Page 3 of Last First Time
I have never forgotten how fast and hard I crushed on her, that beautiful flower child who literally bumped into me in the quad. She had actual clovers in her long, dark hair, and she smelled like sunshine, even if her body looked like it had been made for sin. And while I tried all of my usual wooing techniques on her, she was so wholly unimpressed by me that I’m surprised she ever agreed to be friends with me.
Thank goodness I at least had that much of her. Even now, all these years later, she’s kept me planted squarely in the friend zone, when I am still completely smitten kitten for her. For a grown man closing in on thirty, my frequent fantasies about her have been a little bit embarrassing. But this was Karisma. She is definitely it for me, whether she is willing to admit it or not.
So when she half jokingly gives me the green light, I’m not going to let her out of arm’s reach again. I don’t know if she ever noticed how often I spent time in her periphery. I was always finding an excuse to linger at the bar that she owned, even if I nursed the same drink all night long.
And on her rare nights at home, I’d invite myself over for dinner and a movie. Dinner was whatever Super Slim’s pizza she was in the mood for. The movie was almost always a horror movie these days. Because that’s who Karisma is—she’s tough and she takes no shit from anyone, even fictional bad guys. She reinvented herself into this take no prisoners girl, but I love her just as much today as I had when she’d still been a real life flower child, all of her softness pressing into me as our worlds collided.
I wrap my arm around her shoulder, letting my fingers trace along her collarbone. “What if I want it all? All of you.” I can’t get any closer to her as I whisper into the perfect shell of her ear. “What then?”
She shivers beneath me. Either from my hot breath against her, or from the naughty question, and either way gives me a thrill. I’m doing this to her. After so much time wanting her, knowing I could effect her this way made me want to climb on the bar top myself and pound my chest like a gorilla.
“Well, I already agreed to having you take me home.” She turns her face toward me. “I guess we’ll figure out the all part when we get there.”
And now I have an erection, which would be immediately obvious to anyone who glances at me in my too-tight Calvin Klein suit. I’ve always worn my clothing closely tailored, and had been lucky enough to learn long ago that I am not a small man.
But right now, I want more from her than to show off everything I have to offer. I want to lift Karisma up on the bar and strip off her tight pants and lick her pussy until she screams my name. I want all of those things, immediately, but we are still prisoners at the Joseph and Delilah engagement party, and I can’t cash in on her flirty promise until she’s done working.
“I can’t wait to take you home, Karisma.” I want to bite her earlobe, tug that delicate sparkly hoop between my impatient teeth and see if she likes it a little rough. But not yet, I remind myself and my dick. Not just yet.
She finally slides out from underneath my grip, and gives a quick glance at our audience. “I’m going to shut this party down at the hour. Then I’ll have to clean up and lock up. We’re looking at a two a.m. appointment, Mr. Harrington.”
“That’s Mr. Mayor to you, K.T.” I give her my best politician’s smile, the one that I’ve practiced since I was a bony ass middle school kid. The kind that sold candy bars to the neighbors for fundraising, and the kind that got panties dropped for me on the regular during my four years at Notre Dame.
She gives me a flat look. “2:00 a.m., Mr. Fuckwit. Try not to piss me off before then.”
I can’t help laughing when she pulls her tough girl act with me. I know her for who she really is. She donates money to female entrepreneurs every month. She always cries at the Oscars, the Emmys, and every other awards show that she secretly watches. She laughs when she’s scared, and she loves mushrooms on her pizza. I personally think mushrooms taste like dirt, or a foot, or maybe a foot made out of dirt, but we always have mushrooms on our pizza because that’s what she likes. And I like making her happy.
“It’ll be worth the wait.” I turn up my smile another notch. Is it working though? It’s impossible for me to tell whether she’s joking around with me, or if I actually am going to get to take her home and kiss her tonight. But I’m willing to wait to find out. I’ve been waiting all this time already.
I slide back into my usual seat at the bar, and the engagement party continues on in general rowdiness for the rest of the hour. Then K.T. makes a very kind toast to Delilah that only involves a few profanities and three separate lewd comments. She also includes a very overt jacking off gesture at one point. Everyone laughs because that’s who everyone else thinks she is—the funny friend who is rough around the edges. Nobody sees her inner tenderness except me.
I sit at the corner of the bar and stay out of her way as she herds the partygoers out the door, collecting a few more keys for the fishbowl before turning off the open sign and locking the front door. As always, I offer to help her clean up, but she declines. Karisma is the kind of person who likes things a very specific way, and she gets upset with me when I end up doing it wrong.
“You know you’re not good at cleaning, Rich Boy. Now if you wanted to call up one of your people or something….” Her voice trails off as she waves her hand vaguely at the night.
Same old, same old. I don’t see anything wrong with having maid service helping me keep my home clean, but K.T. likes to act like I am engaging in modern day slavery or something.
She barely keeps enough workers on staff at Riddles to give herself an occasional night off because she is a do-it-herself type. And she seems to have an ongoing problem with the fact that I am not a do-it-myself type. I’ve always been willing to pay other people to take care of things for me that I don’t want to spend my time doing.
Being a good politician means being a professional delegator. I have to be able to trust my police officers, my firefighters, the tax assessors, the parks department, and everyone else working in government in Valentine to do their jobs correctly so that I can do my job. Similarly, if I could trust Vera to collect the utility payments in a timely manner, then I could also trust Mariana to dust my shelves and scrub my toilets each week. But I know it has always bothered K.T., probably because of how she once worked cleaning houses and office buildings in college.
Another part of being a good politician is knowing when to shut up. So I stay out of her way and finish my beer. Then I throw the bottle in the recycling and watch her ass jiggle as she mops up. I haven’t died of blue balls yet, so I might as well have a little more pervert ass-watching time before she catches me or I die of an unrelenting hard-on, whichever happens first.
Because maybe this isn’t going to happen. I’ve been waiting for almost a decade and half, and I am seriously afraid she’s going to have me take her home and give me a hug at the door like any other night. But I am also afraid she’ll let me come inside, and then I’ll try to kiss her and maybe ruin everything between us.
“What’s going on in that pretty head of yours, Rich Boy?” The girl of my dreams slides toward me, switching her sexy hips back and forth like a warning. I swallow the dirty talk that threatens to burst out from my lips and try to think up an innocent topic that doesn’t involve her panties.
“Joe is the happiest I’ve seen him since he came to town. He really seems at home here now.” I lean over and prop my elbow up on the counter. That’s right. Act casual.
She smiles. “Delilah too, and I was briefly concerned that she hated Valentine and everyone who’s ever lived here.”
I laugh. “Don’t talk about her that way. She’ll appear in the mirror and kill you at midnight.”
She snorts. “You’ve got the wrong girl there. I’m the only supposed lady murderer in Valentine.”
I reach for her, wrapping my fingers between her little ones. “Should I be worried about being alone with you?”
“Cut the crap, Reed. I’ve had plenty of chances to bump you off and hide you under a bridge by now.”
