I shift in my seat, trying to adjust my dick, which has been brutally rock-hard since Harlow’s little cock-tease this morning. Well, that’s not entirely honest. I’ve been in a semi-hard state since she walked into my life.
I could have fucked her this morning, despite her hesitation last night. I probably freaked her out when I said the drunk-me equivalent of “Home. Fuck. Now.”
I can’t really blame her for panicking a bit. It’s different for women, unfairly so in my opinion, and even though the entire school definitely already thinks we’re fucking, they’d talk a lot more if she did a walk of shame back to her dorm this morning. Wait. Well, shit, she already did that.
Who the fuck cares what they think, anyway? I care what she thinks, and she seems to be acutely afraid of a repeat of whatever the lucky bastard—bastards? Shit, it’s all a little fuzzy—did to her.
I’d almost wonder if her last lay was bad in bed, like maybe he didn’t get her prepared before he went to ram-town, but I didn’t get that impression last night.
Maybe he was a poke-it and smoke-it sort of fellow. And that makes me want to punch the fucker in the face.
I am dying, dying, to ask her what he—them?—did. Not because I’d judge her. I don’t give a shit if she’s fucked a hundred guys before me because I know I’m better, but I would love the chance to beat the shit out of every single one that hurt her.
Thinking about some asshole taking advantage of Harlow wilts my dick as fast as popping a balloon. My knuckles clench the steering wheel tighter, and the car jerks a bit with the cinch of my fingers. Yeah...it’s best I don’t know, or at least best if she doesn’t tell me while I’m driving.
“Where are we going?” she asks in that voice that is one part smoker and one part music. I swear she was born with grit in her blood.
“Ellisville. There’s a little hole-in-the-wall diner there I like to go to sometimes. They make the best damn burger and fries you’ve ever had. Then I figured we’d walk around the square. They go all out for Halloween: decorating pumpkins, bobbing for apples, haunted corn maze. They entire town gets into it. I’ll even take you for a roll in the hay if you’ll let me.”
I wink at her, and she laughs.
“I think you mean for a hay ride,” she quips.
“Nope,” I shake my head, “absolutely not.”
She laughs again, and this time, it overcomes her until she shakes so hard she can’t breathe and turns bright red.
That laugh makes me feel like a man on top of the world, the guy who just scored the biggest deal of his life, the MVP at the Super Bowl. It’s better than any high I’ve ever had, and that’s saying a lot because I’ve had some pretty awesome highs.
It takes another hour to get to Ellisville, but she doesn’t complain about the drive. By the time we are there, my stomach wants to take chunks out of the leather headrest.
We pass under a wooden arch into the city, the town’s name drawn out in big, loopy letters. My dad would hate this place. He’d call it “kitschy and outdated.” My mom would agree because she agrees with everything he says.
Maybe that’s why I like it so much, because it would definitely piss him off.
It’s like the entire town got stuck in the 1960s, except for the modern cars and civil rights, of course. I slow the car to the speed-limit—Jesus, I must really love this town to obey the speed-limit—as we pass Rosy’s Drive-In Theatre, advertised with a white-and-red neon sign that stands above a matching 1967 GT 500 Shelby Mustang. Two skeleton passengers wave boney hands at the passersby.
“Whoa,” Harlow breathes.
We pass the suburbs going into town, and like I said, everybody gets into it. Frankenstein’s monster is being brought to life on the front porch of an old Victorian while Freddy Krueger and Jason hide in the bushes at their next-door neighbor’s house. Ghosts hang in old elm trees and black cats cross front yards between tombstones. Mummies and vampires alike rise from the dead and monsters made of pumpkins moon the world with their orange asses.
I snort. Harlow giggles.
I’m about to start chewing on my forearm when I see the parking lot for Dave’s Diner. I don’t know who Dave is, but if he’s still alive, I’d like to shake his hand.
“Hungry?” I ask her. Please, for the love of everything, say yes.
“Starving,” she replies.
Thank Christ.
We pull into the parking lot. I have the car parked and am opening her door in less than a minute.
“Hungry much?” she teases as the door slides shut behind her, and I am tugging her to the front door.
I turn around and wink at her. “I’m always hungry for you, beautiful.”
Not my best line, but she laughs anyway. What can I say? My blood sugar is low.
I open the door to the diner for her, and we are transported back in time to red leather barstools, shiny white floors, and a jukebox playing in the corner.
“Ian!” Gabriel calls from behind the counter with a smile.
“Gabriel,” I say with a nod, leading Harlow by the hand to my corner booth.
“Ian’s stunning friend,” Gabriel says with a nod in Harlow’s direction before he resumes wiping down the countertop again.
Harlow stares at Gabriel. I’ve always liked him until now, but I’m not blind. He’s a sandy haired, lithe guy with a French accent from his European boarding school, relegated to working here for a year while his parents’ money magically makes his university forget last semester’s “little incident”—well, that’s what I heard his mom call it at least.
His “little incident” was starting a rave that resulted in over a hundred freshmen out of their minds on mushrooms and molly, running around campus naked and having mass orgies
