The Anchor (3 page)

“Just like that!” Karissa shouts as I thrust into her. Normally, a woman getting loud while I fuck her would turn me on, but…ugh, not tonight. Karissa’s good in bed, but that’s about as far as my interest goes with her. And the interest is waning. I know I’m an asshole for thinking that way, but it’s the truth.

After a few minutes of blocking her out, I finally manage to finish and pull out quickly, heading to the bathroom to dispose of the condom. When I come back, she’s already pulled the comforter over herself and is smiling sleepily at me.
Guess she’s spending the night.

“That was amazing,” she purrs as I stare down at her, wondering if asking her to leave would earn me a kick in the balls. Probably so—better not go there. “Come cuddle with me,” she whines.

My skin is literally crawling at the thought. I’m not a cuddler—especially when I’m not that into a girl. But I begrudgingly slip in bed beside her and hide my distaste as she curls up against me, slipping her damp thigh over my leg, and rests her head on my chest. It isn’t long before I hear her breathing slow and know she’s asleep. I hate the night time. It’s the loneliest part of my day. Even with this woman lying on me, I’m lonely. With a new job at a prominent Manhattan law firm, I’m working long ass hours every day to make a decent headway. During the day I can hide in my work and in the hectic life I live, but at night I’m alone with my thoughts; a mind that doesn’t want to shut off continuously fucking with my rest. I never sleep, not well anyway. It’s been that way since I was a kid.

Shit. I’m out here on my own. My friends and family are all far away and it kind of sucks. Women have done a pretty good job filling the void. Case in point, the snuggler.

I thought moving to New York would be epic, but things didn’t work out like I thought they would. For starters, my best friend, John, was supposed to live here with me. But he fell in love and stayed put in our home state of North Carolina, taking some dinky position at an attorney’s office in Holly Springs to be close to his now fiancée, Edie. Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy for him. She’s a great girl and all, but it does suck we don’t get to tear up New York together. We’d passed the North Carolina State Bar back in July. At the time, we saw it as a brilliant backup plan in case things didn’t pan out here in New York. The New York State Bar isn’t until February, but I guess I’ll be taking it alone. Till then, I’ll be working my ass off, impressing my superiors in hopes that my current gig becomes a permanent one.

Karissa mumbles something in her sleep and squirms enough where I’m able to shift her off of me. Climbing out of bed, I slip on my boxers and head into the living room, pouring myself a Scotch. I hate the shit, but this is my uncle’s apartment and he keeps it stocked even though he’s hardly ever here, so I drink it. When John bailed on moving to New York, my uncle asked me to stay here to keep an eye on the place since he’s barely ever in town. I pay him rent and pretty much have the place to myself. Picking up my cell, I thumb through Facebook and see a photo of Edie and her best friend, Nikki, toasting their beers as Nikki obnoxiously points to Edie’s ring finger.

In two weeks, I head down to Holly Springs for John and Edie’s engagement party. I’m happy for my friend and excited to see him, but I can’t deny I’m most anxious to see Nikki. The weekend we shared two months ago is burned in my mind. The Southern princess was quite surprising. She was ladylike in most ways, but not so much in others. She curses like a sailor, drinks like a man, and looks like a beauty queen. I was a goner from the moment I saw her the day she arrived at the airport with John and Edie for their weekend visit. By the end of the first night, I was ready to give my left nut to have her.

When we hooked up, I was shocked, and ecstatic, and pissed. She was a virgin. The fuck? How could she not tell me that shit beforehand? And how was that even possible? I didn’t know there were still virgins out there. And I had been rough, too. That’s not the way a girl’s first time should be. As if I hadn’t already wanted her bad enough, knowing I was the first man to take her only intensified those feelings. There was just something about her that made me want to possess her. It wasn’t her innocence because by all accounts I would’ve never guessed she was a virgin. She just seemed so . . . unattainable. Her confidence was probably what I found most attractive. Women find out I work in an elite law firm and they fling themselves at me. Hell, Karissa banged me for the first time an hour after we met. And although Nikki did have sex with me after only knowing me a weekend, she didn’t want anything more. She used me . . . that’s how it feels anyway. I’ve tried for the last two months to keep in touch with her through Facebook and texting. I also call, but she never answers. She said we’re friends. And that is all because in her mind long-distance relationships never work.

I’m hoping when I see her at John and Edie’s party, maybe I can convince her to give me the time of day. But something tells me Nikki Reese is going to make it hard on me. And I gotta admit, it fucking turns me on.

Something hard kicks my shin and jolts me awake. My eyes squint as I try to look away from the glare from the kitchen light shining into the living room. Shit. I fell asleep on the couch. I move my tongue around inside my cotton-dry mouth, regretting all the Scotch I drank last night.

“Parker,” a stern voice says, and my eyes peel open a little wider as I look up and find my uncle, Gregory Paul—Uncle Paul, for short—staring down at me, his expression hard. “You need to see your guest out.” When he moves to the side, Karissa is standing about fifteen feet away, her eye makeup smeared down her cheeks and her dress wrinkled and drab. Shit. Slow to stand, I take a minute to get my bearings before I make my way over to her and lead her to the door. Uncle Paul remains in the living room, his arms crossed, watching us. I’m in only my boxers, which makes this all the more uncomfortable with my uncle standing here.

“I tried to leave without waking you,” Karissa whispers. “He insisted we wake you first.” Of course he did. Paul’s a dick like that.

“It’s okay,” I tell her as I open the door. “Do you need cab fare?”

“No,” she says, as her brows furrow. I guess she wants me to say I’ll call her. That we’ll meet up again. Yeah, not going to happen.

“Thanks for last night,” I whisper and kiss her forehead. “I gotta go deal with this.” I jut my chin toward my uncle.

“Oh, yes. Of course,” she agrees and steps out. “I guess . . . I’ll talk to you later?”

I run a hand through my hair, hating how awkward this is. We’ve hooked up three times and I’ve never called her. She just always happens to be at the bar I go to after work and we’ve ended up back at my place. I think I need to cut this off because obviously she thinks we’re becoming . . . more. I have no inclination for more right now. “Bye, Karissa,” I finally manage with an apologetic smile. She hears my message loud and clear: This is done. Shaking her head, she turns and walks toward the elevator as I shut the door.

Making my way into the kitchen, I grab the O.J. out of the fridge and chug straight from the carton. It’s mine; no one else drinks it, so I don’t think it matters.

Paul slips off his suit jacket and lays it across the arm of the couch before walking to the breakfast bar and standing in front of it with his hands in his pockets. “Ever heard of a glass?”

I put the carton down and wipe my mouth with the back of my hand. “Did you want some?”

He snorts. “I’d love some of your backwash.”

“It is tasty,” I jest. “When did you get in?”

Moving to the counter, he laces his fingers together and rests his hands on the dark granite. “This morning at one. Had to do a few things at the office.” Paul works as a liaison between the law firm’s New York office and its international offices. He’s rarely home or at the office, but even when he is, he never seems to stop and relax. It was his reputation as a meticulous employee and contact along with years of working with Shuestar and Bechman that got me my kick-ass job.

A heavy moment of silence falls between us and when his gaze moves from his hands, folded on the counter, to me, I know he has something that he deems as ‘extremely important’ to say.

“It’s not easy being a young man in your position. You’re smart with a bright future ahead of you.”

“And I’m a stud,” I add. This only earns a halfhearted smirk from him.

“But . . .” I groan with an eye roll, knowing what’s coming.

“You’re going to fuck your future up if you’re not careful. Women like that,” he points at the door, indicating he’s talking about Karissa, “would love nothing more than to nail down a guy who’s about to become a New York lawyer. And what better way to do that than with a baby?”

“I’m always safe, Paul,” I say, defensibly.

“Condoms aren’t one hundred percent foolproof, Parker,” he argues as he runs a wide palm down his face. “Do you want to end up like your parents?”

I pinch my lips together to avoid saying something shitty to him. My father, Paul’s younger brother, knocked up my mother the summer before his senior year of college. He was destined to be a
prestigious architect but when my mother got pregnant with me he had to drop out. That was quickly followed by my grandparents pulling the plug on any support for him because he knocked up the town ‘floozy,’ as they called my mother. He never made it back to college after that. Two years after they had me, my sister was born. My parents didn’t even marry until years later. It was quite the scandal among the town’s elite.

“My parents are doing just fine,” I point out, my tone hiding none of the disdain I have for his comment.

“Yeah.” Paul nods in acknowledgement. “They live in a shithole and couldn’t even put their kids through college.” The latter is true. Our home isn’t a shithole though. Maybe it is by Paul’s standards. It’s a small three-bedroom rancher. Modest
,
and just enough room for our family. My father’s other brother, Uncle Winston, still trains horses out in the country, close to my parents, in the outskirts of my hometown of Knightdale. Unfortunately, Paul’s comment about college is spot-on. If it wasn’t for him and Winston’s insistence, neither I nor my little sister would’ve been able to get degrees without taking on huge student loans. His parents cut my father off, but not their bastard grandchildren. I hated taking their money after the way they treated him, but my father insisted. He wanted us to have an education no matter the cost . . . even his pride.

“I’m careful, Paul. Now, can we drop this?”

He shakes his head. “Don’t fuck up your future on some one-night stand, Parker. You’re smarter than that.” I know he’s speaking out of genuine concern but part of me wonders if those are his true feelings about my mother.

Then he leaves me standing in the kitchen in my underwear. Did he just give me the safe sex talk? Jesus. That was awkward.

“I don’t know if I like this color, Edie,” I pout as I gaze at myself in the full-length mirror in the back of Pearl’s shop. Pearl has been my dressmaker since I started pageants; I bring her a design and she makes it fit me perfectly.