Page 65 of Degrees of Control

Chapter 16

For the second time in his life, James walked Charlotte from the café to her yoga studio, but this time he held her hand. It was soft and cool, small enough that he could easily crush it, if he wasn’t careful.

He wanted so badly to be careful.

After he left her place, he’d been a mess, forgetting shit, zoning out, barely making sense when he talked. He knew he must have come across like Charles Manson asking her to move in, then running away without eating the breakfast she’d made for him. He couldn’t believe Charlie hadn’t thrown her cast iron at his head.

As the day went on, he was so useless his CFO David had all but forced him to the nearest bar and poured alcohol down his throat. After four whiskeys he straight up asked him if he had cancer. His boss thought “fatal disease” was more likely than “fucked-up over a girl.” James didn’t think that assumption would surprise Charlotte at all.

He didn’t have many memories of his old man, he’d been gone for most of his childhood, working or on vacation with his latest girlfriend. Occasionally showing up at games and graduations with gifts. As a kid he’d always resented Bob Hunter’s cash-based approach to parenting, but today he’d felt something like sympathy for his old man. In the face of his own asshole behavior, trying to buy Charlotte’s forgiveness had been the only thing he could think of.

When she finally agreed to see him, he’d felt like muscle relaxants had been injected into his forehead, relaxing every muscle on the way down. Then the shit with her ex went down…James had felt jealousy over women before, but seeing that asshole hassle Charlotte made some new breed of protectiveness burn so hot it scared him. Even now he was trying to come up with reasons why he shouldn’t call a cop friend, find out where that Dale prick lived and kneecap him.

I’ve got no idea what I’m doing with her,he realised.None at all. No map. No guide. Completely uncharted territory.

So he kept his hand in Charlotte’s and let her lead him up the street. He signed himself over to whatever she wanted tonight. What else could he do? He could protect her from her ex, buy her things, offer her his apartment and his body, but when it came to emotional shit he was a five-year-old in a thirty-year-old man’s body.

Not five, asshole, fourteen. Don’t you remember being fourteen and getting crushed out over girls? Feeling this sick, spinning feeling? Remember what happened next? Remember? Remember?

James gripped Charlotte’s hand tighter.

They reached her studio and she unlocked the door and led him up a flight of pinewood stairs. The place wasn’t covered in rainbow scarves and cheesy motivational posters as he expected, it was minimalist with wood furniture and spearmint green walls, relaxing in some undefinable way. Charlotte gestured him past the reception and took off her shoes, indicating he should do the same. When they were both barefoot, she led him into what he assumed was the main classroom. It was dimly-lit with a woven carpet and floor to ceiling windows.

“Nice view,” he said.

Charlotte smiled. “It is. This is one of the best yoga studios in the city. I got lucky working here.”

‘They got lucky having you,’James wanted to say. But that sounded too much like‘I got lucky having you.’

His eyes were drawn to a flier for beginner classes pinned near the door. It had a picture of Charlotte on it. She was doing a complicated handstand, her body arched in a circle with one foot extended and the other almost touching her forehead. He whistled, unable to conceal how impressed he was.

“I asked them not to use that one,” she said. “It sends a bad message to the people who can barely touch their toes.”

But James could see why the studio had chosen it. Charlotte looked serene and beautiful, with her supple posture and her dark hair falling around her shoulders. She was the very image of focus.

“It must be something,” he said. “Having that kind of control.”

She smiled, her eyes bright by the light of the streetlamps outside. “It’s good, but sometimes it’s fun not having control too.”

James wanted to smile but couldn’t quite manage it. This place was getting to him. It was so quiet he could hear his pulse pounding in his ears, so still it threw the chaos of his mind into stark relief. “Maybe one of these days I’ll take a class.”

“Maybe.”

It was clear from Charlotte’s expression that she knew that day would never come. He knew it too, but he didn’t want to think about it. He seized her hand once more. “Or you could give me a private lesson. Show me all the ways your body bends.”

She flushed. “We can try, but I warn you, having sex upside down isn’t as fun as men think it’ll be. There’s a reason missionary is standard and not the inverted crab—”

He kissed her before she could say another word, about yoga or control or the sex she’d had with men who weren’t him. The instant their lips touched, James felt his whole terrible day go rolling off his back. She was here and she wanted him. That he understood.

He tugged at her T-shirt and Charlotte pulled away, nervously wetting her lips. “I’m not wearing anything nice. Underwear wise.”

“I don’t give a fuck.” The only thing James wanted was to be touching as much of her bare skin as possible. She let him take off her top and pull her sports bra away from her body. At the sight of her gorgeous tits, James fell to his knees and drew her nipples into his mouth.

“You too?” Charlotte tugged against the shoulders of his T-shirt, and with a pang of irritation at having to leave her breasts, he yanked the offending material over his head, pausing to watch the fascination that overtook her gaze whenever she looked at his chest. He rose, lifting her in his arms and bringing her mouth back to his.

As they kissed, Charlotte wound her talented body around his and stroked her hips against him, spandex caressing denim until they were gripping each other’s hair and moaning into each other’s mouths. All James could hear were the faint sounds of cars passing on the street below and their shared breathing, hers smooth, his harsh. He cupped a palm between Charlotte’s legs, the swell of her pussy obvious even through her leggings.

“Take off the rest,” he muttered. “Take it off now.”

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