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  No matter how many times I said it to myself, I couldn't believe. He had to have an ulterior motive, right? Why else would he have brought me back to his house? He could have had anyone. He had only to beckon and flocks of supermodels would come honking and squawking to his side, eager to please him. But instead, he'd wanted me. Anna Devine. DJ, plus-size, chronically lonely and under-sexed.

  I'd given up on sex being something incredible, since it never lived up to the fuss everyone made out of it.

  And then Chase happened. I wasn't a pretty-enough plus-size girl, or kind-of-hot for a big girl, and sex wasn't just "meh" anymore. I was beautiful and desirable, and sex was incredible.

  I wanted to swing the car into a U-turn and race back to Chase's house, throw him down on the bed, or even the kitchen table, and ride him to climax again and again. I wanted to feel him above me. I wanted to taste him, touch him, feel the sweat bead on his skin and hear him groan as he came.

  But I couldn't. He was leaving for New York, and he wasn't coming back. He'd invited me to go with him, but it had been a last minute thing, impulsive, ridiculous. I couldn't actually just up and go to New York City on a whim, with a guy I'd just met.

  Sex with a guy I'd just met was one thing. A life-changing move across the country to a city where I knew no one is another thing entirely.

  But god, he'd made me feel so good. Not just physically, but about myself. For one night, I knew what it felt like to be a woman wanted by a man. How could I let that go?

  I made it home, snuck past Jamie's half-closed door and crawled in bed. I wouldn't sleep, I didn't think, but it felt so good to be in my own bed. It was freezing at first, the sheets cold from long hours of disuse, but after a few minutes they warmed up and I felt myself drowsing.

  I fell asleep thinking of Chase. I fell asleep holding on to the feeling of being desired.

  Big Girls Do It Wetter

  God, I was so close. I wanted it so bad. I was on the edge, just moments from making myself come, but...I couldn't. I'd tried, and tried, and tried. I lay on my bed, Mr. Pinky McVibrator in both hands, using all my tricks and all my best memories, but...nothing. I could get close, writhing on the bed, gasping and moaning and full of aching pressure between my thighs, but no matter what I did, I couldn't get myself past the edge into orgasm.

  I had the vibrator turned to high, the humming audible in my silent bedroom, I had it plunging inside me, two fingers circling my aching, sensitive nub, and I had a firm image of Chase in my mind. In my fantasy, he was tied to a bed, hands and feet bound by his silky neckties, erection throbbing and dripping dew against his belly, just waiting for me to climb aboard and ride him like a prize bull.

  I could almost feel him inside me, but...it didn't take me there. His hands weren't around my waist, urging me onward. His voice wasn't in my ear, whispering my name. He wasn't giving me gentle commands and wrapping his brawny arms around me.

  He wasn't here, and I couldn't come without him.

  It had been four days since I'd last orgasmed, and it was an eternity. Four days since I walked out of Chase's house, still aching between my thighs from the vigor of his lovemaking.

  He watched me go, sadness in his eyes. He'd argued for a moment or two, but he realized I wasn't going to change my mind, and let me go.

  I wanted to go with him. New York? Alone with Chase and his wonderful erection? Thanks, yes. But...he was going for his career. It was his big break. He didn't need me there, hanging on him, waiting for him to come back.

  Besides, I'd known him for a week. One week. Two meetings. He'd kissed me the first day we met, and we'd slept together the second time.

  Slept together. Such a trivial, meaningless phrase in the face of what really happened. Chase showed me what sex was like, what it could be, even for a big girl like me.

  Big girl. I'd rolled that phrase around in my mind since he left. What did it mean, really? What did it signify? My clothes size? The number on the scale when I dared step on it? The shape of my body or the heft of my breasts and the swell of my backside?

  No, what I realized was my use of the phrase "big girl" in reference to myself was nothing more than a self-categorization. I identified myself as that, so that's what I became.

  Yeah, I know. Diets and exercise and eating right and it's not about what you eat but how much and why...blah blah blah. I'd tried it all. I could get to a certain point, and then my body just stopped shrinking. It just held where it was and refused to change anymore, until further efforts turned into bashing my head against the wall. So I kept myself at the point where I wouldn't lose any more weight and learned to accept it as the best I'd get.

  But then I met Chase, and he thought I was beautiful. He didn't say it—well, he did, over and over again—but it was his actions that showed me he thought I was beautiful. It was in the way he touched me, in the way he kissed and me held me and made love to me. It was the fact that he considered it making love rather than having sex or fucking.

  All this, from one night. Lordy lord. I was so mixed up, so completely screwed up in the head, now, and it was all Chase's fault. I was addicted to his body, to being in bed with him, from one night.

  I had a friend in high school who tried crack once at a party. She tried it once, got high on it once, one single time, and that was it. She was hooked. OD'd a few years later.

  Well, Chase was my drug. Once, and I was hooked.

  The problem was, he was gone, and I couldn't get him back. Not without chasing him across the country. Chasing Chase.

  I tossed the dildo across the room, not bothering to clean it first. There was no point.

  * * *

  DJing that night was hellish. I'd begged off my last shift the weekend Chase left. I went home, got drunk with my roommate and stayed that way all day, marinating in my despair. Jaime never asked what was bothering me, because she's awesome that way. She knew I'd tell her when I wanted to, when I was ready.

  I wasn't ready.

  So now, with my first shift halfway through, I was a mess. I was cranky, bitchy, and off my game.

  Jeff was setting up the speakers and mixer board while I sorted CD's and song books.

  He was holding the speaker above his head with one hand and trying to spin the knob to tighten it in place, but it wouldn't catch for some reason, and he was getting frustrated. Those speakers are heavy, remember. Most people can't lift them above their head with one hand. Jeff's a beast like that. I watched him, grunting and sweating as he fiddled with the knob, his habitual long sleeve T-shirt falling down around his forearms.

  I suddenly realized how attractive Jeff really was. Maybe it was my raging libido or desperate need to get off, but right then, with his face contorted in irritation, his muscles bulging against the fabric of his shirt...he'd never been sexier to me.

  Sure, I'd noticed in an off-hand way that he was attractive, but I'd never considered him before, and I suddenly wasn't sure why not.

  "Anna, give me a hand, will you? This thing is stuck." Jeff's voice snapped me out of my rumination.

  He put both hands to the speaker and held it while I got the knob to work. He was inches from me, the musk of male sweat in my nostrils, the heat of his body radiating into me. So close, yet so far.

  I had a sudden, crazy desire to press my body into him, to see what his arms felt like around me. I was leaning, shifting my weight...and then he was gone. His eyes were on me, though, and I knew he'd felt it.

  I shook my head. What the hell am I thinking? I couldn't afford distractions, not with Jeff. He was my partner, my business friend. Nothing else. It couldn't work.

  Plus, he just wasn't Chase.

  Yeah, but he's not far behind. My libido was piping up now, telling me what it wanted. And it wanted a taste of Jeff, a look at him without his long sleeve shirt, to feel his hands on me.

  Jeff stood around six feet tall, maybe an inch less, but bulky. Where Chase was a toned, proportionate specimen of male perfection, Jeff was more naturally power
ful, heavy upper body and thick, muscular legs, all padded with a layer of softness that belied the power of his body. I'd seen him in action, breaking up fights in the bar, lifting hundred-pound speakers easily. He had short, thick brown hair, expressive dark brown eyes, almost black, and a broad, attractive face. He wasn't a handsome man, not classically beautiful like Chase was, but rather rugged, attractive in a rough-hewn way. Jeff wasn't much for words, but he managed to express a huge amount with a simple look, a quirk of the eyebrow, a small smile, a narrowing of the eyes.

  We got the equipment set up, got the first songs worked through and adjusted the quirks in the mix. Jeff and I did our first number together, "Summer Nights" from Grease. We always killed that one. Everyone loves that song. It's catchy, fun. The older crowd knows it from when the movie first aired, and the younger ones either know it or just like the poppy tune. Jeff's high, clear tenor suits the male part, and I can push my voice high enough to fit the female thread.

  But the spark, the heat and tension driving that drove my performances with Chase...that wasn't there. It was just missing, and I couldn't sell the performance like I usually did with Jeff.

  He noticed.

  When we took our break in closed, darkened bar kitchen, he followed with a pair of Jaeger shots.

  "You were flat at the end," he remarked, handing me my shot.

  I downed it and gave him the rocks glass back. Jeff was blunt, and he always had been. I knew it, and it didn't usually bother me.

  "Well, awesome," I snapped, feeling a sudden rush of irritation. "Thanks for that."

  Jeff gave me a puzzled look. He tells me when I'm flat; I tell him.

  "I didn't mean it like that, and you know it. Just letting you know." He muttered it, irritated.

  "Well next time keep your opinions to your goddamn self. I know when I'm flat."

  "What the hell's your problem?"

  "None of your fucking business, Jeff."

  His eyes narrowed and his mouth turned down. The confused hurt on his face was palpable. I felt bad, knowing he'd done nothing to deserve my irritation.

  "Jesus, Anna. Take a pill. Goddamn." He stuffed his phone back in his pocket and went back out into the bustle and noise of the bar.

  Great, I thought. Now I've pissed him off.

  The last thing I wanted to do was apologize, but I didn't want Jeff mad at me. He wouldn't say anything, just give me hard, sad glances and keep it to himself. It was worse than being yelled at.

  I followed him out and cornered him behind the mixer. "Jeff, I'm sorry." My hand was on his arm; I hadn't meant to touch him, but now I couldn't move my hand away. "I'm being bitchy, and it's not your fault."

  He shrugged, not looking at me directly, but over my shoulder. "No big. We all have bad days."

  "Yeah, well, this may end up being more than a bad day, just fair warning." I didn't want to end up talking about it. "So, if I'm a bitch to you, don't take it personally."

  Jeff eyed me, then, a long, searching look. He had his suspicions what was bothering me I think. He was too spare with his words and emotions to ask though.

  "We can talk about it after. I'll buy."

  I shrugged, uncomfortable. I did want to talk about it, actually, but I wasn't sure Jeff was the right person.

  "Maybe. We'll see. It's just one of those things, you know?"

  Jeff lifted an eyebrow at my vague statement. "Well, the offer stands."

  We made it through the night, and I managed to keep my irritability to a minimum. I only snapped at Jeff few times.

  When the customers were mostly gone and it was time to pack the equipment, Jeff waved me away.

  "Go home, Anna. I got it."

  Home. Jaime would be out still, over at her boyfriend's house, most likely. Silent, empty, lonely home.

  I shook my head. "I'm fine. I'll help."

  He rolled his eyes but let me carry the mixer to his SUV. When we finished loading, we bellied up to the bar and Darren, the owner and manager, slid us a pair of beers. We'd been DJing at Green's Tavern for years, and Darren let us stay after hours to drink until he had to leave.

  We drank the first beer in companionable silence. Jeff spoke up halfway through the second.

  "So. Problems with the boyfriend already, huh?" He spoke without looking at me, a Jeff-quirk.

  "He wasn't my boyfriend." I so didn't want to get into the messy details. "Just a guy. But yeah. The problem is, he's gone."

  Jeff took his time to formulate a response. "And you didn't want him to leave."

  He was trying hard to hide the jealousy in his eyes, but he couldn't quite manage it. At least, not from me.

  "It's complicated. It wasn't anything. Just one night. But then he had to leave, and he won't be back. Sucks."

  Jeff spoke in short sentences, sometimes leaving out words. I had a tendency to start sounding like Jeff after a while.

  "Sorry to hear it. He was good for you?"

  Jeff was being careful. He knew I knew about his feelings for me, and he also knew I wasn't interested. What he didn't know was my mind and body seemed to be changing their minds.

  "Yeah. He was great for me. Treated me like I was beautiful."

  "That's 'cause you are." The words seemed to slip past his lips as if he'd tried to hold them back. "Shit." This last was mumbled into the mouth of his beer bottle.

  I twisted on my stool to look at him. Our knees were almost touching, but not quite. I could feel the space between our knees as if static electricity was sparking between us.

  "I am?" I tried not to make it sound flirty, but didn't succeed.

  Jeff drained his beer and popped the top of the third. Darren had left a few on the bar for us while he counted the register. His actions were short and jerky, the bottle clinking against his teeth as he lifted it to his lips.

  "Don't, Anna. Not if you don't mean it." He was examining the bar top as if it held an answer. "You know how I feel. So don't."

  "How do you feel?" I wasn't looking at him either. It was just easier.

  Jeff didn't answer for a long time. "Quit playing games with me," he said, eventually.

  I shifted my legs so our knees touched. Jeff jerked, as if the contact had physically shocked him.

  "Damn it, Anna. Don't fuck with me." Jeff stood up and slammed his beer bottle down. "I need a shot, goddamn it."

  "I'm not, playing games, Jeff. I promise."

  "Then what is this? What are you doing? I've spent six years as your friend and partner, nothing more. I haven't—what I feel hasn't changed in all that time. But now, suddenly...you—" Jeff reached over the bar and pulled a bottle of whiskey out, found a shot glass and poured a finger into it; he slammed the shot, and then another. "Times like this I miss smoking."

  He'd quit cigarettes two years before, and I'd never heard him voice a craving. He'd also never drank anything but beer or Jaeger.

  I matched his shot count. Darren was at the end of the bar watching us. He'd nodded at Jeff when he first grabbed the bottle. I was feeling dizzy, now, but I didn't stop. I finished my beer and grabbed another. The dizziness was welcome, the lightheaded forgetting a pleasant distraction from my emotional turmoil.

  Jeff was facing away from me, staring out the window into the darkness of an empty street, traffic light cycling from red to green.

  "You're just using me as a crutch to get over what's his name," Jeff said, apropos of nothing. "Not fair to me."

  I stood up unsteadily and made my way next to Jeff. I didn't touch him, although I wanted to.

  "Maybe I'm just realizing what's been in front of me the whole time," I said.

  "Horseshit," Jeff spat. "Besides, I don't want his leftovers."

  Oh, ouch. I'm leftovers, now?

  "What the fuck, Jeff? I'm not sloppy seconds, I'm your friend. And I'm just wondering what else it might be, or could be. I don't know."

  I turned away to stomp to my car, only I wobbled on my heels. Jeff caught me and I shrugged him off. I was pissed off now, even tho
ugh I knew Jeff was just pushing to protect himself.

  "Fuck off, Jeff. I'm going home."

  Jeff grunted in irritation and caught my arm again. "Not like this you're not. You can barely walk. You aren't driving anywhere." He was both irritated and feeling his alcohol, so his accent was getting thicker.

  "I'm fine."

  "You're not." Jeff pulled out his wallet, tossed a bill on the bar and waved a goodbye to Darren. "I'll take you home. And Anna, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it. I was just pissed off."

  I let him help me into the passenger seat of his Yukon. It smelled vaguely of pine-scented air freshener, and something that was indefinably Jeff-smell, clean and male. He leaned over me, buckled me in, dug in my purse for my keys and locked my car. His presence in front of me had me inhaling his scent, wondering what the skin by his jaw tasted like.

  Things were spinning, the dashboard wavering in front of my eyes, and the floor beneath my feet seemed to jump and wiggle.

  "Guess I'm worse off than I thought," I said, hearing the slur. "Don't know what's come over me. I've done more shots than this and been fine."

  Jeff snorted a laugh as he slid into the driver's seat and started the van. "You haven't eaten today. Your stomach's been growling since nine o'clock. Plus, you don't usually drink whiskey."

  "What about you?" I focused on breathing and keeping my head straight on my shoulders.

  "Had a big dinner. And I used to drink whiskey by the gallon. "

  I couldn't summon any more arguments. Maybe it'd be fine, maybe it wouldn't.

  "Don't take me home," I mumbled. "Don't want to be alone."

  Jeff glanced sidelong at me. "You can crash at my place."

  I realized I'd never been to Jeff's place, and I didn't know if he lived in a house or an apartment. He drove slowly and carefully, seeming none the worse for wear. I was having trouble keeping track of time, and it might have been five minutes or an hour before we pulled up in front of a tiny house on a corner lot, deep in a subdivision. It was a shack more than anything, maybe one bedroom, if that.