Everything: A Singed Wings Novel (14 page)

“And…” she prompted, motioning with her hand for me to continue. “Are you gonna make this like pulling teeth?”

Shrugging, I contemplated what all I should tell her. Lindsey wasn’t the judgmental type, and I knew she’d always have my back, but the thing with Everett was different. Like first-degree felony different.

But the tequila I’d had earlier, compounded with the glass of wine I’d almost polished off, muddied the waters of my good sense enough to loosen my tongue. Plus, I
really
needed to unload on someone, and hopefully, fingers crossed, she’d assure me that I wasn’t a completely corrupt perv.

“Oh, Linds, it’s all so messed up,” I lamented, downing the rest of my drink. “I don’t know what I’m doing, or what I should be doing. Why can’t things just ever be easy?”

“Hold on one second. This sounds like a we-need-more-alcohol kind of a talk.” Her eyes grew big with interest as she hopped up and took the empty glass from me, rushing into the kitchen to refill both hers and mine. When she returned, she nodded her head and smiled supportively. “All right, hit me up, sister. Tell me what’s going on that’s not easy, and I’ll wait until later to yell at you for not including me in the juicy gossip before now.”

I rolled my eyes and chuckled softly. “Okay, let’s see. Let’s start with Liam. He’s the relatively simple part of the equation,” I told her, as I pulled my legs up to sit crisscross-applesauce, getting comfy for a lengthy conversation. “He’s really cute in a preppy sort of way, super friendly and easy-going, and everyone seems to like him. The other women teachers and most of the female students stare at him all dreamily, going nuts over his accent and those blue eyes of his. And he’s made it
very
clear he’s interested in me.”

“How so?” she interjected.

“Well, yesterday, he kissed me on the cheek when he walked me out to my car after school, and then today, when we left the restaurant, he did it again and asked if I wanted to go to dinner next weekend.”

“Yeah, that’s pretty damn clear,” she snickered. “So what’s the problem? He sounds great. Are you just afraid of getting involved with someone you work with, in case it doesn’t work out?”

I gulped down a long drink then sat my glass on the coffee table to free my hands for nervous fidgeting for the other half of the story. “Honestly, I hadn’t even thought about that aspect of it. It’s something else,” I admitted.

She grinned knowingly. “You mean some
one
else.”

Nodding, I lowered my gaze down to my intertwined fingers in my lap. My stomach twisted with uncertainty and a twinge of shame.

“Who?!” she demanded. “I can’t believe there’s someone else you met you haven’t told me about, you hooker!”

I slowly raised my eyes to meet hers again. “You actually know about him. It’s Everett, the guy from the bar last Friday.”

“The rockstar?” Lindsey pinched her eyebrows together in a deep V, confusion crinkled in her forehead. “I don’t understand. If you like him, why aren’t we going up there tonight? And how have you talked to him? I didn’t think you exchanged numbers?”

“We didn’t exchange numbers. I ended up seeing him on Tuesday,” I offered a meek smile before dropping the bomb, “as a student in my sixth period class.”

The glass she held slipped through her fingers and fell to the couch, spilling wine all over the furniture and floor, but she didn’t move. “No fucking way,” she murmured, gaping at me in disbelief. “You’ve gotta be shitting me.”

I leapt up to go grab some towels from the bathroom then hurried back to find her in the exact same place. Dabbing the terry cloth at the pool of clear liquid, I cleaned up the couch as she addressed the puddle on the ground then refilled her glass for a third time.

“Yes fucking way, and I wish I was,” I finally replied, as we both settled back down on dry areas.

“Did you have sex with him that night?” she whispered like someone else could hear us talking.

Shaking my head, I mumbled, “Not real sex.”

“What do you mean
real
sex?” she tittered. “Is there a kind of fake sex I’m missing out on?”

“No, like not full-on sex. I may have sucked his dick.” My cheeks burned as the confession fell from my lips.

She gasped, covering her open mouth with one of her hands. “You gave your student a BJ?!”

“I didn’t know he was my student when I did it!” I brought my glass to my mouth. I needed more wine. STAT.

“Well, yes, I realize that, but still…” Her voice trailed off as the lingering silence said everything I’d been thinking for a week.

Sighing, I closed my eyes and hung my head, chin-to-chest.
How can I have screwed things up so much in such a short amount of time I’d been here?

“So… I’ve gotta ask,” she tittered, “what was he like? Bigger than Jonah?”

“Lindsey!” I exclaimed, not that I was all that shocked, coming from her.

She threw her head back with laughter. “What? You know I had to ask. I mean, come on. It’s been a while since I’ve seen teenage cock. I forgot what it looks like.”

“It looks the same as adult cock, dork.” I snickered, unable to keep a straight face at her ridiculousness. “But it wasn’t just about that. I felt… I dunno the right word… natural with him. Safe, even.”

“You really like him, don’t you? More than the teacher.” Lindsey’s assessment was a statement of fact, not a question.

I shrugged again. I seemed to be doing a lot of that lately, not having answers to the problems surrounding my life.

“I
can’t
like him. The law says I can’t,” I insisted, more for my sake than hers. “Even though age-wise it’s legal, as his teacher, it’s not. It doesn’t matter that I met him outside of school beforehand. And why the hell am I so attracted to a… a
kid
?! What the fuck is wrong with me?”

Reaching out to soothingly pat my arm, she shook her head. “Aww, babe, there’s nothing wrong with you. Don’t do that,” she tried to appease me. “Hey, I was there last Friday too, and I can honestly say I had no idea he was that young. He looked like he was in his early twenties. Without flat out asking him, there’s no way you could’ve known.”

“But I
do
know now
—
”

“
—a
nd you still want him,” she finished, leveling me with her stare.

I couldn’t lie to her, despite how much I’d been lying to myself all week. “I don’t understand why. I mean, I don’t even really know him all that well. It’s not like we’ve ever just hung out like normal people. He could be a total douchebag asshole, for all I know. But,” I hesitated, searching for the right way to explain what I felt, “there’s just something about him. This draw I’m powerless against. My body reacts to him despite what my brain tells it to do. I can’t help it.”

She blew out a ragged breath and pushed up to her feet then started pacing the floor next to the couch. “Look, Belle, my husband’s a coach in the same district,” she said, keeping her voice calm and controlled, “so there’s no way in Hell I can encourage you to pursue something like this. You’re a smart girl. You already know what you’re risking, both personally and professionally, if you do. However, I will say I understand a heart wants what a heart wants, and you can’t help who you’re attracted to. I mean, look at me and Michael. We met on his thirtieth birthday, and I couldn’t legally drink yet. His friends made fun of him forever about dating ‘jail bait,’ even though I was twenty.”

Stopping long enough to take a drink, she glanced over at me to make sure I was still with her before she began talking again. “As your friend, my advice would be to do your best to wait it out. He’s a senior and will graduate in a handful of months. If this connection or sexual chemistry or whatever is really that strong, then it should still be there this summer, and at that point, you guys can openly do whatever you want. Until then, you can take this time to get to know him better. I know it’s a little weird in a student-teacher role, but still, you’ll learn more about his personality seeing him for an hour every day than you probably would in a date setting anyway. Who knows? Maybe you’ll discover there’s a certain way he picks his teeth that drives you crazy and you could never get used to it.”

“So what do I do about Liam and this date I agreed to next weekend?” I interrupted.

Her head snapped in my direction. “You told him yes?”

I nodded with a groan. “Yeah, I panicked a little. Didn’t have an excuse for why I couldn’t go, so I agreed.”

“Then you go this once. It’s only dinner. Nothing has to happen if you don’t want it to. And who knows?” She shrugged, one edge of her mouth curling up in a half-smirk. “Maybe you’ll find that you like him more than you thought. If not, you tell him you don’t think dating a coworker is a good idea and you value his friendship too much, or some bullshit like that.” She sat back down on the couch and grabbed my free hand, squeezing it gently. “Whatever you do, Belle, promise me you’ll be careful. I just got you back, and I don’t want anything to happen to take you away again.”

“Okay.” I smiled with a semi-confident nod. “I can do that.”

And I could… until I couldn’t.

“
CAN YOU GIVE
me that other socket wrench?” I called out from underneath Billy’s black ’63 Shelby Cobra parked in his parents’ garage.

“Yeah, sure. Here ya go,” he replied, handing me the tool.

Billy had texted me earlier in the day and asked if I could come over and take a look at his car, claiming it had been running a bit sluggish lately. Neither Billy nor his dad knew a thing about cars other than how to buy and drive them, so when he’d gotten his classic roadster the summer before, I’d spent quite a bit of time at his house tweaking and modifying it for him. Not that I minded a single bit. Though I loved my truck like no other, it was fun to take his sports car out and let her breathe on the open highway.

So after one of Mom’s famous bacon-and-spinach omelets and a morning jam session in the studio with my dad, I’d headed over to his house to take a look at it. Though it didn’t take long to find the problem.

“Dude, when’s the last time you changed out your oil filter?” I chided, as I removed the damaged part and allowed the oil to drain in the pan next to me. Scooting on my back out from under the engine, I shook my head at my friend as I held up the old, clogged filter in the air. “Seriously, you shouldn’t be allowed to own such a nice car if you’re gonna abuse her like this.”

Rolling his eyes, he yanked it out of my hands and tossed it in the nearby garbage can. “Shut the fuck up and fix it. I may start purposely neglecting her just so I can get your ass out of the house and over here,” he taunted. “Other than at school, I haven’t seen you since that day at Empty’s when you stormed off. You’ve been more of an introverted asshole than normal. What the hell have you been doing?”

I knew the honest answer of “jacking off every chance I get to memories of Ms. Sloan sucking my cock” wasn’t anything I should admit to, so I went the safe route of being vague and redirecting. “Still just working on music, bro. When I’m not playing up at the bar, trying to write new shit. Seeing if I can get anything to stick.” I wiped the sweat from my brow with a nearby shop-towel then threw it at his face, nailing my target. “What about you? The phone works both ways last time I checked.”

As he rattled on about some chick he’d met at a party last weekend, I slithered back under the car to attach the new filter and cap off all the valves. It had been fifteen days since the night I met Belle, ten since the afternoon in her classroom she’d told me to walk away and let it go, but I still couldn’t get her out of my mind.

Seeing her each day at school was the true definition of bittersweet. The hour I spent in her class was what I looked forward to the most
—
sixty minutes of unadulterated eye-fucking, purposely making sure she knew exactly what I was thinking each time she bent over to pick up something from her desk or how much I liked to hear her laugh. Even more, I loved making her blush after she’d catch me staring or when she’d unconsciously cross and uncross her legs as I stood next to her desk, asking meaningless questions I already knew the answer to.

Then the bell would ring abruptly, thus ending my time with her and transforming me back into my usual quiet, keep-to-myself guy. Until the next day, at least.

Just as I finished up with the oil change, I heard the rumble of an engine in the driveway followed by the open and shutting of a car door. I rolled out from under the car and sat up as Scott sauntered up, tipping his chin in our direction.