“What? No, really I did.”
She nudges me in the shin with her bare foot underneath the table. “You’re full of shit, Andrew.”
Then she starts pulling out the strips of paper and unfolds them and reads them off.
“Jamaica.” She sets it down. “France.” She sets it on top of the other one. “Ireland. Brazil. Bahamas. Virgin Islands. Mexico.” One by one she stacks them on top of each other.
After several more she pulls out the last one, holds it up folded loosely in her fingertips, and she snarls at me. “Something tells me that this doesn’t say ‘Italy.’ ” She’s trying so hard not to smile.
I really don’t know why I thought I could actually pull this off.
While I’m trying not to laugh and keep a straight face, she unfolds the paper and reads its contents: “Australia.” She drops the paper on the top of the pile. “I should penalize you for trying to cheat,” she says, rounding her chin and crossing her arms stubbornly over her chest.
“Oh come on,” I say, unable to keep a straight face after all. “At least I didn’t add a few more that say ‘Brazil.’ ” I laugh.
“You thought about it, though, didn’t you?!”
I wince at her loud voice, and we both glance toward the hall where Lily is sleeping in her bedroom.
Camryn leans over the table some and hisses through her teeth, “I’m penalizing you. No sex for a week.” She leans away again, pressing her back against the chair and smirks at me.
OK, this isn’t funny anymore.
I swallow down my pride, hesitate, and then say, “Come on, you can’t be serious. You like it as much as I do.”
“Of course I do,” she says. “But haven’t you ever heard anywhere that women have this magical ability to be able to live without it longer? I’ll get myself off.”
“You’re bluffing,” I say, not convinced.
She nods subtly with that hell-no-I’m-not gleam in her eye, and it’s making me nervous. “What are you going to do to make up for it, then?”
One side of my mouth lifts into a grin. “Whatever you want.” I pause, holding up my finger and add before it’s too late, “Well, as long as it’s not degrading, disgusting, or unfair.”
Her grin getting bigger, Camryn stands from the chair slowly. I watch every move she makes with the utmost attention, a part of me worried I’m going to miss something. She fits her thumbs behind the elastic of her panties and taunts me with the idea of sliding them off.
Oh my fucking God… seriously? You call this a punishment?
I try to retain my composure, pretending as though the few gestures she’s made haven’t affected me in any way whatsoever when, in truth, it takes practically nothing to make me crazy for her.
She walks away from me.
“Where are you going?” I ask.
“To get myself off.”
“Huh?”
“You heard me.”
OK, so I did, but… that’s not how this was supposed to go down.
“But… what’s my punishment?”
She stops just long enough to turn and look back. “You’re going to watch.”
“Wait…what?”
I start to follow. Evil witch.
She goes into the living room and lies down on the couch, her head resting upon the arm, one leg propped over the back.
Evil, evil witch!
She looks up at me seductively and that’s all it takes; the second her eyes meet mine I move over and on top of her, crushing my mouth over hers. “No fucking way, babe,” I whisper hotly onto her mouth, and I kiss her even harder.
Her hands grasp the front of my shirt, her tongue tangled passionately with mine.
And then Lily starts to cry.
I stop. Camryn stops. We look at each other for a moment, both of us frustrated, but we can’t help but smile. Lily is a deep sleeper and hardly ever wakes up at night anymore, but somehow her timing tonight doesn’t surprise me.
“I’ll do it this time,” she says, lifting herself from the couch.
I stand up, running my hand over the top of my head.
After she disappears down the hallway, I head back into the kitchen and sit back down at the table to scrawl “Italy” on another strip of paper. I drop it into the hat and refold all of the others and drop them in it, too.
Minutes later, the house is quiet after Camryn gets Lily back to sleep. She sits down in the chair next to me again, pulling her bare legs onto the seat and crossing them. Propping one elbow upon the table, she rests her chin in her hand and looks at me with a warm smile, like something’s on her mind.
“Andrew,” she says. “Do you really think we can do this?”
“Do what, exactly?”
She rests both arms across the table out in front of her, tangling her fingers.
“Travel with Lily.”
I pause and then lean my back against the chair. “Yeah, I do think we can pull it off. Don’t you?”
Her smile weakens.