blackness, it will look like he is just holding me as we watch our friends party. If I turned, it would look too intimate. We would at the very least look like we were making out, and that would destroy the clandestine ambiance—as if our intimacy is a secret that belongs only to us.
I slide my palm up over his underwear until I find the massive shape of him under the thin, wet cotton. My other hand assaults from above, slipping beneath his waistband and immediately finding its target.
“Princess… Fuuuck .” Tucker groans into my hair, emboldening me, and I grasp him firmly and start to stroke.
I’ve only done this once before, when I was probably too young to be doing it at all, and certainly didn’t know how to make it especially good. And granted, my knowledge now only comes from the couple of porn videos Tina and I have watched online, but Tucker’s rapid breathing, the way his fingers burrow into my waist, the trembling of his taut belly behind me, tells me he likes what I’m doing.
I silently marvel at his size, how he possibly managed to fit that inside my body. I move faster, a little stronger, stroking and twisting, wanting so much to make him feel as incredible as he made me feel. He hides his face in my hair, his chest rising and falling fast and hard behind me.
“Fuck, Princess. I’m going to come in your hand.” He says it like a warning, but it feels more like a promise.
And then he stops breathing entirely, his fingers root themselves almost painfully into my skin, and he does exactly as he said. I strain my neck to watch him, his face turned upward to the night sky, eyes shut tight, teeth clenched as he fights to keep quiet just as he forced me to do minutes ago.
In those short moments he is perfectly mine, and I revel in it.
He takes a moment to calm his breathing, and then spins me to face him, green eyes shimmering with awe in the moonlight. “You never do what I expect,” he murmurs.
I bite my lip to keep my smile from growing into an epically embarrassing grin.
It feels like a victory. But certainly not a defeat for him. And I wonder if Tucker and I have found a new way to challenge each other, one where we can both triumph, and I try to ignore the warmth in my chest as my heart swells with pride and something else—something that threatens to thoroughly unravel this new delicate truce of friendship and wonderful, world-spinning benefits.
Chapter Six
Carleigh
Present Day
As the October air grows cooler and the trees change to vibrant coppers and fiery reds, I fall into a routine. Classes and studying, and a reasonable amount of socializing. Devin and I have befriended a few girls from our dorm and we’ve formed a kind of group. Of course, they all want to go to the hottest parties, the most popular bars, and that means running into Tucker more than my heart appreciates. Or maybe my heart appreciates it more than I care to admit.
We seemed to have developed a nonverbal truce, where the only indication that there’s any history between us is his practiced obliviousness to my presence, only rarely interrupted by his contemptuous stare.
Seeing him twice a week in creative digital marketing doesn’t help either. I try to focus in class, participating twice as much as I normally would just to distract myself from his presence, but Tucker takes up the entire room. Our past is a living, breathing entity, a constant reminder of what I’ve lost, and his hostility is tangible.
The sad part is the class should have been my favorite. Even though I landed there by default, and despite the harsh grading system, I actually find the subject matter interesting—useful for the future. And the professor is pretty cool, too. It’s nice to have a professor that remembers what it’s like to be a student, and I honestly don’t mind that he expects a lot from us. I like being challenged. But Tucker doesn’t seem to agree. I hate that I’m so acutely aware of him, but I can’t help but
Mark Sisson, Jennifer Meier
Lynn Emery
Julia Gregson
Karina Novak
Marta Szemik
Edwina Currie
Lawrence Durrell
Barry Malzberg
Chibundu Onuzo
Robin York