn’t asking me out.”

  Miller’s jaw dropped. He held a hand over his chest. “I think it sounds like a perfectly romantic way to spend an evening. You’re just too picky.”

  “Maybe I am,” she shrugged.

  “Well then maybe you should just stick with pussy,” Miller groaned.

  Josh stood from the chair and narrowed her gaze at him, holding her stare until he looked up and jumped when he found her standing directly above him. “What?” he asked, shifting in his chair.

  “Maybe you should stop BEING a pussy,” Josh spat. And with that, she was gone, across the clearing, heading for Finn’s shack.

  Miller looked back and forth between Finn and then me. “What the fuck just happened?” Miller asked.

  “I think you just got rejected. AGAIN,” Finn said, cracking open a beer.

  “Fuccckkkk…I already offered tacos, sushi, and anal. What else is there?” Miller asked dropping his head to his hands.

  “No, that’s not it at all. She didn’t reject you,” I interjected.

  “She didn’t?” both Miller and Finn asked at the same time.

  I shook my head. “Nope.”

  “Then…what DID happen?” Miller asked. Both him and Finn leaned forward in their chairs.

  I took a sip of my beer and smiled. “I think she just told you to bring your A game.”

  Miller growled something inaudible and followed Josh over to Finn’s cabin.

  “Thank you for all this,” I said, once we were alone. “You didn’t have to buy me a house just to get me to like you. I liked you right from the beginning, even when I thought I didn’t.”

  “I didn’t do it to get you to like me. I did it because I wanted to make you happy. I wanted to make you feel good,” Finn said.

  “Why?”

  “Because,” he turned his chair toward mine so our knees were touching. “I’ve learned that when I make you feel good it makes me feel good too.”

  I swallowed hard. “It does?”

  “In fact, I’ll show you…”

  He leaned in. Our lips were only a hair’s breadth apart when a bang broke through the space between us and echoed across the clearing.

  “Was that…a gunshot?” I called out to Finn who was already racing across to the shack.

  “Stay behind me,” he ordered as I followed him.

  Finn cast me a worried side glance as we reached the porch of the shack. “I sure as hell hope not.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Sawyer

  “Ho-lee shit,” Finn said suddenly. Stopping so abruptly I ran right into his back as he gazed through the screen door without making a move to step inside.

  “What?” I asked, curious as to what had gotten his attention. I stepped in front of him and the scene in the kitchen had me gasping. “Ho-lee shit,” I repeated Finn’s earlier sentiment in a whisper. He covered my mouth with his big palm although I think I could’ve shouted and the two people in the kitchen wouldn’t have heard me, their attentions fixated solely on one another.

  Finn chuckled softly. “I knew it,” he muttered. He pulled me to the side of the house out of view. However, when I turned back around I could still see Miller and Josh clearly through a crack in the siding. They were stark naked. Josh’s back was against the kitchen counter, her head tilted back, her lips parted in excess. Miller stood between her spread thighs relentlessly pounding himself into her. His butt muscles clenched with each rhythmic thrust.

  “We probably shouldn’t be watching this,” I whispered, unable to pull my eyes away. I took a step back directly into Finn’s hard chest.

  Instead of stepping back and giving me room to flee Finn surprised me by placing his hands on my shoulders and walking me right up to the living room window where we now had front row seats to the sexiest show I’d ever seen.

  I swallowed hard and gasped when Finn wrapped his arms around my shoulders and pulled me back against him. “Do you like what you see?” he asked, his voice low and hoarse. His hands wrapped loosely around my throat.

  “I…I’m not sure,” I answered breathlessly, confused by my reaction to both flee and watch. “I hate the fact that my first reaction to this was hearing my father’s voice in my head telling me that what they’re doing is shameful. That my body is shameful.”

  Finn tensed. “Say, sex is not shameful. It’s two people wanting to make each other feel good. To give them pleasure. And I will tell you right fucking now that there isn’t a thing about YOU that is shameful. You’re beautiful, and feminine, and soft, and your body is something to be proud of, to enjoy.” He ran his hand down my side, heating my skin everywhere he touched.

  I shivered.

  “Sex, making love, fucking, whatever you want to call it. It’s normal. Natural.” Finn glanced back inside. “Well, other than it being Miller and Josh doing it. There is nothing normal when it comes to those two,” he joked, his breath hot against my ear.

  Finn moved my hair off my shoulder and pressed his lips against my neck. He trailed his lips from the base of my neck right behind my ear and I felt myself pushing back against him. He bit down on my skin between my neck and shoulder. I moaned when the sensation sent a shot of pleasure between my legs. Finn responded by grasping me tighter against him.