A Million Guilty Pleasures: Million Dollar Duet (8 page)

Hands down, best quickie ever. I’ll admit to feeling like a douche for taking her that way the first time after our confessions of love, but I would most definitely be making it up to her later. Over and over again, until she was thoroughly satisfied. And then start at the beginning again, because like my girl pointed out, I was insatiable.

I pulled out of Lanie and eased her down the wall until her feet touched the floor. She swayed a little lethargically in my arms, so I gathered her back up to me. “Easy, kitten. You okay?”

She sighed contentedly. “Oh yeah, I’m really okay.”

I chuckled at her response. She had the same effect on me—not that I was all that surprised, because it had been that way from the very first week we’d spent together, and it always would be.

Always? Was I thinking long-term about our relationship? Damn straight I was. She was mine.

Lanie

“He did not!” my mother squealed.

Dez laughed at her reaction. “Oh yes he did. You should’ve seen him, Momma Faye. He was all”—Dez tucked her chin to her chest and spread her shoulders to mimic my father—“ ‘That’s my wife, boy, and I’ll be goddamned if I’m gonna sit by and let some pimply-faced orderly who’s just barely reached puberty and still jacked up on teenage hormones give her a sponge bath! I’m the only man who touches those goodies! Leave the sponge and the tub, and walk away slowly, son, before someone gets hurt.’ ”

My mother was full-on laughing by the time Dez was finished with her less than accurate impersonation, and the peal was music to my ears. I hadn’t heard her laugh like that in so long I’d nearly forgotten what it sounded like. Of course, had my father heard Dez’s mockery, he wouldn’t have found it quite so humorous. Good thing he was at the house getting things ready for my mother’s return.

It had been ten days since her transplant, and so far so good. All her color was back, and she was sitting up, laughing,
eating, smiling … living. The scar on her chest was an angry red in color, but it, too, had healed significantly, and she claimed that it only hurt a little if she coughed. That may or may not have been true, but the sparkle was back in her eye and she was soaking up every single bit of information she could about how to maintain her health so her body wouldn’t reject her new heart.

The only source of worry I could find was Faye’s concern for the family of the young lady who had given her another chance to live. She wanted to offer her condolences and thank them properly, as we all did, but Daniel said it was the family’s choice not to have their information disclosed. Upon his suggestion, I sat down with my mother and we wrote them a letter that he agreed to deliver, hoping they would one day find peace with their loss. I’d also hoped my mother would find peace with her gain, but she was a sentimental person and I knew the idea that someone else had had to die in order for her to live would haunt her for the rest of her life.

“Well, it wasn’t exactly like that,” Polly chimed in.

“It
was
exactly like that,” Dez argued.

I knew better. “Mack does not say ‘goodies.’ ”

My mother interrupted with a devilish grin. “Um, yes, he does.”

“Oh, gross! Mom!” I did not need those mental images. I contemplated checking the janitor’s closet to see if there was some bleach—or whatever it was hospitals used to keep everything so sterile—I could use to scrub my brain. It was definitely going to take something industrial-strength and then I’d probably still be scarred for life.

She scoffed. “Oh, please, Lanie. How do you think you got
here? I assure you, it wasn’t by immaculate conception.” She got this dreamy look in her eye like she was reminiscing. “We sure did have a lot of fun making you. The things your father can do with his—”

I plugged my ears with my fingers and started singing to drown her out. It didn’t work. I could still hear her over my own hideous screeching.

“ … your dad has this fascination with the Statue of Liberty, so I have this outfit—”

“Stop! Stop! Stop! Pleeeeease stop,” I begged.

Faye finally fell silent at my outburst and gave me a look. “Don’t act like you’re so innocent,” she said, smoothing the sheets over her midsection. “I’ve seen that piece of man meat you’ve been wearing. You two haven’t been able to keep your hands off each other. I bet he’s good in the sack, too, isn’t he? I mean, he’s Noah Crawford, Chicago’s most eligible bachelor.”

“Seriously? I’m going to puke,” Lexi said in a bored tone as she examined her nails. Then she sighed and straightened in her chair. “I love my cousin and all, but I really don’t want to hear this.”

My mom did that thing where she tried to be less like a mom and more like one of the girls. “You shush it, girlie. I want to know everything,” she told Lexi, then turned back to me. “So just how big is the big spender?”

“I’m soooo not going to answer that question,” I said, appalled and embarrassed. I wanted to curl up into a fetal position and suck my thumb until it all just went away. “What are you, some kind of cougar? Need I remind you that I’m your daughter, and this is beyond inappropriate?”

Dez came to my mother’s defense. “Stop being such a prude, Sandra Dee, and let your inner Cha Cha DiGregorio shine through. You’ve shimmied your way into your paintedon leather, strapped on your peep-toe heels, colored your lips red, and snagged Danny Zuko.” Her obsession with
Grease
bordered on insanity.

“Let us live vicariously through you. I mean, you’ve scored the jackpot, honey, so the least you could do is gloat about it for the less fortunate.” Dez crossed her legs, propped her elbow on her knee, and rested her chin in her palm. “What’s he working with? And don’t try to lie, either. I’ve seen the size of his feet
and
his hands.”

“Oh my God! I can’t believe this is happening,” I mumbled, running my hands over my face. “I’m being punked, aren’t I? Where are the cameras?”

Dez made a fist with one hand and started rotating the other as if she were holding a movie camera aimed straight at me. “Lanie Marie Talbot, this is your life,” she said with a game show host’s intonation. “So tell us … Vienna sausage or Peterbilt truck?”

“Just tell us,” Polly chimed in. I was shocked. She sounded like I was about to reveal the secret to eternal life or something. Noah was her boss, and her husband was probably the closest friend Noah had, yet she was all up in my business, wanting to know how long his schlong was.

Lexi sighed and rolled her eyes. “Tell them, for God’s sake, so that we can move on from this horrendous topic.”

“Fine!” I yelled, throwing my hands up in defeat. “He’s colossal, okay? Huge! And the sex is epic! He knocks it out of the park each and every time he’s at bat. He’s got me speaking
in tongues and my head spinning around on my shoulders like I’m possessed or something. If the absolute greatest sex in the universe were to manifest into a physical being, it would clone itself after Noah Crawford. He is the poster child for massive orgasms, the alpha and omega of cocks everywhere. His junk should be stuffed and mounted like a trophy over a fireplace, put on display behind bulletproof glass with heat-sensitive alarms and motion detectors at the Smithsonian of Cockdom! It is the holy grail of penises everywhere, and only he has the ability to harness its full power. In short, Noah Crawford is the epitome of sex. He makes my toes curl and my body convulse. There. Are you happy?”

The room was so quiet you could hear a pin drop. My mother’s jaw was slack and Polly’s eyes were bulging out of her head. And then there was Dez …

“So if you had to put a specific measurement on it, what would it be?”

I heard a throat clear at the doorway and my head snapped in that direction to find Noah leaning against the door frame with his hands in his pockets. Judging by the egotistical smirk on his face, I’d say he’d heard just enough of my speech to make him impossible to live with.

“Sorry to interrupt, ladies,” he said as he straightened and walked into the room. “Mrs. Talbot, you’re looking very well.”

“I, uh … Well, um, thank you,” my mother stuttered, apparently picturing my boyfriend naked, which was oh so Jerry Springer of her.

When I’d first seen my mother in the recovery room ten days earlier, Noah had been right by my side, and I remembered the way her jaw had nearly dropped to the floor and how
she repeatedly rubbed her eyes as if she couldn’t possibly have been seeing what she was seeing. She beamed like the mother of a beauty pageant contestant who’d mopped the floor with all those other wanna-bes. Not that my mother had ever treated me that way, but she knew who Noah Crawford was, and she was stoked that her baby girl was dating him.

“I missed you.” Noah squatted behind me and leaned in to give my neck a very sweet, chaste kiss. Then he wrapped his arms around my shoulders from behind and addressed my mother. “I spoke with Mr. Talbot on the way over and he said all the medical equipment arrived today and has been set up. Looks like you’re good to go when Daniel gives you the green light.”

“Actually, Dr. Crawford said that, barring any unforeseen complications, I can go home tomorrow.” Faye beamed excitedly. “I want to thank you for making all of this possible. I know you’ll probably never claim responsibility, but I also know that if it hadn’t been for you, I wouldn’t be here right now, and my daughter wouldn’t be nearly as happy as she finally seems to be. You’ve touched the life of each member of our family, Noah, and we can never repay you for that.”

He hugged me tighter. “I’d do anything for Lanie. Besides, I only did what any decent human being would do if given the resources, Mrs. Talbot. I’m no saint.”

“Well, in my eyes you are, and I won’t soon forget what you’ve done,” my mother said with misty eyes. She took a deep breath and collected herself before starting again. “Now, Lanie, what are your plans? Are you going back to school?”

Yeah, she and Mack still thought I was legitimately enrolled at NYU. How was I going to get out of that mess?

Lexi came to the rescue. “Actually, I pulled some strings with the dean’s office and got him to agree to let Lanie drop her classes for this semester and reenroll for the next, without it affecting her
scholarship
,” she said, giving me a look that said I should go with what she was saying. “So she’s free to stick around here for a while.”

My mom clasped her hands together. “That’s great! You’ll be coming home, then?”

“Um …” That caught me off guard. I hadn’t really thought about what I would do, or where I would go once she was free to leave. I turned to look at Noah, hoping he’d saddle up on his white horse and come to my rescue yet again, but his defeated expression offered me no solace or hope of being able to go back home with him. I could tell by the way he nodded and offered a smile that our separation wasn’t what he wanted, either. But at the same time, he had to have known this would happen, which meant he was sacrificing, yet again, for me and my family. I wished he’d been selfish and demanded I stay with him, but I knew he wouldn’t.

I turned back to my mother so that I wouldn’t have to see his pretty face, in hopes that I’d have the strength to say what he and I both knew I had to say. “Yeah, Mom, I’m coming home.” I gave her a halfhearted smile that I hoped looked convincing enough.

What kind of daughter had I become? I should’ve wanted to be there to help her on her road to recovery because she still had quite a way to go. But I couldn’t fathom the idea of sleeping in my cold bed—the very same bed in which I’d spent night after night wondering if I was doomed to never know what it felt like to have a warm body cuddled up next to me, to
never know the fire that boiled in my veins from a lover’s touch, to never know what it felt like to be adored by someone of worth.

I could feel Noah’s warm breath on the shell of my ear as his husky voice spoke from just over my shoulder. “If it’s okay with you, Mrs. Talbot, I’d like to steal her away from you for the evening. Unless you need her here, of course.”

Always the fucking considerate gentleman.
Throw me over your shoulder like a Neanderthal, damn it! Whisk me away to your cave with grunted warnings for anyone who might dare try to take me away from you!
God knew the man didn’t seem to have a problem behaving that way when he’d decided he knew what was best for me time and time again before. It may have been seriously fucked up of me, but part of me wanted that Noah back again. At least in that moment.

“No, no, no. Lanie’s been with her sick old mother every single day and night since I got here,” Faye said. “She needs to get out. You two kids go and, um … have fun.” She tried to contain her giggles, but then Dez, Polly, and Lexi started snickering, and all bets were off.

How very junior high of them, I thought. But it became very evident that I was never going to live down the whole Noah-is-a-sex-god rant. I imagined the episode of
The Jerry Springer Show
we could all appear on: “My Mother Wants to Sleep with My Boyfriend, but He’s Too Busy Boinking His Cousin, His Married Assistant Dreams of His Penis Size, and My Best Friend Might Be Pregnant with His Baby.”