“You love begging.” I giggled.
“Only you, baby. C’mon, Bren. I sat through that traumatically crappy movie.”
“It was a good movie!” I protested.
“I fell asleep twice and mostly all I could think about was this itch on my a…”
And he stopped because I had my shirt off.
“New bra?” he croaked a little.
It was. Pink polka dots, very scantily cut with just a little lace. The underwear matched. Once I was down to them, Jake was sitting up straight.
“Wow. I’m really glad I picked today to seduce you back to my house,” he said lowly, and pulled me down onto the bed next to him. Then his mouth was on mine, and I felt the scrape of his watch band, the watch I bought him, as he slid his hand up my stomach and cupped my breast. “Brenna,” he breathed, his mouth moving down along my collar bone and to the tops of my breasts, pushed up and out by my excellent bra. Then my excellent bra was off and on the floor and Jake’s hands and mouth were everywhere it had been.
He kissed down my ribs and along the line of my stomach, then concentrated on my belly button, and my hips. He stopped kissing me for a minute and lifted his head.
“Do you mind if I go further?” he asked, his voice quiet in the cool of his room.
I wasn’t sure. Jake’s fingers played at the lacy waist of my underwear, tracing a finger under the elastic band carefully. He waited patiently.
“I don’t know.” Part of me wanted it so much I was squirming for him to continue; another part of me shied away from something that intimate.
“Then I won’t.” He said it evenly, in that sweet Jake voice that he always used with me when we were fooling around. He wasn’t about to force anything. We kissed and touched until I was warm and exhausted.
He took a long piece of my hair and held it out.
“You have great hair.” He put it to his nose and inhaled.
“Yeah? I was thinking of dyeing it. Black.” I looked at him from the corner of my eye.
He smiled and shook his head.
“What, you don’t have anything to say?” I taunted.
“No way. If I say what I think, you’ll have black hair tomorrow just to spite me.”
“So you think I’d look ugly with black hair?” I hooted.
“I didn’t say that. Stop putting words in my mouth!” he ordered. “I’m just saying, if I say, Don’t do it, Brenna, you’ll do it just to show me you can.”
“I don’t do things like that.”
“That’s exactly how you do things.” He ran his hand over my hair. “I like that about you. That you’ll take a challenge to the extreme.”
“Rebel, rebel,” I muttered, remembering Saxon’s descriptions of me.
“So, about prom,” Jake said, his voice a little nervous again. “I bought the bids already, but I have to pick a corsage. Right? So when you know what color dress you’re wearing, let me know and I’ll go get something. That matches.” It sounded like he was asking me.
“Okay.” I kissed his nose and wiggled with excitement. “I will. Where are you getting your tux?”
He looked confused. “Do I have to wear a tux?” he asked.
“No,” I said. “But most people do. Do you want to wear a suit?”
“I don’t know if my old suit will fit,” he said, and I didn’t have to see it to know that it was a short, gawky, poorly-cut polyester mess.
“Maybe, if you don’t want to rent a tux, you can go and buy a new suit.” I was desperate to keep him from what I was positive was his awful mess of a suit.
“Don’t you want to see my suit?” he asked, his mouth curved into a smile.
“No, I don’t.” I grimaced.
He jumped up anyway and left his room. He came back with a suit in a crinkly plastic bag. I got up and looked while he pulled the bag away.
You could tell on sight that it was an expensive suit. It was chocolate brown, three buttons, and a fabric so fine and soft it looked like it had to be made with silk. But I didn’t know for sure.
Jake pulled the pants on. They were a perfect fit. He put the jacket on, no shirt underneath, and he looked amazing. Just like that. His body was suit-perfect. And the suit was great on him; much better than any boring black tux. He would look awesome. I had underestimated Jake’s judgment again.
“Wow.” I smoothed my hands over the lapels and along the arms. “I really like it.”
“It was my grandpa’s. Apparently he was pretty loaded. Anyway, I’m supposed to be the spitting image of him. I guess. No one has any pictures or anything.”
“Your mom’s father.” I felt a little weird knowing what I did about his father when he was in the dark.
“No. My dad’s. That’s what she said, anyway, Mom. It’s weird, though, because my dad is supposed to look just like his father, too. And I know that must seem weird, because I don’t look anything like him.” He looked down at his body in its suit. “And there’s no way he would have fit this suit.”
I felt a cold quake in my stomach. Jake’s mother had told him things about his real father without him realizing it. Maybe she planned to tell him all along. I was sure she never thought she’d get cancer and die young. She probably thought she’d have plenty of time to tell him everything. There was no way to know what she had planned.
“Bren? You okay?” He was next to me in a second. Since my run-in with pneumonia Jake had been as insane about my health as Mom.
“I’m fine.” I smiled a forced smile. “I’m just shocked that a suit that old can still look so great. I’ll get a dress that goes with it, and we can go shopping for a good dress shirt and a tie. And socks.” I shuddered a little to think of Jake dressed to the nines with white tube socks on. “And shoes,” I added, when the mental image of his boots finished everything off.
“I’m glad you like it.” He wriggled out of the jacket. “I knew you’d think it was some crappy department store suit.” He laughed. “I know how you think.”
I didn’t have anything to say to that one. Thank God he didn’t, really.
Later that night, I talked to Mom about the prom.
“Mom, Jake is going to his junior prom, and he invited me.” I was careful to keep my voice even, like it was no big deal one way or another.
If Mom had any trepidations about prom or Jake or anything else, they all left her head when she imagined prom dress shopping.
“Oh, Bren!” Her eyes sparkled, and I could see the wheels in her head turning as she planned it all out. “Let’s go next weekend! We’ll try Lord and Taylor first. They always have a good selection. If not, we’ll go to Nieman Marcus. Oh, this is going to be so fun!”
I was glad Mom was so excited. So excited, she didn’t really pester me for many details. Other than what Jake would wear. When I told her about his great suit, she grabbed onto the idea, excited about the “classic” look of a good suit. I left my mom to toy over the intricacies of prom dress buying and claimed homework.
Which I had. But more importantly, I had to call the only person I could talk to about Jake.
“Hey Blix. I’m about to go seduce the field hockey center from Sparta High. She’s a little mean, but very, verysexy. Like an Amazon.” Saxon filled me in on things I didn’t care to hear because he wanted me to be jealous and to know that he was getting on with his life without me. I knew I kind of deserved it, so I put up with it and tried not to react in any way that would encourage him to tell me more.
“Good luck with that,” I said absently. “Can I talk to you for a minute about Jake?”
“What is it?” His voice dropped that uber sexy drone he’d been using on me as soon as I mentioned Jake’s name.
“He invited me to prom. He’s going to wear a suit. It fits him perfectly, and his mom told him it would because it was his father’s father’s, and he’s the spitting image, but it didn’t make sense to Jake since he looks nothing like the man he thinks is his dad. And I had to sit and listen to the whole thing, and I don’t think it’s right…” I trailed off from my long-winded ramble because I really didn’t know what else to say, and I wanted to know what Saxon’s take on the whole thing would be.