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Call it a coincidence, but that just so happens to be exactly what I want.
“Show me how much you want it,” he demands, and I can’t hide my truth.
Though, I don’t give him actual words. I only give action. I dig my teeth into my bottom lip, spread my thighs as far as they can go, and lift up my legs so that my heels dig into the counter beneath me.
He nods, surveying my exposed position. “That’s what I thought.”
And then he buries his face between my thighs and doesn’t come up for air until I’m doing exactly what he said—coming on his tongue. Just as he promised he would, he’s changed the way I look at early mornings forever.
Hot damn, what is this man doing to me?
Like he said, everything.
For the past three hours, we’ve engaged in all things touristy. Things I have honestly never done, even though I’ve lived in New York for most of my life.
After a stroll through Central Park, we headed to Times Square, where Ty made me take a million selfies with him while crowds of people got annoyed at us for standing in their way.
We walked into the M&M’S store and bought about three pounds too many of colored chocolate candies. Ty took a picture with Pikachu. And Spider-Man. And Batman. All of them costing ten bucks a pop.
And we bought every piece of I heart New York merchandise that we could find in a little mom-and-pop shop. Hats, sweatshirts, magnets, coffee cups, you name it, and we now own it.
For an early March day, it is unseasonably warm, and the sun is shining as we stroll through a little part of the city better known as Greenwich Village.
Ty comes to a stop in front of a store, and I look up to read the sign above the door—NYC Vintage Books.
“You want to give it a look?”
“Are you kidding me?” I whoop and nod three times too many. “Vintage books are my jam.”
“Well then, after you, milady.” He smiles down at me as he holds open the door.
A little bell chimes as we step inside, and instantly, I’m hit with the most wonderful smell in the whole wide world—old books. And right before my very eyes sit shelves and shelves and shelves of literature.
Oh man. This is a booklover’s dream.
“It’s go time, Rach.” Ty turns his I heart NYC ball cap around, and his eyes turn all business. “You can’t bring an English professor into a vintage bookstore and not expect him to go HAM.”
I laugh. “You’re insane.”
But he ignores me completely, spinning on his heel and heading toward the back of the store.
“The best shit is always hidden in the back!”
An older man with white hair and spectacle glasses looks up from his spot behind the register and glares at me.
“Please excuse him,” I apologize on Ty’s behalf. “He gets really excited about books.”
“Because I fucking love books, Rachel!” Ty’s voice bounces off the walls. “Tell him how much I fucking love books!”
“Again, I’m very sorry,” I whisper toward the man even though it’s taking everything inside me not to laugh. “He doesn’t get out much.”
The man just huffs out an exasperated sigh, going back to reading the newspaper that sits in his lap, and I proceed to put as much distance between Mr. Annoyed and me as I can.
But once my eyes catch sight of a giant glass case with a sign that reads First Editions, I take a sharp right to check it out.
“Damn,” I mutter to myself once the display stands before me like a literary beacon.
Truly, it’s one heck of a collection. Austen and Whitman and Woolf and Fitzgerald and Lee, all the greats are inside. I gently run my fingers along the glass as I move down the cabinet, taking in every name, every title, every cover. And when I reach the middle point of the shelf, I realize this cabinet is unlocked.
As in, I can peek inside.
As in, I can carefully touch the books of my heroes.
I probably shouldn’t…
Or should I?
When I make a silent promise to be gentle with the books, I quietly slide open one of the glass doors and ease the fingers of my right hand inside. Once they make contact with vintage spines, I peek over my shoulder to see if the man at the front is about to call the cops.
But when I see that he’s still staring down at his newspaper, I decide I have the green light to touch the books a little longer. The realization makes me giddy, and a barely there squeal jumps from my throat. I know, to most people, I probably sound ridiculous, but…vintage books. First edition vintage books at that.
It’s almost better than sex. Almost.
I am smiling like the sun as I move down the row of books, my fingers still touching every single spine with the most delicate touch. But my smile turns to something else when I pause at a title, a name, that steals the breath from my lungs.
