Page 26 of Jack

Jack smirked. “Water, huh? I have some Rum and orange juice, if you want to relive the highlights of Mark Cassidy’s party.”

I laughed and put my hands over my mouth. “Oh my god, what were we thinking? Thank god, you guys put a stop to us bringing that unholy concoction into the world.”

He chuckled and handed me a bottle of water, while I stood next to his doorway, unsure of what to do. I’d never had a date for the sole intent of having sex.

“Jesus, Ava, I’m not going to tear your fucking clothes off. Have a seat.” He gestured to the large, sectional couch in the living room opposite the kitchen.

I laughed. “Right, sorry to be acting like such a weirdo. I’ve never had a…sex appointment?”

Jack sat down next to me and groaned. “Sex appointment?”

“Well, I know how you feel about the term dating, so I was trying to use an alternate word.”

“That sounds much worse. Please feel free to use the word date in this context.”

I laughed, feeling more relaxed.

“Is that why you’re late? Because you were worried about our ‘sex appointment?’” he asked using finger quotes.

“I would like to tell you I was just late today, but sadly I usually run late all the time. I just always misjudge how long everything will take me. And then, for no reason at all, I think it will only take me ten minutes to get everywhere, no matter where I’m going.”

“It does take you ten minutes to get here.”

“Yeah, but I had misjudged everything else already, so the fact that I had the driving time right was irrelevant by that point.”

Jack chuckled and took a sip of his beer and my mind wandered back to the strange altercation outside.

“So, that was your dad, huh?”

Jack immediately tensed next to me. “Yeah.”

“Your parents don’t mind you living out here? I mean, I’m jealous. It’s a pretty nice set up.”

Jack took a long pull off of his beer, looking uncertain whether to answer or not. “They don’t mind. I think you can see what kind of man my dad is, considering he was checking out a girl he could reasonably assume was in high school. That’s the kind of motherfucker he is. And my mom was fine with it because it gave him one less place for him to cheat on her.”

I nodded my head, not sure what to say.

Jack tipped his beer back again, nearly finishing the bottle. Though I hadn’t known it was going to be such an uncomfortable topic, I was really regretting bringing up his living situation. Reliving old family traumas isn’t exactly an aphrodisiac.

Jack put his empty bottle on the table and turned to me, his green eyes looking intense, but guarded. “Ava, I don’t really like talking about my family.” He leaned in and whispered close to my ear. “Right now, the only thing I want to think about is all the different ways I’m going to make you come.”

I felt myself unable to figure out how to respond. I didn’t want to trouble him further with talk of his family, but his pivot to sex felt like more of a way to pull us off the topic. However, he hardly brought me here to psychoanalyze him, and even if I wanted to, I couldn’t help but respond to the darts of adrenaline starting to burst through my system as his breath tickled down the side of my neck.

He quickly took the water bottle from my hands and put it on the table next to his empty beer bottle, then leaned in and started kissing me. I responded immediately, wrapping my arms around his neck as he slowly lowered my back to the couch and braced himself above me, his tongue moving deeply in my mouth, then biting my swollen lips in teasing nips.

He moved his mouth to my neck, kissing my flushed cheeks and sensitive earlobes on the way as his hand slid up my rib cage under my t-shirt. When he pulled the cup of my bra aside and lightly pinched my nipple as he bit the side of my neck, I was shocked at the groan that burst out of my throat.

Jack answered my groan by moving his hips between my legs and grinding the rigid length of his erection against me. I tried to spread my legs wider, but my knee hit the back of the couch.

“Fuck this,” he grunted. “Let’s move to my bedroom.” He lifted himself off me and grabbed my hand, pulling me down the hallway to a spacious bedroom in the back of the house. The room was decorated in neutral shades of grey. His king-sized bed sat between two windows with a nightstand on each side and a small sitting area to the left of the bed. The bed and dressers were all dark wood and there was a carpet on the hardwood floor, but I couldn’t see the print in the fading sunlight.

I could see small items on top of his dresser: money, keys, the usual debris you accumulate in your pocket by the end of the day, but I didn’t get much chance to really look around, as Jack pulled me to the side of the unmade bed and lifted his hands to cradle my face. He leaned in to kiss me, but I put my hand on his shoulder to stop him.

“You didn’t even make the bed?” I asked, only half-kidding.

Jack let me go and reached up to rub the back of his neck. “Uh, I don’t usually have girls in here. I sort of forgot about it.” His troubled expression morphed into a charming smile, his hands landing on my hips. “Is an unmade bed a deal breaker for you, Ava? Is that where you draw the line with men you sleep with?”

I smiled begrudgingly at his humor, but the first part of his response nagged at me. “You’ve never slept with a girl in the house that you live in alone?” I asked skeptically.

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