I Love the 80s (23 page)

Tommy Seer
(and whoever happened to be with him) was plied with free drinks while astoundingly pretty girls shook their barely clad butts at him. Jenna sat next to him in
her tacky overcoat and couldn’t find it in her to be anything but delighted.

This
, after all, was the club scene everyone talked about in reverent tones more than twenty years later. Artists and club kids and supermodels and actors all mixed together while a very short man Jenna suspected was Steve Rubell, founder of Studio 54, held court. Out in the main part of the club, DJs played Bananarama, some hip-hop, Madonna, Duran Duran, the Cure, the Smiths, the Bangles, the very beginnings of what would turn into house music some day soon. And the Wild Boys, of course.

It was fun and glorious, but it wasn’t
dancing.
It was the Palladium in 1987, long before it became the cheesy club Jenna recalled from her college days. It was an experience.

And it was no surprise that Jenna found herself a little bit tipsy, especially when she’d been forced to contend with some German princess of taxis – well, no, that didn’t make sense, but that’s what Jenna thought she’d said – and had nearly collided with Ally Sheedy on her way to the bathroom. To say nothing of Molly Ringwald herself, looking at her famous pout in the bathroom mirror. How was someone who had originally been a starry-eyed adolescent in 1987 supposed to deal with so much Brat Pack goodness?

It was all a little too much, and then, of course, so was Tommy.

He watched her, his green eyes alert, his mouth in that faint smile, and Jenna might not have known why, exactly,
he had brought her here, to this once-famous and now (in the 2000s) demolished club, but she knew it had something to do with that expression he wore. As if he was waiting for some sign that only she could give, though she couldn’t imagine what that sign might be.

So she did the only thing she could do. She danced. She sang,
I’ll be alone, dancing, you know it baby
to herself. She danced for what seemed like hours, at the best Eighties night imaginable, until he came and took her arms in his warm hands and looked down at her, and she knew it was time to go.

‘What was that about?’ she asked as they burst outside into the cold night. Her skin was hot and her hair was wet with sweat on the back of her neck. ‘You didn’t dance at all.’

‘I watched you,’ he said simply, as if that was an explanation. ‘Did you have fun?’

‘Sure,’ Jenna said, but she was confused. It must have shown on her face, because his smile twisted and he reached over to thread his fingers in her curls.

‘You looked like you were in heaven,’ he said. ‘You really do like the music.’ His hand was hot against the top of her head, his fingers making even her skull sensitive. He moved his hand over her temple, then along the line of her jaw.

‘I really do,’ she said, and then she whispered, ‘What are you doing?’

As if she didn’t know, but she didn’t really know him then, with that odd, tender look and the soft touch
against her skin. This wasn’t the dizzying fire she had come to expect when he touched her, nor the calculating distance even while kissing her that she knew he was capable of – this, she knew on some deep level, was much, much worse. This was quiet and awful and sweet. This could hurt her in ways she didn’t dare consider. This was everything she was afraid of, right there in front of her.

He didn’t speak. His mouth settled into a grim line and he searched her face for something in the passing lights of the busy Manhattan street, something she was afraid he wouldn’t find – or worse, that he would. Something tightened in her gut, something sharp and barbed and made of heat and fear and more.

‘Let’s go,’ he said in a quiet voice, and he took her hand. Jenna felt his fingers close over hers, and felt the calluses on his fingers from his guitar playing, hard and rough and perfect, somehow, against her skin.

He hesitated, and Jenna thought,
I have to tell him, right now, that whatever he’s thinking can’t happen
—

But she didn’t open her mouth at all. His hand tightened on hers when she failed to speak, and a very male sort of expression flashed across his face. Jenna felt a flash of answering heat deep in her belly.

And then he was moving, and she felt unable to do anything at all but follow him. She told herself she was tipsy, that she had no control over what she was feeling, but she knew she was lying to herself. The last of her tipsiness had vanished the moment the night air hit her, and
everything she’d felt since then, she knew, was Tommy. Pure and simple.

The truth was, she was surrendering. She knew it.

She wanted it.

She couldn’t remember, any longer, why she’d fought him in the first place. She didn’t care if he was faking, or if he had an agenda. She could feel every nerve ending in her body standing at attention, thirsty for him, and she didn’t know how to deny that any more. She didn’t want to.

They didn’t speak on the taxi ride. Jenna felt his heat and his pulse through their linked hands, and watched the city slide by outside the windows, red tail lights and street lights gleaming, brightly lit bodegas on the corners and clumps of pedestrians walking along the cold sidewalks.

It was as if an electric current hummed inside of her. Desire pooled in her belly and spilled outward. She felt the urge to throw herself at him even in the back of the taxi, with the need to taste him, touch him, explore him. It was making her so dizzy she thought that if she let go of his hand, she might spin off into the darkness.

Then, finally, they were outside her apartment building. On some level that surprised Jenna, but she let him lead her inside and up the stairs, until they were standing in the little yellow studio and there was no more pretending this was a dream. This was happening, right now.

Her breath was coming in short bursts. She could feel the rapid thump of her heart against her chest, like it was fighting to get out.

‘Why here?’ she asked, her voice sounding to her as if it came from far away. ‘Why not one of the many rooms in your apartment?’

Tommy smiled, and looked around the yellow room, which Jenna thought was closing in on them. He seemed bigger somehow. Or maybe it was just that she had never experienced the studio with another body in it before. There was hardly enough room for one.

‘Why not here?’ he asked. ‘I like this place. It’s cute.’

‘Uh huh.’ She felt anger sear through her then. ‘The international superstar thinks my little studio is
cute
. That’s why you live in a palace on Central Park West.’

His head tilted slightly as he regarded her for a long, cool, moment, with her sarcasm hanging between them like a blanket.
Thumpthumpthump
went her heart, picking up its pace.

‘It’s okay,’ he said finally. ‘I get it.’

‘You get what?’ she demanded, and then sucked in a breath because he closed the distance between them, and she felt edgy and terrified and desperate, and were those
tears
pricking the backs of her eyelids?

‘We don’t have to fight or banter to mask it, you know,’ he murmured, too close now. ‘It’s intense, isn’t it? But it’s going to be okay.’ His grin was crooked, and his eyes were far too knowing. ‘I promise.’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ she said, but her voice was nothing more than a croak, and it was a lie anyway.

‘Yes, you do,’ he said, so softly, and then he settled
his mouth over hers, his hands wrapping around her upper arms and anchoring her there, holding her still while the kiss went on and on and Jenna slowly lost her mind.

Tommy kissed the way he sang
, she thought, with all of that heat and yearning and sweet, hot sex. Somehow they ended up sprawled across the futon, and it no longer mattered if the studio was big enough, because they were finally, finally touching each other with all the frustration of the weeks – years, in Jenna’s case – they hadn’t touched. His hands were everywhere – learning the shape of her curves, tracing them, and tasting them, too. He yanked off his shirt and Jenna kissed her way across the hard planes of his finely moulded chest, then gasped when he pulled her up and kissed her, hard. He stripped her clothes from her body, and laughed when their hands tangled trying to get his pants off. He grabbed a small package from the back pocket of his pants, sheathed himself in one quick movement, and then they were both naked and it was really, truly happening.

‘Relax,’ he said then. He reached over and smoothed away the frown between her eyes. ‘You look very serious all of a sudden.’

Because this is not a dream. Because this is happening. Right now
.

‘I’m totally relaxed,’ she lied, which made him smile.

He swung over her, rolling her beneath him, and she could feel him all along the length of her body, head to toe. The crisp hair on his legs against her smooth ones,
the breadth and strength of his shoulders above her, and between them, his erection pressed hard against her belly. She shivered, and he smiled.

She loved all of it, and it was too much at the same time. So much heat and contrast. So much skin. She tasted him.
Salt and sweet
.

She wondered if it would change her. Shouldn’t sleeping with such a huge crush change her somehow? What if, after all of this, it was terrible? What then? Was it possible for chemistry to just …
fizzle out
?

‘I can hear your mind going,’ he murmured then, amusement lurking in his voice. ‘What are you thinking about? So loudly?’

‘Oh … uh … nothing,’ she said, embarrassed. ‘I’m not thinking anything.’

‘You’re not mindless and begging, either,’ he said in that silky tone that made her shiver. ‘I don’t know where you went, Jenna.’

‘I’m right here—’

But her protest died when he claimed her mouth with his own. This time his kiss was hard, possessing. This time, he used his hands. They cupped her breasts, holding them while he moved down and took first one peak, then the other into his hot, demanding mouth.

Jenna tried to catch her breath but he kept moving, tasting her belly, licking his way down between her thighs, where he settled his mouth on the molten core of her. Jenna gasped, but he only held her hips in his strong arms, held her down, and ravished her with his mouth
until she was sobbing out his name, begging him to stop – or finish – or something, she didn’t care what.

But he didn’t stop. He teased her and toyed with her, bringing her closer and closer, and then, just as she shimmered on the edge, he released her, and kissed his way back up her body.

‘What are you … ?’ She was out of her mind. Red-faced, panting, and she wanted to kill him, too. ‘Why would you … ?’

‘Much better,’ he murmured, and then he twisted his hips and drove into her.

Jenna shattered into a million pieces.

When she came back to herself, he was motionless above her, braced on his arms and watching her, determination and satisfaction written all over his face. She reached over and touched that wicked mouth of his with her finger, astonished to see she was still shaking.

‘You better hold on, Jenna,’ Tommy told her, his voice rasping in the quiet room, and she could see how much his effort at patience was costing him. His eyes gleamed. ‘We’re just getting started.’

He was as good as his word.

Dawn was greying the dark outside the windows and just starting to light the room. Jenna disentangled herself from Tommy’s limbs and got to her feet. Her thighs felt like jelly beneath her. She pulled a shirt from the pile on the floor and tugged it on over her head. His, she realized belatedly. She guessed that her hair had redefined
the word
bedhead
, and she had a feeling she would not want to see what that looked like.

In the soft light, Tommy lay sprawled across the futon that they’d finally pulled out to make into a full bed at some point. He looked like some kind of god lying there, his big body taking up most of the space. Fast asleep, that clever mouth relaxed and the too-knowing eyes hidden, he looked different. Softer.

Every muscle and bone in her body hurt. Her skin hummed with leftover electricity, and she desperately needed water. Her eyes burned from so little sleep and she was sore. Oh, so deliciously sore. Something in her thrilled at it, but there was no denying the twinges every time she shifted position.

Tommy, it turned out, was a creative and inventive man. That should not have surprised her as much as it did. On some level, she’d been expecting him to be selfish and inconsiderate, like the famous rock stars were always accused of being in memoirs. But not Tommy. He’d been the opposite of selfish. So unselfish, in fact, that she didn’t think there was a single spot on her body he hadn’t made his own. She wondered if that came from the legion of women he’d undoubtedly slept with, a subject she thought she should probably care about. But she couldn’t rustle up any outrage or insecurity. How could she?

He’d made her limbs do things she didn’t think they could do. He’d laughed and teased and practically made her go blind from the sheer, overwhelming pleasure of it all. And then he’d done it again, and again. And again.
She’d lost track of how many times he’d reached for her, or she’d reached for him. One touch blended into another, and swirled in her head like some extended montage scene of sex and sighs and
more
.

And even grainy-eyed and exhausted, she wanted him. Even sore, and unsure how or if she could walk, she still wanted him. She had the disconcerting thought that if she could figure out how, she would burrow into his skin and lie there with him. Was that insane?

No, just incredibly creepy
, she retorted silently, disgusted with herself. She would not be sharing that decidedly freaky thought with Tommy, that was for sure.

She turned away, and moved across the floor towards the tiny kitchen, aware of her body and all the new and various aches. It was a sin tax on dying from pleasure, she thought, feeling a little bit smug. She hadn’t had many nights like the one she’d just had with Tommy. In fact, if she was honest with herself, she’d never had anything that came close.