The Shameless Hour

C
opyright © 2015 Sarina Bowen
, all rights reserved

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Cover design: Tina Anderson

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T
he Shameless Hour
is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously.

T
his ebook is licensed
for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

T
he Ivy Years

The Year We Fell Down #1

The Year We Hid Away #2

Blonde Date #2.5

The Understatement of the Year #3

G
ravity

Coming In From the Cold

Falling From the Sky

Shooting for the Stars

“
T
he Shameless hour
is a gift to any girl or woman who’s ever been slut-shamed. It’s magnificent.”

—
Tammara Webber, New York Times bestselling author of
Easy
and
Sweet

“
G
ripping and deliciously steamy
, The Shameless Hour will make you cry and swoon. Sarina Bowen is a master at drawing you in from page one and leaving you aching for more.”

—
Elle Kennedy, USA Today bestselling author

I
t had been
two hours since I blew out twenty candles on the cake Ma made for me, but my ass was still parked in a chair at Restaurante Tipico.

It was always hard for me to get away from the Dominican joint that my extended family ran. I needed to be on a train headed back to Harkness College. But here I was at table seven in the back corner, rolling silverware for the evening rush, the same way I’d done my whole life.

“One more and then I’m gone,” I said to Pablito, my sixteen-year-old cousin. “I have seven o’clock dinner reservations. If I miss the four-thirty train, I’m screwed.”

“Big date tonight?”

“Yeah, it’s actually her birthday, too.”

“No shit?” Pablito grinned as he applied yet another of the self-adhering bands we used to hold the napkin around the knife and fork. “So I’m going to sling food all night and go home smelling like the fryer.
You’re
getting a nice dinner, a bottle of wine and then” — he made a lewd hand motion — “some happy birthday to
you
.”

Jesucristo
. I was not about to share the details of this evening’s plans with Pablito or anyone else. “At least you got an hour’s worth of labor out of me.” I set a silverware roll on top of his pile.

“Don’t forget your present,” he said, casting an eye on the vintage money clip my mother had given me for my birthday. It was sterling silver with an art deco design. “I know why your Ma chose that for you.”

“Yeah?” I tucked it in my pocket. It was no mystery why Ma gave it to me. I loved old things. She’d chosen well, and I’d thanked her.

“No place to hide a condom.” Pablito snickered.

I had to grin, because the kid made a good point. But looking out for a dozen younger cousins was a part of my life, so I felt obligated to add, “You’re not supposed to keep them in your wallet, anyway.”

“Eh.” He shook his head. “Like it would matter.”

Check please
. I could
not
talk about sex with my sixteen-year-old cousin. Not today of all days. I tossed one last silverware roll onto the pile and stood. “
Tengo que irme
.”
Gotta run
.

He returned my fist bump. “Go on, then. Back to the good life. Don’t think of us, the little people.”

I cuffed him on the head, then ran into the kitchen to kiss my ma goodbye.

She wished me a happy birthday, and I thanked her for the cake and the present. “Bye. I need to go. I’m taking Alison out tonight.”

She eyed me for a few seconds. “
Sé bueno
,” she said finally.
Be good
.

Cristo
. I could swear sometimes she had telepathic powers. When my mother got pregnant at nineteen, my so-called father had married her. But when I was a few months old, he’d gone back to his people in Mexico for a family funeral. And never came back.

Since then, it had been just the two of us — plus about three dozen aunts, uncles and cousins — but my mother had always impressed upon me that sex made babies and that good boys had a responsibility not to get girls in trouble.

My mother would
not
approve of what I had planned for tonight.

“I’m always good,” I told her. True statement. I planned to be very careful with Alison. Every single time. (I hoped there were many times.)

Before I left, my mother unleashed one last bit of Catholic guilt. She asked if I was coming home for my cousin’s christening in November. (I wasn’t sure.) She reminded me they were shorthanded at the restaurant (a familiar guilt trip, since I’d decided to go to college outside of the city) and she told me to have a happy birthday.

That last thing I could do.

I kissed her cheek one more time and ran out of there.

T
he Metro
-North train from 125th Street wasn’t crowded, and I got a seat to myself. After watching the grit of New York transform into the green of Connecticut, I pulled out my phone to call my girlfriend.

“Hi,” she answered sounding a little breathless.

“Hi, angel. Happy birthday.”

“Happy birthday yourself!” I could hear her smile coming through the phone.

“I made the four-thirty, so we’re still good for seven o’clock.”

“I was just thinking about you,” she said in a quiet voice.

“Yeah?” I hoped she meant it in a good way.

“I love you, Rafe.”

Alison had said those words before. But there was something so serious about the way she said them now. “I love you too, Ali.”

“Tonight is going to be great.”

Warmth bloomed inside my chest. There had been too many moments during the past six months when I’d doubted Alison’s feelings for me. It was just so gratifying to hear she was looking forward to taking the next step.

“I can’t wait,” I whispered. “I hope dinner doesn’t take too long.”

She giggled. “See you soon.”

T
he train pulled
into the Harkness, Connecticut station at six-fifteen. I ran the mile to campus because it saved me seven bucks, clearing the doorway of suite 301 in Beaumont House with just a half hour to get ready.

Unfortunately, both my roommates were home and bickering in the common room as usual.

When I passed them with my towel, they were arguing about politics, and when I came back freshly showered and shaved, they were arguing about tomorrow’s Giant’s game.

“You want some action on the game?” Mat asked me as I headed for my closet.

“No thanks.”

He turned his attention back to my roommate, Bickley. “Come on, fancy boy,” he taunted. “Bet me on the Giants. A hundred bucks. That’s like pocket change for you.”

“I will consider your wager,” Bickley countered, “if you shave that bit of ridiculousness off your lip.”

Alone in the bedroom I shared with Bickley, I chuckled. It’s not like I had time to witness the latest episode of The Mat and Bickley Show. But Mat’s experiment with facial hair
was
pretty hideous. Of course, the louder Bickley made this point, the longer Mat would keep his weird little ’stache.

“I’m not shaving it off,” Mat argued. “Tonight, when I have Devon’s balls in my mouth, I’m going to scrape it against his shaft.”

Cue a disgusted groan from the common room. “You arsehole,” Bickley spat. “No thank you for that image.”

“Then quit yapping and bet on the football game, sissy boy,” Mat said. “The spread is three and a half in favor of the Giants. I’ll even give you an extra point, okay? But only on a hundred bucks. No more.”

I rolled my eyes at this bit of salesmanship. Mat was a complete shark, and I was pretty sure that betting against Bickley was a major source of his income.

There was a silence while my roommate tried to decide whether there was a catch. Bickley was my soccer teammate, but as a Brit he didn’t have a lot of experience with American football. But he had trouble admitting that he wasn’t an expert at, well, pretty much anything.

The ego on Bickley? It was so large it had its own gravitational field. And the chip on Mat’s shoulder? It was as vast as the Grand Canyon. Between the two of them, I rarely had any peace.

“Give me the spread plus two,” Bickley countered in his clipped, aristocratic accent.

“Plus two? Forget it. I’ll call my bookie instead.”

“Well…” Bickley was about to cave. I could hear it. “Fine. Plus one on a hundred dollars. As soon as I look up the spread, you have a deal.”

“Seriously? If I tell you it’s three and a half, it’s three and a half.” Mat’s voice was full of irritation. But that was normal for him. Mat was a prickly guy. “Only a dick would lie about the point spread.”

“Trust but verify,” Bickley replied.

“You douche canoe,” Mat grumbled.

“What? You don’t want my money?” Bickley asked. “Ah. The point spread is indeed three and a half.” (His clipped British accent made it come out like
hauf
.)

Mat was silent for once.

A minute later, Bickley appeared in the doorway to our little room. “I feel good about this one,” he announced. With his designer jeans, polo shirt and preppy haircut, my roommate looked like a J. Crew ad come to life.

“Awesome,” I deadpanned. Not only was I sick of listening to these arguments, I had my own stuff to think about tonight.

“Where are you taking Alison?” he asked.

“The Slippery Elm.”

“Nice. Be sure to order the sweetbreads. They are a delicacy.”

“Wait — what the hell are those?” Taking dining advice from Bickley was nearly as risky as betting on football with Mat. The guy bragged about eating whale blubber in Japan and Haggis in Scotland. “Aren’t sweetbreads the calf’s balls, or something?”

“Pish. They are a gland and very buttery.” Bickley closed his eyes, smacking his lips with appreciation.

“I’ll take it under advisement.” The fancy restaurant lost its appeal all of a sudden. I was nervous enough about tonight without having to worry about which fork to use, too.

“Hopefully, I
won’t
see you here later,” Bickley added. “I know you bought earrings for Alison. But I hope she gives you the kind of gift that can’t be wrapped in a box.”

“I always wanted a pony,” I quipped, trying to steer Bickley away from this topic.

He flopped onto the bed, a gleam in his eye. “At brunch this morning, I heard your Ice Queen’s roommate say that she was staying away from their room tonight. This bodes well for you, sir.”

“Does it now?”

“Come on. You can tell Uncle Bickley. Are you going to finally shag that girl?”

I was, unless she’d changed her mind. “That’s none of your business, dude.”

“Very well. But I need to know if I can bring my date back here later. At least tell me that much.”

Bickley, to his sorrow, did not have our room to himself very often. Since I’d slept alone every night of my life (so far) his trysts usually happened elsewhere. When he did bring a girl home, they had to finish up at a reasonable hour. This made for the occasional awkward departure, where I kept my eyes on Bickley’s fancy television screen while he led his girlfriend-for-the-night out of the room.

My roommate had a whole lot of what everyone else called casual sex. In my head, though, those two words didn’t fit together. To me, there was nothing casual about getting naked with a girl. My sexual experiences — as limited as they were — had been intense. The first time my high school girlfriend let me touch her was an experience that was burned on my soul. The sounds she made, the heat of her body. The potent look in her eye when she…

Dios
. “Casual” was not the right word at all.

I wanted all of that with Alison. And more. And the fact that I was supposed to have it all tonight? Mind-bending.

“Er, earth to Rafael.”

“Um,” I said stupidly. “You can have the room. If I come home, I’ll crash on the couch.”

“I hope it does not come to that.”

So did I.

“Do you need one of my suit jackets?”

“I’m good, thanks.” I’d rather wear my old one than borrow from Bickley. He’d probably lend me some Armani number that cost two grand, and I’d have to worry about wrinkling it. I didn’t need any extra reasons to feel jittery tonight.

The suit jacket I slipped on was the one I wore to church with my mother. It was a vintage 1940s blazer that I’d found in a Harlem thrift shop.

Funny how I was wearing my church jacket for the date where I would lose my virginity. And the next time I wore it would probably be to confession. Now there was a fun little irony.

I opened Bickley’s dorm fridge and grabbed the bottle of champagne I’d stashed there. The bottle went into a gift bag that I’d bought, along with a gift for Alison (silver earrings) and a gift for me (a box of condoms.)

With a wave to Mat and Bickley, I left.

The commute to Alison’s door took sixty seconds. Harkness College had twelve “houses.” But these were misleadingly named. Each house was a big stone or brick residence for several hundred students, with its own dining hall and library. Alison and I were both in the beautiful Beaumont House, with its gothic spires and slate flagstone walkways. As I strode across the courtyard, it impressed me, as usual, that Harkness students had been walking this path for a century. Ma had wanted me closer to home, and she meant well. But attending Harkness was an incredible opportunity, and I wasn’t about to feel guilty about it.

At Alison’s entryway door, I shivered as I peered into the little diamond-shaped pane of glass set into the oak. It was the third week of September, and we were having an early cold snap. But my chill? It was not due to the weather. Suddenly, I was nervous as hell.

Someone appeared in the entryway on the other side of the door. On a Saturday evening, there was always plenty of traffic in and out, as students returned from dining halls, libraries and coffee shops to get ready to party. So I wouldn’t have to call Alison to come down and let me in.

“Hey man.” The guy who opened Alison’s entryway door was in my French class. “Big date tonight?” He eyed the gift bag in my hand with a smirk.

“It’s her birthday,” I said quickly.

“Ah. Have fun,” he said, holding the door.

“Thanks. See you Monday,” I called as he walked away.

I stepped into the echoing stone stairway and began climbing the stairs. I loved this old stairwell, with its marble steps and its ironwork railing. Students had climbed these stairs to their rooms when jazz was still a brand new word. I didn’t hear any jazz right now, though. From behind the first door I passed came the sounds of a single-shooter video game. In the thirties, you might have heard the strains of somebody’s “wireless.” Or maybe a Victrola.

I was a bit of an antiques nut, which was kind of weird for a guy my age. But thinking about vintage audio equipment took my mind off my nerves. I was sweating just from climbing two flights up the curving stairwell. So when I reached Alison’s floor, I kept climbing. There was an odd little landing about ten steps further on. I set down my gift bag there, taking care to keep the bottle of champagne upright.

Removing my jacket, I took a deep breath. There was really no reason to be nervous around Alison. We’d been seeing each other since last spring, when we were both freshmen. We’d taken things slowly with our physical relationship. I was always ready for more, but Alison told me straightaway that she was a virgin, and when I admitted the same, she seemed enormously relieved.