Trashed (Stripped #2) Read online

  “I’m not mysterious.”

  I laugh. “Yes you are.”

  She shakes her head without breaking our locked gazes. “There’s just…a lot I don’t like to talk about.”

  “Fair enough.”

  My hands are on her back, resting lightly. I leave them there, and I shift forward, slant my mouth across hers. I taste her breath; feel the shaking in her body. But she’s pressing closer, her magnificent tits crushed between us, and I’m losing the fight to keep her clothed. I can’t hold back anymore.

  “I have to see you.” I whisper it, my lips moving against hers.

  Her lips move on mine, and she lifts up on her toes, deepening the kiss. I groan at the taste of her lips, the feel of her body against mine, and then her tongue slips between my teeth to slide against my tongue, and I’m lost. I’m gone.

  I reach up and curl my fingers into the thick collar of the robe, just beneath her chin. She’s on her tiptoes, so tall I don’t have to bend at all to match our mouths. The last of my will is shredded by the way she grinds her tongue against mine, and I slowly pull my hands apart as I slide them down the center of her torso. The robe opens, revealing tan skin and inner side boob. She gasps into my mouth and her fingers claw into my shoulders. I’m this close to having the robe off of her, to having all of her gorgeous body bare to me.

  “No.” She grasps the edges of the robe and pulls them back together, jerks backward, out of my reach. “Adam, I—I can’t. I can’t.” She’s gasping, her eyes wide and wavering back and forth.

  I hold up my hands in surrender. “Des, it’s okay, I’m sorry, I—”

  When my hands go up, she stumbles away from me, as if scared of me, of my hands, and her eyes are wet with tears. “Don’t! Don’t touch me, don’t—please—”

  “Des? What’s wrong? What did I do?” I’m totally baffled. I barely touched her, and as soon as she said the word “no” I had my hands off. This is an extreme reaction to a simple situation, and I don’t know how to handle it, what to do, or what caused it.

  She hits the end of the bed with her knees, sits down, and then scrambles away from me, and she’s sobbing, and I’m totally helpless.

  * * *

  This is a panic attack.

  I’ve only had one before this, and that was the last time I let a man touch me. It was a guy from a two hundred-level psychology class, someone I’d been in several classes with. He was a nice, attractive guy, easy to talk to, easy to look at. We had coffee after class one evening and then a few drinks and then we were in his car and we were kissing. Then his hands were under my shirt, and I wasn’t sure I liked it but I let him grope my boobs anyway, just to see how it would feel.

  But then he got greedy and tried to undo my pants and I freaked. He stopped right away and apologized, and I could tell he didn’t know why I was freaking, but I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t breathe and couldn’t see, dizzy and lungs aching. Eventually I managed to get it under control and the guy took me home, confused and frustrated and still nice as ever.

  That was a year ago.

  This panic attack is wracking and unending, terrifying in its intensity. I’m crying, and the more I cry the more I can’t breathe, and the more I can’t breathe the worse my terror gets, which in turn only worsens my weeping. It’s a cycle I don’t know how to break.

  I hear Adam saying my name, but that’s somewhere outside myself, and all I can grasp are the tears and the need to breathe and the terror. And somehow the tears come harder and faster and I can’t breathe. I’m choking and rolling away from him and crawling up the bed to curl into a ball near the pillows, sobs wracking me.

  The bed dips with a heavy weight, and I feel something warm drape over me. A blanket. He’s covering me. He wraps the blanket over me, and then slips his hands under me and lifts me like I’m a child, weightless. He settles on the bed with me, my head against his chest, and I can hear his heart beating steadily, a little fast, his breathing even and easy, and his arms are around me and his lips are at my ear, and he’s murmuring something rhythmic and soothing.

  I focus on his heartbeat, focus on his breathing, and try to match my breathing to his, try to will my heart to beat in time with his. Slowly my terror recedes and the hyperventilating lessens to ragged gasps. His hands rest on my shoulder and my hip; I’m curled on his lap like a child. I hear his voice now, and realized he’s singing some pop song, the kind of song you hear on the radio a dozen times every day but never really know the title or artist, just the hook and chorus. His voice is low, quiet, and melodic.

  I’m still crying, but quietly now.

  I have to stop this. I have to calm myself. I move off him into a sitting position. Breathing deeply and slowly, I slow my heartbeat back to normal, and I wipe at my eyes with the heels of my palms.

  I can’t even look at Adam now.

  He slides off the bed and goes to the kitchen. I hear water running, and then the gurgling of a kettle. I need to get up, need to get dressed, need to get out of here, but I can’t seem to move. I’m not thinking of the panic attack now, I’m thinking about what preceded it.

  I’ve never been so embarrassed in my life: I let a man I’ve known for a matter of hours almost get me naked, let him touch me, let him kiss me. And he’s not just some random guy, he’s a rich and famous movie star.

  What the fuck was I thinking?

  And then I go and have a panic attack.

  God, I’m a freak, and a mess.

  He comes up the stairs and into the bedroom with a mug in his hand, the string and tab of a tea bag dangling over the side of the mug. He’s wearing nothing but a pair of black gym shorts, and even after everything that just happened I catch myself staring at his crotch, watching the bounce and sway of his dick in his shorts as he walks toward me. I can see the tip in the folds of the shorts, a thick round thing. I force my eyes away and blink hard, keeping my eyes down on the floral-print comforter and accept the mug of tea from him.

  He sits on the edge of the bed and watches me sip the tea. Waits. “Des, I—” he stops, sighs, and tries again. “Are you okay?”

  I shrug. “I’m fine. Thanks.”

  “I want to ask what happened, what I did to make you have a panic attack, but I—”

  I interrupt him. “It wasn’t you. I just…have issues.”

  “I should have backed off. I’m sorry, Des. I saw—I knew you were nervous or something, but I didn’t realize—”

  I finally meet his eyes, and see that he’s genuinely upset. “Just…forget it, okay? It wasn’t you.”

  “Don’t feed me the ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ bullshit, Des. You don’t just have panic attacks that bad out of nowhere.” He says this gently, reaching out to trace my cheekbone with his thumb. “Drink your tea, babe. I’ll get dressed and take you home.”

  Babe. He called me babe.

  Why do I like that so much? And why do I feel this crazy urge to explain everything to him?

  Instead, I follow him across the room with my eyes as he snags a pair of jeans and a black T-shirt out of a suitcase in the corner of the bedroom area. He goes into the bathroom and comes out dressed a few seconds later. I notice he didn’t put on any underwear, and that does things I can’t quite figure out to my insides.

  I take a long sip of the tea, which is some kind of minty lemony herbal tea, and it’s exactly what I needed even though I didn’t know it until now. I listen as he calls down to the front desk and requests a private carriage.

  “What kind of tea is this?” I ask when he comes back.

  He goes down to the kitchenette and grabs the wrapper off the counter. “Harney and Sons. Mint Verbena.”

  “It’s really good.” I try to smile at him. “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.” He smiles back at me, but the questions that keep piling up in his eyes are all I can see.

  “I’m sorry for freaking out on you, Adam. It really wasn’t your fault.”

  He shrugs. “Don’t be sorry. ”
/>   I want to tell him how good what he did made me feel, but I don’t know how. “And thank you for…” I wave my hand vaguely, hating the way I’m flushing. “This.”

  His gaze narrows and heats. “This what?”

  I try a different tack. “I had a really…really good time. Until I wigged out, that is. But dinner, and everything. Just…thank you.”

  A smile brightens his face, his eyes gleaming. “I really enjoyed everything, too, Des. So thank you.”

  I finish my tea in two long swallows, burning my mouth a little and not caring. I have to get home. He’s too much. This is too much. I’m embarrassed by my freak-out, shaken by how intensely attracted to Adam I am, not just physically but to him, to the man, and I just don’t know what to think or feel or do.

  I still can’t believe I almost let him get me naked. That can’t happen. He’d see things no one has ever seen except Ruthie, and I don’t know how he’d react.

  I take the linen bag containing my clothes into the bathroom and dress quickly, and when I emerge Adam has a pair of cross trainers on and his room key in his hands. We walk to the elevator in silence. We ride down to the parlor level together in silence, and he walks me out to the covered driveway, not holding my hand and not speaking.

  A closed carriage waits, two tall black horses stomping and swishing their tails and shaking their heads. The driver is hunched over, wearing a slicker and gloves and looking miserable. A doorman opens the carriage door, and Adam hands me up.

  “Goodnight, Des,” he says.

  “Goodnight, Adam.”

  A million things lie between us, all unspoken.

  Rain still falls in wild, windblown curtains, and thunder still crashes and lightning still splits the sky. I’d forgotten, for a while, that it was storming.

  Adam hands a folded bill to the driver, tells him my destination, and then closes the door, shoving his hands in his pockets and watching as the carriage jerks into motion. I watch him until he’s out of sight.

  When I finally get home, Ruth is on her bed reading.

  She frowns at me over the top of her book. “I thought you were meeting Jimmy and me for drinks?”

  “I was going to,” I start, and then realize I have no clue how to explain what just happened, to myself, let alone to my friend. “Something came up.”

  Ruth knows me well enough to know when I’m evading, when I don’t want to talk about something. “Okay,” she shrugs, and then looks at me more closely. “Are you okay? You look like you were crying.”

  I owe her something, at least. “I don’t even know where to start, Ruthie. I just don’t. I’m okay, though. I just…I need some sleep.”

  She stares at me, one pierced eyebrow arched in suspicion. And then she goes back to reading. “Fine. But if you ever want to talk, you know you can tell me anything.”

  “I know.” I lean over and hug her, but quickly, so she doesn’t smell Adam on me. “Thanks, Ruthie.”

  Sleep is a long time coming. I can’t stop thinking of Adam, of what he made me feel. I realize he knew exactly how to handle my panic attack, and somehow I’m not surprised. He just took care of me, and he didn’t ask any questions.

  And when I finally fall asleep, I dream of his hands and his mouth and his eyes, and his words. I dream of his big warm hard body beneath mine, just holding me, and I dream of listening to his heartbeat.

  Chapter 5

  It’s late afternoon, the day of the fundraiser dinner. I’ve managed to spend the day in my room, answering emails and working on my script and studiously not thinking about Des. Eventually, I’m compelled by my restless nature to head downstairs for lunch. After eating, I find Gareth on one of the couches in the parlor, sipping tea and staring at his cell phone, a sour look on his face.

  “Bad news, Adam,” Gareth says to me.

  I sit down beside him, and he sets his phone on his knee. “Bad news, huh?” I glance at him. “What’s up?”

  “I just got a call from Emma.” He doesn’t look at me as he says her name. “The storm is still out of control. They ran the ferries all day yesterday despite the storm, but today they’re saying the waves are well over fifteen feet in places. They’re shutting down the ferries for a while, until the waves go down a bit.”

  I frown. “I didn’t think they ever shut the ferries down.”

  He shrugs. “I didn’t either. First time in like, twenty years or something. One of the ferries almost capsized this morning, apparently.” He taps at the screen of his phone. “Anyway, point is, Emma can’t make it for the dinner.”

  “Well damn,” I say, my tone dry and droll. “I’m so upset.”

  Gareth rolls his eyes and grins. “I’m sure you’re heartbroken. But you still need a date for the dinner.”

  “I might be stuck going on my own. It’s not the end of the world.”

  “Fine, whatever.” Gareth pokes me in the shoulder. “But you will show up, Adam. Alone or with a date, you have to at least make an appearance.”

  “I will, I will.”

  He sets his tea down with a clatter, and picks up a tiny triangular sandwich with something pink on top of the bread. It’s a formal English type of tea setup that they do every afternoon, apparently, complete with weird sandwiches and bizarre pastries.

  “Well, I’d better go make some calls,” I say, slapping my knee.

  Although, by the time I get up to my room, I already know what I’m going to do. It’s reckless, and sure to get me in trouble, and probably make a huge scene for everyone, but I don’t care. I shower and dress in my tux, fighting with the bow tie for nearly twenty minutes before getting it to look right. Fucking bow ties.

  I ask for a private carriage and bring an umbrella, not that it’ll do much good, as it’s still raining really hard. I hop into the waiting carriage, tell the driver where I want to go, and then sit back to think about what I’m going to say. And try not to think too closely about what I’m doing, and how bad an idea it is.

  It’s only a few minutes before the carriage is stopping outside her dorm. I jump out and jog to the entrance, which is luckily unlocked. A girl with blue-streaked blonde hair and an eyebrow piercing is exiting one of the apartment doors and locking it behind herself.

  “Excuse me,” I say, fixing my public-appearance smile on my face. “I’m looking for Des Ross.”

  The girl starts and presses a hand to her chest, having not seen me as I approached. “Holy shit, you scared me, dude.” And then she actually sees me and her eyes go wide. “Holy shit. Holy motherfucking shit.”

  I ignore her unblinking stare of disbelief. “Do you know where I can find Des?”

  She tilts her head to one side. “Why?”

  “I met her yesterday, and I wanted to…talk to her.” I take a step closer and let a silence hang. “Do you know where I can find her?”

  The girl has a calculating expression on her face. “She came home last night looking like she’d been crying.”

  “Home?” I glance at the door behind the girl. “She’s your roommate?”

  “Ruth Nicholson.” She extends her hand, and I shake it, squeezing gently.

  “Adam Trenton.”

  “Nice to meet you, Adam.” She withdraws her hand and fixes me with an impressively hard look. “So why did she come back looking shaken up?”

  I hesitate, not knowing what to say. Finally, I decide on neutrality. “I think if she didn’t explain, neither should I. But how about you just tell her I’m here, and let her decide if she wants to see me.”

  Ruth nods. “Good enough.” Her eyes rake up and down. “Nice tux, by the way.”

  “Thanks.”

  She goes back inside, and then returns after only a moment. “You can go in.” She closes the distance between us and looks up at me, a fierce expression on her face. “You better be nice to my friend, dude. I don’t care who you are. Don’t hurt her.”

  “She’s in good hands,” I tell her.

  She nods, a rueful expression crossing her fe
atures. “Yeah, that’s what I’m afraid of.”

  And then the small but fiery girl with blue-streaked hair is out in the rain, ducking and running across the street and into a coffee shop. The door to her and Des’s apartment is cracked open, so I knock on it and push in. It’s a dorm room, exactly like you’d find in any college in the country. Small, a bunk bed on one wall, a bookshelf and two small bureaus on another, a bathroom behind a partially open door. There’s an actual closet too, shallow and narrow, but more than most dorms have. There are girl clothes everywhere, a bra hanging off the hook of the bathroom door, inside-out jeans on the floor, a hairbrush on the desk under the window, a tiny scrap of thong underwear on the floor just inside the bathroom. Having sisters, I’m unfazed.

  Des is sitting at the desk, her hair in a ponytail and hanging over her shoulder. She’s wearing yoga pants and a hoodie, and she manages to be a knock-out even in that.

  Her eyes find mine. “Hi.”

  I move to the desk and perch one hip on the edge. “Hey.”

  She eyes me warily, but doesn’t move away from me, even though I’m suddenly in her personal space. “What’s up? Why are you here, and why are you wearing a tux?”

  “Do you have a nice dress here with you?”

  She just blinks at me. “A dress?”

  I nod. “Yeah. Like, a nice one. An evening gown type of thing.”

  I can see the wheels turning in her head. “I do, actually, yeah.” Her gaze flits over me. “God you look hot in that tux.” She closes her eyes slowly and presses her lips together, as if she hadn’t meant to say that.

  I laugh. “Thanks. So. How long will it take you to get ready?”

  She frowns. “Ready? For what?”

  “The ferries are shut down, so the person I was bringing to the dinner tonight can’t get here. I want you to come with me.”

  “The dinner? The fancy fundraiser dinner?”

  “Yep.”

  She shakes her head. “No. No fucking way.”

  I lean closer to her, brush my palm against her cheek and inhale her scent. “Please?”