Page 89 of How to Hide in Plain Sight
I couldn’t breathe. I lost the ability to do so around the same time that Manuel’s lips came within six inches of my face. “For one-dollar pizza?” I whispered.
He laughed softly, brushing his fingers down my cheek. “No, Eliot. Not for one-dollar pizza.”
My heart was seconds from collapsing. “Then what?”
His hand came down to cup my jawline. His thumb strayed upward, gently stroking my cheek. “To win back the love of my life.”
I inhaled sharply.No, whispered the cruel, familiar voice in my head.Turn around, Eliot. Run away. You don’t deserve him.I jerked my chin to the side, tore it away from his gentle touch, and stumbled backward. What I didn’t realize was that I was standing right at the edge of the boardwalk. My foot missed the wooden planks entirely, flying through open air. I yelped as my body tipped backward, arms swinging wildly as I fell, fell, fell…
Two strong arms wrapped around my torso. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” said Manuel, holding me fast as I dangled out over the bramble. He laughed softly, though there was a hard edge to the laugh, an edge of hurt. “There’s no need to jump ship, Eliot. You can just tell me that you don’t feel the same.”
My heart hammered against the arms holding me so tightly. I stared up at his eyes. Did he really think I didn’t feel the same way? How could I possibly? How could I, when just inches away from his warm chestnut eyes, like honey, like caramel, like every sweet flavor I’d denied myself for so long…
I threw my arms around his shoulders.
I pressed my lips to his.
Manuel stumbled backward, shocked by the sudden embrace. His shock dissolved quickly, however, replaced by a low growl as he scooped up my small frame and nestled me close to his chest. Our bodies started to sway as he carried me up the boardwalk toward Little Lies, all without breaking the kiss. I didn’t open my eyes. I trusted him to get me where I needed to go.
The screen door banged open as Manuel carried me into the cabin. Still I kept my eyes shut, determined not to wake up from this wonderful, intoxicating dream into which I’d fallen. One where I never hurt my best friend. Where I wasn’t a bad person, where I actually deserved love. I knew it wasn’t real, that I would have to face the truth eventually, but for now…
For now, I let myself sink into the bed as Manuel laid me down. Let my eyelids flutter open to take in the moonlight glinting off his eyelashes, his jaw, the desire burning in his eyes. It was almost too much, like I could die from how badly I ached for him. A part of me was okay with that. A part of me wouldn’t mind if he was the last thing I saw.
Then again, that would mean that I wouldn’t get to feel the soft brush of his lips as they kissed down my neck, my collar, the soft skin of my stomach. I wouldn’t feel the heat of his palms as they slid down my sides, slipped under the cotton of my T-shirt, grazed the bare skin just above the hem of my shorts.
For the past year, I’d done everything I could to douse my body’s ability to become aroused. I ate almost nothing. Exercised religiously. Spent my days staring into the abyss of my work laptop, drowning the little focus I had left in an ocean of words. I didn’t want to think about kissing. I didn’t want to think about sex. I didn’t want to think about anything that could awakenthatpart of my body, the one that terrified me so badly.
But here I was, moaning softly at the feel of my best friend’shands on my body, every touch a flame on the fire building within me. It didn’t feel wrong, the way I expected. It didn’t feel dirty or evil. I couldn’t dwell on my fears; I was too wrapped up in him. I felt safe. I feltalive.
“Eliot,” he whispered. His fingers toyed with the hem of my shirt.
“Take it off,” I said. “Please.”
He pulled up the fabric, and I raised my arms to help him get the shirt off my body. He tossed it onto the wooden floor. A light breeze blew in through the open door, raising little goose bumps on my bare skin. Manuel skated his fingers along them, leaving trails of warmth in his wake.
His gaze roved up my torso, my neck, my chin, settling at last on my eyes. Slowly, his fingers danced low, brushing the insides of my thighs. I inhaled sharply. His eyes darkened, and his fingers crawled higher. Up into my shorts. I wasn’t wearing underwear, which Manuel quickly discovered. When his fingertips brushed the wet skin around my soft opening, a low groan escaped his lips.
“Eliot.”
“Yes?” I asked breathily, trying not to push my pelvis too eagerly against him.
His fingertips brushed over my opening once more. “Try to stay quiet, okay?”
I whimpered.
Then he plunged one finger inside me.
I twisted my neck to the side, moaned into my pillowcase. I knew my family was all over this island. That they could be standing on the boardwalk just outside this cabin, could hear if I let loose. I needed to muffle the pleasure rolling out of me, but it was almost impossible.
“Tell me if it’s too much,” he whispered.
“Not too much,” I practically hiccupped. “N-not enough.”
Manuel’s teeth glinted in the moonlight as he smiled. His fingermoved in small circles inside me, each one eliciting a little thrust of my hips upward. Something was beginning to build within me. Something foreign and warm and wonderful, like a bundle of rope baking in the sun. The rope stretched and stretched, the knot at its center growing tighter and tighter. It was not just in my pelvis. It was every muscle in my body, every vein and artery. They seized up, forming one big, protective knot around the pleasure crackling at my center.
“Condom,” I choked. “Tell me you brought a condom.”
Manuel’s shoulders shook with silent laughter. “Eliot,” he said, and my name sounded so beautiful on his tongue I wanted to make him say it over and over again. “When would I have had time to go back to my cabin and get a condom?”
