Unforgivable Read online

  The shuffle of feet behind him moved them apart from each other like they’d been attached to uncoiling springs. It would’ve been too late to hide what they’d been doing if Jay had been paying attention, but the look on his face said he was too wrapped up in his own drama to have noticed what he’d walked in on. He saw them, of course, and since he’d already talked with Alice about her and Mick he might easily have guessed, but clearly he wasn’t in the mood to care.

  “Hey,” Alice said, pushing Mick gently to the side. “What’s up? You okay?”

  “Didn’t feel good.” Jay went to the fridge and pulled out a pitcher of water. He filled a glass and drank it without looking at either one of them.

  Alice looked at Mick, who shrugged. She looked at Jay, whose shoulders had slumped. Friendship or fucking, she thought, wishing she and Mick had gone to his bedroom ten minutes ago. With a sigh, she squeezed Mick’s shoulder.

  “Want to talk about it?” she asked Jay.

  Mick took a step back from her, eyes on hers, mouth quirked on one side. “I’m going to head to bed. ’Night.”

  Jay turned as Mick left, so Alice didn’t watch him go. She looked at her friend, his face pale. Circles below his eyes.

  “You look like shit. Are you going to puke?”

  “No. Feel like it, though.” Jay lowered his voice and looked at the glass of water in his hand. He poured it down the sink and rinsed the glass, then put it in the drainer. His shoulders slumped again.

  Shit. He might actually be crying. Alice put her arm around his shoulders. “Talk to me, Jay. Is it Paul?”

  Jay nodded.

  Double shit, she thought, but waited for her friend to speak. He didn’t at first. They stood in the kitchen in silence, until finally he turned to face her.

  “He’s not going to ask me to move in with him.” The words clearly stuck in his throat, but he forced them out. He even managed to give her a wobbly smile. “I’m not even sure he’s not going to break up with me at the end of the weekend. I think he’s just holding off because he’s here with me.”

  “Gross, Jay. Why would he do that?”

  “So he doesn’t make it awkward.” Jay grimaced. “Because Bernie’s my friend, not his.”

  Alice petted his shoulder. “It should be awkward for him, then. If he’s going to be a jerk.”

  “He’s kind of always a jerk,” Jay said with an embarrassed laugh. “That’s part of his charm.”

  Alice sighed and gave him another hug, but ended up laughing along with him. She squeezed him. “Is it worth me telling you to dump him?”

  “You’ve known me longer than that.” Jay leaned into her embrace. “But I don’t want to wait for him to break it off with me, either. The rest of my weekend is kind of ruined, anyway. Can we get out of here?”

  Alice hesitated. It was Saturday morning by this point, but she hadn’t planned on leaving until Sunday night. She’d been looking forward to another two days and one more night to spend with Mick.

  “Please,” Jay said.

  And, with a sigh, Alice agreed.

  Chapter 23

  Mick waited until lunch time to ask Bernie where Alice was. He thought maybe she’d slept in, or gone off to town with Cookie. Something, anything other than that she’d up and lit out without bothering to tell him she was going. But when noon ticked around and still no Alice appeared, he had to know.

  “Jay wasn’t feeling well, so she took him home.” Bernie offered a bottle of beer, but Mick shook his head. “She left me and Cookie a note. Sorry, I should’ve mentioned it earlier.”

  “Nothing serious, I hope.” Dayna had a platter of deli meat and cheese in both hands. She’d been on the way to putting it on the dining room table, but paused at Bernie’s explanation.

  Paul, who’d been setting the table with flatware, put in, “He had a case of the vapors.”

  Dayna laughed. Mick didn’t. Bernie smiled briefly, but without much humor. Cookie came out of the pantry with some bags of chips, and lunch carried on without more on the subject. If Paul felt the loss of his boyfriend at the table, he didn’t show it. He spent his time charming Dayna and Cookie with stories about his world travels. They didn’t talk about Jay at all, nor about Alice.

  She hadn’t left Mick a note explaining her late-night escape. She hadn’t left him a message, either, though the cell service out here was spotty enough that even if she had, he wouldn’t get it until he was closer to home. He checked his phone anyway, dialing in to his voicemail just in case there was something there. Nothing.

  And nothing all day, though he tried not to think about it too much. Still, he felt her absence too keenly to ignore it. At the lake, during dinner, the games they played after. He thumbed a text or two to her, but suspected they didn’t reach her. Either that, or she wasn’t answering him, and the thought of that was worse than the fact she’d ducked out without telling him.

  Sunday morning, Mick made his excuses about wanting to avoid traffic and a heavy workweek ahead, and got on the road by 9:00 a.m. Bernie’s place was two and a half hours from his place, but only an hour and a half or so from Alice’s. He’d never been to her house, but she’d sent him a funny card in the mail a week or so ago. They’d been doing that, sending each other notes and cards. He’d had flowers delivered to her, too. He remembered the address.

  It wasn’t until he was pulling into her driveway that it occurred to him he should have called first, in case she were still in bed. Or not home. Or had snuck out of Bernie’s house without telling him because she never wanted to see him again. But it was too late, he’d been impulsive and now here he was. He had two choices—get out of the car and knock on her door and tell her there was no way he could last another day without being inside her. Or, he could be responsible and respectable and not a creepy stalker sex freak and go home.

  Mick got out of the car.

  Chapter 24

  Alice had been up since dawn, too wired and anxious to sleep any longer. She and Jay hadn’t gotten home until six yesterday morning, and she’d managed to keep herself awake all day so she didn’t throw off her sleep schedule . . . well, sort of. She’d been a zombie all day long, mustering little more energy than it took to watch old movies and read before she crashed at just past 7:00 p.m.

  She’d slept hard, but fitfully. She’d dreamed of Mick. His hands, teeth, tongue, lips. His cock, hard against her. She’d woken in a sweat, the covers tangled, her body singing from the dream but aching from the lack of release.

  He hadn’t called her.

  She had left in a rush at Jay’s insistence, but she’d made sure to leave a note for Bernie. Surely Mick would’ve asked why she’d left. He might even have worried, a little. Jay was his friend, too. If he were really worried, wouldn’t he have at least called once?

  She hadn’t been shy about calling or even texting him occasionally in the past few weeks, but for some reason her fingers now refused to punch in his number. She didn’t want to interrupt him having fun, she told herself, but the real reason was more complicated than that. Stupid head, she thought now with a jaw-cracking yawn. Making trouble for the body.

  At the knock on her front door, Alice frowned. It wasn’t even noon on a Sunday, and even if she hadn’t had a terrible two days without enough sleep, shouldn’t there be some unspoken rule that nobody was allowed to come over without warning on a Sunday morning? She almost didn’t answer, that was how annoyed she was, but as soon as she peeked through the curtains covering the side transom window, her heart thudded. Skipped. Her stomach leaped.

  “Mick,” she said as she opened the door. “What the . . how did . . .”

  “I didn’t want to be there if you weren’t.” He stepped through the door and took her in his arms. “I’m going to kiss you, Alice. And then I’m going to take you upstairs . . . your bedroom is upstairs, right?”

  “Oh, yeah. Absolutely.” She grinned.

  He kissed her. Slow. Sweet. But determined, no doubt about that. His tongue stroke