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For a moment, I pretended I wasn’t a job to him.The beautiful women he datesmust feel this way in the car with him. What kind of car was it? I’d been so zoned out with nerves, I’d hardly noticed. Some kind of SUV? We drove quickly down the Jersey turnpike together, and I let my mind wander with fantasies.
“So, um, Layla and Kit are getting serious I think,” I told him. I wondered if he knew about it already. How much of our lives did he actually know about? Layla still needed protection, so Michael might know more than I did. My sisters and I kept a text chain going—Hope started it. We mostly talked about boys they were dating. Sometimes I told them about a test I took or a paper I wrote, but they didn’t know about my projects.
It was too much to explain.
He frowned. “Are you a big fan of Kit?”
I really wasn’t, but I hesitated admitting it aloud. “Is this a vault? Like, you’re never going to tell anyone?”
He stared at me for a second before turning his gaze back to the road. “You can trust me. I won’t tell anyone what you tell me unless someone I’m protecting is going to be hurt or die.”
I supposed that was fair, and it meant he’d keep this secret easily. “It’s just petty. I…I wouldn’t want to hurt Layla.”I might as well just say it, at this point. “Kit seems empty to me. Like, he’s a shell of a person and not nearly good enough for my sister.”
He nodded. “I agree, one hundred percent. I’m sort of hoping that it’s one of those relationships that just fizzles away on its own.”
At least I wasn’t alone about that. Hope didn’t seem thrilled about him, either, but we’d never admit it to each other. One thing we Radfords were good at—pretending to be okay with each other’s bad decisions. We took so much constant criticism from my father and the world in general, we, the three Redheads, as they called us, just smiled at each other’s decisions. If they thought I was doing something wrong, they wouldn’t tell me, either.
The thought made me pause.What might they think I amdoing wrong? What wouldn’t they tell me?
“What about you? Are you dating?” He tilted his head and pulled off the highway. Had we really been driving for almost three and a half hours? I hardly noticed. It was like he put a spell around me.Wow. What would my sisters think of this?
I nodded. “Sure. Here and there. I just ended it with someone. He was…boring.” It felt mean to say it, but that didn’t make it less true.
Plus, I hated sex…not that I would admit that to Michael in a million years. Of course, Michael’s hands distracted me as he skillfully handled the wheel.They might not make me want to shove them off me, if he…
No.If Michael ever liked any of my sisters, it would probably be Hope. Layla was too in the spotlight, but Hope was loaded with confidence and gorgeous to boot.
I didn’t like the thought at all.
“Well, don’t date anyone boring. That won’t get better with time.”
I grinned. “No, it won’t. Of course, the problem could be me. I might be boring.”
“No way.” He shook his head. “I refuse to believe that. Not possible.”
“Thank you.” A thought dawned on me. My sisters hadn’t texted that they were on their way. “What time are my sisters arriving? Or are they here already?”
He lifted his eyebrows. “I think he only summoned you, Bridget.”
“Well, that can’t be good. I’m doing well in school. I have straight As. I didn’t do anything embarrassing, so I can’t imagine what I might’ve done. I mean, I’m not going to date the Kits of the world, if that’s what he wants. He’ll just have to find another way to love me.”
Had I just said that aloud?Ooph.I wasn’t being cool.Damn it.
“I’m sure you’ve done nothing bad, and as for a father loving his children…whatever way he does that, you’d know better than most when it comes to your dad. I think out of everyone in his life, he respects you the most.”
If that were the case, I was in big trouble.
* * *
We arrivedat the boat just in time, because my father was impatient to get it going. Michael boarded with us, and I stepped into what had always been the room my sisters and I shared when we were invited to join him on excursions—which arguably wasn’t very often.
I closed the door, trying to find strength in the silence.
Everyone was up on deck, and I was in the room alone. All day, I’d been on edge, my nerves snapping with tension. All day, I thought about Michael’s hands on me. I had to do something about this energy or it was going to explode. I couldn’t deal with whatever was about to happen like this.
I walked into the bathroom and closed another door. I didn’t want to be heard, not that it would matter. I never orgasmed. Still, I pulled down my pants and undies and leaned against the wall of the bathroom. The slight rocking of the docked boat momentarily distracted me but not for long. I pressed my finger against my clit.
With steady hands despite the jolting of the boat, I touched my clit. I usually got bored when men did it, because it took so long, and they didn’t get the rhythm right.I might just be a little bossy.But even when I did it myself and managed to get close to coming, it was a hollow experience. Still, right then, I pictured his hands. They’d been on the steering wheel or gesturing when he spoke. He changed the radio with them. Sometimes he touched the small of my back.
