In the Wake of Touch

Jesus Christ. There's not enough beer in the kegs by the barn for this.

Definitely not enough in my system.

Could I ever forgive her?

Do I even have an answer to that?

I thought we were being friends. Do friends pick at old wounds, scabs

with little corners sticking up on the sides, ripe for tearing off and gouging

the skin that had been trying to heal and creating even worse scar tissue

than what was there before?

It's taken me years and years to form these scabs, even shitty as they

may be, but in she comes, ready to just pull at them all, scrape away and

scratch them off rather than let me keep doing my slow healing?

Nah.

This is a conversation I'm not here for. Not tonight.

Rory breathes out a heavy breath next to me, cheeks all puffed out as

she looks the other way.

"I'm sorry. You don't have to answer that. I … I shouldn't have asked."

"Damn, girl. What happened to starting over?" My tone is more strained

than I was shooting for, but I think I've done pretty well tonight, all things

considered. I should get a little slack here.

That gets me a watery laugh, and she shakes her head. "You're right. I

was out of line."

I nudge her body with my elbow and wait until she turns back and

meets my eye again.

"Friends, yeah?" I offer. "I meant that. While you're here, if you need a

friend … I'm here."

She's always been my soft spot. No matter the turn my life took after

she left, the damage she caused, all I can feel for her now that she's back is

empathy. That's a sentiment I'm not too familiar with, being a bit of a surly

fucker myself, but like I said, she's my weakness. Always has been. She's

hurting, she's in pain, she's here, facing her fuck ups to do the impossible,

and I can't not try to make it easier for her. Giving her what she needs, I

spent so much of my youth, my formative years, focusing on it, I think it

became part of my DNA, some sort of evolutionary shit.

"Friends," she says with a nod and what might be a sniffle. She takes a

big gulp of her beer and looks back at the bonfire. "So, how's your

brother?"

I huff out some sort of snort and she looks over at me, eyes wide.

"Another sore subject? Damn, this is like Battleship, trying to talk to you,

huh? Direct hit after direct hit?"

My beer is dangling from my hand by the lip of the cup, and I raise it in

front of my face to down some more. Hopefully it gives me the ability to

talk to my one sore subject about the other.

"Think I've only got the two," I mutter with a look that tells her I'm not

being cruel. Most other topics should be safe. "Weston … he's Weston," I

add on with a shrug. "Same old irresponsible little shit he always was."

She laughs, looking back at the fire, lost in some memory of him that's

much happier than mine are. "I always liked your brother," she says fondly.

"Like we're kindred in some ways."

"Yeah, you're both bougie as fuck, and expensive to keep happy, and

neither of you cared to stay in the Heights."

She pulls back with a start. "He left the Heights too?"

I shrug back at her. "He left, came back, left again. In and out whenever

the urge strikes. I'm sure he'll be back. Flaky bastard that he is, it'll

probably be when he needs something."

She makes a noncommittal noise, something like disapproval, and I

realize we need to change the subject before this turns into a sad sack fest.

That's not the break she needs tonight.

I ask her about life in New York, and she tells me all about the amazing

apartment she scored, how she finished school up there, and the firm she

got a job with and has since moved up the ranks with. Her favorite bagel

vendor, the various bakeries and grocers she frequents. Her face lights up

when she talks about all of it, and for a minute I'm jealous of the city for

giving her that light that this town and I couldn't. But I'm happy for her. It's

good to see that she followed her dream and it worked out.

I fill her in on what she's missed around here. Not a whole lot. I'm still

working on cars, obviously, just like I was when she left. Give her the recap

on my family, Ronnie's, the general gist of the town at large, at least the

better parts of it.

"Sounds like everything's more or less the same then?" She tosses out

with a quirked brow after my updates.

I suck in an offended breath through my teeth. "You take that back,

ma'am. We got a Buc-ee's. It's basically a whole new world out here."

The sound of her tinkling laughter warms my insides even more than

the beer, and I manage to prompt her for more about her life, despite the

thickness in my throat.

She tells me how the partners she reports to wouldn't let her fully quit,

insisted that she go on a hiatus, and possibly do some remote work on

contracts and other legal documents while she's away. How she's been

trying to figure out how to make that work in that tiny apartment she's

living out of while also doing what she's here to do.

"I'm sure Duke and Dallas would let you use the bar during the

daytime," I throw out. "There's never anyone really other than Ernie there

until the plant and the factory close."

She waggles her head back and forth. "Yeah, that's true. Definitely

would be more room down there at least. If I could set up a printer

somewhere it'd probably be a lot easier to review documentation on a larger

surface than whatever tiny desk would fit upstairs." She smiles at me, and it

feels like a prize I've earned. "Thanks, Wyatt."

Her eyes—those dangerous, wavering little bastards of mischief—they

float to my lips, not for the first time tonight. My cock takes note, and I

fight readjusting myself. I tip back my beer for another swig instead. "Of

course."

She licks her lips and looks away, and I wonder if she'd still taste the

same. Wonder how crazy I'd have to be to try and find out.

I'm nearing the end of this cup, my third beer, when something

unexpected leaves her mouth again. She's still facing the other way when

she asks, "Do you ever think of me?"

I toss back the rest of my cup. Fuck it. She wants my truth, I'll give it to

her.

"Only when I'm coming." It sounds like a growl, and I can feel her

reaction next to me, without giving in to the temptation of looking over at

her. The sharp little inhale she takes when she registers my words.

I bet her cheeks are pink, her nipples pebbled, and her pussy wet.

I wonder if that still tastes the same.

Now there's no helping it, I'm gonna have to readjust. I rest an elbow

on a knee, drape my arm across my lap, and sneak the other hand down to

free up some space inside my pants, my underwear, try to let my boner

breathe until I can talk it down or rub it out, whichever comes first.

"Oh," she finally says, and I dare it. I look over to my left and she's

staring at me, that mouth of hers in a perfect O, one that I could easily see

stretched around my dick, because I've already seen it hundreds of times

before. After all, it's what I usually see when I'm coming in some other

girl's mouth.

"I think about you too," she admits softly, and I give in again.

I let my eyes run over her face, those lips even plumper than I

remember them, down her neck, follow that flush to her chest, those perfect

tits that look even bigger than they were the last time I got to see them.

She's breathing faster, and I follow the rise and fall of that chest, let my

eyes fall down her dress, picturing what's happening underneath it right

now. Is her underwear soaked? Are her thighs clenched? Is her clit puffy

and begging for my tongue, my lips, my teeth?

If she looks at me with those needy eyes—begging for things her mouth

won't say aloud—when she's fully sober, I'm gonna do something about it.

That's the kind of friend I am, I guess. You need something, I'm your guy.

As long as your name is Aurora Rose.

And it's when my eyes are on her legs that I see something else by her

legs. Something she surely hasn't noticed, because as much as Aurora Rose

Weiss has changed, she's definitely not any more outdoorsy now than she

was when she lived here. And the creature creeping toward her exposed

toes, feet, and legs is not going to be a welcome one.

I OPEN my mouth to warn her, but the critter gets to her first. It wends

between her ankles, beneath the extended calf there, and brushes up against

her, tail winding around her lower leg, eliciting an ear-piercing scream.

It actually makes me feel a bit safer—if she's got that set of lungs on

her, I don't think she needs a whistle for muggings or any of the other

thousand dangers I've spent hours researching the statistics of on Google in

her absence.

In an instant, she's jumped up, back, and away from the thing, but I was

ready. I'm with her, next to her, bracing her as she tries to jump on top of

the log, like that's going to help her get away from the friendly barn cat.

"WYATT!"

This would be a great time for a joke about her screaming my name, if I

still did those. That was Wyatt 1.0.

"I'm here, you're fine," I tell her placatingly, but not patronizingly. Her

irrational fear of cats isn't as irrational as it might sound, actually. She had a

bad run-in with an overprotective mama kitty when we were teens. She's

still got the scar on her arm, and the nickname to boot.

Aurora is still dancing on top of the log, mostly behind me, holding onto

my shoulders for balance as she wipes the offended leg on her other, trying

to remove the feeling from her skin.

Like I said, I know the girl. Dedicated a huge chunk of my life to

knowing her, her needs. Understanding them.

"Hop up," I tell her, gesturing toward my back, and she doesn't think

twice. Her lithe body, tall, pretty average build, soft in all the right places,

leaps up and attaches itself to mine. Those arms of hers wrap around my

neck, strangling me.

"You might like to be choked, but I don't," I grunt out, peeling her

forearms from off of my windpipe.

"Not the time for jokes, Grady!"

Ooh. My last name. She means business.

I grasp her lower legs to make sure she's secure and then I reach down

to the cat, who's now pacing the log, purring by my ankles, and scratch

behind his ears.

"This is Boots," I tell Aurora, trying not to focus on the way her heavy

breaths are hitting my ear, her breasts pressed into my back so tightly I'm

pretty sure I can feel her rapid heartbeat through them. Is there an ulterior

motive at work here? Me, leaning down, her being pressed further into me

as I do? Might be. "Puss in Boots, in full. He's the barn cat here."

"That's lovely. Please get me away from Boots." Her death grip on me

tightened when I leaned down, and she doesn't ease up until I've walked

around the log, toward the majority of the other people and her senses seem

to come back to her when we're far enough away from the danger.

"You can put me down now," she says stiffly, and I drop her down

carefully, hands bracing her as best I can from this angle as she goes, trying

to ignore all the curves I end up feeling by default as she dismounts.

I turn to face her and she's hugging herself, arms across her body.

"Thank you," she says as dignified as one can be after just having been

terrified by a furry little friendly cat and scaling your ex for safety.

It's a good thing I'm not prone to excessive smiling or laughing,

because I can tell that would not be the right move based off of the look on

her face, her posture, her demeanor.

"We can hang out over here?" I gesture back toward the barn and the

bulk of the other people, many of whom are now staring at her, some even

snickering or laughing at her display. Knowing them, it's probably just

amusement at what just happened, but knowing her—for as much as she

says she's changed, I'm quickly seeing she's still a lot of the girl I've

always known—she's probably taking it as something worse than that. Her

mind always worked against her when she got stressed, and I'd say that

probably hasn't changed.

She shakes her head in what I think might be horror. "No, no, I think

I'm good. Thanks again for the beers, and the invite. And, you know, saving

me."

Her attempted fleeing is interrupted by the arrival of my best friend. "Is

that Rory?" Ronnie's brash yell reaches us from where he's just parked. "Is

that Rory Weiss I see?"

"You might've missed your chance to go peacefully," I whisper to her as

he crosses the field, nodding and waving his hello to most of our friends as

he does.

She grumbles, shifting from one foot to the other, but doesn't make a

break for it.

When Ronnie gets to us, he walks straight over to Rory, leans down to

hug her, and then lifts her up and spins them around.

Something acidic turns in my stomach, and I have the most unusual

impulse to crack his spine. Honestly, I could punch him on a good day, but

the specificity of the spine cracking is what's new there.

He puts her down and I think she'd be laughing once again if she

weren't still shaken and a bit mortified by what happened with the damn

cat.

I can tell she's back in her own head again, after all the work of getting

her out here, back into nature, what's always calmed her, and those benefits

have already faded away.

"It's Aurora now," she tells Ronnie instead of the million other ways she

could've greeted him, and I see his face fall just a fraction before he gives

her a big grin.

"You'll always be Rory to us," he tells her jovially, but it doesn't land.

I glance between them and can see her shutting down brick by brick.

Great.

"And seeing you with Grady? Just like old times!" He keeps going,

because he's a fucking numbskull who can't read the room if it were in a

children's picture book with hundred-point font right in front of his damn

face.

Aurora's face falls even further, and she backs up away from both

Ronnie and me.

"I was just leaving, actually," she says, jerking a thumb over her

shoulder, back toward the makeshift lot.

"Are you good to drive?" I ask her. "I can take you," I offer before she

responds.

She shakes her head. "No, no, I'm good. That sobered me right up.

Thanks."

I glare at Ronnie for a split second, then back to her. "At least text me

when you get home?"

"Home is seven hundred miles away," she corrects me quietly. "But I'll

text you when I get to the bar."

And she's gone. Again.

The silence of her absence makes me realize that, for once, I didn't

mind all the talking tonight.

My sharp glare returns to Ronnie, a crestfallen look on his face.

"What did I do?"