Her message is short and to the point, but I feel something more behind it. Maybe it's wishful thinking, but I remember the way she was the last time we fucked. I saw the emotion in her eyes and heard it in her voice. The way she held me close and soothed me; it has been so long since I felt anything but lust and desire in sexual touch. It seems as though she cares, and it terrifies me.
But I like it too.
Her email leaves it open to me to decide what happens next. It's encouraging. I read the line that begins “I want you…” and shiver. I want her so badly it's a physical ache in my chest. I lie in bed, the darkness all-consuming, and press my hand over my heart. I don't want to feel the emptiness anymore. I dig my fingers hard into the muscles of my chest, enough to leave crescent-shaped arcs from my nails, and the bite of pain is a welcome relief.
Nicole's words circle. 'I'll be there, Aaron. Will you?'
I just don't know. Getting to Rhode Island would be easy. I have nothing going on that can't be dismissed by Sandrine with an emergency as an excuse.
I imagine going to Nicole's hotel room and seeing her again; her sweet mouth, that silky, long hair that always smells of vanilla, and the smile in her eyes. I think about tying her up to the bed and licking her until she's begging me to let her come until I can feel her slipperiness all over my chin and watch it slide down onto the bed beneath. I want to watch her body orgasm and see the way her pussy flutters with pleasure. I've felt it around my cock like a fist squeezing rhythmically, a hot, soft fist.
Thinking about her makes my cock as hard as an iron bar, and I slide my hand from my chest, over my stomach to the pulsing bulge in my shorts, squeezing. He doesn't want my hand, though. He wants Nicole.
I reached into my nightstand and pull out the pink panties that she hurriedly handed to me in the hotel bar. They're sheer, a devilish mix of innocent and brazen. They'd been wet in my palm, and it had driven me crazy to think of her so riled up for me. I bring them to my face and inhale the sweet scent of her, pulling at my cock slowly. Her scent kicks up my arousal. Maybe it's the pheromones or something. She just smells so damn good to me.
I'm close fast, but the pleasure feels hollow, like looking at a picture of a cake and not being able to eat it. I force myself to think about the first time we had sex because that was the most impersonal. I don't want to orgasm to memories of the tender moments we shared before I left Nicole in London. It seems like a betrayal somehow. After I come in thick streams against my belly, I pull off my shorts to clean myself up and then force myself into the shower.
While I wash, I consider not going to Rhode Island. It was hard before her email, knowing that I left her behind and that she probably hates me for it. Now that she's confirmed that she wants more, can I stay in Atlanta and work a typical day knowing she's waiting for me? An image of her sitting in her hotel room, looking at her watch, floods my mind, and it aches in my chest.
I don't want her to be disappointed or distressed.
But maybe it's best for both of us to be disappointed now and to hurt less in the long run. I can email Nicole back. Tell her that it isn't going to work out between us and wish her well. I can run from the first connection I've felt to a woman in a long time. I can hold to the rule and keep everyone at arm's length and never allow myself to get hurt again.
I scrub myself dry as if I can erase all the doubts and regrets that way, then stand and look at myself in the mirror. My reflection gazes back with an expression as empty as I feel inside. I've developed some lines around my eyes in the last year and a few streaks of gray have appeared in my hair, which make me look more mature. I'm a man on the outside, but I feel as uncertain as a teenager on the inside. It's as though Adrianna and her betrayal have reversed my emotional maturity, and I've been unable to move forward.
I rub at the skin around my mouth, stubble rasping against my fingers, imagining myself as an older man with salt and pepper hair and deeper lines on my face. What would my life be like then if I didn't try to move forward? Unmarried men in their forties are not seen as happily single out of choice, but as eternal playboys, or tragic figures with commitment issues. And who the fuck wants to be the only man in the room without kids to pass their good fortune on to? I don't want that to be that man.