Dean touched one of the plants. “You really have a green thumb. What kind are these?”
“Mostly flowers, but there’s a spider ivy on the bottom tier,” I said. “Geraniums, begonias, pentas. I bought a yellow amaryllis last week. I haven’t named it yet.”
“Named it?”
Embarrassment heated my cheeks. “I name all my plants. Svengali, Mrs. Danvers, Cruella de Vil, the White Witch.”
He turned to look at me. “You name your plants after villains?”
“Just a silly thing. A way of turning something bad into something good.” I went toward the kitchen. “Can I get you a soda?”
“Just water, thanks.”
I poured him a glass and returned to the living room. He’d wandered over to examine the books on the shelves. I flushed at the thought that I had some spicy erotica titles tucked in among the textbooks. If he saw them, however, he gave no indication. Or he didn’t mind.
Instead he picked up the small, framed picture of North that I kept on the lower shelf. Nervousness rolled through me suddenly. I’d never talked about North with anyone, not because I didn’t want to but because I’d never had anyone to talk about him with.
I’d taken the picture outside North’s workshop and made a bunch of silly faces until he’d finally smiled. His grin showed through his bushy beard, the little braid tied with a red ribbon visible on the right side, and his leathery features squinted against the sun. His long, graying hair was pulled back into a ponytail.
“Your dad?” Dean asked.
“No.” I put the glass on the coffee table and wiped my hands on my skirt. “Just a good friend. Not that kind of friend,” I added when he glanced at me with a hint of a scowl. “The kind of friend who helps you remember which way is up. And who reminds you that sometimes that’s the only direction you can go.”
Dean looked at me, still holding the photo. “You’re lucky to have a friend like that.”
“North was… special.”
“North?”
“Short for Northern Star Richmond.”
“Seriously?”
I smiled. “His parents were hippies.”
Dean put the photo back on the shelf. “So you used to live in California?”
“I traveled there a few times with my mother, then I went back before I started at community college. Lived on a commune.”
“A commune?”
“They’re called other things now. Intentional communities. Cooperative living. But, yeah, it was near Santa Cruz. Twelve Oaks. My mother and I lived there when I was thirteen, then I went back by myself a few years later. I thought I’d just visit for a week or so, but I stayed for a year. North was the guy who ran the place.”
I realized I was opening the door to questions I didn’t want to answer. I gestured to the sofa. “So make yourself at home. I’m just going to take a quick shower and change.”
“Take your time.”
He settled on the sofa and picked up a coffee-table book about the history of literature. I went into my bedroom and closed the door. As I stripped out of my clothes, my heart pounded harder. I was acutely aware that a thin wall separated me from Dean.
Was he remembering that night in his apartment? Was he thinking about kissing me again? Was he thinking about me undressing?
My blood warmed at the speculation. I pushed my underwear off and stood there naked for a moment, staring at my reflection in the mirror on the opposite wall. I didn’t often look at myself naked. My legs were short but well shaped, and I had a curvy, full-breasted body that I was still, at twenty-four, trying to feel comfortable in.
I slid my hands down my waist, which tapered to round hips and my not-quite-flat belly. I tried to imagine Dean’s hands on me, his long fingers sliding across my hipbones and down between my legs.
I shivered and turned away from the mirror. My cheeks warmed. I pulled on a thick robe and ducked into the bathroom. After turning on the shower, I stood under the hot spray and wondered what it would feel like to breach the distance between my imagination and reality.
My very vivid imagination. My very mundane reality.
I wanted to live in the space where the two met. I imagined it as a place of sunlight and green trees where a man and I wanted each other with crackling desire and our bodies fell into pleasure.
I closed my eyes and let the water stream over my face. What if Dean was thinking about me in the shower? What if he was imagining what I looked like naked and wet? I trembled at the thought, almost feeling the heat of his gaze.
A bolt of arousal went through me. I grabbed the soap and lathered up, drawing in a sharp breath when my palms glided over my hard nipples. Pleasure zinged along my nerves. He was there. Sitting so close…
I rubbed soapy froth over my belly. The bubbles slipped from my skin. Hot water pounded on my neck and shoulders. I grasped the shower bar and rubbed the soap between my legs, unable to resist pressing a finger into my cleft. A shudder rocked me. Oh…