Those Nights in Montreal Read online

  “I’m going to make sure you’re dressed for the occasion. In other words, that he suffers the deaths of a thousand fires for making you break up with him in the first case.”

  That has us all chortling.

  Did I mention April has done a bit of acting?

  An hour later, I have to admit, I’m feeling and looking better than I have in a while. I have the kind of long, thick hair that does nothing but hang there. Most of the time, I don’t have the patience—or time—to wrestle with it so I just wear it straight or pull it into a loose slipknot.

  Tonight, April uses her model skills and patiently curls it into something pretty stunning if I may say so myself. Seriously, like I’d gotten it done at a professional salon. Olivia does my makeup and they both help choose my outfit. And like the pampered princess I’m so not, I give up all reins of control and let them. Best thing I could have done because the end result is me looking good in snug low-rise jeans, an aqua-blue, three-quarter-length sleeve, cropped sweater and April insisted I borrow her three-and-a-half inch, black boots with gorgeous ruche detail. Those are her words not mine.

  Scott can’t take his eyes off me when he picks me up an hour-and-a-half later. His heated gaze drinks me in from head to toe and then back again. And I do my own perusing. Hot would be a mild understatement to how good he looks in dark brown chinos and a tan pullover that makes his shoulders look impossibly broad. On his dimpled jaw and angular cheekbones are the beginnings of a five o’clock shadow. He knows how much that turns me on, which is a clear indication that he doesn’t intend to play fair. The bum. Although I’m not sure I wouldn’t do the same thing if our positions were reversed.

  “You look good,” he says, his gazing holding mine, his voice deliciously low.

  “So do you.” Why am I now feeling shy around him? I haven’t felt this way since the first time he drove up to see me after we met at Warwick.

  After an awkward kiss on the cheek, we say goodbye to April and Olivia and head to his car.

  Twenty minutes later, we endured a quiet ride to the next town over and are seated at a booth near the back of the Cheesecake Factory. Let’s just say that it will take us time to get back to the ease we once shared. Conversation had come in snatches between the overwhelming silence.

  Scott waits until our waitress—too perky and cute for my liking, especially the not-so-subtle way she’s been eyeing my boyfriend—sashays away, before giving me his exclusive attention.

  “Feel like old times?” he asks with a lift of his brow.

  Yeah, except my nerves are shot and a gazillion butterflies feel like they’ve taken refuge in my stomach no matter how many times I remind myself that this is just Scott. The same guy I’ve kissed hundreds of times, had sex with and, by the time I’d broken it off, had actually been pretty comfortable with him seeing me naked…with the lights on. Okay, so we haven’t been together for a year but still, I shouldn’t be this nervous. For crying out loud, we had sex two weeks ago.

  “Maybe. Kind of.” If he means old times like when we first met, then yes. I’d been a bundle of nerves back then too.

  At my reply, he nods and offers a faint smile as if he understands although he doesn’t seem the least bit nervous himself. But when has he ever? Oh yeah, the time I told him I was pregnant. I immediately push that memory from my thoughts. We’re starting over. Kind of.

  “My mom was here back in April. She wanted to see you.”

  He stills and his eyes go wide as he stares at me.

  “You didn’t tell her that you—we broke up?”

  “Yeah, she knows. But you know how much she liked you. Still does.” My free-thinking mother who lives the live and let live philosophy adores Scott. Thinks he’s the best thing that ever happened to her boy-crazy daughter. Before Scott, I fell in and out of love at the drop of a dime. Every guy I crushed on was the love of my life. After Scott, I’d pretty much found it impossible to truly get into any guy. That’s how I’ve partitioned my life, before Scott and after Scott, which makes him on par with Jesus, right? Not.

  “I really like your mom,” he says, his expression going all soft like he’s thinking back to all the time he spent in our cramped apartment, then our house when my mom could finally afford to buy one, which had only been a year-and-a-half ago. “Have you told her about us?”

  I shake my head. “Not yet.”

  “Why not?”

  “First of all we only got back together like three days ago. Anyway, I want to wait, you know, give it some time in case…. Well you know.”

  His expression hardens against me. “What? In case it doesn’t work out?” His voice has taken on a clipped tone.

  What the hell? Why is he looking all pissed off, like it’s not even a possibility? “I just don’t want to get her hopes up, that’s all.”

  His gaze narrows, then he draws an audible breath before expelling it slowly. “Right, I get it,” he finally says, but by the look on his face, I’m not sure he does.

  “How are things going with your folks and your brothers and sister?” My question isn’t me reciprocating just because he asked about mine and I’m not just being polite. In the year we went out I never met his family. Never even talked to any of them on the phone. I only had Scott’s cell number and that’s how I always got in touch with him. It hadn’t bothered me until I couldn’t get in touch with him during the whole pregnancy scare. That’s when I’d realized I really knew shit about Scott’s personal life. Simple things like his address and home phone number. I knew where he went to school but there’s no way I would have ever called him there. I didn’t know the name of the business his family owned and he’s the only person my age I knew who didn’t have a Facebook page.

  “They’re doing good. Great actually.”

  That’s his standard answer. I usually don’t get more than that. Oh once, he did tell me about his older brother graduating from college with a chemical engineering degree, his sister getting into some ballet school or program and his younger brother making the varsity football team. Never anything about his parents, at least nothing specific.

  “You think now that we’re going out again, I’ll finally get to meet them?”

  We’re interrupted by the waitress bringing our drinks and she eyes Scott the entire time she’s performing her waitress duties. He is polite but his expression makes it clear he’s only interested in one girl in the restaurant and she isn’t the blonde wearing tight black pants and a white shirt with a small notepad and pencil clipped to her waist.

  If one went by smiles, I’m being perfectly polite too but my smile probably conveys ‘He’s not interested in you so keep walking’, and not, ‘You’re so sweet and doing such a great job’.

  Not sure if it’s me or Scott but Miss I Have No Boundaries takes the hint and, like that, she’s all business. The girl is smart. Why jeopardize a good tip for a guy you’re not going to get? Wise decision. Scott is hot so I won’t be too hard on her for trying.

  Bitch.

  When she walks away, there’s a lot less swing in her saunter.

  Scott takes a drink of his Coke while I’m content to stir mine with my straw. “Well, you think I will?”

  My question draws his gaze back to me. “Will what?”

  Evasion. Not the first time he’s tried to stonewall me on this.

  “Meet your parents.” I prompt, mildly irritated. I’m one hundred percent sure he hasn’t forgotten the question.

  “Sure, whenever they come up.”

  “You said they’d probably never come up to visit you. Has that changed?”

  Averting his gaze, Scott takes another draw from his straw. Thirsty is he? He shrugs nonchalantly. “I don’t know, they might. My brother said something about them bringing him out to see me.”

  Yeah right. Not that his brother hasn’t been bugging the crap out of his parents to take him to see his older brother. That I believe because from what Scott told me about his younger siblings and older brother, they’re all
pretty close. But I highly doubt his parents will make the trip and I think Scott knows that. From what I gathered by things Scott used to tell me, his parents live to work. As in never at home, their live-in housekeeper doing double duty taking his brother and sister to all their after-school activities as well as running the household.

  Unlike my family, Scott’s family has money. Apparently lots of it if they can afford a live-in housekeeper and a maid.

  “So I take it that’s a no.”

  “C’mon Bec, don’t be like that.”

  Some things never change. “Like what?” I ask with a shrug. “It’s nothing, I was just wondering since you’ve met my mom and she practically considered you one of the family.” I don’t mean it to come across as snippy but it does. “You know what, forget I even mentioned it.” The truth is, I’m not trying to pick a fight. Honest to God I’m not. It’s just that a part of me has always felt that me not even speaking to anyone in his family has more to do with me not being the kind of girl he felt comfortable taking home to meet his family and less to with the fact that he’d always come to visit me because his parents weren’t as “cool” as my mom.

  CHAPTER NINE

  SCOTT

  I can tell by the expression on her face that if I don’t fix things now, our date will be shot to hell. But damn if I want to talk about my parents. Explaining why I never took her up on her many offers to make the trek down to L.A. to visit me and meet my family would mean having to explain who they are. Revealing who they are would also mean revealing the things she doesn’t know about me and I’m not ready to do that. At least not yet. I want to wait until things are solid between us.

  I’m an ass. I should have told her eons ago, like after we started getting serious. But look at what happened when I’d been honest with Andrea about me. In my junior year, she’d been new at the all girls’ school as well as to the area, and she’d been the girl I was interested in. Her interest in me had gone from high to zilch in two seconds flat. Good, decent girls weren’t interested in a guy like me.

  Apart from how pretty, sweet and fun she was to be with, that’s one of the things I’d liked about dating Becca. She didn’t know me. To her I hadn’t come with my reputation and all the garbage that came with it. I wasn’t Carol Carver’s son, the royal screw up and overall fuck up. Crap, and it’d be even worse when she learned about all the girls…. Yeah, now is definitely not the time to tell her. The shitstorm my past would cause will come soon enough. As it is, I just need to salvage this date or it may be the last we’ll be going on together.

  The waitress bringing our food saves me from having to say anything now. I barely glance at the girl. One because she’s been making eyes at me in front of my girlfriend and two because I don’t want to give Becca another reason to skewer me.

  While we’re eating, we talk about school. What classes we’re taking and how apartment living is so much better than living in a dorm. I don’t tell her that my roommate had basically been interviewed for the position. My dad had to make sure Clint could be trusted and wasn’t going to be a bad influence. It’s the same reason I’m not on Facebook or Twitter. Keeping a low profile is the mantra in my family. Only my parents are allowed to be high-profile and it’s usually always on their terms.

  The next hour flies and then it’s time to take Becca home. A certain tension settles between us on the drive back to her apartment. My mind is on what’s going to happen when I walk her to her door. I’m sure hers is too. She hasn’t stopped fidgeting since she got in the car.

  I park in the sporadically lit parking lot of her building and shut off the ignition before turning to her to address the elephant in the room. “I’m going to walk you to your door and kiss you goodnight. Nothing else. So don’t worry that I’m going to try to pressure you into having sex.” Even though I wouldn’t mind pressuring the hell out of her, I’ll stay true to my word.

  “I didn’t think y-you were—.”

  “Yeah you did, that’s why you can’t keep your hands still.”

  Instantly, her hands go motionless in her lap.

  I chuckle softly. Bingo.

  “Better yet, let’s get the kiss over with. That should calm you down.”

  Before she can open her mouth to respond, mine is on hers, my hand cupping the back of her head, my body angled over the console.

  Her lips are soft and although I planned to take it slow, finesse the kiss, I can’t. It’s been two weeks; just too fucking long.

  REBECCA

  The second Scott’s lips touch mine, my senses go into sensory overdrive. My eyes close and my lips part, two things that seem to happen of their own volition. He tastes like the mint he’d been sucking on after dinner and right now I’m feeling like I’m suffering the worst case of mint addiction.

  His tongue parries with mine as I wrap my arms around his neck, trying unsuccessfully to get closer. The front seat of a car is not the most comfortable place to make out. But he’s holding and kissing me, and right now that’s all that matters. My body’s reaction to him is seen in the beading of my nipples and the growing moisture between my legs.

  I become lost in the drugging kiss, pulling his bottom lip into my mouth and running my tongue over the wet pink flesh. Groaning against my mouth, his hand trails down my side. When it reaches the hem of my sweater, he pushes underneath where my skin feels hot to the touch.

  A moment later the upward press of his hand is pushing the flimsy cups of my bra up and away from my breasts. I gasp in pleasure when he encloses the right one in his hand. The flick of his thumb across my nipple sends a jolt of lust from my breast to my core. Panting, he breaks the kiss and buries his face in the crook of my shoulder, his breath labored and harsh against my neck. “God, Becca.” He gently squeezes my breast and continues his relentless thumbing of the hardened tip.

  A part of me knows that unless I want to end up on my back in the back seat with my panties around my ankles, I need to end this right now. But that part of me is fighting my body, which is pushing for the satisfaction of having him inside me. Pounding into me.

  Before I can react to my warring parts, he pushes my sweater far up enough to expose my breasts to the cool night air and sucks the tip into his mouth. The throbbing between my thighs goes from hanging-by-the-nails tolerable to excruciating pleasure-pain. My gasp of pleasure ends in a shuddering moan, my hand cradling the back of his head to keep him there—as if he were going anywhere.

  The exquisite torture of him sucking and his tongue circling my nipple lasts several minutes. By the time he’s finished with one breast and starts on the other, I’m almost gone. But it’s that brief cessation that brings a moment of clarity to my beleaguered senses.

  “Scott,” I gasp, trying to push his head away before he can reach his intended goal. “We can’t.” Especially not in the front seat of his car. I send a brief thanks to God that we aren’t in my apartment because I’m not sure I would have had the strength to call a halt with a bed a short walk down the hall.

  Both breasts exposed to his burning gaze—and to anyone who happens to be peaking in his car windows—he stills, his mouth inches from my reddened nipple. His breathing is harsh and ragged, as is mine. It’s as if we’ve both just run the last leg of the New York City Marathon.

  It takes a good thirty seconds before he gets himself under control and that’s when he finally looks up at me. Hunger banks the heat in his eyes. With more willpower than I can even credit myself, he fixes my bra in place and pulls down my sweater while I watch on, bemused and unfulfilled.

  “That got out of hand,” he says hoarsely as he shifts fully back into his seat. I quickly follow his lead, readjusting my bra in an effort to get it comfortably back in place.

  “Yeah, I guess it did,” I say when I feel like I’m properly put back together. At least on the outside, inside my stomach is churning and the throbbing between my legs still hasn’t subsided.

  Scott sends me a look that starts at my chest. My nipples, whic
h are still making a marked imprint on my sweater, further harden under his heated gaze. From there, his eyes lift to my mouth, where they darken and narrow. My throbbing intensifies and from the pronounced bulge in his crotch, he’s still just as turned on as I am.

  I hastily look away and try to think about anything but that. Sex. Delicious mind-blowing sex that we used to have. Like the sex we had ten days ago.

  “Well, I’d better be going.” I make a move to open the car door.

  “I’ll see you up.” Dark and low, Scott’s voice is a heady combination of arousal and sexual frustration.

  He’s already out the door and walking around to the passenger side when I plant my feet on the ground. “You don’t—”

  “Becca,” he warns, his tone implacable.

  My mouth snaps closed at that. I let him escort me to my apartment. At the door, he kisses me once, softly on the lips. Weak with need, I start to sink into the kiss when he abruptly ends it.

  He rests his forehead against mine and inhales deeply. “Goodnight. I’ll see you tomorrow.” With that, he’s gone and not toward the elevator but to the stairs. I live on the fourth floor. Obviously, he has energy he needs to expend. Right, and so do I.

  I can see this is going to be a long night.

  CHAPTER TEN

  SCOTT

  Becca and I are sitting in the nearly empty coffee shop on campus forty minutes before closing time when the subject of the fall mid-term break comes up.

  “Are you doing anything over the break?” she asks, sounding tentative.

  There hadn’t been anything tentative about Becca when we’d gone out before. But then, as I’ve realized the last three weeks, my girlfriend has changed. She’s not allowing herself to get too close. To me. Which is frustrating as fuck.

  But I’m the picture of patience. Or I hope that’s how I’m coming across. I’m trying but it’s hard though. It feels like I’m living in a constant state of sexual frustration. Our make-out sessions never go beyond kissing and some heavy petting. I’ve redefined torture as going home after every date with a brutal case of blue balls. Sometimes I get the feeling that she’s doing this to test me. You know, how far I’ll go to prove myself to her.