Escalation Clause (5 page)

As she pulled into the Taylor’s driveway, the summer heat rose from the asphalt in shimmering waves. She sat, staring at the large red brick house where she had spent so many hours with her brother and their friends, Brandis and Denise Taylor. It sat back from the cul-de-sac street and had an in-ground pool, huge patio, and a finished, kid-friendly basement. The four of them had swam, played ball, ridden bikes, shot illicit fireworks, then later drank beer and smoked pot, and everything in between during their growing up years in Ann Arbor. Somehow, it seemed different now. Smaller, less imposing, maybe even a little shabby, but it didn’t matter. It was not her father’s house, and that’s all that mattered.

Denise stood in the front entrance, her dark mocha skin and head of frizzy hair complemented by a white tube top and jeans shorts. Her bright smile made Mo’s heart skip a beat. They had not been friends long, having been thrown together by circumstance of their brothers’ relationship. But the bond between them transcended anything superficial. “C’mon in,” she held the door open. Mo trudged in, dropped her suitcase and backpack, then burst into tears.

Later, after the adults had left the teenage girls to the monotonous drone of the television, Mo looked over to find Denise sound asleep on the couch. She crept outside to the still warm bricks and perched on the edge of the pool. The water had cooled some but held a pleasant residual heat of the day. She dangled her feet in and lay back on the patio, trying to relax. Images shot through her brain—her asshole father, angry brother, and a barely-remembered mother who had died of liver failure when Mo was twelve. The distressingly handsome face of her current boyfriend—well, the guy who’d taken her to prom about a month ago and who’d tried like hell to get her to go all the way ghosted across her memory.

When she kept refusing to let him do any more than grope and kiss he had literally left her stranded in Fuller Park, her expensive dress a wrinkled mess, her carefully coiffed self melting into the grass from embarrassment. She’d walked to the nearest payphone, located in the emergency room of University of Michigan Hospital, across the street from the park. Jack had already come home from his last year of college before heading to Chicago for law school. He’d picked her up, face set in hard lines at the sight of her.

She’d sobbed all the way to the house, but he had helped her sneak in without waking their father. He’d sat with her as she finished her blubbering, held her close, then gripped her arms and held her at arm’s length his voice firm. “Tell that asshole that if he comes near you again, I will fucking castrate him, then maybe kill him, or maybe just let him walk around dickless the rest of his life. I am serious, Mo, as a heart attack.” She’d nodded and leaned into his neck, never more grateful to have her big brother.

By the following week, the supposed boyfriend was back, flirting in his jockish, annoying way. She’d clutched her books to her chest, stood with her friend Denise and delivered Jack’s message. He had backed away, laughing nervously. But, Jack had some measure of fame in the halls of Huron High, as a former star track and basketball player—a jock with a serious brain, the magna cum laude graduate of his class. So, she never encountered the jerk again. And, now, in a perverse reversal of logic, she was lonely. Although vowing she’d not surrender her virginity to a guy like him, she missed having someone around, paying attention to her. She sighed, swung her feet in the water, watching the fireflies dance overhead. Maybe she’d never lose it, never find anyone worthy. God knows Jack had made that clear to her—no one ever would likely be good enough for his baby sister.

When a stream of ice-cold water hit her right in the nose, she tried to hold back the scream as she rolled over, the fight or flight instinct making her heart pound. She squinted into the darkness. “Denise?” Crickets and light traffic noises covered her whisper. She took a step forward, somehow knowing what she’d find. Strong arms grabbed and held her close; she pressed her face into the bare chest of Brandis Taylor, her brother’s best friend, fellow charmer of women, track star, member of the Air Force ROTC, and recent graduate of the University of Michigan. He held her close, nearly a split second too long, his lips on her hair, her cheek. She pulled out of his embrace and wiped her eyes.

“Cut it out.” She insisted, pretending not to notice that he wore nothing but running shorts and shoes, his sleek brown torso shining with sweat in the moonlight. He smiled, made as if to run a finger down her face, then lifted the squirt gun and got her square between the eyes once more before taking off across the field of the elementary school adjacent to his back yard. “You asshole!” She ran after him grabbing a couple of tennis balls and heaving them at his disappearing, broad shoulders. Another stream of water hit her in the chest, soaking her T-shirt. “Damn you.” She gasped, slowing to a walk then stopping, hands on her waist. She crept sideways, hoping he’d circled back, and was about to hit one of the large trees that lined the field and clamber up into it when she was tackled, knocked to the ground and rolled around in the dry grass, being tickled until her eyes streamed with tears. “Stop! Uncle! Seriously!” She gasped, and finally he did.

He pulled her to her feet and up onto his shoulders in a fireman’s carry, swatting her ass all the way back to his house. She ignored the instant burn in her core at his touch, reminding herself this was her brother’s “bad boy” friend. Damned if it didn’t feel good being carried in the dark over his strong back which she pretended to smack but in reality loved to touch.

After dumping her unceremoniously into the pool, he stood, smiling as she emerged. Pretending to be hurt, so he’d crouch down with concern, she reached the side and let him hold out a hand to her
. Too easy.
She yanked hard, pulling him into the water with her.

They sat together on the swing, huddled under blankets, the small fire he’d started in the pit warming them in the cooling Michigan summer night. She snuggled under his arm, and tried to ignore the muscles of his thigh, so strong and so near hers. She clenched her hands together.

“Do you still need me to take care of that tool of a prom date?”

She smiled, loving the smell of him—sweat, chlorine, and man, all coiled in her brain, making her nearly breathless. Why the guy would suddenly do this to her, after all the time they’d spent together was beyond her. But, she knew one thing—she wanted him to kiss her so badly her lips burned.

“No, I shook him off.” She laid her head back. Sensing his gaze on her, she turned and met it. “It’s nice to see you, Brandis.” Their faces were close enough to…. He smiled, which made her shiver.

Brandis frowned, then looked away, speaking up into the night sky. “Yeah, well, I understand you are a Taylor-house boarder this summer?” He draped an arm around her shoulders. She had never felt safer than at that moment.

She let her hand drift to his leg, dying to feel it. He took it, pressed it to his lips without looking at her. “Don’t,” he said, his voice light. She leaned into his torso again.

“Jack said he’s moving into the Church Street house with you,” she stated, for lack of anything better to say. He stiffened, pulled away from her slightly. Without thinking, she put a hand back on his leg, loving the sensation of his hard flesh under her palm. “Relax,” she whispered.

“Um, yeah, well, tell you what,” he leapt up, ran both hands through his close-cropped hair. “I’m gonna head back.” She stared at him, a foreign sort of need pulsing through her, centered between her legs. His running shorts were still wet enough for her to see the distinct outline of his…. She looked away, mortified at herself for even thinking it but unable to get the image of his obvious erection out of her brain. Clearing his throat, he yanked on his running shoes and croaked out, “See you later, Mo,” before he took off through the gate, running a fast clip out of the southwest suburb, towards central campus and the house he shared with three other ROTC guys—and her overprotective brother.

She watched him disappear, then poured water over the small fire and headed inside her newly adopted summer home. She knew it  was not wise to get tangled up with Brandis, but she acknowledged in nearly the same thought that she wanted him more than she’d ever wanted anything in her young life. He was wrong for her on many levels. He was her brother’s friend. And Jack would never in a million years approve. Brandis was older, nearly twenty-three, compared to her turning-eighteen-in-a-month. He was black, but color had never played a part in the friendship he’d shared with Jack or in hers with Denise. Ann Arbor was a very diverse and open-minded place, typical of many college towns nestled in the middle of conservative states. But even that seemed taboo now for some reason.

Her teeth chattered in the air conditioning. She could practically feel his lips on hers, sense his hands on her flesh, as she yielded her virginity to him, suddenly viewing it as a burden she wanted to throw off like a veil, just as long as Brandis would catch it. She buzzed with a strange, newfound energy, and she clutched the blanket they’d shared, still smelling him as she drifted off to sleep.

Chapter Three

Maureen clutched the red plastic cup full of cheap beer and watched as her brother, Brandis, and several of their college friends held court beside the pool. She sipped, getting angrier by the minute as Brandis ignored her in favor of some slutty looking Asian girl who was no more than a stick in her black bikini and had a laugh that set Mo’s teeth on edge. She let Denise hand her a new cup, scooting over when her friend dropped to the side of the pool with her.

 “Stop staring,” Denise half-whispered.

“What?”

Denise scoffed. “Stop staring at my brother. There, did you understand that? He’s an asshole, mostly, and you know that, so just cut it out.”

Mo held back the tears, turned her attention to the totally uninteresting guy currently flirting with her. She let him toss her into the pool, touch her, even kiss her once as the beer floated through her system. When his hands traveled south, in the waning light of the summer day with sounds of the radio mixing with feminine giggling and masculine murmurs all around her, she stopped him. Pinned against the side of the pool, the sudden clammy graspy-ness of his hand made her furious at herself. She turned her head, but his boozy breath stayed with her. A spike of fear shot through when he pressed himself too close. “Back off,” she shoved him away. She was no small girl at five-foot-nine and nearly a hundred fifty pounds of running and tennis-playing muscle. But, at that moment, she felt fragile and girlie which pissed her off.

He trapped her against the concrete, his hands on either side of her at the edge of the pool. “Tease,” he growled.

“Nope,” she ducked out from under his arm, swimming away, anger sobering her up enough to make her escape. When she emerged, climbing up the ladder, Brandis stood, hand out, helping her up. Her whole body zinged at his touch. He glowered at the guy who still stood at the shallow end, and then yanked her close, his lips hovering over her ear.

“You okay?” He kept his hand at the small of her back. She let herself curve into him, hoping the shadow at the far end of the pool would hide them from everyone.

“I would be,” she put her lips along his jaw, gratified when his skin pebbled. She touched his shoulder, ran her finger up the smooth skin of his neck. His breath caught in his throat. She turned her head just enough, their bodies still so close they could be dancing, or more. Not knowing if it was the beer, or just her intense need to see if his lips were as lush as they seemed, she put her hands on his arms and took a few steps, tugging him back further under a tree and into the corner of the huge lawn.

“Cut it out Mo,” his voice was just a whisper, but she kept going.

“Kiss me,” she whispered. “Just once.” But, she didn’t wait for him. She slanted her mouth over his, her urgency and inexperience making her quivery. She slid her hand behind his neck. He made a low noise in his throat that lit a fire in her core.