diminish after nine at night, but not in the Mocha. People
hunched over their refilable mugs, mainlining high-
powered flavored coffees and clutching at specialty drinks
as they chatted in smal groups and played board games.
Soft music, something indie and folksy that would make
my ears bleed if I paid too much attention to it, drifted out
of the speakers.
I spotted Austin right away. His faded denim stood out
from the rest of the skinny jeans and flat-ironed-hair boys,
and he didn't wear a speck of guyliner. His hair had grown
long enough now to pul back in a ponytail at the nape of
his neck. He was carrying two big cups.
his neck. He was carrying two big cups.
When he saw me, his face lit up, so much the way it used
to that my heart hurt. I swalowed hard against the rush of
memories threatening to topple me right then and there. He
handed me a mug and gestured toward a love seat set
toward the back of the shop.
"Sit?"
He asked, didn't tel, so I nodded. "Sure."
I had time to compare first-date awkwardnesses as he
folowed me. My dinner with Eric had been thick with
tension, but with Austin at my back al I could think of was
how uncomfortable it felt to not know what to say. I sat
and warmed my hands on the cup, which was almost too
hot for comfort.
"You look pretty."
"Thanks."
We both sipped. Austin put his mug on the table and dug
in his pocket for something he held out to me. "Here."
I didn't take it at first. "What is it?"
I didn't take it at first. "What is it?"
He held it out again. "Just something they were giving out
at the bank when I signed up for a new checking account.
Made me think of you."
"Is it money?" I took it, not money but a smal clear plastic bottle.
Hand sanitizer, the bottle imprinted with the bank logo.
Just a smal bottle, only enough for one or two uses. I
clutched it in my palm and didn't know what to say.
"I thought you'd laugh," Austin said when I didn't make a
sound. "Shit, Paige. I'm sorry. I just thought—"
"I know what you thought. Why you thought it." I tucked it into my bag.
"It's just…you know. Your thing."
He did know me. I hadn't believed he did. Maybe I hadn't
wanted to believe.
"Thank you."
More awkward silence.
More awkward silence.
When he finaly spoke, it was in a man's voice and not the
familiar voice of the boy I'd falen in love with. It helped, a
little. Made him more of a stranger than he was, so I could
keep him just far enough away not to leap into his arms.
"Paige," Austin said. "I just wanted to tel you that I'm realy sorry."
I didn't know I was going to touch him until it was too late
to pul back my hand. His hair was soft beneath my
fingers, and I let them drift over it and down to tug the
ponytail he'd never have worn in high school. "Shit
happens."
He laughed and looked down. "Yeah. Wel, with us, a lot
of shit happened, huh?"
I took my hand away and shrugged. "We were young."
"Young, dumb…"
"And ful of come," we finished together, quoting one of
our favorite movies.
It felt good to laugh with him. It had been a realy long time
It felt good to laugh with him. It had been a realy long time
since we'd sat like this. Beside me, his thigh was big and
warm. The love seat dipped from his weight, forcing me to
sit closer whether I wanted to or not. I thought I might
want to.
"I just wanted to tel you that." Austin shifted to face me.
A smart-ass, snotty reply rose to my lips, but didn't come
out. "You don't have to apologize. We've been divorced
for years."
When he reached for my hand, I shouldn't have been
surprised. It was the perfect moment, after al. Soft music,
expensive hot drinks, the scent of cheap body spray
wafting from the gaggle of out-too-late teens in the corner
and the rise and fal of their laughter al wove a John
Hughes–film mood. It was the perfect time to have my ex-
husband kiss my knuckles, look deep into my eyes and
say, with utmost seriousness,
"So, I didn't jerk off the other night. Just like you said."
I yanked my hand from his. "Austin!"
"What?" He looked genuinely confused. "You said not to."
"I know what I said." My heart became a bird, my ribs the
cage it beat against.
He sat back, frowning, and crossed his arms over a chest I
couldn't help noticing was broad and muscled under his T-
shirt. "And?"
I frowned, too. "I thought you were trying to be nice."
"I am being nice! I bought you coffee!"
"You asked me here to get me into bed!" I'd turned heads
with my raised voice. I stood and glared down at him.
"That was the only reason?"
Austin looked guilty. Then he shot me a cunt-seeking
missile of a grin. "That's not the only reason."
I jerked my chin at him and flipped my hair. Yeah, very
high school, but we had a history. "Fuck you."
"I'm hoping."
I didn't want to smile or laugh, so I bit down on my
tongue. Hard. "It's late. I have to work tomorrow. Good
night, Austin."
night, Austin."
I was gone before he could register the fact I meant it.
What Austin didn't know was that it wasn't that I didn't
want to take him to bed and screw the living daylights out
of him. I wanted that very much. But there was a part of
me, smal though it was, that knew this couldn't be good
for either one of us.
We had history, and a past, and al of that meant he knew
how to push my buttons just right. It didn't mean we
should keep pushing those buttons. Like Def Leppard
said, it was time to stop treating each other like an act of
war.
I made it al the way to the sidewalk before he was out
after me. Austin grabbed my elbow and I turned to face
him, my mouth already open to say something cutting. He
stopped it with his tongue. He walked me up against the
bricks, hard on my back. Him hard on my front.
I pushed him away. "I'm not that easy."
He puled me closer and kissed me softer. "You could be.
I know you could be."
"Austin…" His name eased out of me on a sigh. "This isn't a good idea. Can't we just be friends?"
"What? Are you shitting me?" His hands gripped my waist,
but he wasn't pressing me against the wal anymore.
I sagged against him, my head in the place it fit just right on
his chest. "No. I'm not."
His grip tightened on me, then released. I mourned the loss
of his body when he stepped away from me, even though I
knew it was for the best. Fucking like tigers had its place,
no doubt, but I didn't think I could keep surviving the
scars.
Austin smoothed my hair off my forehead and hovered his
mouth over mine without kissing me. "Fine."
"Yes
?" I refused to let myself feel miffed. It was what I
wanted, after al. To stop the constant game of catch and
release we'd begun so many years ago.
"If that's what you want. If it's al you want."
I stepped out of his embrace. "I think it's better for both of
us, Austin. If we…you know. Move on."
us, Austin. If we…you know. Move on."
"If that it's what you want," he repeated. "I'l do whatever it takes."
I blinked slowly. "What's that supposed to mean?"
He shrugged and looked around at the night before
looking back at me. "It means I'l do whatever it takes.
Whatever you need. What you want. I'm your guy."
"Austin," I said warningly, but he held up a hand.
"It's stupid not to have you in my life, Paige. We've known
each other too long and too wel to just throw that al
away. I told you that when you left me."
"That was a long time ago."
"It hasn't changed." He shook his head and shot me a
smile. "So. Friends? Fine."
"Whatever it takes?" I said warily. "Uh-huh."
He leaned to kiss me again, and this time I let him. He hit
my cheek with his lips, his kiss chaste and demure. He
didn't even grab my ass.
didn't even grab my ass.
"I'm going home," I said.
"I'l walk you."
I pointed down the block. "You don't have to. I can see
the door to my building from here."
"I'l walk with you anyway."
He did. We didn't speak. He didn't try to kiss me again, or
come upstairs. He didn't shake my hand, either.
"I'l cal you," Austin said, and I had no doubt he would.
Chapter 28
Not everything is meant to last forever, no matter how
much you want it to. I'd married young. Too young. And I
was grateful we'd both figured out our mistake while we
were stil young, before we had kids, before we'd tied
ourselves together for a life and had none left after we fel
apart.
I'd married him for the right reasons. I'd divorced him for
the right reasons, too. Hadn't I?
I'm watching him, and he doesn't know it. I wish he could
feel the burn of my gaze from across the bar, that
somehow my eyes alone could make him turn, but Austin's
too busy paying attention to the game and his friends and
even that brown-haired whore shaking her tits every time
he glances at her. I can't necessarily blame him for looking.
They're like two beach bals shoved into a tiny tank top.
But I don't like to watch him looking.
It's another late night for him when he should be worried
about getting up early in the morning, and another late night
for me studying for tests I know I'l pass but don't know if
passing wil matter in the end. School's been going on a
passing wil matter in the end. School's been going on a
long time, longer than I imagined it would when I decided
to go. Money's tight and even community colege costs a
lot when you have to pay rent and buy food and pay off a
car, too.
I only stopped here because I knew if I went home and he
wasn't waiting for me I'd be furious. We'd fight and then
we'd fuck, and I'm getting tired of that. I'm tired of him
teling me what to do and making me feel like shit for doing
anything else. I'm beginning to think this whole marriage
thing was a bad idea, but after only two years I don't want
to give up. I don't want everyone to laugh behind their
hands and point and whisper. Mostly I don't want to give
him up just so Miss Big Tits and Bad Extensions can get
her claws into him.
At home I shower and toss my clothes into the hamper,
and I'm making myself a sandwich when Austin comes in.
He doesn't act drunk, but when he kisses me I taste beer.
I turn my face to give him my cheek.
"What, you don't want to kiss me? Fine."
I hate it when he sulks.
He steals half my sandwich and tries to tell me about
his day, and all I want to do is go to sleep so I can get
up early and be at the shop to make the next day's
deliveries. We need the money I'll earn. I have another
tuition payment due.
I'm not listening to him, but I'm watching his mouth
move. His lips glisten with oil from the sandwich. His
tongue swipes across them. It's late, I'm tired and
annoyed, but later when he comes to bed I think of the
swipe of his tongue on his mouth and I roll over to
face him.
It's easier to fuck him in the dark, when I can pretend
he's got a different face and so do I. When we can be
different people in a different place. I can forget I'm
supposed to be in love with him and just fuck him like
he's a stranger and I don't have to ever see him again
in the morning.
Austin did cal me, but he seemed to have meant what he
said about agreeing to just be friends. I hadn't forgotten
what it was like to hang on the phone with him for hours, in
the dark, revealing every second of the day just to have a
reason to keep talking. Our current conversations were
reason to keep talking. Our current conversations were
shorter than that, but they reminded me of back then.
Things on the Eric front were more complicated. I'd seen
him a few times since our dinner date. Another dinner, out
to the movies, walks along the river. Things like that.
Conflicting schedules had made it impossible to see him al
the time. Besides, I wasn't "that" girl. The one who took
We were moving slowly, slowly. Glaciers. And that was
fine with me. I'd seen interest flicker in his eyes, watched
him watching my mouth when I spoke. Felt his fingers
tighten in mine as we walked.
I knew he was waiting for me to make the first move, or to
be told to make one, himself. I wasn't quite ready to do
either. As Paige, I was enjoying the whole taking-it-slow
thing.
As his anonymous mistress, on the other hand, I had
complete control of his life.
Each day I sat at my kitchen table with that Chinese box
open in front of me, my pen stroking that thick, creamy
paper with the touch of a lover. I didn't come from the
writing. Not quite. But each note I wrote put me into a
state of heightened awareness of every piece of me. My
fingers, closing around the pen. My palms, caressing the
paper. The inside of my wrist, my elbow, forearm pressing
the table as I wrote. My thighs, touching beneath my skirt.
I didn't come from writing the notes, but it was almost as
good as if I had.
I told him what to wear. What to pack for lunch. He had,
at last, given up smoking. I ordered him to buy me lingerie,
and I gave him the size but alowed him to choose. I had
him send it to the post-office box I rented from a branch
close to my office. I expected something in black.
Crotchless, maybe, or at least with fishnets. The soft, baby
blue satin and lace pleased me.
I let him st
roke himself to orgasm for that gift.
It was time for something more now. I wasn't sure how I
knew this, just that I did the way I knew each day when I
went in to work how to gauge Paul's mood and keep him
focused on work so he didn't hassle me about the job with
Vivian.
What frightens you?
What frightens you?
I tapped the pen against the paper, then my lips.
I want to know what makes your palms sweat but gets
you hard at the same time. What frightens you because
you want it so badly?
It wasn't a question I'd have been able to answer without a
lot of thought, but that was the point. To make him think. I
sealed the note in a matching plain envelope and ran it
down to the mailboxes. Eric was working another twelve-
hour shift and I knew he wouldn't get home until after I'd
gone to bed, but I didn't want to get up early to deliver it,
either.
I went online to pay bils and make some changes to my
Connex account. I hadn't been on it in weeks and had a
page of friend requests to approve and friends' list entries
to scrol through. Nothing terribly interesting, since the
people I knew from home were stil doing what they'd
been doing when I left.
Even so, I got sucked into watching a series of "ghost-
sighting" videos and "true alien abductions," and so I was awake when my phone hummed and a new text message
awake when my phone hummed and a new text message
came through.
I'm afraid of being owned.
Not of being "pwnd" which was something else altogether.
I sat back, the computer forgotten, my heart thundering in
my ears and my mouth tasting something like honey al at
once. It was the sweetness of anticipation. Expectation.
He was afraid of being owned.
So that's exactly what I gave him.
I found it in one of the kiosks in the center of the mal. It
sold hair barrettes of tooled leather, belts, along with
necklaces of cord and beads. And there, hanging
unobtrusively on a rack with a slew of others that didn't
even turn my head, was the bracelet.
Flat black leather about an inch wide, fastened with a
snap. It was the sort worn by teenage emo or skater boys
and could be tooled with any number of phrases or
designs.
"Help you?" The boy in skinny jeans and high-tops leaned
"Help you?" The boy in skinny jeans and high-tops leaned
around the kiosk to catch my eye.
I lifted the bracelet. "I'd like this."
He looked at me through the fringe of his long bangs.