Going the Distance (15 page)

“Ah…yeah. I mentioned it.”

“You did? Why?”

He cleared his throat. “They made me.”

“What?”

“They’re huge gossips, Olivia. They have nothing to do with their time, so they spy on me. Brant even called Jonah and told him.”

“Who’s Jonah?”

“My brother.”

“Oh, right. Your brother.”

He glanced down at her. She was still watching the path. He’d pried into the most painful part of her past, and had never offered her more than the most basic facts about himself. He sighed inwardly. “We’re twins.”

She looked up in surprise. “Twins?”

“Yeah. Fraternal. He’s six minutes older.”

“Wow.” She was quiet for a few minutes.

He nudged her. “What’s wrong?”

She scratched her cheek. “Have you ever slept with someone and then realized that you didn’t really know anything about them?”

Ah…He was definitely not going to answer that question. He’d slept with tons of women he knew nothing about, but he preferred it that way. Olivia made a scoffing sound and he risked a look down at her. She’d obviously read the answer on his face. “Never mind, Jarek.”

“You knew I had a brother.”

“That’s all I knew. Are you a lot alike? Was he in the army as well?”

“No. He’s a gardener. A ‘landscape architect,’ if you believe his business card.”

“A landscape architect?”

He pursed his lips. “A gardener.”

“Is he married?”

“Yeah. They have twins. Girls. Picket fence, the works. They go to church, he volunteers, she’s a ballet teacher.”

“Wow. That’s so…perfect.”

“Yep. He’s perfect. Everyone says so.”

Another quarter mile in silence. “What about your parents? How long ago did your mom…pass?”

He cleared his throat awkwardly, swatting cottonwood seeds out of the air, the fluffy pods clinging to his dark shirt. His life before the army wasn’t really a secret, he just never talked about it. It felt strange and foreign, but he tried anyway. “She died when I was six. Pancreatic cancer.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Sure. Thanks.”

“What was she like? Were you close?”

“Yeah. I mean, the way any kid is close with their mom. She was really beautiful. I remember she always wore dresses and lipstick. She liked to go out a lot, dancing, restaurants, stuff like that.”

“Were they really in love?”

“My parents?”

“Yeah.”

Now it was his turn to be quiet. “My dad was in love with her,” he said finally. “And I guess she loved him. But he wasn’t really…enough for a woman like that, I don’t think.”

“What do you mean?”

“He never went out with her.”

“So?”

He shot her a meaningful look. “So I didn’t know it because I was six, but she wasn’t going out alone. There were other men. A lot of them. I mean, she was beautiful and alive, and he just wasn’t.” He tried to keep his voice level and his face blank, not letting her see how difficult this was. How alike he and Aidan McLean were, no matter how many times he’d sworn he wouldn’t be his father.

“And he didn’t mind?”

“He didn’t do anything about it. Then one day she didn’t feel well and she went to the hospital, and a month later she was dead. And my dad never really got over it.”

She heard something in his voice then, because she stopped running and waited for him to stop too, turning to face her. “Did you? Get over it?”

“Yeah. Let’s keep going.”

“Jarek—”

“Let’s keep moving if you want to talk about this. I don’t want to have a fucking heart to heart in the middle of town, okay?”

She pulled her lower lip between her teeth. “Okay.”

They ran another quarter mile before he spoke again. “He was different after she died. Worse. Like he didn’t know how to be a real person, or be around other people. He was angry.”

“Did he take it out on you guys?”

“Yeah.”

“Was it worse for you than your brother?”

He used the hem of his shirt to wipe sweat from his brow. “No. It was the same for both of us. We processed it differently, obviously. He became a gardener and I beat the shit out of people for a living.” That was over-simplifying things, but she was smart enough to see it. He’d spent his entire life vowing to be nothing like his father, then he’d enlisted and they’d done an aptitude test and lo and behold, he was best suited to hurting people. Jonah, for whatever fucking reason, was destined to plant flowers.

“How long has he been sick?”

“Awhile now. Something to do with his liver. Jonah tells me about it, even though I asked him not to.” He hadn’t spoken to his father in four years. What did he say to the man who’d helped turn him into some soulless asshole? He hadn’t beaten his kids for fun or sport, the way some abusers did. He’d just punished them severely for every little thing; forgetting to make your bed merited the same beating as a suspension from school. Somewhere along the way he and Jonah had diverged. Jonah took the beatings personally and tried to be better, but Jarek started to feel nothing. He recognized the pain, but on the emotional front, he was a blank slate. And that was how it had been when he was working: doing whatever it took to get results, then going home and sleeping with a clear conscience. He’d never had so much as a bad dream. He was the perfect asshole.

“That’s enough, all right?” he said when she opened her mouth to speak. He didn’t know what she was going to say, another question or some sympathetic remark, but he didn’t want to stay on this train of thought. He wasn’t even sure what had prompted the sudden sharing, except that he didn’t want to keep shutting her out in case she finally gave up and walked away. They had until her contract was up at the end of June; he’d just let the pieces fall where they would and pick them up when she was gone.

“Sure.” She didn’t do anything to make him feel worse, didn’t look at him with pity or try to hold his hand. She just ran beside him, her breathing even, footsteps matching his, until they’d run the entire length of the path and back, exiting near her apartment.

“Do you want to get something to eat?” she asked as they weaved their way through traffic and pedestrians on the busy street.

“No.” He gripped her arm and fairly dragged her the short distance to her building. After the conversation he’d done little more than watch her tits and ass bounce, and he wanted nothing so much as to lose himself in her for a little while. “Just open the door, okay? Let’s go upstairs.”

She read his intention easily, discomfort flashing across her face. “Are you okay? Maybe—”

He took the keys from her hand and opened the green door, nudging her into the stairwell. “I’m fine, Olivia. I’ve wanted to fuck you since you bent over that dolly this morning, and I don’t want to wait anymore.”

“Jarek, I…” She glanced around the stairwell, as though anyone lingering would be able to understand what he was saying.

“Tell me to go if you don’t want to.” He stopped on the second floor landing, watching her hesitate a few steps up.

“This is just really abrupt. I didn’t know—”

He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Is it because of what I said?”

“What?”

“About my father? You think I’m an asshole because he was one?”

“No. I just thought you were sad, so—”

“Olivia. I’m not sad. I’ve got a fucking hard-on and I want your help with it. If you don’t want to, then say so, but don’t look at me like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like you’re sorry for me.”

She scoffed. “I am the furthest thing from sorry for you.”

“Then what’s it going to be? You going to let me in?”

Her fingers gripped the rail for support, and he could see her hard nipples through the thin fabric of her shirt. “What are you going to do?” she asked.

Jarek climbed the stairs slowly, advancing as she retreated. “I’m going to bend you over the table right inside the door and fuck you,” he said softly. “Is that what you want to hear? I’ve been doing a lot of talking tonight.”

“I know you have.”

“So let’s take a break and do something else, okay?”

They reached the fourth floor, breathing hard. He could tell she was nervous, and didn’t bother telling her she had nothing to fear from him. Almost all the people who had been afraid of him had good reason, but she didn’t need to worry. He didn’t say so, however. Just waited as she twisted the key in both locks, followed her inside, slammed the doors, bent her over the table, and pulled her shorts down to her knees. Her skin was damp with sweat and warm from exertion, and he freed his straining cock and slipped on a condom in record time. He kept her legs together and fit himself to her pink folds, pushing in and finding her slick but not wet, making the process excruciatingly slow.

She gripped the table over her head, knuckles white, relaxing only when he was buried to the hilt. He gave her a moment to adjust, then squeezed her ass to get her attention. “How does the song go, Olivia?” he asked mildly. “
I put my dick in.”
He pulled out and drove forward again. “
I take my dick out.”
He withdrew. “
I put my dick in and I shake it all about
.”

She trembled with a sudden laugh, smothering the sound with her forearm. He could see the tension easing from her shoulders as she correctly gauged his lighter mood. “Stop,” she begged as he continued. “I have to sing this song for two more weeks.”

He trailed a finger down her back, skimming between her ass cheeks, stopping at the tiny hole he’d never penetrated. “
I put my finger in…”
he murmured, pressing at the resisting ring of muscle.

She went completely still. “
Jarek
.”

“What? Have you ever done this?”

She wasn’t stopping him, so he pushed until half his finger disappeared, the tight muscles clenching desperately. Her hesitation spoke volumes. “You’ve tried it?” he asked again.

“Once,” she mumbled into her arm. “Chris…”

“And?”

“I made him stop.”

He dragged his finger in and out, shallow, slow thrusts. “Why?”

“It felt…”

“Bad?”

She shook her head. “It was too much.”

He prodded her with a second finger, but she was too tight. And he gave up trying altogether when she reached back to grip his wrist. She’d never really stopped him before, sexually. He was sure he’d done things to her Chris hadn’t tried, but she’d gone along with him, participating equally. Now he let her still his hand, finger lodged inside, not moving.

“Am I hurting you?”

“I don’t want you to…”

He leaned over her, brushing her blond hair to the side and kissing the nape of her neck. “You don’t want me to fuck your ass?”

She shuddered. “No.”

“You sure?”

Now she turned her head, looking at him out the corner of her eye. “Positive.”

He grinned. Anal wasn’t really his thing, but he liked this part. Thought she might like it, too. “Okay. I won’t. Want me to take my finger out?” Her cheeks flamed as he wiggled the offending digit. “No? You like it? Want another one?”

“No.”

“You can tell me if you do.”

“I don’t.”

“Okay. Put your hand back over your head. You’re blocking my view.”

She met his gaze for a second and must have decided to believe whatever she saw there, because she returned her hand to the table and pressed her face into the crook of her elbow, granting him access. She was so wet, his cock slid in and out easily, and he groaned at the grip of her pussy, eyes locked on the finger buried in her back passage. He demanded so much honesty from people, but trust was another thing altogether. The people who broke down and told him the truth hadn’t done it because they’d trusted him, they’d done it to get him to stop. Olivia allowed him to continue because she trusted him, because she saw something in him that didn’t make her want to run screaming.

“I want to feel you come, Olivia.” He whispered it into her hair, his voice rough.

“I’m close.”

He slipped a hand over her hip, finding her swollen clit, grazing it with his fingertip. “Will this help?”

She shook. “Yes.”

“Harder?” He circled her sensitive flesh, pressing more firmly when he got the reaction he was looking for.

“Yes, yes, yes…” Her cries were muffled by the table as she clamped down and writhed against him, pulling him deeper, drawing him in. He tormented her with the finger in her ass, tormented himself with the realization that when it came to Olivia he’d never feel like he had enough.

He curled over her, moving his hands to squeeze her slim shoulders as he pounded inside, pouring out his release with a groan, burying his forehead in her neck. When their breathing slowed, she lifted a hand to stroke his hair, soothing him, as though she somehow knew he needed it. Letting him know without words that he could trust her, too.

O
LIVIA’S
E
YES
F
LEW
O
PEN
and fixed on the alarm clock on the nightstand: six ten. It was six ten in the morning and something hard was pressing into the back of her thigh. Something that wasn’t supposed to be in her warm, safe—

“Morning.”

She almost toppled out of the bed when a broad arm wrapped around her waist and Jarek planted a kiss on her shoulder. She grabbed his wrist for balance and tried not to make a fool out of herself. He’d spent the night. For the first time. Ever. It was coming back to her now. Sex on the table. A quick run across the street for dinner. A movie (
27 Dresses
, to his extreme displeasure and her joy), more sex, this time slower and sweeter, and then…he’d just stayed there. She’d lain in bed, waiting for him to tense up the way he always did, the way he thought she didn’t notice. He was physically uncomfortable with the idea of sleeping over, as well as emotionally pained by it. And yet Jarek had remained, lying on his back, eyes on the ceiling, not moving. She’d dozed off, expecting to be woken any moment by the bed shifting as he crawled out and went home, and it hadn’t happened. At all, apparently. He hadn’t left.

“You’re here?” she mumbled.

“Yeah.” The hand on her waist shifted up to squeeze her breast, and she turned her head and smiled into the pillow. He was spooned up against her—Jarek McLean, spooning—and enjoying it, if his erection were any indication.

“Did you sleep all right?”

“Fine. You?” He’d slept naked and she wore panties and a T-shirt, the former of which he worked down her thighs so she could kick them off. He insinuated a knee between hers, and cupped the soft folds between her legs.

“This is a surprise,” she said in response.

He chuckled into her hair and fit his cock to her, nudging his way inside. “I know.”

“What changed?” She bit her lip as he circled her clit with two slick fingers. She wasn’t complaining; he’d been a diligent student since they’d started sleeping together. Initially his motivation had been simply to make her orgasms better. Once he’d figured out the key to her pleasure, he’d set himself the task of making them more frequent and intense. His talented fingers knew just what to do now, and she was soon breathing hard and thrusting back against him.

“Nothing,” he said. “Everything.”

“I see.”

Suddenly he swore and pushed her hips away, pulling out and clambering over her and out of bed. He was buck naked, his protruding cock slick and shiny, and she stared at him, confused and trying not to laugh. “What’s wrong?” she managed.

“This!” He gestured to his erection and cursed some more as he hunted for his pants and snatched them up.

Olivia sat up straight, alarmed and annoyed. He’d never left her unsatisfied before—not on purpose. “Would you please tell me—” She cut off when he held up a condom, wielding it like a weapon.

“I fucking forgot, Olivia. I fucking—Oh my God. I’ve never forgotten. Never. I don’t—”

“Shh.” She climbed out of bed and took the condom from his fingers. He hadn’t opened it yet, and she still wanted him. Not without a condom, however. They were both clean, but she wasn’t on birth control anymore—no need, for the past year—and she wasn’t about to visit a doctor here if she didn’t have to. “I just finished my period,” she said, stroking his arm. “I won’t get pregnant. Are you okay? Do you just want to…?” She let the phrase trail off, leaving the options open.

He took the condom from her hand, rolled it on, and backed her into the bed. She sank down and wordlessly he followed, propping her legs wide open and sliding inside.

“Are you okay?” she asked again.

“Yeah. Sorry about that.” He hid his face in her neck and thrust gently.

“I was hoping your first time sleeping over would alleviate your fear of spending the night when you realized nothing terrible would happen.”

His laugh was pained, muffled by her skin. “It’s the opposite of terrible, Liv. You feel so fucking good. All over. You’re the best thing I’ve ever felt.”

She ran her fingers through his curls, letting them tangle. “You’re sappy in the morning. Is that why you avoid staying over?”

“Guilty.” He rocked against her, his pubic bone hitting her clit and sending her over the edge. He followed, lips fastened to her neck, hard enough that she knew she’d have her first hickey in years.

A while later Olivia went to take a shower while Jarek dressed and made the bed. When she came out she dressed for work and combed out her wet hair, then found him standing in the kitchen with a glass of orange juice and a banana, watching the bustling street below.

He poured her a drink and she accepted, watching him over the rim. “What?” he asked, looking suspicious.

“I think we should talk about starting a family,” she said, straight-faced.

He spit his mouthful of orange juice back into his cup. “What did you just say?”

Olivia ticked up three fingers as she spoke. “Bed. Breakfast. Babies. That’s the order.” She tapped the third finger. “We’re on point number three.”

“Oh my God.” He poured the remaining juice down the drain and rinsed out his cup. “You’re fucking demented.” He reached over and covered her fingers with his own, removing all three “points.”

“I’m a woman, Jarek. This is how we do things. If someone spends the night and then eats breakfast, they have to marry you. It’s the rule.” She made a finger gun and shot his banana.

“You have a warped sense of humor, Olivia. I almost had a heart attack.”

She laughed. “I would have saved you.”

“Don’t. Let me die if those are my options.”

She winked and returned to the bathroom to dry her hair. He appeared in the doorway a few minutes later, watching. “What’s up?” she asked.

“What’s this?”
This
was the tourism information from Beijing she’d collected from one of the local travel agencies and arranged on her desk.

“I’m going to Beijing!” she shouted over the roar of the dryer.

“When?”

“Maybe in two weeks. I’ll make it a long weekend. I want to see the Great Wall.” She tapped the matching picture on the brochure and finished her hair. “Have you ever been?”

“No. Are you going with somebody?”

Olivia squeezed past him to sit at the table and put on her shoes. “I was going to ask you,” she said, which was true. “And then if you said no, maybe I’d go by myself, or maybe someone else would want to come.”

“Who?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t thought that far ahead. But I’m not going to be here much longer, and I wasted the first few months being so nervous about how new everything was that I kind of have to jam it all in. I’m going to Thailand, too.”

“Thai—When?”

“First week of June. You’re not invited, no offense. It’s for my birthday. I booked it months ago. Apparently it’s much easier to get around Thailand than China, so I think it’ll be okay. I have to start figuring out how to be on my own, you know? Plus it looks really beautiful.” She was talking too much, but the look on his face was making her antsy. He was so mistrusting, no matter how honest she was. Never mind that she’d never lied to him about anything before.

“You’re going alone?”

“Yeah.” She finished lacing up her shoes and scooped up her keys. “I have to go to work. You can think about Beijing if you want. I’m going, either way.”

He set the pamphlets on the table and followed her out, down the treacherous stairwell to the street. The morning sun was bright, scooters and taxis zipped past, and the now-familiar city smells filled the air. The construction site and her school were in opposite directions, so they stopped on the sidewalk. Jarek had his hands in his pockets—something he always did when he was thinking—and studied the scene around them.

She pasted on a smile and stepped away. “Have a good day at work.”

He nodded and examined his shoes, nodding to himself. “Okay.”

“Okay, bye.” She didn’t take this stuff personally anymore. The mood swings. The man who opened up about his mother, then fucked her bent over a table. The man who told her he wasn’t what she needed, then came over with a first aid kit. She didn’t dwell on it. She’d had consistency before. Steady, reliable Chris. And look how that had turned out.

“I mean, okay, Beijing,” he said, stopping her.

She turned. “Okay, you’ll come?”

“Yeah. If you want.”

She lifted a shoulder. “Whatever.”

He cracked a smile. “
Those
are the three B’s: bed, breakfast, Beijing.”

“Is that it? I could have sworn it was babies.”

“It’s definitely Beijing.”

“I suppose I could have misread it.”

He was smiling again. She liked him when he was broody and dark, but she liked seeing him smile, too. She liked that it was a challenge and that she was up for it.

“Beijing,” he said. “In two weeks.”

“Two weeks,” she echoed. “It’s a date.”

They’d never gone on an actual date
, she mused as she sat at her desk and prepared for the day’s lessons. Sure, they’d gone places together, but never anything special. More often than not they stopped somewhere for fried rice or noodles or plates of fried bok choy and shredded pork, still dressed in their running gear. Jarek had never called and asked her out, brought her flowers, held her hand. Sometimes she had to remind herself that she didn’t care. This wasn’t a typical relationship. Plus, she’d already had typical, and it had been a pretty epic failure.

“Good morning, Olivia.”

She glanced up to spot Honor entering the classroom, Alan in tow. The Spiderman costume was nowhere to be seen today, instead he was dressed casually in jeans and a sweater. And for once he didn’t look mutinous.

“Good morning, Honor. Good morning, Alan.”

He shuffled his feet and his gaze shifted around the room. Honor squeezed his hand and said something in Mandarin and he mumbled a greeting that may or may not have been in English.

“What are you doing here so early?” Olivia asked, standing to meet them in the middle of the room. “There’re still twenty minutes before the bell.”

“Alan wants to show you something,” Honor said. She spoke to Alan in Mandarin and he nodded, eyes fixed on the floor.

Olivia thought about what Jarek said, how Alan just wanted her to like him. How she just had to keep trying. “Okay,” she said, smiling. “Let’s see it.”

Honor nudged Alan and he shrugged out of his backpack and dumped it on the floor. Olivia expected him to take something out of the bag, but instead he crouched low on the floor, one hand extended in front of him, face set in a serious scowl. She looked uncertainly at Honor, who was trying not to laugh, and then Alan started to…dance. Well,
dance
may not have been the best word. It was part interpretive dance, part made up martial art, and part spinning in circles. The whole thing appeared to have been carefully choreographed, lasted two minutes, and ended with Alan jumping in the air, karate chopping an invisible foe, and shrieking at the top of his lungs.

Olivia stared, wide-eyed, and made herself clap and smile when what she really wanted to do was gape at the kid. “Very good, Alan. That was so great!” She sounded about as sincere as Jarek had when he’d told her she was hilarious that morning, and felt just as shocked.

Alan dusted himself off, looking pleased, and brought his backpack to the desk, sitting down and taking out a workbook.

“What was that?” Olivia whispered.

Honor covered her mouth so she didn’t laugh. “He wants to perform this dance as part of your play.”

“He wants to be Spiderman and dance?”

“Yes.”

“I…”

“At least you have many trees,” Honor offered.

Olivia ran a hand through her hair. “That’s true.”

“Your boyfriend is very nice. The teachers think he is handsome.”

“Oh yeah?” It was on the tip of her tongue to say that Jarek wasn’t her boyfriend, then she remembered that he, in fact, was.

“Yes. Very tall. It’s good.”

“How about Ritchie?” Olivia asked. “Do you like him?”

Honor blushed. “Yes,” she said. “I like him. But maybe…he does not like me. Not today.”

Olivia frowned. “He likes you. He told me.”

“Another day, yes. But now…maybe not.”

“Why? What happened?”

“I have another boyfriend. Three other boyfriends.”

Olivia’s jaw dropped. “What?”

Honor waved a hand dismissively. “Not real boyfriends. I’m old now, and my parents want me to find a husband. So they call their friends and they send their sons to see me, and say they are my boyfriend. So I must agree.”

“I—How old are you?”

“Twenty-three years old.”

“That is
not
old.”

“In China, maybe it is old. Almost old. Enough time to get married.”

“Is that what you want?”

“Maybe. If I find the right husband.”

“And these boyfriends…?”

“They are nothing. Not really.”

“And Ritchie?”

A shrug. Honor looked uncomfortable. “He is different. But he does not want to be my boyfriend if I have another three boyfriends.”

“Well…That’s fair.”

Two of the older Chinese teachers approached, neither of whom spoke English. They chatted with Honor, who translated, telling Olivia that they thought her hair was not shiny enough today, but that she had a handsome boyfriend. What was it with everybody and the need for brutal honesty?

“Thanks,” Olivia said. “I’ll tell him.”

More chatter. “Do you love him?” Honor asked.

Her brows shot up. “I—no. He’s just—It’s—I—No.” She looked around the courtyard in case he had somehow managed to sneak in. After the “she’s not my girlfriend” debacle, she didn’t want to have the tables turned, even if it was true. She didn’t love him. She might, if they had more time, which they didn’t.

There was more rapid fire conversation, of which she understood nothing. “They say he loves you,” Honor informed her. “He made so many trees for you.”

“That was just scrap wood.”

“What? Wood? Yes, I know.” The awkwardness was interrupted—or exacerbated—by the arrival of Zhang Laoshi, the school principal. Zhang Laoshi (Teacher Zhang, though she didn’t actually teach any classes) was a small, middle-aged woman with a perpetual smile. She beamed at Olivia then said something to Honor in Mandarin, and the other girl’s demeanor shifted slightly. Olivia had a moment of panic as she wondered if she was in trouble for having allowed four strange men onto the school grounds, but that was not the case. “Olivia,” Honor began, somewhat formally. “Zhang Laoshi says that you have a nice boyfriend.”