A Very Dirty Christmas Read online

  "Screw 'em," Hendrix says, in his understated Hendrix way.

  "Yeah."

  "They're selfish bastards, you know," he says. "Try not to take it personally, even though I know you can't help it."

  I shrug. "It's no big deal," I tell him. "But I'm glad you came with me."

  Hendrix pulls into the parking lot and squeezes my leg again, sending heat rushing through me. "This is the part where I'm supposed to say 'knock 'em dead,'" he says, pausing for a beat. "But you probably shouldn't try to knock anyone dead."

  I slap his hand. "Don't even suggest I'm going to hit someone in the car during my freaking drivers license test, Hendrix," I say.

  "I'm not going to jinx you," he says, at the same time as I tell him, "You'll jinx me."

  "Buy me a cola," we both say at the same time.

  He laughs. "Stop being stupid. Let's go get your dumb license."

  "Can I drive your car home?" I ask, as we get out.

  "Fuck, no," he says. "You think I'm going to let you out in public behind the wheel?"

  "Hendrix, come on. I've driven it before," I say. But he's grinning and I know he's joking. He's totally going to let me drive his car. It's a beater, this old Mustang he bought with his earnings from working last summer. He didn't want to buy it with anyone else's money, his father's or mine. It smells vaguely like gym socks, but it's still awesome.

  He pushes the door open to the department of motor vehicles, turning toward me while leaning on it. "You know what we should do, though."

  "What?"

  "Road trip."

  "Yeah, right."

  Hendrix shrugs. "You don't want to hang out with me, just be honest, sweet cheeks. I was even going to let you drive part of the way."

  "We can't just drop everything and take a road trip somewhere."

  "Who's watching you? Our parents left for the weekend," Hendrix says. He leans close to my ear, his voice a whisper. "Unless you're chicken, Addy-girl. Are you afraid I'm going to corrupt you?"

  I'm afraid you already have. A shiver runs up my spine. I know he's not talking about sex, but for some reason, it feels that way and my heart pounds so loudly in my chest it feels like it's going to explode. "Okay," I say. "But only if I pass the test."

  Hendrix slides into one of the cheap plastic seats in the waiting room. "Go pass your fucking test already, Addy-girl," he says. "You and I have a date with the open road."

  * * *

  PRESENT DAY

  Shit. The blood pumps loudly in my ears, and my heart races. I close my bedroom door, leaning up against it like I'm barricading it with my body. As if Hendrix is going to follow me into my bedroom or something. I'm sure he hates me now. He was furious when he walked down the hallway. When he walked away from whatever just happened between us.

  Oh God. What the hell just happened between us?

  My brain refuses to process this information. Whatever happened out there in the hallway was just some weird too-early-in-the-morning-to-count parallel universe kind of thing. That was not Hendrix and I.

  What was I thinking, wandering out there in a t-shirt and panties?

  I was thinking that Hendrix had left to go running and that I had the house to myself.

  I don't even know why I'm up this early, anyway. I should be getting better sleep with Hendrix here. He's been really helpful in some ways, scheduling and taking care of things, before I even know to ask. He's been cooking, too. It's kind of like having a personal assistant and bodyguard and chef rolled up into one.

  Except that I haven't been getting more sleep. My sleep has been restless, fragmented by dreams, torn apart by half-lucid memories of the past, of Hendrix before he left for boot camp. And by how I felt about him back then.

  Seeing him standing in my hallway, inches away from me, wearing boxer briefs that hug his perfectly formed ass and his holy-shit-huge cock...well, that isn't going to do anything to help me get him out of my head, either. I think that image is going to be permanently burned onto my brain. And what he did a minute later, the way he grabbed a handful of my hair and pulled me toward him…even now, it's like every part of my body is turned on, wired somehow, on a cellular level.

  I lean against the door, my breath still caught in my throat, my chest rising and falling. My nipples are hard, so sensitive, that the normally soft cotton fabric of the t-shirt I'm wearing feels more like sandpaper. I close my eyes, picturing Hendrix's hand in my hair, feeling the rough way he grabbed me, the twinge of pain that rocketed through me as he yanked the hair by the roots. When I slide my hand over my breast now, heat rushes between my legs, and I can't imagine anyone's hand there except Hendrix's.

  Hendrix should be the last person on earth I fantasize about. I should be picturing anyone else -- one of the movie stars I know, any one of the myriad gorgeous male country singers I'm friends with, or hell, someone I've dated. Even that jerk-ass ex-boyfriend of mine.

  Anyone but Hendrix.

  But Hendrix is the only one I can picture, the only one I want to imagine.

  I run my hand up the inside of my leg and between my thighs, finding my clit. My fingers roll easily over it, aided by my wetness, and I exhale heavily as arousal courses through my body. I imagine Hendrix's hands on me, roaming my body, Hendrix's hands in my hair.

  Hendrix's lips on mine, his tongue finding my tongue.

  His face buried between my legs.

  When I slide my finger lower, finding my entrance, I'm already close to the brink. And when I press my palm firmly against my clit, my fingers lodged deeply inside me, I crash over the edge almost immediately.

  It's Hendrix's face I see.

  And Hendrix's name that escapes my lips, less of a word and more of a moan, when I come.

  A minute later, the throbbing between my legs still hasn't subsided, and I open my eyes. The realization of what just happened overwhelms me.

  I just came thinking about Hendrix.

  It's not like that's the first time it happened. But it's the first time it's happened in years. It's definitely the first time it's happened with him right in the other room.

  "Addy." Hendrix speaks my name, his voice low and gravelly, from the other side of the door.

  Shit.

  He wasn't even in the other room. He was on the other side of the door. Embarrassment washes over me like a tidal wave, and I swallow hard. Surely he didn't hear what I just did. Surely he didn't hear me moan his name.

  "Open the fucking door," he demands.

  I don't move. "No," I say, my voice softer than I intend.

  "I know, Addy," he says. He doesn't push open the door, the way he so easily could. Do I want him to? A few weeks ago, I would have vehemently answered no to that question. After what he did to me, what he said...he could rot in hell as far as I was concerned. When he left, I never wanted to see him again. Except that I never could get him out of my mind.

  "There's nothing to know," I say.

  "I'm not deaf, Addy-girl." His voice is lower now, more gruff. Insistent.

  Heat rushes to my face. He didn't just hear me. He couldn't. "I don't know what you're talking about."

  "My name -- Hendrix," he says, his voice softer. "You said my name."

  "I -- " I start. Crap. He was listening. Why would he stand at my door and listen to me?

  "Open the door," he says.

  I want to let him in.

  I can't.

  "No," I say.

  "Goddamn it, Addy," he says. He pauses and for a minute, I think he's gone. I want him to be gone. I don't want him to be gone. Shit, I don't know what the hell I want.

  "Hendrix?" I ask.

  "Addy-girl." The way he speaks the word, formerly a platonic term of endearment, sounds a lot less fucking platonic now.

  "You didn't hear what you thought you heard," I lie. How am I going to face him now?

  "What did I think I heard?"

  "Me..."

  "You what, Addy?"

  I'm silent. I can't say it.