The Marriage Pact Read online

  “I saw some beer in the fridge,” he said casually. “Want one?”

  “What if we get caught?” I asked, wrinkling my nose at the word beer. He knew I could hardly stand the stuff. It seemed to smell like sweat and football, both of which I found distasteful. But there was a part of me that was still caught up in trying to impress him after all these years, so if he had one, he knew I would, too.

  He chuckled and reached over to stroke my cheek fondly. “You’re so damn cute, you know that?”

  The rich, deep sound of his laughter never failed to make me flush with pleasure. I batted my eyelashes at him just to hear him laugh again. “You really think so?”

  “You know I do. And what are you worried about, anyway? You’ll be legal in three years. No big deal.”

  I started to point out that three years was still a long way off, but in the end I shrugged. “OK. Sure.”

  The movie was just getting started and Ingrid Bergman had just walked into the bar.

  “Hurry up, Brody, or you’re going to miss it!” I called out. The first time Sam played ‘As Time Goes By’ was his favorite scene.

  “I’m coming already!” he called back. He walked into the living room moments later and handed me a cold can of beer, watching me expectantly.

  “You have horrible taste in beverages,” I commented before opening the can and taking small, timid swallows until I couldn’t stand it anymore. I winced as the liquid went down my throat. Neither of us was that into drinking, whatever else we might have said to our classmates, which was why I was surprised to see that Brody had already downed his can.

  “But I have wonderful taste in women.” He winked.

  “Flatterer!” I accused.

  “Want another?” he asked, turning back toward the kitchen.

  “Brody!” I exclaimed with a laugh. “What are you doing, trying to get me drunk?”

  “Of course not. I just want you to be relaxed.”

  “Come on, sit down.” I patted the couch invitingly. “You’re not even watching the movie.”

  He shrugged, but it made me look at him closer. Normally, ‘watch a movie’ was code for make out. Usually, after the first five minutes we were on each other as hot and heavy as a frying pan that had been left on the stove too long. The only exception was his black-and-whites, which was why I was appraising him thoughtfully.

  When he sat down beside me, I moved until I was straddling his lap and cupped his face in my hands. “You don’t have to go to all this trouble to get laid. You know that.”

  “Shan—”

  “Shh.” I leaned over and inhaled the scent of his cologne right before I bit down gently on his neck. It was a move he was never able to resist and I often used that knowledge to my advantage.

  “Shana. Wait a minute.” He pushed with gentle hands until I stopped. I sat back, staring at him in surprise. “I just want to talk.”

  “Talk?” I laughed. “Sure, let’s talk.” I leaned forward and captured his mouth with mine, nibbling down on his bottom lip. I could feel his resistance, but damn, I was horny. I felt the exact moment when he gave in: when I slid my tongue in his mouth and his intertwined with mine, I knew whatever he had to say, he’d decided to save it for later.

  “All right, if that’s how you want it,” he growled, his voice husky as he picked me up and deposited me back on the couch, towering over me.

  “Brody, wait. Maybe we should—”

  “Oh, no, don’t try to distract me. You have to finish what you started.” He leaned down and kissed me with so much pent-up passion that it stole my breath away.

  “But—”

  Another kiss silenced me and I gave up, giving into the sweet taste of him, the gentle but insistent pressure of his lips on mine. After we’d kissed until our lips were swollen, he pulled my t-shirt over my head and pitched it onto the floor. I was already unhooking my bra—my breasts spilled out, my nipples already hard and aching for his touch.

  He obliged, immediately putting his lips on my left nipple and alternatingly kissing and suckling until I thought I would cream my panties then and there. He must have known it, too, because when he pulled back he gave me a lazy, boyish grin that never failed to turn my insides to mush.

  I wished he’d at least let us take this party to the bedroom, but part of the thrill for Brody was the prospect of getting caught and I was too wound up with arousal to care very much about anything else just then.

  “You’re so beautiful,” he whispered throatily as he pulled my pants and panties down with one hand while the other squeezed and fondled my right breast.

  “Shut up and do me already,” I said with a grin. It was an inside joke between us, the same thing I’d said when Brody had been busy confessing his love while I’d been a horny virgin. It wasn’t very romantic, but it did make us laugh when remembering our first time.

  Brody unzipped his fly—the sound of it never failed to make me shiver in anticipation—and wasted no time in plunging into my soaking wet pussy. He thrust in and out and I raised my hips to meet him every time. When I clenched my pelvic muscles around his cock, I heard his breath quicken. “God, Shan,” he ground out.

  I couldn’t answer because I was lost in a sea of sensation. Pleasure flowed through my veins until I was practically shivering from the heat of it. I knew I was nearing my climax, but I was in no hurry to get there. I liked feeling him inside me, seeing his face as he tried to bring us both to the brink of ecstasy.

  When he stopped and pulled out, it was a minute before I understood what was going on. “Brody?” I propped myself up on an elbow to look at him.

  He gave me that same easy grin. “Your turn.”

  “What?”

  “Ride me, Shan.”

  I could feel my thighs slick with moisture and my craving felt insatiable. I moved toward him and pushed him back onto the couch, rather forcefully, but he just laughed. I turned my attention to his hard cock, also shiny with my juices. I took it in my hand and moved up and down his length until I had him groaning. “A kiss for luck?” I suggested just before I took it in my mouth, tasting him.

  “Shan,” he rasped out, but I kept going, moving my lips up and down until he was hard as a rock.

  Only then did I straddle him and lower myself onto his waiting cock. I saw him grit his teeth and shut his eyes and I felt a heady rush at being able to make him feel this way. Is this how he felt when he made me orgasm? Spurred by the thought, I rode him hard and fast, enjoying the feel of my breasts bouncing up and down as I did.

  Brody enjoyed it, too, if the expression on his face was anything to go by. When I felt his muscles go taut, I knew he was close. I reached down and cupped his balls, giving them a gentle squeeze to seal the deal. Our orgasms were almost simultaneous. Just as Brody was groaning his release, the first wave crested over me and my body rocked with the force of it. As the second wave was building, I collapsed on top of him, breathing heavily.

  Brody pulled me to him, caressing my sweaty hair as I rode to the top of my summit. It would have been a hard road down, if he hadn’t been right there. We lay in silence for a few minutes, concentrating on inhaling and exhaling, which was all we could do right then.

  When my blood began to cool down, I turned to Brody and smiled. He looked sleepy and I knew I probably did, too. I reached out and stroked his cheek, grinning as my fingers caressed his stubble. His mom was always after him to shave more. In that moment, I thought things would always be as perfect as they were just then. I should have known better; things can never stay the same.

  “We should get dressed,” I suggested as I sat up.

  He smiled back and I looked at him expectantly, unable to see the train that was headed for me. He didn’t give me any clue; he didn’t drop to one knee or anything like that. Instead, he took my hands in his and rocked my world with a sentence. “I love you so much, Shana Rae. Willyoumarryme?”

  It came out in a jumbled rush that took me a minute to decipher. But I’d been deciph
ering Brody for a long time and I knew that he always talked super-fast when he was nervous. When the words untangled themselves and their message reached my brain, I felt frozen in time, stuck in between knowing that what we had was precious and knowing it couldn’t last—wouldn’t last, once I broke his heart.

  Once I thought about it, I found it strange that I didn’t feel excited, like I’d always pictured myself being when he popped the question. I wasn’t anything, I thought when I looked deeper. I felt numb, paralyzed by the staggering disappointment I alone knew was coming. I tried to keep my breathing even and my pulse steady.

  “Shan?” He laughed nervously.

  I forced myself to smile even as my heart was breaking. I looked at him, taking it all in while we were still in this moment, before the hope in his eyes evaporated. His light brown hair was still spiked a bit up top, no matter how many times he tried to brush it down. His brown eyes had specks of green in them that shone deep and dark as emeralds after we made love. Every time I saw the green glittering beneath the brown, my sex clenched even as my heart became light. He had sharp features and a high forehead—the face of a man meshed with the face of a boy who was still growing into his natural good looks. My eyes lingered to his lips—those soft, pink kissable lips. On impulse, I leaned forward and brushed my lips over his. I sighed when I pulled away—it was now or never.

  Before I could say anything, he beat me to it, reading my thoughts as he’d been doing for years. “That didn’t feel like a yes.” He sounded as stunned and numb as his proposal had left me.

  “I’m sorry.” Hopelessly inadequate words that were swept away with the wind as soon as they left my mouth.

  “Why?”

  The anguish on his face was almost enough to make me change my mind. Almost. “Because our lives are just starting. We can’t… we’ve never even dated anyone else, Brody.”

  “I don’t want to date anyone else, don’t you get it? I just want you. It’s always been you.”

  “You feel that way now, but if we got married you’d… you’d realize, sooner or later, that it was a mistake.”

  “I wouldn’t!” he burst out. “What are you even talking about? This is crazy. I thought you wanted the same things I did. Why have you even been with me if you didn’t want to be together long term?”

  How could I answer a question like that? I worried my lip between my teeth as I considered him. How could I make him understand that I couldn’t bear to be without him when at the same time I had to do what was best for both of our futures? I knew how this would play out. In a year or two, we’d have a baby, then maybe another. Before we were five years in, I’d have stretch marks and dark circles under my eyes and we’d both wonder where all our dreams had gone.

  “It’s complicated,” I pleaded with him to understand. “You know I want to go to Brown and—”

  “I know,” he replied glumly, turning his back to me. “I would go with you, you know. Just because you’re going to college doesn’t mean we have to be over.”

  How could I take him alongside my carry-on? It didn’t work that way and he knew it, no matter how hard he tried to pretend. Truth was, I was sure if I probed long enough he’d admit that he’d thought a marriage would persuade me to stay in town and go to community college. I wanted more than that for myself and I’d worked long and hard to get it.

  Besides which, what I’d said was true. We’d only ever been with each other. Brody might have thought I was the best thing since sliced bread, but how could you know something like that for certain when you’d never tried cheese? I knew I wouldn’t be able to make him understand, so I didn’t try. I lay back down against the pillows, staring at the ceiling as I waited for the explosion I knew was brewing.

  “Is this about college boys? It is, isn’t it?! You want to go three states away and not have to worry about your high school boyfriend,” he snarled, hurling the words at me like weapons.

  Each one made its impact and I winced from the blow. “You were never just—”

  “Save it,” he snapped. “I had you figured all wrong.”

  “You’re angry now. If you’ll just—”

  “Just go.”

  “Brody, please, just let me—”

  “I don’t have anything else to say to you!” he shouted. “Get out!”

  With one last beseeching look, I stood on shaky legs and began rifling for my clothes. I found my shorts in a crumpled puddle. I could practically feel him seething with anger, every bit of it directed at me. Tears were stinging my eyes and clogging my throat—I couldn’t stay here a moment longer. I grabbed a shirt off the floor, not caring who it belonged to. I threw them on, bra and panties be damned.

  By the time I managed to stumble outside, my legs were pumping and I was running as fast and as far as I could. What had I done? I ran until my legs gave out. When they did, I fell to the ground, arms wrapped around my stomach as I gasped in deep, burning gulps of air. I cried until I couldn’t cry anymore, and it was only when I was wiping my eyes that I realized he’d kicked me out of my own house.

  * * *

  Brody was long gone by the time I made my way back to the house. I locked myself in my bedroom and cried into Mr. Soft Paws, ignoring my mom’s knock at the door until she finally went away. I wasn’t hungry anyway.

  Even long after I cried myself to rags, I couldn’t sleep. I tried, I really did, but it was no use. I tossed and turned and glared at my alarm clock. Finally, when it read 12:17 I decided this had gone on long enough. I exchanged my nightgown for a pair of faded sweats and quietly let myself out of my bedroom, tiptoeing gently down the hall. Thankfully, I didn’t see any lights, so it was a safe bet my parents were in bed. It was normally a safe bet at this hour, but you could never be too careful.

  I moved slowly and softly through the darkness, feeling my way around the house until I made it to the back door. When my hand found the knob, I hesitated. What if he didn’t want to see me? What if he didn’t ever want to see me again? The thought was almost enough to make me dissolve into tears all over again.

  Steeling myself and searching frantically for my resolve, I took a few deep breaths and let myself out the door. It was an easy walk next door, even in the dark; my feet had learned the path long ago, and there’d been more than one midnight rendezvous.

  I knelt by his mother’s flowerbed and fished for pebbles. When my fingers closed around four small ones, I tested the weight of them in my hand before pocketing them. I walked around the house and pulled out a pebble. The moon was full tonight, which made it easy to see my target. I aimed and tossed the pebble, which bounced off with a harmless pink.

  Come on, wake up, Brody, I thought as I tossed the second one. We’d started doing this when we were thirteen as a way to talk without waking our parents. I couldn’t remember when the last time was that I’d used it—nowadays, I just let myself in the side door. I tossed the third pebble and rubbed the fourth between my fingers, debating. Still nothing. Might as well go home and try to get some sleep.

  I was turning around when I saw a flash in the window. When the sill opened and Brody peeked out, looking sexily sleepy with his hair rumpled, my heart froze in my chest. When he saw me, he scowled.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” he hissed.

  “I… I thought you might want to… talk.”

  “Talk?” he echoed, his voice rising. “What’s there to talk about? Unless you’ve changed your mind.” He snorted without giving me a chance to answer. “But you never change your mind, do you?”

  It wasn’t fair, but I wasn’t about to point it out when I hadn’t, in fact, changed my mind. I was sure I was doing what was best for the both of us.

  “I’m not going to stay awake at one in the morning to ease your conscience. Run home, little girl.”

  I could feel myself getting angry. I knew he was upset, but did he have to be such a jerk? When he turned to walk away, I took aim and tossed the pebble through the open window. My aim was always bet
ter when I was angry and this time was no exception: it hit him squarely in the back of the head.

  When he whirled to face me, eyes blazing, any remorse I might have felt was extinguished. “What the hell’s the matter with you?” he demanded sharply. “First, you break my heart, now you throw things at me?”

  “If you’d stop being such a jerk—”

  “Better than being a heartless bitch, I guess.”

  His words stunned me, paralyzing me for an instant. No matter how mad at me he got, he’d never called me that. I could see the anger fading, could see his expression softening as he looked at me, but I couldn’t speak. “Shan, listen, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”

  I whirled around and jogged away, not wanting to hear what else he might say. Funny, I thought when I got back into my bed, hugging my knees to my chest. And I thought I couldn’t feel any worse.

  Chapter Two

  Three years later

  “Shan! Shana Rae! Over here, pumpkin!”

  I forced my lips into a smile with difficulty as I turned to see Aunt Liz hurrying toward me, waving her hands theatrically. “Hey, Aunt Liz.”

  “Don’t you ‘hey, Aunt Liz’ me, young lady! Give us a hug!”

  I rolled my eyes at my friend, Becky, who had turned away to hide her amusement. My aunt had been obsessed with Queen Elizabeth for almost a decade now and thought speaking in the royal ‘we’ made her seem impressive. I had no choice but to oblige, leaning in and pecking her dry, wrinkled cheek.

  She pulled back, beaming, her arms still spread wide. “There she is, our girl. Home at last.”

  I was about to reply when I was bumped from behind. I was jolted forward, sending my champagne spewing out of its glass.

  “Excuse me, I’m so sorry.”

  I turned around to see Harry Parker standing behind me. I smiled genuinely this time. “Parker! How have you been?”