Every Second with You

Chapter Sixteen





Trey

I must be made of iron.

Harley’s been sitting topless on my futon for the last hour. The window is open, and a warm breeze filters in? mingling with The Postal Service playing faintly on my phone. The heat wave has broken, but it’s still September, and there’s a light sheen of sweat on her neck. It takes all my resistance not to lick her right now.

But then, resistance is something I’ve learned to manage better. We both went to an SLAA meeting this evening—she to the girls,’ me to the guys,’ and then we came back here so I could practice.

She’s behaved too, sitting cross-legged, wearing only a pair of white cotton underwear, as she reads a book for her literature class and I draw on her chest. Her blond hair is twisted with a pencil on top of her head, and a few loose strands have fallen. One sticks to her neck, the heat making it curl. She is the perfect canvas, and I’m nearly done. She twitches once as I finish shading in the last pink blossom right under her collarbone using a tattoo stencil pen.

“Stay still,” I tell her in a soft voice.

“I am,” she says, never taking her eyes off the pages.

A few minutes later, I’m finished.

I release a breath I barely realized I was holding, and then relax my shoulders. I stand up and look at the drawing on her body. It starts above her right breast and curves over to her bare, unmarked shoulder.

“Come look,” I say and bring her to the bathroom.

She appraises herself in the mirror, nodding several times as she admires the pink blossoms, the red leaves, and the brown branches. “This is amazing. You are seriously talented, Trey. You might almost tempt me to have you do one on me too.”

“Thank you for letting me practice on you. You know what the cherry blossom tree means?”

She shakes her head.

“In Japan, it’s a symbol for the preciousness of life. With tattoos, it represents femininity and beauty, so it’s perfect for you,” I tell her, watching her eyes shine in the reflection. She is so beautiful. I press my lips to her neck, kissing her, and then licking off her sweat. I watch her reaction in the mirror. Her eyes flutter closed, and she draws in a quick breath. “Especially now,” I whisper. “It’s even more perfect for you now.”

Her lips part, and she moans lightly.

“And this reminds me that I have unfinished business with you.”

“What’s that?”

“Something I was remiss in doing last night.”

She opens her eyes, meets my gaze in the mirror. “What would that be?”

I spin her around. “I wanted to be inside you so much last night that I couldn’t wait. But now I can do my favorite thing. I love going down on you,” I tell her and she inhales sharply, licks her lips and nods a yes.

I run my fingers along her hipbone, that spot that drives her wild, before I fall to my knees, and pull down her underwear, helping her step out of them.

I look up at her, and she’s ready, her eyes are hazy, and she reaches for my hair, threading her fingers through me, pulling me close. I lick her softly at first, because that’s how she likes it. She needs the tease, the kiss, my lips against her and kissing her wetness like I do her mouth, before I plunge my tongue inside her. She cries out, clasps a hand over her mouth, and yanks hard on my hair.

I know this won’t take long, and I love when she loses control like this, because I’m the only one she’s ever been like this for. Ever, ever, ever. I make quick work of her, cupping her sexy ass, burying my tongue inside her. She rocks her hips against my mouth, fast, and then faster, until she’s f*cking my face just the way I like it. This is my favorite place to be, and I couldn’t be happier to hear her pant and moan as I kiss her senseless until she comes, hard. She tastes so f*cking good on my lips.

After her legs stop shaking, I stand up and run my finger across her jawline. She shivers against my touch, her eyes all wild and drugged.

“I love everything about the way you taste,” I tell her.

“You do?”

I nod. “Everything. Do you have any idea how many times I thought about doing that to you during those six months when we were just friends?”

She shakes her head. “No. How many times?”

“Every single night. I can’t get enough of it.”

“I think it’s your turn now though,” she says.

I don’t argue with that as she strips me, takes me in her mouth, and I lose my mind with pleasure.

Later, we’re naked on my futon, and Harley lays her hand on my thigh. “So listen, remember those cards I told you I found?”

“Yeah.”

“I went back to my mom’s and I did what you said.”

Oh shit. I flash back to the day she went there, when she tried to talk about it and I was far too focused on f*cking her to listen. But I want to listen now. I want to know.

“What did you find?”

“More cards,” she says, and then she jumps up and grabs her purse.

She digs into her purse, and shows me several cards. I study each one, tracing the words as if I can decode them. Stories of the sand, the beach, and a girl. Like this one: She could build them as high as the sky, with sand turrets and towers that reached for the clouds. Only, there were no clouds where she was, underneath the bluest of blue, so different from the places she was used to . . .

“It’s kind of a cool story,” I say.

“Yeah, I love it. And that’s all the more reason why I want to find them,” she says, and tells me how she and Kristen hunted for a name, an address, any sort of information. “I really want to know where they are. How to reach them. I want to talk to them, Trey. So what do I do?”

I push my hand through my hair, running through scenarios in my head. Sites to try, names to research, documents to look into, but the reality is we’re here in New York, and her grandparents are probably somewhere in California, and she doesn’t even know their last name. She can’t waltz into the hall of records for the county and dig around till she finds the info. I wish I knew a detective, or an investigator to track them down, but then it hits me.

There’s one person who just knows stuff. Who can find things out.

And I can’t believe I’m about to suggest this because two months ago he was my worst enemy, but he might be the one who can help her. And it takes every ounce of guts and restraint to get the words to travel from my brain to my throat to my mouth to my lips, but I want this for Harley, and I want to show her I can move on.

“What if you asked Cam to help find them? He could probably figure out their names somehow, right?”

She blinks several times as if she doesn’t recognize me, as if I’m some strange robot inside her boyfriend’s body.

“Are you serious?” Her mouth hangs open, the shock still lingering.

“Give it a shot,” I say, even though there’s a part of my brain that’s smacking me for suggesting this at all. But I ignore that part because I know this is what she needs. “I want you to find them and he’s one of those people, right? He’s the kind of person, for better or worse, who knows how to figure things out. Just don’t wear your socks and Mary Janes when you go see him, okay?”


She shakes her head, and laughs. “I burned those motherf*ckers.”