Recklessly (22 page)

There wasn’t a single sensation in his arm, and the only thing he wanted to do was stay right where he was. Beyond her beauty, Lana was alluring in another way; something he couldn’t quite capture in a word or thought, only a feeling. A good one. And it was possessing him in a way he couldn’t resist; one he was already having trouble reining in. He pressed his lips to her forehead, brushed a few wisps of hair off her skin and ran his hand down her back. “Probably not…and you guys should stay as long as you want. Use up the tab ‘cause I can’t get a refund…”

“
Oh,
” Abel said, drawing out the word as an innuendo, “Catching up, huh?”

“I guess you can say that…”

“Wrap it up, dude.
Wrap it up.
I don’t care what her ass looks like in a thong or what she’s whispering in your ear. Or whether her ankles are around her neck…or your neck. I’m too young to be an uncle, and no one should be stuck with you as a dad.”

Wes snorted. “Thanks for the advice, Abel. Be safe. Have fun.”

“Later, baby bro. Baby bro bro! Baby—”

Wes hung up, laughing, and Lana stirred, so he kept absolutely still, hoping she wouldn’t wake up. Waking up meant going home, and he wanted neither. He was actually dreading it. As uncomfortable as the numbness in his arm was, it wasn’t worth the risk of losing the moment.

Lana shifted, her hands lightly feeling his chest, like she was trying to orient herself. Much to his disappointment, she pushed up and stretched into a sitting position. After rubbing her eyes, she said, “How far did you get?”

“About a quarter in. Maybe farther.”

“Shit…how long was I out?”

“About an hour and a half, maybe two,” he said, grimacing as he massaged the tingles out of his own arm. “It’s okay though.”

She watched him for a moment with a furrowed brow. “Jesus, was I crushing you? You should’ve woken me up, Wes.”

“I liked you sleeping on me,” he admitted.

Lana offered her hands for his arm and worked her fingers up his muscles to aid in helping the feeling return. “I didn’t mean to…it’s been a long day…it’s been a long everything…”

“Stay,” he said suddenly.

“Stay…the night?”

“Mmhmm. I don’t want you to sleep alone.” He didn’t want to sleep without her. She stopped, her gaze rising up to his; there was an appreciative gleam in her eyes.

Wes stood and hoisted her onto his shoulder before making the trip up the steps and into his room. Lana stripped off her clothes, everything except her underwear, and his dick was immediately at attention as he stared at her frame. Every time he saw her bare body he thought of more ways he wanted to explore it…with his mouth…with his hands…all over, everywhere. “We’re…
sleeping
, right?” he asked as her gaze dropped below his waist. “Just sleeping?”

Lana fluffed her hair before she walked straight up to him. “I want to sleep in the shirt you have on…” she said, and Wes obliged, peeling it off then passing it to her. With a smile (and ass) like that, he’d have a hard time saying no to her. After Wes pulled off his sweatpants, they climbed under the bed sheet together, sinking down into opposite sides of the mattress. Wes switched off his bedside light; he was drained from the day and he felt like bricks had been lowered onto his eyelids. He never would’ve survived an entire night at that strip club.

“Man, I thought you looked sexy on a surfboard but, damn, you were hot on that bike tonight.”

“Before or after you thought I was a creep?” He reached beneath the sheet and pinched her butt.

Lana giggled. “A little before…
definitely
after.” She sighed. “I love that this smells like you…Grayson has been going on and on about you and your Tom Ford cologne, and how you two are the best of friends now. I don’t like sharing you with my roommate.”

I don’t like sharing you.
“Yeah…but what me and Grayson have is what I’ve been searching for, for years. It feels so real,” Wes said in a dramatic tone.

“Oh my God. Shut up!” She reached over and smacked him right on the stomach, and her hand stayed there even after she stopped laughing. Quiet fell over the dark room for several minutes, but he was determined not to drift off. He could just tell she wanted to say more, and he would wait out her silence, but after a final sigh, Lana said nothing, so he let himself slip off to sleep with his hand on top of hers, a reminder for when she was ready to speak.

Wes.
His eyelids fluttered open at the sound of Lana’s voice but he was pretty sure he had dreamed it. “Wes?” Her voice was louder, closer, real that time. In the darkness, he turned toward the sound.

“Hm?”

“I’m…I’m…not okay…” she whispered, and her voice wound a knot of sadness in his chest. He knew it was coming but it still bothered him to hear her agonizing over Sadie. Wes reached for her and pulled her until she was right up against him with her head on his chest.

“I know. And with me, you still don’t have to be.”

“Deuce!” Wes lifted his head from the pillow, opening one eye. “Deuce!” Someone was shouting through his bedroom door. He looked over to the other side of the bed and then to his closed bathroom door when he heard the faucet come on. Lana hadn’t made the early morning sneak out. “Wes!”

“Hold on!” He lumbered to the door, pulling it open to find Christian standing there in last night’s clothes, while other familiar voices snaked through the hallway and up the stairs.

“You want in on breakfast? Abe is grabbing food for all of us.”

“Who is all of us? Did
all
the guys crash here last night?” Wes asked.

“Yeah, dude. We started ordering cheap bottles and got
your
money’s worth, so no one was sober enough to drive home from here...at all. Shit,
okay,
Abel
…he’s at the register now, Wes.”

“Uh…yeah…he knows what I usually get. Make it two.”

“Benzo?”

“No.” And Wes spoke in a way meant to prevent further questioning.

Christian failed to surreptitiously peek around Wes to spot evidence of who else it might have been. “Okay. One for him and one for
not
Benz.”

“Get out of my room!” Wes said with a laugh, slamming the door in his face. His bathroom door swung open behind him and Lana stepped out, still wearing his t-shirt. Damn, this girl’s smile could break and stitch his heart back together at the same moment. “Hey, beautiful.”

“Hey yourself!” she said cheerfully as she cut the space between them and jumped to wrap her arms and legs around him. He pressed his nose into her shoulder; his shirt smelled like her now, too.

Wes kissed her neck, and when she laughed, the timbre of the sound warmed him. “You working today?”

“Nope. You surfing today?”

“Nope. Wanna stay in bed with me? Three guesses on what we’re going to do.”

Lana tapped her finger to her lips. “Umm…read, eat…and fuck?”

“Yes to the first and third…” Wes smirked. “…Only me for the second.”

“You’re so dirty and I like it…”

“But we’re actually going to have breakfast with the boys first.”

“I have sex with you and I don’t get breakfast. I don’t have sex with you and I get breakfast. No more sex, I guess. I choose food.” Lana dotted soft kisses to his lips. “Morning breath. Ew!”

“So much ouch!” Wes kissed her back anyway. “Well, get your fine ass over to that bookshelf and pick out what we’re reading today.”

“You’re pretty trusting, Wes Elliott.” But Lana tightened her legs around him. “Thanks for last night, Wes. The bike. The book. For not making me talk about Sadie. I know it didn’t seem like it, but it was a good night for me. I needed it. Look out world, Wes and I went backwards. We went from sex to actual friendship!”

“We sort of always had the friendship part, almost from the get-go. A better friendship now…”

“So about that…we’re still on the same page, right? We’re still…no-frills, right?”

Wes gulped down, an unexpected sinking feeling erupting in his stomach. “Yeah…you still want that, right?”

“Yeah…” She took a deep breath and climbed down off him herself. “…And I also want to show you something.” Lana walked to her bag and pulled out the sacred sketchpad then sat on the bed. She flipped a few pages as Wes sat down next to her. “Here’s how I drew Sadie.” Lana showed him several pages of drawings, and they chronicled the child from birth to her current age. Lana had drawn herself into each picture, but with each age progression she was farther and farther away from the image of Sadie, until in the most recent one, Lana wasn’t in the sketch at all.

“You feel like you’ve really lost her…” he said.

“And it’s selfish, I guess, because I gave her up, so I have no right to feel this way, and I stand by my decision, but she’s still a part of me.” She turned a few pages and pulled Erin’s letter out. “I hope you don’t mind, but I brought it upstairs with us last night. I didn’t open it. Are you going to?”

“No. The fact that she wrote it, told me everything I need to know. She loved me. It’s just that simple. She hurt me but I was still the one she wanted. It’s like a huge weight has been lifted, a heavy ass five-year weight.” Wes tore the envelope in half, balled up each and tossed them into the trashcan. “So, I need to ask you something…” His heart galloped into a sprint.

“I don’t do anal.”

“Wait…what?” Wes snorted and laughed for several minutes, completely shedding the anxiety. “I want you to come to Tahiti. A bunch of us are renting a house right on the beach. You don’t have to be there the whole two weeks, obviously, just come for the party on the weekend at the end.”

Hesitation sank into Lana’s features but he had expected that. “Wes, I can’t afford Tahiti, even for a weekend.”

“You don’t have to. Sponsors pay for me; I pay for you.”

“Well, that’s my problem,” she said after a sigh. “I don’t want you doing that.”

“It’s an invite. If I invite you, I’m obligated to take care of it, so please let me, okay?”

Her expression indicated that she would hold her stance. “I’ll think about it. That’s the best I can do right now, Wes…”

“Okay, I accept that,” Wes said. He was disappointed but he had known better than to set his hopes on a hard “yes.” “Well, let’s go eat. Put on your shorts. All my friends are down there.” He tossed them at her when she stood up.

Downstairs, his kitchen and living room looked like they were the scenes of some very bad things last night, and no one had bothered to remedy them. Pillows and blankets. Empty liquor bottles. Discarded clothing. Two sets of smooth, shaven legs belonging to two very much still sleeping and unfamiliar women, sticking out from beneath blankets. For people who had come back there well into the morning, his friends were wide awake and setting up the dining room for all the food Abel was bringing back, but inspective eyes quickly turned to him and Lana. His friends had seen plenty of women in the mornings after, but rarely did anyone join them for breakfast. In the instant, Wes felt pretty comfortable with them getting used to seeing her around.

“Hey, everybody, this is Lana. Lana, my assholes,” Wes said. They greeted her with a resounding shout of her name like they were at some group meeting, and she made a courteous effort to shake everyone’s hands. They were all checking her out but curious, inquiring eyes were also turning to him…after they looked at her ass, of course.

“Hi, Lana!” Charlotte said, and she patted the empty space on her chair for Lana to sit.

“Hey, Char! And just so we can get it out of the way, everybody, I dated Brody Swift…” She trailed off when they started booing.

“We don’t speak that name around here…just ‘cause you’re really hot, it doesn’t mean you get to do it either,” Leko said.

Lana blushed. “…We had a kid when we were teenagers, and we gave her up. I’m sure it’s something you may have heard before surrounding Brody—” They booed again, cutting her off and she gave up with an eye roll. “Hey! You’re Christian Lamont!”

“And you’re the chick from the Open…”

“Yeah! Congrats on dominating last year!” she said as she slid into Charlotte’s chair. “Must’ve been great after Eamon Burns talked so much shit about how he was going to beat you. He didn’t even make it out of any first round heats. And I was glad. Not a fan of his.”

“Thank you! But you’re a fan of surfing in general? Does that mean you’re going to Tahiti in a few weeks?” Christian asked. Instead of responding, Lana pivoted to look at Wes with a suspicious glare, and he shrugged back at her. He really had no idea why the question had come up…until he saw a small smile appear on Kai’s face as he pretended to be busy texting.

“Oh my God, Lana, you
have
to come.
Have
to,” Charlotte pleaded, squeezing her thigh. “
Please!
We get VIP bracelets because we’re with the surfers and we just get into
everything
. No lines. Free alcohol…” She trailed off when Wes gave her a look. “…That I won’t be drinking…”

Leko said, “I definitely want to see you there.”

“It’s going to be a good time…” Ribsy threw in after a yawn. “My fiancée’s competing in the women’s event.”

“My girl’s going, too,” Kai said.

What’d you do?
Wes mouthed to him.

Nothing.
Kai looked down before his huge, guilty grin appeared.

“Well, what’s the answer, Lana?” Christian said, a harmless but flirtatious edge to his tone. “I’m going to be completely brokenhearted if you say you won’t be there cheering for Elliott to win the trials so I can beat his ass in Bali.”

“Uhhhh…” Lana said, laughing, as she spun back to face Christian. She didn’t look angry that she was the subject of all the pressure, but Wes’ heart felt unsteady as he waited. He was frozen, taking no steps toward the empty chair waiting for him.
Please say yes. Please say yes.

“I guess…yeah…I’ll be there…but only to see Deuce win the trials so he can kick
your
ass in Bali,” she shot back, and the guys exploded into instigating cheers at Christian.

Wes blew out a breath and he finally took the necessary stride for the chair, containing his excitement but flashing a big smile at Lana. Abel arrived a few minutes later with the food, and the conversation shifted from surfing to a multiple person narration of the antics at the strip club the night before. As he stared at Lana as she laughed at Christian’s imitation of one of the strippers’ moves, it was hard not to be impatient about Tahiti now, to not plead with time to make a miraculous rapid move forward. He wanted her by his side, and even in this short time, she blended in with his friends so naturally, like she belonged here, the same way Dylan had. And somewhere inside him, he knew it was bigger than just Tahiti; he liked the thought of Lana being along for the ride,
period
, with him. And what would that be like? It wouldn’t be hard for their relationship to transition. Nothing would have to change beyond it becoming exclusive. He and Lana were both pretty laidback, they weren’t demanding, their personalities gelled well enough for this to work.