Taboo Read online

The next day I’m waiting outside the bathhouse for Harper when I feel him behind me. He’s so big I feel like a shadow passes over me, eclipsing everything else. I hold my position for a beat because I’ve already made a fool of myself more than once and I’ve got to handle this carefully.

  “Hey,” he says. He’s close enough for me to feel his breath on my neck.

  I turn and his eyes are on my chest. I feel the heat rising off my own body. “Hi.”

  He’s so pretty. All I want to do is run my hands over his flawless skin. “So,” he starts, “I get off work at nine tonight.”

  “Okay.” I’m wondering if he’s just telling me this or if this is way of asking me out. I have mixed feelings on the asking me out part. Where do you go with an eighteen-year-old? Bars are out. Lame clubs he can get into are also out. Would he take me to the Dairy Queen or Taco Bell? Can we even go out in public? I don’t think so.

  “We could meet up, maybe, when I’m finished,” he suggests. I don’t think his eyes have left my boobs yet. I shift slightly to the right and sure enough, he never loses contact. This is my fault, though, I’m wearing the stringiest bikini. On purpose.

  “Maybe.” I try to restrain the smile spreading across my mouth.

  I feel a tug on my hand and we both look down. Claire stands below to me with her bathing suit twisted around her neck. Carter and I burst out laughing. “Hey, let’s go fix that,” I offer, pushing her back into the changing room. Before I go in, I feel a finger hook in the string of my bottoms.

  “Here. 9:15.” he says. I fight the thrill creeping up my body from his simple touch. He’s thought this out. I consider he may not be as inexperienced as we suspected.

  “I’ll be here.”

  Chapter 12

  The best thing about eighteen-year-old boys is they would rather kiss than talk. They’re infatuated with boobs and all you have to do is barely graze the spot above their hip and below their stomach, and you own them.

  “Do that again,” he says. I scrape my teeth down his chest, over the taut ab muscles covering his stomach, down to the soft, fuzzy hair waiting below. He jerks when I kiss him soft and slow, and lick the skin so close to where he wants me most. I laugh and inhale the scent of chlorine and sunscreen off his body.

  “You’re laughing at me.” He pulls me forward so he can touch my breasts through my dress, running his thumbs over the tops.

  “A little,” I say. “You’re cute.”

  He kisses me, better than the first time. He’s a fast learner and I’m a dedicated teacher. It’s a firm kiss, perfect tongue, perfect pace, perfect boy.

  “You’re beautiful.” He positions me so I’m straddling his hips, my dress hiking up my thighs. We’re on a lounge chair in the dark and the pool has an eerie calm about it at night. His warm fingers trail like fire up and down my legs. I concentrate, attempting to ignore his cock, but it’s impossible because it’s hard, so hard, and right there.

  I need to know more about this kid. I need to know what he knows, what he’s done. I need to make myself feel better about the position we’re in. Literally.

  “So you really don’t have a girlfriend?”

  His eyes narrow. What girl asks about another? he wonders. I can see the question in his eyes. I hold his gaze until recognition takes hold. This girl, the one here for this. The one willing to do that. The one not jealous because there is nothing to be jealous about.

  “No, not now,” he tells me.

  “So, before?”

  He shrugs. “Here and there. I’m not really into relationships. I’ve always been focused on school and sports and just hanging out with my friends.”

  I kiss him for his honesty and for being so freaking cute. When I pull back I say, “That’s nice. I was kind of the same way.” I stare at him for a minute. The sharp jaw, the sun-kissed hair. “Carter, tell me about your experience.”

  “What?” This takes him off guard and I suppose it should. Teenage girls don’t talk about things like this. They have fumbling sex in the back seat of a car or awkward blowjobs in their parents’ basement. They do it, but they don’t talk about it.

  I kiss him again and rub my chest against his. The cotton of my dress is thin and I’m not wearing a bra. My erect nipples mesmerize him and he can’t stop looking at them—touching them, and if we keep this up my panties will soak through.

  I lick his ear and whisper, “Tell me what you’ve done. What you know how to do and what you want to experience.” When I look at his face again, I realize that he understands, because his mouth is agape and his cheeks flush red. The wheels spin furiously in his head.

  “I’ve had sex before,” he declares, which I’ve suspected because he’s just confident enough. “With two different girls. The first was a senior who asked me to Prom when I was a sophomore. I had no idea what I was doing,” he laughs. His fingers dip between my thighs like he’s letting me know this is no longer the case. “We had sex in the hotel room while her best friend puked up peach Schnapps. God, it was awkward but…” he shrugs again. “Then, I had a girlfriend earlier this year. I liked her well enough, but, I don’t know. I go to Catholic school—there’s a lot of guilt going around. It’s a little awkward when a girl sucks you off and then you see her duck into the confessional the next day.”

  For once, I know a little something about guilty sex. “I’d like to see you in that uniform.”

  He lifts an eyebrow. “That can be arranged.”

  He’s acting calm but he stopped moving his hips a while ago. Probably because any more movement will set him off. I fight the urge to test this theory, because he and I need to set some things straight before things get out of hand.

  “Carter, I just feel like maybe I should be clear here, before we go further.”

  “About what?”

  I take a deep breath. “Obviously, I’m older than you and more experienced. And for whatever reason, okay for obvious reasons, you’re under my skin. It’s totally weird and unlike me.” I shift my hips a little and feel him beneath me. “But, I’ve been watching you and thinking about you and I just really, really, really want to spend time with you.”

  He stares at me for a minute, swallows and says, “Are you asking me or telling me?”

  “I’m just letting you know where I stand and what I want.” I brace myself for the horrific rejection that should be coming my way. That and I’m anticipating some kind of special pervert police squad to bust in and arrest me.

  A lazy, adorable smile appears, “I think what you want sounds really, really awesome.”

  “You’ve been very patient. All these weeks of cat and mouse. I didn’t know if you would be into it,” I lie.

  “Are you kidding?” he asks with a croak. I’ve positioned myself so I can reach him better.

  He never changed out of his swim trucks so it takes a little maneuvering, but while he grips the side of the lounge chair I finally get a look at his dick. Oh hell. It’s big like the rest of him, throbbing and eager. I graze my finger over the sticky tip. There’s no way he’s making it more than a couple more minutes.

  “Can I?” I ask.

  He nods furiously and I dip my head, licking the soft skin, slow and skilled. He emits a deep, breathy groan while thrusting his hips toward my face.

  “Slow down,” I tell him and he tries to oblige. I hurry my pace a little, this time taking him in deep, tasting him top to bottom. Carter’s balls turn rock hard and I graze them with my fingertips while he’s fucking my mouth. Normally, I’m not so into this but god, he’s adorable and his stomach muscles contract with every movement and Jesus, it’s a thrill to control him like this. To bring him to this point.

  “Oh god,” he says, jerking into my mouth. I take everything he has to give while hovering above him. When he’s finished I swallow and wink to let him know guilt is not a word that consumes me.

  “That…”

  “Was just the beginning,” I tell him, standing up and moving to the edge of the pool. I pull my dress over my head and drop it to the ground. “Come swim?”

  You’d think he’d move slower, but I remember he’s eighteen and he, in particular, seems to have endless energy. I haven’t even had the chance to jump in the water when he tackles me from behind. Cradling me in his arms we both fall with a splash into the deep end.

  I open my eyes under water and try to make out his shape in the darkened pool, but it’s not necessary because his hands are all over my body and his lips have found mine.

  This summer just got way more interesting.

  *

  Guilt doesn’t consume me, but Carter, on the other hand, does. I wasn’t lying when I said he’s under my skin. He’s an itch I cannot soothe. In another life I’d call myself a whore or a slut or a cradle robber. But I don’t care. I want this and him. It’s a summer fling and I plan on falling straight into it. I plan on dragging him with me.

  We stand at the cars afterwards, my long hair still damp and hanging down my back. Our cars sit alone in the parking lot and he says, “Shouldn’t I give you a ride home or something?”

  The idea of him in my apartment has its appeal but it’s a line I’m not willing to cross. I just laugh and say, “I’m a big girl. See you tomorrow?”

  We part with another kiss and another until I push him away and drive off. Even then I’m jumping out of my skin in anticipation for the next day, but I try to keep the smile off my face when I enter the pool, because really. I need to chill out.

  “How was your meet up?” Finley and I cool off in the water. It’s too freaking hot to be anywhere else.

  “Good.”

  “Yeah?”

  I splash water on my arms and over my chest. He’s watching every move. I lean back on the edge of the pool, propped on my elbows, so he ca
n have a better view. “Yeah.”

  “Did you guys do it?”

  I shake my head. “Not yet. I wanted to work my way up, or down as the case may be.”

  “Did you?” She makes a crude, but well-known gesture.

  “Oh, yeah.”

  Her head turns toward him a little. She’s thinking about it. About him. “How big?”

  “Big—like him.”

  “Was it weird? Is it? Him being younger?”

  “Maybe a little.” I shrug and watch him yell at a kid for running. His voice gives me chills. He’s nice but firm to the kids at the pool and that makes me like him even more. “We talked some. He’s not a virgin. He’s had a blow job before. This isn’t uncharted territory for him. But…”

  “But what?” She turns and rests her elbows on the side.

  “But when he looks at me it’s like seeing a kid in a candy shop. And I’m the candy. I can feel the want vibrating off his body. It runs though his blood and across his skin. Does he want me in particular?” I muse. “I don’t know, I doubt it, and really, I don’t care. That kid is horny twenty-four-seven and I plan to exploit every last second.”

  We both look over just in time to catch him adjusting himself in the chair. We giggle and he gives me a quick, oblivious smile.

  “Twenty-four-seven.”

  Chapter 13

  “Softer,” I tell him. His face moves between my thighs and his beard feels thick and scratchy. I want him so bad it hurts, but he asked me to show him, so I am. After some fumbling around and a couple moments of indecision he found his rhythm and I found mine. His tongue feels hot and perfect. But I know if I don’t come soon, he’s going to end up with sticky shorts and neither of us wants that.

  “Keep going,” I encourage him, feeling the rush from doing something so dirty. So immature and illicit. I haven’t made out in the back seat of a car since high school. The fogged-over windows give a false sense of privacy, but anyone could find us. Anyone. Then his tongue hits my sweet spot and my body starts to shake and shiver, the possibility of getting caught makes the pleasure more intense.

  I’ve barely come down, when I see him on his knees, his dick tenting in his trunks. I pull them down, and his cock bounces like a spring. I open my already spread legs wider, giving him the green light. He moves frantically, like he’s afraid I may change my mind.

  “Calm down,” I coax.

  “Ouch,” he says banging his head on the roof of the car, trying to get fully free of his shorts.

  “You okay?” I ask, but I think it comes out in a mushy giggle because I’m still high from the feeling of his tongue.

  “Yep,” he replies. The look of determination, plus lust on his face, confirms that a bump on the head isn’t going to keep this from happening.

  “You have a condom?” I ask, but he’s already searching for one. With trembling fingers, he rummages through his glove compartment, pulling the square package out. I pluck it from his hands and tear the wrapper. “Come here.” He hovers over me in the tight space, allowing me to roll it on. He jerks a little when my fingers touch his skin, trying to control himself, and I know he won’t last long, but I don’t care, I need him as much as he needs me.

  He’s quick about it once he settles down, pushing in, burying himself to the hilt. I’m glad he’s big because he isn’t skilled. His enthusiasm makes up for it, anyway. His pretty gray eyes glaze over as he gets lost in my bouncing chest, and he sucks the sharp breaths out of my mouth with his kisses. When he’s ready he grunts deep and sweet, faster and faster and faster until his face is in my neck and dirty words tumble out of his mouth.

  We untangle, and he trashes the condom in a fast food cup, then rolling on his back. I let him pull me on his chest. I rest my head on the smooth skin—he isn’t very hairy yet, just a couple soft hairs scattered here and there. “That was awesome,” he says, and I nod into his skin, wanting to close my eyes. I can’t because were in the back of his SUV in the swimming pool parking lot. The SUV his parents bought him for graduation. The thought makes me search for my shirt but my sweaty body sticks to the leather of the seat. He tightens his grip. “You’re kind of amazing,” he whispers and then kisses the top of my head and the pit of my belly stirs.

  I lift myself up and smile. “You’re pretty amazing, too.” He pushes his hips toward me and he’s hard again. I think about being his age and how once a night would have been enough, but now the idea of a second go is more than appealing. He’s more than ready to oblige.

  “What time do you need to be home?” I ask, wrapping my hand around him, feeling a little strange asking the question. But I have ideas and plans for the rest of the night and most of them take place in this car.

  “Whenever,” he says, tossing my shirt to the front seat with one hand and reaching for my chest with the other. God he’s handsy.

  Whenever is perfect. Whenever is fine. I decide then to do whatever we can do between now and whenever.

  Chapter 14

  “Details.”

  We’re back in the shade again, but not because of the sun. This is the best place to watch Carter when he decides to get cocky and show off on the diving board. Right now he’s standing on the board, leaning against the guard rails waiting for the kid in front of him to take their turn. He’s funny, because he’s so laid back and even this little kid being slow doesn’t faze him.

  One fuck session and my obsession has shifted. I’m no longer focused just on his body, but on him. Like where does he go when he’s not here (or with me?) and where are his friends? And seriously, how can he not have a girlfriend?

  But something else I’ve noticed is how the water truly is his home. For Carter it’s like another layer of skin. He glides through it. He moves fast and graceful. Outside the water he’s capable as well, but he’s like a puppy. Arms and legs slightly out of control. He occupies too much space. He’s just a little too big for his coordination, but in the water he moves like he can breathe under there.

  Like Aqua-Man.

  “Ruthie,” Finley snaps her fingers. “Details? Please? I’m dying over here.”

  “It was good. He was good.”

  “Really?” Her nose scrunches up and I can tell she’s skeptical.

  “I mean, no, he’s no sexpert, but honestly, he’s so into it, and so into me and he’s so freaking eager, it makes it more than worth it.” I think about his face when he comes. The way his eyes squeeze shut and the way he bites his bottom lip. It’s all about the sex. Nothing else.

  “What does his skin feel like?”

  “Velvet,” I tell her. “Smooth like velvet.”

  We watch him go to the edge of the board. He’s on the high dive now. Carter balances himself, arms wide and in a beat he’s in the air, first sideways, then tumbling forward, and ending in a can-opener that showers us in water. We’re drenched, and his head bobs to the surface and he gives me a fast smile.

  Show off. Splashing girls is Carter’s way of flirting. The equivalent of pulling my pig tails. He’s marking his territory without ever saying a word.

  I fight a smile back because I still don’t want anyone to know. These moms gossip too much, and the older kids are into everyone’s business and I’m working here. Plus, I like him being my dirty little secret. He likes it, too.

  “So does he listen? Like are you telling him stuff?”

  She’s still talking about sex. “Yeah, he’s willing to learn. Last night we worked on the theory of why men should make sure women get theirs first.”

  “Oh, yeah?” She smiles. She knows this to be true.

  “Yes, he learns fast, and—“ I start to giggle. “He was rewarded richly.”

  I hear the spring coil and release. He’s in the air again, pushing his body to the highest levels it will go. Again, he lands like a bomb, in the sweet spot between his butt and his back and water showers over me like rain.

  *

  Carter pushes the hair off my neck and kisses the spot below my hairline. My skin is sticky and slick with sweat. Just like every other inch of our bodies.

  “Holy shit,” he says, for the third time. There have also been a series of fucks, damns and one sweet Jesus earlier. Now though, he pulls my skirt down so it covers my backside, and in the shadows of the darkened girls’ changing room I can see him pulling his shorts back up. His hands shake and I can see his knees wobbling as much as my own. I slide my back down the wall and rest on the bench.