Naked Read online

  We didn’t go straight to his parents’ house the way I thought we would. First we went to check in at the large old hotel located right on Lake Erie in the heart of Cedar Point Amusement Park. Alex had made the arrangements, and I was surprised at his choice, but he only grinned as we took our bags up to the suite overlooking the water.

  “If you’re going to do the park, you really have to stay onsite,” he said.

  I cocked an ear to listen for the rumble of a roller coaster. “Are we doing the park?”

  “You don’t think I brought you all the way not to ride the tallest and fastest roller coasters in the country, do you?”

  I laughed. “I guess not.”

  He stretched out on the bed and beckoned me with a come-hither pout. “Let’s try out this mattress.”

  “Don’t we have to go to your parents’ house?”

  “Not until Sunday.”

  I crossed to the bed, but didn’t let him pull me down. Both of us knew my resistance was more for show than anything. I crossed my arms. “I don’t really want to ride a coaster with your love juice oozing down my thighs.”

  Alex made a face. “You are soooo classy.”

  “I’m serious.”

  He sighed and looked put-upon. “Can I just eat you out until you come all over my face?”

  “So long as you wash it right after,” I told him sternly.

  I loved the glint in his eyes. “It’s a deal.”

  “I might even suck your dick at the same time,” I offered archly.

  He fell back onto the pillows, both hands clutched over his heart. “Yessss!”

  “Hold that thought, tiger. I’m going to use the bathroom and freshen up a little.”

  “Hurry,” he said, with a leer so blatant it should’ve been silly but wasn’t.

  “Yeah, yeah. Give a girl a minute or two.”

  “I’m counting.”

  Laughing, I went to the bathroom and availed myself of the facilities, then grabbed a washcloth to do a quick freshening. A nine-hour car ride hadn’t done much for my sense of sexy. Over the sound of the water running, I heard the distinctive jangle of Alex’s iPhone—he was the only man I knew who used sound clips from The Wizard of Oz as his ring tone. And, considering most of the men I knew, that was saying a lot.

  He cut Glinda off in midtrill. Through the cracked-open bathroom door, I heard the low murmur of his voice, then a laugh. Also low. Deep. A sexy laugh.

  I froze at the sink, my fingers wet and soapy, and water clinging to my eyelashes. I blinked to clear them, and turned off the water. I could hear his voice, but only pieces of words. He wasn’t talking to his parents; I could tell that much. There was no denying the dip and cadence of his words or the implication in them.

  I stood at the door, listening without opening it. I knew better and did it anyway. You never hear anything good when you listen at doors.

  “Fuck you, man,” Alex said. “No, fuck you twice. Fuck you with something hard and sandpapery. Right. Whatever. Yeah, I know it has. Yeah. Well, good. It’ll be good.”

  For other women with other boyfriends, the simple “man” would’ve been enough to chase away any fears…but of course, it only created some for me. My hand slipped on the door and it opened. Alex looked up.

  “Yeah, we’ll be there,” he said, sounding subtly different with me as his audience. Or maybe my imagination put that butch accent in his tone. “Yep. See you then.”

  He slid his finger across the phone’s face to disconnect the call. “That was Jamie, my best friend from high school.”

  “Oh?”

  I guess there are always moments when you realize for the first time you don’t really know the person you love. Something beyond the giggly checklist you go through in the beginning of a relationship—favorite color, favorite food, shoe size. When you first realize you could know all those things and a lot more and still not truly have a clue about the person you’ve decided you don’t ever want to live without.

  “Yeah.” Alex hesitated, maybe realizing he’d never mentioned this friend before. “I haven’t seen him in a few years.”

  “He’s still here in town?”

  “Yeah. He invited us over for a barbecue on Monday. I told him we’d go.”

  “Sure, of course. I’d like to meet your friend.”

  “Awesome.” Alex tossed the phone onto the bed and headed for me with a familiar grin. “Now…about that business with the oral sex…”

  We didn’t make it into the park for another couple of hours. We spent Saturday at the park, too. We rode every ride, sometimes twice, and ate our fill of amusement park junk food. I hadn’t seen Alex act the part of tour guide before, but it was clear he was proud and excited to show off to me the machinery he’d worked on and the bathrooms he’d scrubbed back in the days of his teenage employment at the park. He was different here, the way I guess we all are when put back into a place we’ve left.

  And he had stories to tell. It was the most expansive Alex had ever been about his past, and I gobbled up every scrap he offered. Realizing there was so much I didn’t know made me all the more determined to learn all I could.

  We walked hand in hand on the midway, lost a roll of quarters in the arcade. Had our pictures taken in the photo booth, me laughing on his lap. Kissing. He won me a stupendously crappy stuffed frog with great goggle eyes and a crown.

  “Should I kiss it?” I said.

  “I’m the only prince you’ll ever need, baby.”

  It was a very good day.

  Early Sunday, when it was still dark, I woke to the muffled sound of something nasty happening in the bathroom. I sat up in bed and felt the empty spot beside me. I heard the toilet flush and the water in the shower turn on. It ran for a long time, so long I was just about to get up and check on him, when it turned off. Alex came into the dark room a few minutes after that and slipped into bed next to me, naked.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Too many loopty-loop rides and ice cream.” He sounded a little hoarse and exhausted. “I’ll be okay.”

  “Can I get you anything?”

  “No.”

  We’d made love the night before and he’d been fine. I turned to press the back of my hand to his forehead, checking for heat. My own stomach turned at the thought of a virus shared with a kiss.

  “Do you feel better?”

  Surprisingly, he croaked laughter. “I’ll be okay, babe. Really. I promise. I just need to get some sleep.”

  I yawned, not knowing the time other than it was early. “How long have you been up?”

  “I haven’t slept.”

  “Oh, honey.” I shifted in the sheets. “That sucks.”

  “Yeah.” Another croak masqueraded as a laugh. “I’ll be okay. I think I can sleep, now. A good yark always does that for me.”

  I wrinkled my nose. “Ew.”

  He turned on his side, away from me. “Sorry.”

  “It’s okay. I’m sorry you don’t feel good. Sure I can’t get you anything?”

  “Nah, I’m fine. Really. Just…” He hesitated and cleared his throat. “My stomach’s just shot to shit, that’s all.”

  I got it, then. “Your parents?”

  His body shook a little, from a shiver or a nod, I couldn’t tell. “Yeah. Fuck.”

  I put a hand on his shoulder. “We don’t have to go.”

  “Yeah,” Alex said soberly into the darkness. “We do.”

  I thought I understood, though my heart went out to him that it had made him so nervous he was sick. It didn’t do much good for my peace of mind, either. “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “Not really.”

  I understood that, too. I rubbed his back in gentle circles and listened to the sound of his breathing finally get soft and slow as he fell asleep. Then I was the one with a churning stomach, staring at the blackness, unable to sleep.

  “This is it.” Alex pulled the emergency brake, though we weren’t on a hill, and turned off the ignition.