Plastic Confidence (Good Bye Trilogy #1) (10 page)

“Julia. You are more perfect than I remember. More gorgeous than any photo can take,” he groaned, as he open mouthed kissed my neck all the way down to my breasts.

“Brennan,” I said for the lack of a better sex word. Brennan was sex.
Synonymous.

“I had a plan,
Julia. I didn’t plan on wanting inside of you the moment I saw you.” He quickly pulled away and I was left feeling bereft. “Let me do this right, okay?”

I rolled back over to my seat and exhaled loudly. He wasn’t going to take me to bed right now and I needed
to calm myself. He took my hand and kissed every finger.

“Please. I need to do this right. I need every moment. I want every second to be about you.” His face was determined. He still felt guilty. I was just horny. I waved my hands for him to go. He chuckled as he put the car into drive and took us down to the Ritz where I had booked the penthouse suite, stocked with everything romantic.

We didn’t make it to the bedroom before our pants were off. I felt him against me and I grew nervous. I stopped kissing him in a tizzy and he noticed me backing off.

“
Julia, it’s okay. We don’t have to do this,” he murmured into my ear.

“Does she know that you are here with me?” I asked, feeling small and somewhat dirty.

“She knows you were coming to see me,” he said. His voice was tight like he didn’t want to talk about Amelia. I couldn’t help but move away. I left him standing there, a large tent of clothing protruding from his rigid body. God, his muscular, dark body was eye candy and I wanted to lick every inch of him. We stood quietly for a bit all the while enjoying our mental foreplay. We looked at every line, every curve, and every movement of our chests.

“You’re the most gorgeous woman I have ever seen,” he whispered.

That is all it took. The image of a faceless Amelia and the dirty feeling I had, went poof. Everything that held me back before fell away as we grabbed for each other. Brennan picked me up and carried me into the bedroom. All the while, he sucked through my tank top on what would become his favorite part of my body.

THIRTEEN

2010

New York City

The intensity of our love-making made the atmosphere in the hotel room electrify. The vivid colors of the room, the sun beams through the windows, and the sounds of pleasure between us were gorgeous and magical. Brennan tried to catch his breath while tugging on my breasts with his teeth. For hours we laid naked and twisted up in sexual perfection. His moans and grunts even after we had climaxed made me want to roll on top of him again. If only I could move my body. I never felt like a pile of blissful mush in my life. He had wrecked me. An inch of my body had not gone unnoticed and as I brushed his hair with my fingers, I closed my eyes, picturing every moment that led up to this one.

“What are you thinking about
Julia?” Brennan quietly breathed out as he continued to pay close attention to my chest.

“After that?
Not much. Bren, you fucked every thought out of me,” I laughed. He froze. My eyebrows drew together at his reaction. What had I said?

“I didn’t
fuck
you, Julia,” he said, as he made his way up and brushed my hair out of my face. “I
worshipped
you.”

“Worship away anytime,” I smiled at him
as I waved my hand towards my naked body. I was truly happy and excited for the next two days alone with Brennan. I wanted him to read to me again. I wanted him to hold my hand. I wanted to sing to him.

I took a deep breath and looked into his eyes.

My mind has a blank space where you belong

Lover
.

You take up my heart in the wrong way

Baby.

But don’t you know? Don’t you know?

I can’t not love you

I can’t. I can’t. I can’t.

I ended the last word on a long, deep note. I had written the song for him in my spare time. I had written many songs that I wouldn’t show to the guys. It felt too personal to share with them.

“Is that a new song?” he asked, completely engrossed in my eyes and lips as I finished singing.

I nodded. “It’s not a LSP song. I wrote it on my own. It’s too sultry for the band. It would kill my angst image,” I
sniggered.

“When did you write it?” he asked. He wanted me to say I wrote it for him. I shrugged.

“A few months ago. I have been writing a lot. Did you like it?” I asked, genuinely interested in what he thought.

“It was
... Jesus, Julia. I have no words,” he beamed as he shook his curls into my face.

“I wrote it for you,” I whispered into his hair.

“Sing it again,” he demanded as he looked into my eyes.

“No way.
You get that one memory from me. No repeat performances.”

“Tease,” he laughed as he tickled my underarms. I
instinctually shoved him off me and told him in every choice word there was to stop.

“Don’
t tickle me.
Ever
,” I nearly yelled at him. Brennan held up his hands in surrender as he looked at me with sympathy. I felt like an asshole but Goddamn, I hate it when people tickle me. I put my hands over my eyes and his face flashed into my mind.

Jason
#2.

I squashed that memory of losing my virginity down.
I pulled my legs up to my chest as I felt the weight of the complicated thoughts that memory had just caused.

Brennan was laying quietly on the other side of the king sized bed. He was obviously afraid to touch the tiger
that was me.

“I am sorry I yelled at you,” I
whispered with a grim smile. I looked over to him with a pleading expression. I wanted his arms around me. His touch lit a fire in me that I had never experienced before.

Brennan rolled over and placed his hand on my foot. He started to rub methodically as he looked up into my eyes.

“Why? Why did you yell at me?” he asked.

“I want to tell you because I don’t like to be tickled but it’s more than that. I guess it reminds me
of the guy that I lost my virginity to,” I shrugged.

Brennan popped up on one elbow with hardness in his look. “What
it bad or something?”

I couldn’t look in his eyes as I said, “
I don’t want to say bad. It just was. He was my brother’s friend. He took my virginity. At the time, it made me feel so damn special. I mean what older guy wanted to be with a kid like me? I was awkward and hardly had friends. My two best friends and I grew distant that summer. I had just turned thirteen. They didn’t come to my party but Jason made it
his
job to make me feel special,” I admitted.

“
Over that summer, we all changed. Emmy was kind of popular with the girls. She was still nice to me and said “hi”, but we didn’t hang out. Angie was distant. She kept to herself and shit, I don’t even remember if she ran with a crowd. I was popular... in another way,” I said quietly as I rolled my eyes over to Brennan. “I was the easy girl, the slut. I was just popular around the boys that wanted my body, you know?”

This was the most I had ever told anyone about my history and it pained me to think about that little girl. I felt like I was still that girl only being recognized for my big chest and plump lips.

“God, thirteen years old? So you... ” he asked, looking like he couldn’t find a politically correct word.

“I
am
a slut,” I finished for him. He scoffed at me and I gave him the
bullshit
look. Didn’t he hear Johnny back in the hotel room when we met? I didn’t get the ultimate title by telling boys to keep their pants on.

“You are not a slut,
Julia,” he said adamantly. I smiled back at him. It was a genuine smile that probably made him think I believed him. Brennan was so very sweet and so very wrong.

An hour later, we had taken
a sex fogged shower to a new level and were dressing in slick clothes to go out for dinner on the town. We were both giddy and just could not stop touching one another. If I were a spectator, I probably would have vomited at least three times by now. I made last minute reservations to a five star Italian restaurant that I wanted to try the last time I was in town. When I name dropped, I saw Brennan roll his eyes at me as he smirked. I stuck my tongue out at him and the make out session started yet again. Everything led to us kissing. Go ahead and vomit for that one, too.

For the first time in my life, I let another person spoon feed me. Brennan sat right next to me at our table so that he could treat me like a little child and make sure I tasted and enjoyed every part of our meal.

“Close your eyes, Baby,” he said softly.

I drew back and opened my eyes a little larger.
Baby? Where did that come from?

“Did you just call me b
aby because you are literally spoon feeding me this meal and now I kind of feel like one,” I laughed hollowly.

“Did I just call you b
aby?” he asked, perplexed while he dabbed a napkin at the side of those appealing lips.

I nodded my head.

“I promise you,
Baby
,” he emphasized, “that I only called you that as an endearment from my heart.” Okay, he was smooth.

“Aw, Bren.
You are melting my black heart,” I cried out sarcastically. He chuckled along with me.

“Now close your eyes, Julia,” he demanded. I saluted him and did as I was told. It was such a foreign feeling but I felt so damn safe with him.

“Open your mouth,” he whispered.

The minute I did, a chocolate explosion took over and I moaned.
I let the molten chocolate cake, which he must have been hiding up his ass, dissolve on my tongue. After a few beats, Brennan joined in on the chocolate and entered my mouth to enjoy the dessert, too. This was one of those moments I would never forget. His tongue and chocolate together was heavenly glorious. I heard him moan into my mouth and I snapped my fingers for the check. We made out through Brennan paying the check, Brennan putting on my coat, and all the way back to the hotel room.

The many explosions
that followed the dessert decadence transpired while we were naked and in the king sized bed. We didn’t sleep a wink and I had never been more content and satiated in my entire life.

FOURTEEN

“What do you feel like doing today?” I asked as I played with Brennan’s locks that covered my whole stomach. I loved the feeling of him resting his head on my heart while looking up at me. It was so intimate. Cuddle time was awesome. With Brennan. Only Brennan.

“You,” he laughed as he squeezed a very exposed breast. It hurt
, but after the tickling incident, I was not going to complain about his administrations on my body. How odd. I was thinking of his feelings before mine. Was this what truly caring about someone really felt like?

“And?
There must be something else you might want to do. Money is no issue,” I stated as I tried to braid a few of the locks together. Damn curls were so silky that nothing stuck. My long, thick hair remained out of an elastic band and hung all over my face and shoulders just the way Brennan liked it. He played with my hair a lot, too, when we talked like this.

Brennan rolled his eyes. “I know you have money, Julia. That is not the point of us spending time together. I have money, too, you know. So
... what would you like to do in New York City?” he asked, emphasizing New York City with a flourish.

“How about a really good cup of coffee first?”
I nodded at him with a smile.

He smiled back at me as his palm when to my cheek. “Sounds perfect,” he whispered.

“Umm... then maybe we could go out the Statue of Liberty?” I asked, covering my eyes and feeling like a total dork.

“The Statue of Liberty?
Seriously?” he questioned in shock.

“I’ve never actually been out there,” I admitted as he pulled my hands away from my eyes and started to stroke them gently. I moaned at the massage and closed my eyes anyways.

“I will take you anywhere and everywhere, Julia,” he said. I opened my eyes to find his so firmly locked onto my face. He was memorizing everything. I saw the moments they flicked to a different part of my face where he would spend one, two, three, and four beats just staring.

Trying not to be so intense, I smirked at him and took a fistful of hair to pull him up to my lips.
“Statue of Liberty.” I stated with finality.

He kissed me soundly and from afar I heard his phone ring. He didn’t even flinch. He just kept kissing me. Amelia. I had totally fucking forgotten that I was ret
reating to a private vacation for lovers with a married man. I felt the air leave my lungs and my lips stopped responding to his. The ringtone was the worst of it all. Out of all the millions of songs to have as a ringtone, that one had to be a sign. It had been days since I last had the nightmare and here I was, wide awake and living it all over again. Girls on the merry-go-round closing me into the middle. “Jules is a slut, slut, slut, slut. Jules is a slut, slut slut, slut,” they sang out to me as the ringtone continued.

Brennan pulled back, clearly confused. “What is it,
Baby?” he asked.

I shook my head in a daze.
“Why is your phone playing
American Pie
?” I asked slowly and numbly.

He shrugged, not understanding the significance
, but he didn’t have to. He knew he had struck another chord with me and quickly popped off the bed to go shut it off. I watched his muscled, beautiful, tatted, and naked body reach for the phone and with strong forearms and fumbling fingers, he powered the phone completely off. He sighed at it and then looked up to me, his hair falling all over his face.

“Is it
better now?” he whispered tentatively.

“Yes,” I said confidently. And it was. Somehow, the sight of Brennan in all of his vulnerable glory
shutting off a trigger of mine so I could be happy, made the girls’ voices stop. I mentally told them to fuck off and got up to hug him. He wrapped me in his strong embrace, tight and safe.

“I am falling for you, Brennan,” I said weakly. “I am so scared
. I am doing everything I want for us. It feels so right to be in your arms right now. But then I remember that we aren’t supposed to want or feel right for each other.”

“No, no, no,” he groaned. “This has been perfect. It has been the best time I have had in so damn long.
Please don’t ruin it now.”

Moments passed as we slowly rubbed each other’s nude backs and swayed to the music of Manhattan day life.

“What was so bad about that song, Julia?” he finally whispered in my ear.

This was him asking to
know me. He wanted to get under the plastic wrap that held my true self firmly inside.
Tight and tucked in with no air to breath.
What good would come out of me telling Brennan about my dream? There was too much confusion, too much pain. Sometimes, I felt like I was the one raped and strangled.

Telling Brennan
, in detail, about what I did to make myself feel normal after that summer, wouldn’t change him being married or me being a slut. I didn’t know how to trust anyone. I wasn’t ready and maybe, I would never be. My mother and father certainly didn’t show me how. My brother did, somewhat, and yet he still had no clue that his best friend took my virginity. I was fucking pissed that I couldn’t trust Brennan. I just couldn’t do it.

“It’s nothing. Was that Amelia
on the phone?” I questioned. He nodded slowly as he took in my reaction to his question about the song. I showed him nothing. He was so honest and yet I couldn’t be. He didn’t answer the phone because of me. Because of us. I was the woman he was taking into account. I wasn’t his, we weren’t a real couple, and he did not need to know anything about me. That was the cruel reality. We were lovers, off on a small, private getaway.

I had to take
this thing between us at face value and find the normal Jules again. She didn’t give a rat’s ass about more with any guy. The faster, the better. To the point and jump ship. Coping mechanism or not, it worked.

Except
, not when Brennan Curtis was looking at me the way he was. Nope, none of those shitty tactics worked when he grazed my stomach with his. It was devastating to watch myself getting caught up in him. It turned everything upside down and then fucked it sideways.

“I am going to
take a shower. I would like to head out for the eleven o’clock boat ride,” I stated nonchalantly. It was no matter that I just had the biggest revelation in my entire life.

“May I join you?” Brennan asked gently as he took my hand into his.

“Of course,” I answered in the same gentle way. We silently turned the water on and got in. He took the soap from my hands and washed me. He washed under and over my breasts. He washed my belly button. He washed inside my thighs. He washed in between every single toe.

He proceeded to wash
my hair. It was incredible. His strong fingers stroked and massaged in my earthy scented shampoo, which even my internal moans of pleasure, were covered up by the silence that we didn’t want to break. But I felt every moan in my heart. I felt every word of endearment. He loved me in a way I had never experienced before. By the time he was done, I had tears in my eyes and so did he.

An hour later
, we were on the boat to Ellis Island. We left our cell phones in our suite and held hands on the boat. I marveled at his presence. The beanie was back on, his glasses were getting a little fogged up, and I was soaking in his every movement. A woman from the other side of the boat was watching me. When I looked over at her small, older face, she gave me a knowing smile.
Yes, you love him
, she said without words.

We paid for the crown level tickets and found ourselves high up and looking onto Manhattan. A small man with a professional camera approached us for the photo bait shot e
veryone wanted to buy but cost way too much for the average tourist. People could easily ask for someone to shoot a photo with their own camera phones.

Since we didn’t have ours and secretly, I did want the professional stamp from the Statue of Liberty
, I bought four of the photos and gave Brennan two. We looked like an amazing couple. His arms went around my shoulders as he stood behind me. In one picture, he smelled my hair and I was laughing with a genuine smile. It had been years since I took a photo without the scowl on my face.

Brennan
noticed that a couple of twenty-something girls recognized me, guarding me from their approach, we quickly made our way to the small museum before the boat headed back to Manhattan.

“Do you think you might be able to make it to Boston sometime soon?” I asked him on the
short boat ride back.

“I want to. Would you have me for a few days? Am I allowed back into the lair of Julia Delaney?” He smirked at me and I gave him the stink eye.

“I would love it if you came to visit,” I assured him. We kissed softly and that seemed to break the compounded ice that the morning had produced.