THE LIGHT CHANGES and I step off the curb, crossing the street in the middle of a small crowd. With my phone pressed to my ear, I listen as my brother Colton rattles off a list of things that will have to be repaired, most of which need to be done before the boats can leave the dock again.
“And you’re sure the wiring’s shot?” I ask. My stomach churns and I feel the need to clarify. “Do you know if it’s the wiring itself, or have you checked the fuse panel?”
I hear him sigh and can imagine him taking off his hat, using the brim to scratch the top of his head. It’s Tuesday and he’s worked straight through the weekend on this. I’m sure he’s beat. “Checked the panel myself while Levi was in the wheelhouse with a meter. We replaced any bad fuses and every goddamn one of them blew as soon as we flipped the breakers.”
“Fuck.”
“Pretty much.”
“So what’s the plan?” I ask, stepping into the shade of a bright red canvas awning. The sun is high this time of day, the sidewalks clean and nearly empty of shadows.
“I need to replace a bunch of wires, figure out how to pigtail them in on the damaged lines. It’s gonna take some time.”
“Jesus. I need to be home, not in fucking California of all places.”
I lean against the wall of a brick building, trying to figure out exactly how all this happened. It feels like it’s been one thing after another this year; add that to a long line of years with not enough fish and not enough money and well, I’m in fucking California.
But Colt isn’t having it. “Stop,” he says. “We’ve got it handled here. We need you there, figuring out the next step. We’ve made it through worse. We’ll make it through this, too.”
I take a moment before I ask the question I’m dreading. “So how long?”
He blows out a breath and I can practically hear him calculating. “I need to unbolt and pull panels from the wheelhouse floor,” he says. “At least a couple of days.”
It could be better. It could definitely be worse. I do the mental calculation of how much money we’ll lose being off the water. “You serviced the engine?” I ask.
“We serviced number one,” he says.
“And? Same? Worse?”
He hesitates. “A little worse.”
“Fuck. How long will it hold?”
“Report says at least six months. But it said that six months before that, Finn. And six months before that. There’s only two percent more shavings in this oil sample than there was the last time. I’d say we have at least a year, easy. By then we’ll have finished the season and we’ll be good. We can do this.”
“Right,” I say, and push off the building. I pass several shops, restaurants, and small bars, the sidewalks growing more crowded the farther I go. The San Diego sun beats down, and I feel the heat of it seep into my black T-shirt, through the thick denim of my jeans. Colton is right; we’ve been through worse. We don’t need to push the nuclear button quite yet.
Why the fuck am I here, then?
“So you’re all ready for the meeting?” he asks, a hint of anxiety finally coloring his tone.
“Doesn’t sound like I need to be.”
His nervous laugh rings through the line. “Finn, let’s keep the option open, okay?”
“I know, Colt. I’m just fucking with you.” Though I’m not. Not really. I want my business to stay the way it always has, and the L.A. Option, as I’ve been calling it, is not an option.
“When do you go?” he asks, like he doesn’t have the date burned into his brain. Like we all don’t.
“Next week.” I lean against a building, scrubbing my face. “Why did I come down so fucking early? I could be there fixing shit and—”
He groans. “God, would you stop worrying? Spend some time with Ansel and Oliver, have fun. Remember fun, Finn? And for all our sakes, please, get laid before you head up to L.A.” I almost trip when he says this because Jesus Christ, my abs are still sore from the marathon sex with Harlow the other afternoon. “All this will still be waiting for you when you get back. Got it? Fun?”
There’s a run-down large brick building to my right, and I glance inside the windows as I pass. My reflection looks back at me against the busy street, but I stop in my tracks. Because there, sitting at a table and frowning down at her laptop, is Harlow.
Fun, I think.
“Yeah, I got you.”
THE HOSTESS AT the little podium smiles as I walk inside. She’s hot, in that cool, pinup kind of way, and like she’d be perfectly at home stretched across the hood of a vintage muscle car. Her purple hair is cut short and clipped with little barrettes at the sides; her lip is pierced and so is her nose; splashes of bright-colored ink cover both of her arms. I almost consider calling Colton back; this girl is exactly his type.
“I’m over there,” I tell her with a smile, and point to where Harlow is sitting, still alone, still staring at her screen and scrolling mindlessly through whatever she’s looking at. Every once in a while she picks up her phone, scrolls some more on that, and sets it down again.
The hostess smiles back and motions for me to go ahead, handing me a menu and winking before I turn away. It’s dark and blessedly cool inside. October on Vancouver Island is chilly. In San Diego, it’s as if the summer is only just getting started. Perpetual summer. No wonder everyone here is so laid-back.
Sleek black cushions and couches line the walls and create little seating areas in the front half of the restaurant, while long, well-worn tables and stools fill the back. It looks more like a club than a place you’d have pizza.
Harlow is at a long wooden table in the corner. She’s in some sort of yellow skirt thing today, her tan legs stretched out, wrapped in a pair of tall brown sandals, and resting on a stool across from her. Her hair is pulled back from her face in a knot that seems simultaneously messy and complicated, and as I near the table, I’m more than a little pleased to spot what looks to be a small hickey on her shoulder.
“Hello, Miss Vega,” I say.
She jumps at the sound of my voice and looks up, her smile vanishing and replaced by an expression of surprise . . . and maybe defeat.
“Finn.” I don’t miss the way she angles her laptop away as I slide onto a seat across from her. “Please,” she says dryly. “Have a seat.”
“You know, I think I actually heard your eyes roll when you said that,” I reply. “That’s talent.”
A waitress steps up to the table and I glance down, seeing that Harlow has only a glass of iced tea in front of her.
“I’ll have the same.” I blink back to find Harlow watching me.
“Planning on staying?”
“Why not? This place seems kind of cool.”
She hums in response—neck flushed but otherwise definitely pretending I didn’t tie her up and fuck her three days ago—and glances down to her phone again.
“What time do you need to head back?” I ask.
She shakes her head. “I don’t have anywhere to be.”
I make a show of looking at my watch. “I don’t mean to be nosy—”
“I find that hard to believe,” she interrupts in a mumble.
“—but don’t you have a job?”
“I do,” she says, more to the screen than to me. Her eyes are still down and the little pendant she wears swings ever so slightly with each of her exhales. It’s too easy to remember how she looked on her back, nothing but that necklace resting above her breastbone and my rope around her—
Focus, Finn.
“Then shouldn’t you be in an office, or out with ladies who lunch?”
She makes a show of closing her laptop slowly. “Not today.”
“Why?”
She’s definitely growing irritated with my questions, which—let’s be honest—only makes me more curious. “Because I don’t work today. My mom isn’t feeling well. I was just looking some stuff up.”
“So when you work, what exactly do you do?” I ask.
“I’m an intern at NBC.”
I make another show of looking at my watch—more dramatically this time—at the fact that it’s one twenty in the afternoon on a Tuesday, and she’s sitting in a pizza place staring at a laptop and playing on her phone.
“Part-time,” she clarifies, adding, “I work about twelve hours a week.” Twelve? At my less than impressed expression she throws in, “What?”
“Unpaid?”
“In-tern?” she says, as if saying the word more slowly will help me understand. “I want to work in the film industry but you have to start somewhere, and NBC is local.”
“I see. So you, like, get coffee and stuff.”
“Occasionally.”
“Doesn’t that bug you? You’re the kid of a famous actress and a big Hollywood guy, and yet they make you the lowly coffee girl?”
I’m only partly serious. I mean I am curious, but in truth, she’s just really fun to wind up.
“That’s not all I do,” she says, and then reconsiders, smiling at me with surprising self-deprecation. “Actually, yeah, they love to make me do the grunt work because of who my dad is. I’ve worked on his sets for as long as I can remember, and probably know more about how movies are made than most of the people I work under now. But Dad always told me my first lesson in work should be how to earn respect through humility, so I guess that’s what I’m doing here. It won’t always be this way.”
Huh. Wasn’t expecting that. And it’s a little disquieting how much it sounds like something my own dad would say. “So you went to college and majored in . . . ?”
“Communications.”
“Communications, ah. What is that, like majoring in Twitter and Facebook?”
She purses her lips playfully studying me. “You’ve heard of Twitter?”
I consider flipping her off for this.
“What are you doing downtown, anyway?” she asks, slipping her fancy silver laptop into her even fancier bag. “Is your mysterious business here?”
“Grabbing lunch and then making a few calls,” I say, scanning the menu. “Why? Got some other ideas on how to pass the time? I’m sure I could think of a few.”
“Well, since we are at Basic and you’re already here, I feel it’s my duty as a San Diegan to make you stay and eat. The food is good and they have beer.”
“Beer would definitely make it easier to have lunch with you.”
I hear her playful gasp but fail to dodge her fist connecting with my shoulder.
IT TURNS OUT, Harlow was right.
“Did I really just eat mashed potatoes on pizza?” I ask, reaching for my beer.
“Yep, and wasn’t it the best pizza ever?”
It was pretty close, I think, but I’m not telling her that. I finished off half a mozzarella, mashed potato, and bacon pizza by myself. Harlow wasn’t that far behind. “It was good.”
“ ‘Good,’ ” she repeats, shaking her head. “Don’t hurt yourself with the enthusiasm there, Finn.”
“I can give plenty of compliments when the situation warrants.”
“Example?”
“I seem to remember telling you how good your pussy feels.”
Her eyes go wide from across the table and there, that’s what I’ve been waiting for. There’s something about eliciting a reaction from Harlow—whether it be shock or abandon or rage—that tugs at a baser instinct in my chest. I know that makes me some sort of a caveman-asshole, but it feels good and gets both of us off. I’m really not interested in psychoanalyzing it.
“Speaking of which, why did you leave so abruptly on Saturday? I give great back rubs.”
I can tell she’s not prepared for more of this blunt-force honesty because she blinks at me a few times, speechless, but she recovers. “Because it was intense. And I just wanted to get laid.”
I hum into a small remaining bite of pizza crust. “What are you going to do about that libido when I leave town?”
Shrugging, she says, “Masturbate more,” and then takes a huge bite of her own slice.
I laugh. I do really like being around her. “So you majored in communications and your dad is a big-shot cinematographer. What else should I know about you?”
“Finn, don’t you remember our arrangement? You should know I like orgasms. Don’t strain yourself.”
“Come on, Ginger Snap.”
“Fine.” She wipes her hands on a napkin and then tosses it down on the table. “I have a sister, Bellamy.”
“Is she cute?”
Harlow looks at me with disgust. “She’s eighteen, you predator.”
“I mean for my brother Levi. Jesus, trigger finger.”
Laughing she shrugs. “She’s gorgeous but totally crazy.”
I raise an eyebrow, saying, “Genetics are a bitch, huh?”
“Har.”
“Is she in school around here?”
Shrugging, she says, “She’s doing an art school thing I’m pretty sure is just a front for a giant pot operation.”
“Seriously?” I feel my eyes go wide. I’d heard stories about California, but . . .
“No. I’m kidding, settle down Canadian DEA. But it seems like a pretty flaky program. I’m sure her degree will make her only marginally more employable at Burger King.”
“And you live at home still?”
She narrows her eyes at me. “I’m twenty-two, Finn.”
“But your parents are here and you’re an unpaid intern working twelve hours a week fetching coffee. Pardon my harebrained assumption that you may rely on them for shelter.”
“I have a trust fund.” She shakes her head, pointing her pizza at me. “Don’t make that face like you’re surprised.”
“I’m only surprised you admitted it.”
“Because I should feel bad my parents were responsible with money and that I, in turn, was responsible by investing in California real estate and own my condo?”
“Should I congratulate you for knowing how to properly spend your parents’ money?” I ask through a laugh.
She leans forward. “It’s cute you think I’m a rich airhead, but I’m no more an airhead than you are a dumb lumberjack.”
“Fisherman.”
“What?”
“I’m a fisherman, Harlow.”
She licks her lips before growling, “Same. Fucking. Thing. My job might not be very glamorous but I am damn good at it. Best fucking coffee fetcher out there.”
I burst out laughing. “You’re a trip.”
“You’re a hot piece of ass.”
I lean my chair back, balancing on two legs, watching her watching me. She’s hands down the sexiest girl I’ve ever seen. Surprisingly, she may also be the smartest. “Yeah. I know.”
“So what about you? Do you have siblings? Brothers, right?”
I nod, reaching for my glass to take a sip of beer. “Colton and Levi.”
“You guys work together?”
“Yeah, plus my dad. He had a heart attack and a stroke a few years back, so he’s not as hands-on as he used to be, but he’s still always around.”
“What about your mom?”
I shake my head. “Died when I was twelve. Breast cancer.”
Her face seems to literally fall and she lifts her iced tea to her lips, taking a sip with a shaking hand before she manages to say, “Finn. God, I am . . .” She shakes her head, takes a deep breath, and then closes her eyes. “That is heartbreaking.”
What else can I say but, “Yeah. Long time ago.”
She blinks away and for the first time it occurs to me that she looks exhausted. “So what has you looking so beat?” I ask. “A grueling Facebooking session during your day off work?”
I can tell she’s on the verge of saying something smart in response, but her expression softens and she says, “Just looking some stuff up.”
“Next season’s top shoe picks?”
“Something along those lines.” And wow. Harlow is a terrible liar.
But if she’s not sharing, then I suspect I shouldn’t push, anyway. Lord knows I don’t really want to lay my woes on this table, either.
“Come on.”
Looking up at me, she draws her brows together.
I stand, holding out my hand. “Let’s go.”
SO WE’RE DISCOVERING a pattern. We fall into the hallway at Oliver’s again, hands in hair and mouths everywhere. Her body is warm, her skin soft and smelling so fucking good.
Harlow leads this time and steers us down the hall, stumbling blindly in the direction of my bedroom.
“Oliver?” she asks, breaking away just long enough to glance around, and listening to the empty house. Her lips look bitten and her cheeks pink. Her hair has come loose from the bun and some smooth strands fall around her face and shoulders.
“Not home yet,” I say, and pull her back to my mouth. Our feet shuffle along the wood floors and I wonder if I’d have time to fuck her right here, bent over the couch or with her hands pressed to the wall, the sound of her screams ringing through the silent rooms. “Not sure when, though; think you can be quick?” I circle my thumb around her nipple and she groans.
“Mmm, I didn’t come all the way over here to be quick.”
I don’t want to, either. In fact, I’m beginning to wish we’d gone to her place. Someplace we can take our time like we did the other day.
We get to my room and I close the door, flipping the lock behind me.
“On the bed,” I say.
Harlow pulls away with a final kiss and—surprisingly—does what I tell her, making a show of kicking off her shoes and climbing up onto the mattress. I cross the room and stand over her, meeting her gaze as I unfasten my belt.
“Take your clothes off.”
Harlow nods and we each begin to undress: shirts first, her bra, my jeans. She takes hers off slowly, not like she’s putting on a show, but like she’s relishing the way my eyes move over every inch of newly exposed skin and is trying to make the feeling last. Her tits are fucking fabulous, high and full—a generous handful, and I have big hands—with tight pink nipples that make my mouth water. She has to lie back to shimmy out of her skirt and I step over, reaching forward and pulling it down her legs.
“Wonder what you’d look like with these ankles tied up in the air,” I say, bringing her leg to my shoulder and pressing a kiss to her calf. I don’t mean it—not right now, anyway—Oliver could be home any minute, and for something like that I want to tease her, take my time until both of us are absolutely wild. But remembering last time, the suggestion is enough to do the trick, and Harlow’s eyes widen, her breath picking up.
With an arm braced near her head, I reach between our bodies, slipping my finger into her panties.
She gasps and I push in more, adding a second alongside it and moving my thumb in circles over her clit.
“Look how wet you are,” I say. “Just from taking off our clothes. I’ve barely touched you and you’re ready to come all over my hand.”
Harlow huffs out a breath, like she can’t decide if she wants to deny it or not, but still she rocks her hips, taking more of my fingers. I kiss along her ribs and up, taking a nipple between my lips, sucking until she’s wet and slippery. She gasps in a breath as I use my teeth, easy at first and then just a bit sharper.
“More,” she groans, and I move to the other, sucking, biting. I don’t want to hurt her—that’s never what this has been about—but I do want her to feel it later. Those small, lingering aches that catch her off guard. “Finn, more.”
“Roll over,” I say, and grip her hips, helping her to her stomach. Her lace panties are barely a scrap and I reach for them, slipping them down and off her body, leaving her completely, gloriously naked in front of me.
“Fuck. This ass,” I say, squeezing it, not even knowing where to look. I grip her tighter, a little rougher, rubbing my palm over her again and again to prepare her for what’s to come. “Seem to remember I had plans for it.”
Her entire body is tense, practically vibrating, every muscle poised and waiting. I move my hand over her hip and up to her lower back, dragging my short nails along the skin there. She lets out a little sound, and I can hear each of her breaths, how they’re almost even and controlled but still just the slightest bit shaky.
“Has anyone ever spanked you, Ginger Snap?”
She shakes her head against my pillow, loose strands of dark hair following the arch of her back. “Only you.”
I try not to think too much about the spark of pride I feel when she says this, and attempt to tamp down the curl of possessive heat in my stomach. “You want this?” I ask.
She nods, but it’s not what I need, and I slice my hand upward through the air, landing with a quick smack on her backside, just enough to get her attention.
“Say it, Harlow.”
“Y-yes,” she says. “Yes.”
I do it again, my palm connecting with her skin, a little harder this time.
Harlow gasps, her fist closed tight around the sheets, and she arches her hips, pushing back toward me. Wanting more.
“Didn’t I tell you I’d give you what you need?” I say, and bring my hand down again, on the other side. The sound she makes is louder this time, more desperate. I spank her a few more times, just until her skin is warm and pink, and she moans as I soothe the flushed skin with my palm. I wonder if she’s ever thought about this kind of thing before, had any idea how much she’d like it.
There’s no doubt Harlow Vega gets off on a little manhandling, or that I very much enjoy being the one to do it. There’s just something so hot about the way she lets me. She knows she could take control at any moment, but I’m sensing that she doesn’t want to. I’m sensing that maybe she needs someone else to lead right now.
By the tenth spanking, Harlow is wet down her thighs, and I’m not sure I’ve ever been harder. Her hand has disappeared between her legs, fingers slipping over the slick skin.
“You do like it,” I say. “Feel that.” I lean forward, touch where she’s working herself over. My fingers push in alongside hers and fuck. I need a condom right now.
Straightening, I reach for the box I’d hastily tossed into the dresser drawer. Harlow moves to her back and watches, eyes fixed to where I slide the condom down and over my dick.
I climb over her, lifting her arms above her head, helping her reach for the bed frame. “Keep them here, okay?”
She nods, and I see the way she tightens her grip, knuckles turning white with the effort.
I press the head of my cock against her, moving it back and forth before beginning to push in. “Think you can be quiet?” I ask, gauging her expression as I continue to move. “Oliver could come home anytime. You need to be quiet. Okay?”
She looks down the length of her body, where my palm slides over her skin, and nods.
I reach for the pillow next to her head and lift her hips to position it just beneath her ass. “That’s right,” I say, pressing deeper and deeper, watching as I disappear entirely inside her.
Her teeth bite into her bottom lip and she moans around it. I shush her gently. “Look so good like this,” I tell her, watching her breasts bounce with each snap of my hips. I place my hand on her sternum to hold her down, and admire the color of my skin against hers, tan and rough against golden softness. A rough engine sounds outside and I recognize Oliver’s car, hear it move up the street and pull into the driveway.
Harlow’s little gasps are still too loud, and so I reach near her hip for her panties, ball them up in my fist, and, after I kiss her on the lips, I stuff them into her mouth.
Her eyes close like she’s grateful, and she moans around it—and it’s enough that I nearly come.
“I said quiet, Ginger Snap.” I spread her legs even more. I tilt her hips in a way that my pelvis doesn’t rub against her clit while I fuck her.
And again, she moans, a deep, desperate sound that makes me fuck into her harder, wanting to make her do it again.
“You definitely like this,” I whisper into her ear. “I bet you think I won’t be able to stop thinking about this later, how wet you’re getting my cock.” I suck along her neck, careful to leave the skin red, but not marked. “Can you tell I like it, too? You nearly made me come before I was good and ready.”
She groans around the fabric and presses her knees to my waist, using the leverage to bring me closer, harder.
“I wonder if you’ll get wetter?” I say. “Should we see if I can make you wetter when you come?”
She nods urgently.
I can hear Oliver outside, laughing and shouting something over to a neighbor. I hitch Harlow’s leg up higher and reach down, smacking her ass again. She cries out, clenching around me. Her skin is flushed, her nipples hard and goose bumps spread along her skin.
“He’ll be inside any second. Do you think you can be quiet? I can make it so good for you if you can.”
She nods and I fuck her harder, my arms shaking, neck corded and tense as I hold myself back. I see the moment it happens: Harlow’s eyes widen before they close again, a tear slipping down her cheek as she struggles not to make a noise.
It’s enough to send me spiraling after her. I lean down, nearly bending her in half with my thrusts—just one more time before I’m coming and have to muffle my sounds against her skin.
When I can move, when my heart doesn’t feel like it might burst out of my chest, I push up, slipping out of her carefully before tying off the condom. I take her in my arms, kissing her fingers, her wrists, the corners of her mouth.
“You did so good.” I press my lips to her shoulder, drag my nose up her neck, and growl in her ear. “You did so fucking good, sweet girl.”
