And it makes me nervous because I don’t know if that’s what Penelope wants.
So my leg shakes, and my palms get sweaty as I wait for that bathroom door to swing open, watching the shadow beneath the door as she passes by, blood coursing through my veins.
A few more passes by the door, and it opens.
I stand.
Game time, buddy.
Game time.
“You look…stunning.”
She’s in a satin green dress belted at the waist with large gold hoops in her ears. Her hair is wavy and loose—silky and smooth—and sways as she moves forward, blush already on her cheeks.
I wrap my arm around her waist and pull her in for a kiss. “You smell good too.”
“Thanks, so do you. Smell good and look good.” She’s embarrassed to say the words, but she gets them out, almost shyly.
I don’t blame her. We’re not feeling ourselves these days, and every single moment we’ve spent in each other’s presence feels vulnerable.
Arm in arm, we step through the hotel room door.
Chapter 15
Penelope
This entire day has been magical.
I feel like I’m sleeping, waking in my dream. I can’t explain it, but something about being with Jack is intoxicating—not Jack Jennings, the football player, but Jack, the boy from my past and the man of my future.
Tonight felt like the first time he took me out on our very first fancy date. Neither of us had much money, but he’d made reservations at a fancy place along the river in our college town. A place where very few students ever went. That’s how fancy and expensive it was.
But Jack took me there.
We’d been dating four weeks and had only done the usual: a few movies. A basketball game. Gone to a few Greek Week activities and a house party. Coffee. Target to walk around.
The usual.
Things kids do when they’re broke.
There we were at the fanciest place in town, all dressed up in the fanciest clothes we had in our closets. I wore a black velvet dress that I’d worn when I’d gone through sorority recruitment (though I hadn’t joined one), and Jack was in black dress pants and a baby-blue shirt with a matching necktie.
It was all nervous smiles and nervous giggles, accidentally touching because our knees kept knocking below the table.
“I’m way too tall for this table,” he apologized for the second time. “Sorry.”
“Gosh, stop apologizing. It’s not as if you can help it. It’s fine if you want to stretch your legs out.”
He nods, readjusting the napkin the server had lain across his lap. “But then it’ll look like I’m slouching, and I don’t want to be rude. This is a fancy place.”
I glance around, sitting up straight like the other women in the room, wanting to fit in though we clearly did not.
“Should we order an appetizer?” Jack was studying the menu again. “How about oysters on the half shell?”
I hated oysters. My roommate had gotten drunk one night on Saki bombs at a sushi restaurant and thrown up in our closet all over my shoes. Inside my shoes. Inside the file cabinet I kept in there.
I haven’t been able to eat sushi or oysters since—not that I ever had the opportunity.
“If you want oysters, we can have oysters.”
Not exactly a ringing endorsement, but I don’t want to tell him I find them repulsive.
“Penelope, if you don’t want something, just say so.”
“Fine. I don’t want oysters…”
That had been the beginning of me finding my voice with him. Knowing I could tell him what was on my mind, and he would accept it from me.
Still, some things weren’t easy to admit.
Like the pregnancy.
“Oh look, they have oysters on the half shell,” Jack is saying, grinning back at me, legs still too long for the table. “Remember when your roommate in college barfed in your closet after she got wasted?”
“Um, yes. But joke’s on you because I can tolerate oysters now—especially if they’re drenched in cocktail sauce and horseradish.”
“Cocktail sauce and horseradish? That’s cheating.”
We tease each other all night. The staff at this restaurant leaves us alone, only coming over to bring food or remove plates.
Bring dessert.
The check at the end of the evening.
“Is the bathtub calling your name?” Jack is holding my hand across the table, stroking my palm with his thumb, the motion sending shivers down my spine.
I’m so easy. It’s been forever since I’ve been touched, if I don’t include this past weekend when he kissed me. But he hadn’t put his hands anywhere else. He’s kept them above board, not under my shirt, not over my shirt, not down my pants.
Chaste.
I’ve been restless since that night, my mind constantly wandering to sex—foreplay. Kissing. Touching.
Oral, even.
My entire body itches.
The ride back to the hotel takes forever. The concierge sent a car for us so we didn’t have to drive ourselves. Jack’s hand resting on my thigh practically burns a hole through the fabric of my dress.