ReCAP: A NORMAL Novella (11 page)

I open my mouth to tell her that she means
the fucking world to me, but she blurts out "and you're super hot,"
and we both crack up laughing. God I love hearing that. I wasn't
even sure she found me attractive at all.

"I like drunk Rory," I tell her, and she
scowls at me, surprising me.

"And what? You don't like sober Rory?" She
pouts.

Is she fucking crazy?
Yeah, I spend most of my time with her and the rest of it thinking
about her because I
don't
like her. I lean into her, needing her to hear
me. "Oh, I like sober Rory a lot. I just like hearing you tell me
what you're thinking. And I told you, don't pout, it's too
adorable."
And it makes me want to suck
on your fucking lip.

Being so close to her is confusing my
boundaries. Her honey and vanilla scent is invading my senses, her
beauty overwhelming me. I can't stop myself when my fingers take a
lock of her hair, my thumb rubbing at the perfect softness before I
tuck it behind her ear.

"You think I'm adorable?" she breathes.
Actually, it's more like a gasp.

I smirk down at her, and give her own line
right back to her. "You know you're gorgeous. You're not fooling
me." In truth, I'm not sure what she knows. If it were any other
girl, I'd say there's no way she's unaware of how attractive she
is, and I'd think she was fishing for compliments. But that's so
not Rory. In fact, attention is the last thing she wants, and this
ex of hers did a real number on her self esteem, because I really
don't think she realizes that she's the most beautiful girl I've
ever fucking laid eyes on.

"I tell you want I'm thinkin' all the time.
I tell you all kinds of things," she says.

"You tell me things," I agree. "But usually
not what you're thinking. Not in the moment, anyway. It's
refreshing," I tell her honestly.

"Tell me what you're thinkin'," she
challenges. "Drunk or not, it's only fair." Her confidence is far
more intoxicating than any alcohol, and the way she bats her
eyelashes at me makes my jeans feel painfully tight.

My lips quirk up into a
half-smile. "I'm thinking… you look beautiful," I whisper. I'm too
close to her, and I'm fighting to say in control of my emotions, of
my intense attraction to her.

"Carl and Tina did a good job makin' me up,"
she replies hoarsely.

I bite my lip to stifle my
grin at her naivety. I have that thought every goddamned day – that
she looks beautiful.

"Not just tonight, Rory."

Her breathing has grown shallow, but not in
panic, and I realize the alcohol has warped her judgment, because
right now, I want to kiss her more than I want to breathe, and I'm
pretty fucking sure she would let me.

The valet opens her door behind her and she
yelps in surprise. I hadn't even realized we'd arrived at the
hotel. I slide away from her and open my door, but by the time I
get around the car, she's already stumbling out of it.

"Hold on there, Ror." I rush to her side and
sling an arm around her. "I got you."

Neither of us says a word
as we make our way to the elevators and upstairs. I feel a strange
sense of melancholy. It's irrational, of course, the night has gone
as well as I could have hoped. But it's not the night that has me
feeling defeated. It's the whole situation. It's the irony. That
the one girl I could see myself really being with, has no interest
in being with me. I bet there'd be a line of girls who would be
deeply satisfied to see me being so damn pathetic.

"Come on, give me your keycard, I'll open
your door," I tell her.

"But I'm not tied," she pouts again.

I brush my thumb over her bottom lip,
feeling the soft, damp plumpness against that small bit of my skin.
It doesn't help my growing lust.

"I told you not to pout," I warn her.
Because her lips are too damned enticing, and we're just friends,
and she's drunk, and there are a million and one reasons not to
kiss her.

"Okay," she breathes. I need to get her in
her own hotel room so she can go to bed.

"Give me your purse," I
tell her, and she hands it over immediately. But there's nothing in
it besides a loose credit card, some cash, her cell phone and a
lip-gloss still in its original packaging.

"Where's your room key? It's not in
here."

She slaps her hand to her
forehead. "I may have left it on the writing desk… in my
room."

Shit
. I sigh. "This is why we should have left our adjoining
doors open." So she could just go to bed, and we wouldn't have time
alone in my hotel room while we wait for someone to come open her
door for her.

She follows me into my room, and it's all I
can do not to fantasize about throwing her onto the first flat
surface we can find and lifting that cute little skirt up around
her hips.

Fuck
. I need to get ahold of my thoughts. It's been way too long
since I've hooked up with anyone, and this girl inspires serious
fucking lust.

"I was worried we might end up in bed," she
says, and I stop in my tracks.

What the fuck?

She can't read my
thoughts. So how could she think such a thing? That I'd,
what?
Sneak into her
room in the middle of the night and take advantage of
her?

Her hand flies to her mouth, as if she
hadn't meant to say it at all, but all that means is that she was
really fucking worried about it. I walk right up to her, horrified
at her thoughts, and at myself for getting carried away with my own
fantasies. I've been nothing but a respectful, supportive friend to
her, so why would she think such a thing?

"I would never take
advantage of you like that, Ror," I swear to her.
"
Jesus
, how could
you think—“

But she presses her fingers to my lips,
stunning me back into silence.

"No, Sam, I wasn't worried
about
you
, I was
worried about
me
."

I frown –
what the fuck is that supposed to
mean?

"You look so cute when you do that." She
moves her fingers to the crease of my brow, and strokes it gently,
but I try to ignore it. I'm not sure I can handle affection from
her right now, I'm so fucking bemused by the last two minutes I
don't know which was is up.

"What are you talking about?" I ask her.
"What do you mean you were worried about you?"

She stares at me, too close, and I can do
nothing but stare back.

Then her fingers move
again, trailing down my jaw and around to the back of my neck, and
she leans up on her tip toes, and presses her lips to
mine.

For one split second I'm frozen in shock,
and then my body takes over.

I kiss her back, slowly, gently, pushing all
of my emotions into a kiss for the first time in my life. Her lips
feel better than I even imagined, soft and plush, and they fit
against mine as if they were molded specifically for one another.
I've been turned on all night, but right now I'm harder than I've
ever been, straining against the fly of my jeans with intense
need.

I groan when her fingers find their way into
my hair, and I take hold of her perfect face, holding it at the
perfect angle, as I tease her perfect lips with my own. My thumbs
brush back and forth over the soft skin of her cheeks.

Fuck
,
she feels amazing.

I've fantasized a thousand
times about just this – just kissing her – and even the fantasy
doesn't compare. It's her reactions that are killing me. Her soft
moans and whimpers, as if she's just as desperate for me as I am
for her.

I need more.

I lick the seam of her
mouth, and she opens immediately, welcoming my tongue, and I waste
no time tasting and exploring. I feel the skin of her neck, her
shoulders, wanting to touch her everywhere at once, but forcing
some semblance of awareness, because I can't let this go too
far.

My hand slides into her hair, holding her
mouth to mine, and the other pulls the rest of her body until we're
flush against each other, her soft breasts pressed against my
chest.

Her tongue dances with mine, and I love her
eagerness, it's the hottest fucking thing, and I suck her bottom
lip into my mouth like I've been imagining all night.

Fuck
she's amazing, and the moan that slides up her throat and
into my mouth chips at my control until I'm moving us to the desk
behind her. I lift her and press against her, kissing her
harder.

Her legs open in welcome,
and
God
do I want
between them, but my control is a tenuous thing right now, and I
hurt for her. But she isn't having any hesitation. Her legs wrap
around my hips, pulling me where I belong, and she pins my erection
right between her sweet, soft thighs. She moans again, and runs her
hands up the front of my shirt, tormenting me beyond anything she
could possibly fathom.

And then she moves her hips against me, and
I'm done. I have a choice. Because I'm either going to fuck Rory on
top of this desk right fucking now, or I have to stop this
immediately.

The thought stops me cold.

I tear my mouth from hers
and take long steps back from her so we can't touch again, and I
try in vain to catch my breath. I inwardly chastise myself.
What the fuck was I thinking?!
Did I really just consider taking Rory on a
fucking hotel room desk? We've never even kissed before, and I
somehow thought it was okay to take advantage of her drunken lack
of judgment?

I drown in self-loathing, still trying to
get ahold of my raging lust, because Rory sits on that fucking
desk, leaning back and panting like a goddess, her legs splayed and
her skirt hiked up, and it's all I can do not to tell my conscience
to go to hell, and pounce on her.

I promised to protect her, to look out for
her, and as it turns out, I'm the asshole she needs protection
from. How the fuck could I have let this happen? I need to make
this right.

"God, Ror, I'm sorry.
I—“

"
I
kissed
you
," she interrupts.

I stare at her. She's right. She did kiss
me. But that's not the fucking point, is it? She's drunk, and I
almost took serious advantage of her. Shame floods my chest,
pounding me with well-deserved guilt.

"Rory, you're
drunk
," I remind her.
"Whether you kissed me first or not, I shouldn't have let that
happen, you're my friend." And if she wasn't drunk, she never would
have kissed me.

She slides off of the desk and saunters over
to me, and I wonder if she has any idea how fucking sexy she is,
how dangerous her proximity is right now.

"Please, Sam. So, I'm
drunk. So
what?
Half the girls in Miami hookin' up with strangers tonight are
drunk. And you ain't a stranger, you're my friend. I trust you."
Her voice is breathy and seductive, and she slides her hands up my
shirt, shaking my resolve beyond my capacity for
restraint.

But how doesn't she get
that she's
not
half the girls in Miami? She's
Rory
. And the same rules don't
apply.

"It's not like I'm a
virgin. You don't need to worry. I've never felt this way before,
please, I just wanna know what it feels like to do it
because
I
wanna
do it. Because it makes
me
feel good. Please, Sam."

She's fucking killing me.

She leans up and kisses me again, and in my
head I'm pulling away, being responsible. But in reality, it takes
too long to send the message from my brain to my lips, and I kiss
her back for long torturous seconds before I stop her hands from
exploring any further, and wrench my mouth from hers.

Because I've finally registered her words,
and they don't make sense. I'd assumed she wasn't a virgin, though
I hadn't known for sure. But considering she'd been in what was
presumably a serious relationship with that bastard ex of hers, I
figured they'd had sex. Not that I like hearing it confirmed,
though.

And I don't want her
sleeping with me because she wants to try a casual hookup and she
happens to trust me, because there's nothing casual about this for
me. But it's that last thing she said about doing it because
she
wants to that's got
my hackles up. Is there another reason to do it? I don't
understand.

She stumbles a step, and
I'm reminded of how drunk she is – how fucked up it is that I let
this go as far as it did.

"What do you mean you want
to do it because
you
want to do it? What other reason is there? I ask
her.

She shrugs, and she's starting to look a
little out of it, like she's even drunker than I realized, and I
feel like an even bigger piece of shit.

"You know,
because
. Because I had
to. It ain't like I always got a choice," she murmurs almost
absentmindedly, like she's still just trying to get to the part
where we hook up, and I'm not sure she even realizes what the fuck
she just said. "But now I
want
to. I've never wanted—“

"What do you mean you had to? That you
didn't have a choice?" I cut her off. Is she saying what I fucking
think she's saying?

She blinks in
consternation, as if she's trying to work out what I'm asking her,
but they were
her
words. I curse the alcohol in her system, because this is
fucking serious, and I need her to focus right now. Because if
she's telling me she was forced to have sex with her ex,
then...
fuck
.
Fuck, fucking fuck!