Glass Houses Page 4

  Mutant droids and sorceresses who could morph into wolves had completely overwhelmed me. I had expected a fair bit of lasers and spaceships, but I was surprised at how raunchy Elliot’s writing actually was. There was an undercurrent of something ardent and a little scary in every scene. I found myself pressing my thighs together on more than one occasion.

  I was loath to set the laptop aside and turn off the light, my thoughts full of exotic landscapes and impossible creatures. I wish I could say that when I closed my eyes and pressed my fingers to my mound my first thought was for the characters I’d just read about. That, at least, would’ve been easy to set aside as a fantasy. But as soon as I let myself touch my pussy, all I could think of was Elliot and his bound wrists. The way he strained against the sheets to meet me, the way he begged with his eyes. I bit the pillow to stifle a moan—I didn’t want anyone to overhear, to suspect that I was more than a sexless, patient robot, content to run after rug rats all day without any other kind of desire.

  I thought of Elliot and his voice—‘You’ve always been beautiful, Miriam’. He was welcome to say it again, stretch out the syllables, and shout them from the rooftops. I wanted those words whispered against my cunt as I came, shuddering all over my own fingers, pushing me past the point of pleasure until I was gritting my teeth and could stand it no longer. I wanted them gritted out against a gag.

  I hid my face into the pillow and fought to catch my breath, my sex throbbing against the palm of my hand. I couldn’t believe it. My body was slicked with sweat, my cheap cotton tee stuck to my skin.

  Two years past and Elliot still made me feel like this. I smothered a laugh that was two parts wonder to one part glee. I’d take the awkwardness of dealing with an ex-lover for orgasms like that.

  Chapter Three

  “Are they gone?” I heard, muffled through the door. Riley had barricaded herself in her room, having pushed the dresser against the door to keep anyone from forcing their way in. When she got like this, I didn’t know whether to sit outside her door and wait until she deigned to let me in or take more drastic measures. At least this time she wasn’t pissed off at me.

  “Yeah, sweetheart. They just left.” I sighed. “Won’t you come out?”

  I heard the screech of the dresser on the naked hardwood floor and my fluttering heart settled in my chest. Riley pulled open the door. She had her ‘adults suck’ face on. “I wish they’d stay gone.”

  “Don’t say that,” I pleaded, every platitude I could think of coming to mind. I barely swallowed them down.

  “Why not?”

  Because you don’t mean it, I thought, but from the height of my twenty-five years, I knew how annoyed I got when I was told I didn’t know my own mind. “You’ll get frown lines,” I said instead, grazing my thumb over the crease between Riley’s brows. “Come on, let’s do something fun.”

  It was Sunday and school was a non-issue for another twenty-odd hours. I made the executive decision that whatever homework the children had left could wait until tonight.

  “Can we go shopping?” Riley asked, a cautiously optimistic tilt to her lips.

  “If the kids want.” Us adults had to keep them in mind, after all.

  Riley made a face, but she followed me downstairs willingly enough and even picked Zara up when her sister held out her hands.

  I relayed the suggestion to Phoenix. Zara would go along with whatever we wanted.

  Her brother remained dubious. “Shopping for what?”

  “Clothes,” Riley said.

  “And light sabers,” I supplied, trying to sweeten the pill. There was a Blu-ray and DVD player, a Netflix subscription and a perfectly functional TiVo all at the children’s fingertips, and yet Phoenix would still make me recount the original Star Wars movies to him from time to time, sound effects included. I think he just liked to see me make a fool of myself.

  He rolled his eyes. “Fine…”

  “You’re killing me with the enthusiasm, kid.”

  * * * *

  We ventured into Chinatown just as the sun was breaking through the cloud cover. It was one of those typical San Franciscan summer afternoons—stiflingly hot but overcast, the rumblings of thunder rolling in from the west. I sent up a hasty prayer that we might escape getting soaked through and trailed after the kids.

  “Don’t wander too far,” I told Riley every time she disappeared between the coat racks arrayed on the sidewalk. “Phoenix, don’t touch that,” I called out when I saw him getting his hand licked by a Great Dane nearly as big as he was. “You don’t know where it’s been…” I was more worried he’d lose a finger, but I decided against saying as much in case Phoenix thought to prove me right.

  Knowing he liked dogs but that his father was allergic made it doubly hard to drag him away, but I did it anyway. I could always take him to a petting zoo tomorrow—or maybe to a pet shop.

  It wasn’t easy calling the kids back to order, but as long as I didn’t lose them—as long as we didn’t end up the Emergency Room—I had every confidence that this first day without either of their parents around would end well.

  Optimism had always been my weakness.

  The first drops stained the sidewalk in a fine drizzle, but there were so many people making the most of their Sunday morning that I didn’t notice it was raining until we exited a no-name store where I prevailed on both Phoenix and Riley to try on a pair of pajamas. We were already halfway around the block when the storm really hit. My first thought was to pull the hood of the stroller to cover Zara before she got soaked.

  I struggled to open my umbrella and handed it over to Riley as rain beat down on us like a shower spray. “Get your brother!” I shouted over the clap of thunder. The downpour had already plastered my hair to my skull and I felt every splash of filthy puddle water strike my bare legs as pedestrians ran past. Shoppers as unprepared as we were had taken to crowding into coffee shops and bars, making the most of every available shelter. Without Zara and the stroller, I might have joined them.

  “Go, go,” I told Riley. We would have better luck a little farther up the street.

  “We should’ve stayed home!” Riley yelled back at me, disgruntled. “Where are we even going?”

  I had no idea, until I saw the washed-out pink of the building ahead. Sometimes when life gives you torrential rain, you can be misled into thinking it’s an opportunity. For me, it was more of an inconvenience, but I ushered Riley and Phoenix into the shop anyway, tracking water as I struggled to get the stroller in through the door. I was absolutely dripping as the door swung shut behind me. A few shoppers threw me sympathetic glances. There weren’t very many—this was San Francisco and the locals were more annoyed than compassionate when presented with other people’s misery.

  “Where are we?” Riley asked as she closed the umbrella and shook it dry. Her nose wrinkled. “And what’s that smell?”

  “It’s a bookstore,” I answered, wringing the runoff from my hair. I fought to keep exasperation out of my voice, but it was hard to do. I was standing in wet plastic sandals, a pair of denim shorts and a chiffon tank top that stuck to my curves in ways that fell short of flattering, feeling a long way from comfortable. I’d always had small breasts and big thighs, but my fleshy belly was a more recent development and it made me feel self-conscious to think the whole shop could see it.

  The last thing I wanted to deal with was Riley’s lip. “It smells just like it’s supposed to.” I had no desire to venture farther into the shop for fear of making more of a mess, but out in the street, the rain was coming down in sheets, spattering the asphalt. “Looks like we’ll have to wait it out, you guys…”

  I was already racking my head trying to think of ways to entertain them when I noticed Phoenix peering around a bookshelf. Riley was thumbing through the New Releases. I freed Zara from the stroller so she could stretch her legs and her hand immediately sought mine, clutching tight. As if I’d ever let her go. For better or worse, I was attached to these kids. Probably f
or the worst.

  I went to see what had Phoenix so enthralled.

  “What did you find, kiddo?”

  “They’re reading something,” he told me. “Like in church.”

  One section of the bookshop had been cleared of the usual stacks and filled with chairs arranged before a simple lectern. For a moment there, I could feel my heart skip a guilty little beat in my chest.

  I remembered the reading Elliot had told me about last night. I had seen the advertisement for the book signing on his website, too, but the whole thing was well outside my reach while I had the kids with me. If Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton hadn’t left for Santa Barbara this morning, I might have been able to beg off in the early hours and see Elliot again. As it stood, I had all but given up the hope. It annoyed me that the longing had resurfaced so easily—and that it had set me up for disappointment when there was no way in hell he’d still be around three hours after the signing ended. No one was that dedicated.

  The woman reading from the pulpit glanced up and our eyes met. I drew Phoenix away. I didn’t want to intrude.

  “They’re doing a book reading,” I explained. “That lady is the author. She’s the one who wrote, um—” I glanced over my shoulder to glimpse the banner unfurled behind her. It was a stylized picture of a woman coquettishly peering over her shoulder at the camera while her dress threatened to slide completely off her back. The title was Ravaged Ruby. On second thought, maybe it wasn’t a book a ten-year-old should know about.

  “But why is she reading?” Phoenix pressed me.

  “To get people interested in her work, I think. Or because her fans want her to. Why do you think I read to Zara?” His sister beamed at me, smiling a gap-toothed grin. Give it six years and you’ll be pestering me with questions, too, I thought. Assuming I was still with the Hamiltons in six years. The thought spawned a touch of melancholy. It wasn’t so long ago that I’d thought of this job as a temporary solution to my unemployment. Was I shooting myself in the foot by treating it as a career?

  Phoenix rolled his eyes. “To put her to sleep, like Mom used to do for me.”

  “She did?” I couldn’t school the surprise out of my voice fast enough to conceal the sentiment. I found it hard to believe, but maybe the Mrs. Hamilton I was used to wasn’t the same one that her children knew.

  The door clicked open to admit a pair of stragglers. I felt a touch of kinship—they were just as soaked as I was, if not worse, and absolutely miserable. One moment’s inattention was all it took.

  I jumped at the touch of a hand on my bare shoulder, right where the sopping strap met skin. I wheeled around, umbrella at the ready—and felt my heart promptly catch in my throat.

  “Elliot!” I gasped.

  “Hi,” he said and grinned at me—actually grinned—and stuffed his hands into his pockets. He was wearing a black button-up under last night’s leather jacket and a pair of distressed blue jeans. They fit him perfectly and they weren’t even damp. I realized I was staring.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “Waiting out the rain,” he answered easily. “Same as you, looks like. My God, you’re drenched—” He gawked at me, as if he hadn’t noticed me standing there like something that had been fished out of a river until now. “Here,” he said, stripping off his leather jacket. “Put this on before you catch cold…” He sounded like a weird mixture of my grandmother and an overly affectionate boyfriend on a first date.

  My wet dog impersonation aside, a rush of heat flooded my nethers. I’d always been a sucker for chivalry. “Oh, I couldn’t—”

  Elliot wouldn’t hear of it. “You’re completely soaked!”

  “Yeah, but I need a towel more than your jacket. Honestly,” I said, stopping his hands with mine. “I’m good. It’s just rainwater.” Acidic, probably, and crawling with carcinogens, but that was the price of living in the city. I pressed the leather jacket back into his hands.

  Elliot wasn’t pleased with my refusal. I thought he might insist some more, as men in his position often did, but to my surprise he relented with a sigh. I watched him fold his jacket over his arm, as though it was useless to him now. For some reason, his disappointment made me feel like I’d committed a major faux pas.

  I mustered a smile and shoved past the unwelcome sentiment. “You remember Phoenix and Zara, right?” I asked, endeavoring to change the subject. Elliot still remembered me after two years. I was pretty sure he’d recall the kids he’d had dinner with last night. And yet for some reason, I still found myself adding, “Phoenix and Zara Hamilton. And that’s Riley over there—”

  “Sure I do.” Elliot held out his hand to Phoenix. “Hey there, big man.”

  “Hi.” The response was suitably aloof and suspicious, and I felt a flood of tenderness at the sound of Phoenix’s icy greeting. “You’re my dad’s friend,” he said, something just slightly accusing in his tone.

  “That I am.”

  “You drive a motorcycle?”

  “Yeah—”

  “That’s lame,” Phoenix said and did his level best to sneer.

  “Phoenix,” I reprimanded, stunned. It served me right for tolerating even the slightest bit of bad manners. “That’s rude. We don’t talk like that to anyone. Apologize, please.” I felt like half of my job involved running after the kids, trying to get them to school—to dinner, to sleep—while the other half was all about scolding them for minor offenses. I wondered if this was the way of parents, as well, or if I was doing it all wrong.

  “Sorry,” Phoenix muttered, staring the checkered floor down as though it had personally offended him. It barely passed muster, but I wasn’t going to quibble at details of tone and sincerity.

  Elliot didn’t look particularly put off. “Don’t worry about it. I’ve had people say worse things about my driving.” He crouched down to put himself at eye level with Zara, something that might have worked on a less shy kid. For Zara, it only served to make her seek shelter behind my knees.

  “She’s anxious around strangers,” I explained, my hand on her knobby little shoulder. Now I was apologizing, too. Weird. I told myself it was preferable to reminiscing about masturbating to the thought of Elliot last night, particularly since he was on his knees in front of me now and just as handsome as I’d pictured him.

  Get a grip, Chase.

  He peered up at me, smirking with half his mouth. “Quite right.”

  “I thought your, um, book signing ended a while ago,” I said, for want of anything cleverer.

  “I had a date with my agent,” Elliot told me. “He wanted to show me the Vesuvio.”

  “The volcano?” I asked, the words tumbling out of my mouth before I could stop them. The urge to slap myself was almost overwhelming. I prayed for the ground to open up and swallow me whole. Typically, it didn’t.

  “The café?” He grinned, luckily, and so did I.

  “Right. Obviously.” Twenty-five years in San Francisco and the attitude to match, and still I made touristy, rookie mistakes. I felt like I was sixteen again and tongue-tied in the presence of a boy I liked. It didn’t seem to count that I knew what this particular boy looked like with his clothes off, or what he liked in bed, or how. “We were shopping,” I said, determined not to be lured in by the fluttering of his long, spidery lashes.

  “Yeah,” Phoenix interceded. “For light sabers.” My savior.

  Elliot beamed “Oh, I got a couple of those at home! Bought for my nephew’s birthday, but it turned out he already had a pair, so I kept them. You wouldn’t believe how relaxing it is to fence with light sabers.” He took one glance at me and backtracked. “Okay, maybe you would…” Elliot arched an eyebrow, tilting his head back as though scrutinizing Phoenix from a distance. “So you’re a Star Wars fan, huh? Are we talking prequels or the original?”

  Phoenix surprised me with an imperious little scowl. “What do you think?”

  “Prequels?”

  “No!” Ten years old and already he’d mastered the Art of the Glower.<
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  “Don’t get him started,” I begged Elliot. “He’ll argue with you until the moon turns blue from cold.”

  “Mom says backing down is for weak people,” Phoenix countered haughtily, looking to me for confirmation. I had no doubt she’d said it. It sounded like Mrs. Hamilton’s philosophy.

  “Your mom’s a grown-up.”

  “So?”

  I could feel Elliot’s eyes on me, his palpable interest. I wondered whether he would turn around and tell the Hamiltons that I was usurping their relationship with their son. I doubted it. For one thing, none of the people that Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton called friends seemed to notice their kids. For another, I felt that my purpose was transparent. I defied anyone who thought I had ulterior motives to spend a day handling Phoenix and his sisters.

  “So,” I said, “your mom has to try harder. We all do. We’re not as clever as we age. Just think how bad I am at Mario Kart.”

  Phoenix nodded, the tight line of his mouth softening. “Yeah, you’re pretty lousy.” There was no disputing that fact. As long as the measure of my character was correlated to my lack of talent in playing video games, we were safe.

  “I really am,” I said and breathed a little easier. “Hey, do you want to look at the books? Maybe there’s something that‘ll catch your eye. Doesn’t seem like the rain’s letting up yet.”

  “What happens if it doesn’t stop?” Phoenix asked me, stubbornly.

  It was Elliot who answered, “Then I’m afraid we’ll have no choice but to live here for the rest of our days. We’ll eat the rats in the basement to start with. And after they run out, we’ll draw straws…”

  “That’s right,” I said, solemnly backing him up. “We’ll be the world’s best read cannibals.”

  “We’ll start with the people who’ve never read Mark Twain.”

  “And continue with the obnoxious Ian Fleming aficionados,” I suggested.

  Elliot nodded sagely. “We’ll save the English majors to the last.”