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1
Ten years ago
Juliette
July in Louisiana had us in its grip. The moon turned our skin to silver and even though it was a million degrees in The Manor’s sleeping porch I could not stop touching Tyler. I slipped my fingers along his ribs, over his chest and down the other side. Back and forth a thousand times. I lifted my fingers and sipped his sweat from my skin.
“Babe,” he breathed, panting a little. Which made me smile. This sex we were having – it was seriously aerobic. “We are so good at that.”
I laughed. The truth was – I had never in my life had sex the way that Tyler and I had sex. I’d never been touched the way he touched me. Or loved. So loved it sounded corny and ridiculous but he loved me so much I felt cherished. In the dirtiest way.
And considering he was Tyler O’Neill and his bad reputation in Bonne Terre had been secured when he was in high school maybe even grade school– I was happy he was as blown away by our sex as I was. And that he felt my love, too.
I cherished him and I wanted him to feel it. The guy hadn’t had a lot of cherishing in his life.
I spent hours already this summer trying to figure out why we worked like this. Why I lost all my weird little self-conscious idiosyncrasies. Why I was able to stay out of my head and deep in my body when he touched me.
Chemistry and trust was what I came up with. It was a powerful one two punch.
“Like gold medal good, don’t you think?”
“World champs,” I said, kissing the skin closest to me which happened to be his armpit. Which should have been gross, but no part of this man was gross to me. The boys I’d messed around with in college were nothing compared to Tyler O’Neill. Not that I was going to tell him that – the man had a swollen head already, being the first man to make me come.
“I didn’t expect you out at Remy’s tonight.” Tyler rolled slightly to face me. He brushed the back of his hands down my arm to my hand. He linked our fingers together. God. We could not stop touching.
“The band sounded good,” I said. “Gatean on the trumpet was great.”
“Yeah, I think we’re getting that second set pretty tight. But still, Jules, you don’t have to be out there every night.”
“I told you, Ty,” I said. “If you’re out there. So am I. Isn’t that the girlfriend’s job?”
“Well, if the girlfriend is you I think the job is studying for the LSAT.”
“Tyler, that’s months away.”
He ran the knuckles of our joined hands across my collarbones. “It makes me nervous when you talk like that.”
“Like what?” His fingertips brushed my nipple.
“Like law school isn’t important.”
Right now law school felt a million miles away. A problem to worry about later. I wanted to just be in this moment. This sweat-soaked, sex-fueled, happy as fuck moment.
“It’s summer, Tyler,” I said, which was the same excuse I gave my Dad when he asked me about studying and why I was out all hours. “I’ve got the rest of my life to work.”
“I think,” he drawled and dropped my hand so he could palm my breast. I took a deep breath. We’d just had sex. The orgasm had rolled through me and left me weak and with one touch I was ready for more. “I’m rubbing off on you.”
“What does that mean?”
“You are the serious student, the girl with plans and the big future.”
“And you’re what?”
“Trouble, baby.” He grinned but I knew it was just a show he was putting on. The whole town thought he was trouble. Too reckless. Too charming. Too lazy. Too O’Neill, for most people’s taste. But he’d shown me the real him.
And the real him was vulnerable. And smart. And so sweet he broke my heart all the damn time.
“Well, I have an idea,” I said, pushing myself up against his chest, because frankly, two could play this game and as much as he turned me on, he’d made it real clear that his hunger for me was non-stop.
And I liked that so much I could barely stand it.
“What’s your idea?” he whispered as my hand traveled over his chest and down the tender skin of his belly. “Fuck, Juliette.”
“When I go back to school in September, come with me.”
“To Oklahoma?”
“Actually, I’m thinking about a transfer to Tulane.” I’d already put in the paperwork, mostly just to see if it was possible. And it was. I hadn’t made any other moves because I wanted to talk to him. But I knew Tyler and he needed some roadblocks knocked down before he’d believe we had a future.
“New Orleans?” His eyes went wide and I knew I had him. This future I saw for us was possible.
