His Ordinary Kiss (His Kiss Book 2) Read online

  I stood, facing him, trying to ignore the fact we were both stark-naked, I was covered in his “love marks,” and his erection was reaching towards the ceiling. I wanted to say screw it, sit on his lap, and ride him until the end of time. But that was the least healthy thing for me to do.

  “Trev… you know I’m a mess. I can’t—I don’t even know how to have a healthy relationship.”

  Trevor sighed. “I know you believe that, but it isn’t true. Your past doesn’t own you.”

  I nodded emphatically. “It does, actually. It owns me like you wouldn’t believe.”

  “Only because you let it.”

  I ignored the jibe. “I love you. You’re one of my best friends. Can we just… pretend this didn’t happen?”

  The hurt on his face made me want to take it back. I concealed my shattered pieces with a veneer of arrogance, so hurting people had never bothered me. I protected other people from me, and in return, protected myself. But this was Trevor. I never, ever wanted to see that look on his face.

  I kept my mouth shut anyway.

  With his jaw set, he stood—all six-foot-two-inches of naked Trevor.

  I almost wavered. I’m just a woman with an eye for a gorgeous male body, after all.

  “Whatever you want, Vespers,” he said as he gathered his clothes.

  I watched him leave the bedroom, and a moment later, the bathroom door clicked shut.

  * * *

  I DIDN’T MEAN TO SLEEP with my best friend.

  It was a one-off. An accident. Too much red wine and a marathon of “Orange Is the New Black.”

  Based upon the two little pink lines on the applicator resting benignly on my bathroom counter, that night was the worst decision of my life. At the time, it had been the best sex of my life. Talk about a WTF.

  The bathroom suddenly felt hot. Raging hot. I grabbed a hair clip from beneath the cabinet and used it to pull my mess of platinum dreadlocks off my neck. I fanned myself with both hands, staring at the mirror.

  The black-and-white dragon tattoo that curled up my neck was flushed red, as were the tiny green vines that decorated my ears. The silver stud in my nose glinted in the bathroom light. I was a pierced and tattooed pregnant woman.

  I sank to the toilet seat, unable to look at the pregnancy test again and verify that this was actually happening.

  How? How did this happen?

  My first inclination in a crisis was to call Boston. The day I found out I was pregnant was no exception. But I couldn’t do that. For one, she was asleep, and I didn’t want to wake her up. Just because my burning need to know if my late period and last week’s abnormal nausea meant I was baby-on-board made me get up at the crack of dawn didn’t mean she needed to lose any sleep. Not to mention I hadn’t told her about me and Trevor. In the month since, he and I had settled into a normal routine that didn’t acknowledge we’d screwed, but was sexually charged all the same.

  And two, I didn’t want to do anything to ruin her newly engaged haze. She and Ian were looking at houses and planning their dream wedding, living in this constant state of syrupy happiness that I was loath to ruin. Coming soon, it would no longer be The Boston and Vespers Show; it would be Just Vespers. Might as well learn to stand on my own now.

  Lacking Boston, I called the next best thing: my therapist.

  Luckily, Dr. Forth had an opening for me.

  I tossed the pregnancy test in the trash and unrolled an entire roll of toilet paper over it, burying it like every other issue I’d glossed over in my life. Then I washed my hands like I could wash away the very idea of being pregnant.

  Two years ago, I got a fish. A little betta fish. He lived in a bowl on the bathroom counter. His name was Jorge.

  Jorge lasted three weeks. That effort at research into “can Vespers Malone actually care for another living thing?” had failed miserably. Jorge’s small glass bowl had been converted to a toothbrush holder.

  Thus, I never got a dog. Or a cat.

  And now I was about eight months away from a tiny human.

  My chest grew tight as if someone were squeezing my heart, fingers digging into important vessels and arteries, cutting off my blood supply to the point where I was gasping for air even though nothing was wrong with my lungs. I gripped the counter to hold myself on my feet. Panic attack. I didn’t have them often, but when I did, they were awful.

  I opened the medicine cabinet and shuffled around on the shelves searching for my gaba gaba. Melatonin, because I didn’t sleep. Three different kinds of B vitamins because I was prone to melancholy and depression. Multivitamins, white oak bark for pain relief, toothpaste, deodorant, gaba. Thank God.

  I extracted a citrus-flavored lozenge and stuck it under my tongue. By the time the lozenge dissolved completely, I knew the tightness would be gone, and I’d be a little more level-headed.

  I passed down the short hallway from bathroom to bedroom, pausing briefly to stare at the patchwork quilt of images on the walls. Famous sites from all over the world: Machu Picchu, Angkor Wat, the beehive cathedrals of Myanmar, the pyramids at Giza, the Nazca Lines… None of them my own photographs, because I’d never left Tory. But my dream was to visit them all and more.

  I touched my abdomen, struck dumb by the thought that my plans were officially ruined.

  I got dressed without giving much thought to the effort: yoga pants, a long, loose tank top over a sports bra, and Toms. Hair tied back, no make-up because I didn’t have the patience for it, and I was out the door.

  I lived in a cookie-cutter gated community near downtown Tory. My small shotgun house sat just inside the “gates”—so quoted because they were never actually closed and anyone could come and go as they pleased. The house had belonged to my mom’s mom before she bought the condo on Tory Lake. Grandma Linh sold the house to me for twenty-one thousand Vietnamese dongs. About one US dollar.

  She was an odd duck, my grandmother.

  The sun shone hot and bright in a washed-out blue August sky. I could have taken the moped, but Dr. Forth’s office wasn’t even a mile away, and I could use the fresh air and the solid feel of the ground beneath my feet. While I walked, I called work and told my manager I wasn’t coming in for my shift. There was no way I could focus on being a pleasant barista while my emotions were all over the place.

  I didn’t know where to start. I’d have to find a gynecologist. I worked in a fucking coffee shop, how was I going to afford to raise a kid? And Trevor… I couldn’t think about that right now. I just couldn’t.

  Dr. Forth’s office was one of four in a converted Victorian downtown. She shared the second floor with an attorney who’d once dated my mom after he handled her divorce, while the first floor was occupied by a salon and a tax specialist. It was an awkward family, but they all seemed to coexist nicely.

  I stepped through the front door, leaving the humid Georgia air for a slightly cooler, dimmer interior. The ancient steps creaked beneath my feet. For a moment, I had the crazy thought they were judging me the way a bunch of gossipy biddies would if they knew my predicament.

  YOUNG UNWED MOTHER-TO-BE PUSHED DOWN STAIRS. More news at eleven.

  “Hey, Ina,” I greeted the receptionist, slamming the door to Dr. Forth’s office harder than necessary.

  Ina Mendez was a short, curvaceous girl with eyes so dark brown they seemed black and hair that fell in luxurious waves all the way to her ass. She was a couple years younger than me, but we’d been at Tory High together at one point.

  “Ves!” She smiled, then looked at her computer screen and clicked around a couple times before she went on. “You’re not due in till Friday.”

  “Emergency,” I told her. “I called Dr. Forth about a half hour ago.”

  “Ah.” Ina nodded sagely. “You realize only the true crazies get Dr. Forth’s personal number.”

  I sank to a chair against the wall and held up a hand. “Guilty.”

  “I’ll let her know you’re here.” Ina picked up the phone.

  Th
ere was something comforting about Dr. Forth’s office. The lobby was small and bright, painted a happy yellow and trimmed in white. The furniture was all antique wood, even the big desk behind which Ina sat. It was the kind of room a normal woman would want to see in her own home, except “normal” women didn’t have to come here. Dr. Forth’s way of giving us crazies something nice, I suppose.

  Ina placed the phone back in the cradle and said, “Go on back. She’s waiting for you.”

  I waved to her and took the hallway behind her desk, noting as usual the ever-revolving collection of photographs on the walls. Dr. Forth was an amateur photographer; she rotated her favorites in and out on the walls. Today, the theme seemed to be Ireland—everything was green. I recognized Dublin’s Four Courts in one picture, and a majestic shot of the Cliffs of Moher.

  Sometimes, I thought that was why I liked Dr. Forth so much. She lived the life I wish I could live. I wanted to travel. To get the hell out of Tory. I’d been saving money for just that endgame for five years. Now, here I was watching my plans scatter like marbles.

  I knocked on Dr. Forth’s white-painted door and entered at her command.

  “Close the door behind you, Vespers.” Dr. Forth pushed her wire-framed glasses on top of her curly auburn hair and smiled so the corners of her eyes crinkled. “I would say it’s a pleasure to see you, but it’s a full four days before you’re due. I’m assuming we’ve had a bad weekend?”

  “Oh, no. My weekend was great.” I threw myself onto the fainting couch, my seat of choice during our sessions. As Dr. Forth gathered her notebook and pen and moved to sit by me, I rambled about the ghost hunt we did on Saturday and shopping with Boston and our friend Annabelle on Sunday.

  “So where was the disconnect?” Dr. Forth asked. Her glasses were back on her pert nose, and she peered through them with vivid green eyes.

  “I didn’t start my period last week.”

  Dr. Forth didn’t react; the woman was a pro at non-emotion. “Go on.”

  “So I remembered this morning, and I had a pregnancy test under the bathroom sink. My Grandma Linh gave it to me for Christmas.”

  My therapist raised an eyebrow.

  “Don’t ask. Anyway, I tested positive. I’m pregnant.”

  Dr. Forth crooked an elbow on the soft armrest of her chair and rested her chin in her hands. “Is this a negative thing for you?”

  I nodded, tossing an arm over my eyes so I didn’t have to see anything but the backs of my eyelids. “You of all people know I’m not the best candidate for mother.”

  “Vespers, just because you suffered abuse in your childhood doesn’t mean you aren’t capable of being a great mother. On the contrary, many kids who suffer at the hands of a parent grow up to be the best kind of parent themselves.”

  I moved my arm away from my eyes but stared at the ceiling. “I know. And I know my mom is great. I’ve always thought one day I’d like to be a mom, and I’d want to be like her, right? But not right now.”

  “Do you know who the father is?”

  “Ew, of course I do.” I made a face at her implication. “When was the last time I told you I had a boyfriend?”

  Dr. Forth smiled. “Never.”

  “Exactly. He’s the only guy I’ve slept with in six months. And it was only that once… one night.” It most certainly hadn’t been once and not even twice or three times. I shivered, recalling the way he’d worked me like an expert.

  “Do you like him?”

  I shrugged, but because I was lying down, it looked more like an awkward twitch. “He’s my best friend.”

  “Seems to me this is an ideal circumstance for an accident to have happened.”

  “I can’t…” I trailed off with a sigh. I sat up, kicking my Toms off and crossing my legs Indian-style under me. “I can’t even think about telling him.”

  Dr. Forth inclined her head. “Tell me why.”

  “You don’t know him, doc. He’s so noble. He’d make a big deal out of it. Wanna get married and shit. I can’t have a relationship with him.”

  “Why are you so certain of this?”

  “I’ve ruined every relationship I’ve ever been in.”

  “Yet he’s your best friend. How do you keep your friendships together if you’re incapable of maintaining relationships?”

  “I guess… I don’t know. By being me?” Her questions were making my head spin, which wasn’t uncommon in her presence.

  “Would you not think that works the same for a relationship?”

  I paused. “No. I have to be a different person or the relationship won’t work.”

  Dr. Forth pursed her lips in a smile, as if she were trying not to laugh. “Ah. So much is explained. Have you considered abortion?”

  I shook my head. “Never. I mean, I’m about as pro-choice as you can get, but I wasn’t raped. Trust me, that sex was insanely consensual. I’m plenty old enough. Yeah, my finances aren’t so hot, but I know my mom and my grandmother will help me. Like they always do when I get in a jam.”

  “First of all,” Dr. Forth said with a chuckle, “let’s not call the baby ‘getting in a jam.’ It’s a baby, Vespers, not a missed rent payment. You’ve got a long road ahead of you. And the father deserves the truth, don’t you think?”

  “What about my father?”

  Dr. Forth nodded. “This is where your fear lies. Your belief that you cannot function in a relationship goes back to your father. But you mustn’t allow his crimes against you to taint your view of a friend whom you obviously adore.”

  “My father taints everything in my life,” I said bitterly. “If he didn’t, I wouldn’t come sit on your couch every two weeks.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  After I left Dr. Forth, I went back home and crawled in bed, feeling sorry for myself.

  There was a part of me that knew I had to tell Trevor. It wasn’t a matter of if; it was a matter of when. After that night, he and I had settled back into life as it had been before we jumped each other’s bones. Five weeks had passed. He hadn’t brought it up and neither had I, but I couldn’t lie to myself. There was something between us that hadn’t been there before. It wasn’t just sex and desire, though there was plenty of that on my end. Seemed to be plenty on his too by the way he lingered in my personal space and touched me as often as possible. He made even a shoulder tap feel sexy.

  There was more than lust, too. When I saw him, my heart skipped a beat. He made me laugh. A smile from him could make my day that much brighter.

  I slept fitfully, drifting among dreams of a baby that looked like Trevor.

  * * *

  WHEN I AWOKE AT SEVEN, the house was dim and quiet but for the leaky faucet in my bathroom.

  I grabbed a white tank top and an ankle-length skirt tie-dyed in shades of red. In the bathroom, I washed my face to wake up. As I dried my skin, I stared at myself, thinking I looked tired. There was even a little fear in the slanted eyes I’d inherited from Grandma Linh. For good reason.

  I hopped on the moped, my satchel draped diagonally around my shoulders, and took a right turn out of the neighborhood.

  Starbucks had become headquarters for our ghost hunting business. It used to be because it stayed open late, but it had become a mutual relationship. A rumor had started to circulate that the Tory Starbucks was haunted, and the baristas hadn’t done anything to quell it. The store manager swore she’d seen an uptick in sales since the rumor began.

  I guess, technically, it was haunted when Boston the unbelievably-lifelike-Earthbound-ghost was there.

  I entered the shop on a blast of frigid A/C, clutching the strap of my bag in one hand. I noted Boston and Trevor sitting at our table in the corner as I stepped up to the register.

  My favorite barista greeted me. “Hey, Vespers! The usual?”

  Lane was a tall, lanky girl with porcelain skin and curly, rust-colored hair. She worked evenings, so she knew us all by name and drink.

  “No. Um, just a vanilla bean tonight.”


  Her sapphire gaze narrowed, and she looked at me scant-eyed. “No caffeine?”

  I shook my head and held out my Starbucks card. “I plead the fifth.”

  My heart pounded as I crossed the cafe, headed for the same table we sat at every night we worked. Trevor had headphones covering his ears, his gaze on the computer screen. Boston sat across from him, her combat boots kicked up on another chair and her fingers clicking a wireless mouse.

  Boston was short and thick but muscular with the most beautiful, square-jawed face I’d ever seen. She kept her dark brown hair pulled back when she was with us, but I knew Ian preferred it down. She’d even stopped dying it almost-black and had let it revert to its natural color. Ian had brought Boston out of her shell and made her more comfortable with herself. It seemed to me that was what a healthy relationship did to a girl, though I most certainly couldn’t speak from experience.

  She glanced up as if she could feel my regard. Her face lit up. “Ves! Come here. Look what I found.”

  I moved to stand over her shoulder as she paged back through the images we’d taken at a job two nights before. She stopped on an image of the kitchen. The Kayrouzs’ home was barely ten years old, but in the last few years, activity had picked up in the house. Their house was in the first development phase of a project called Sunlight Vistas, and the second phase two blocks over was plagued with haunting activity.

  The vague outline of a woman emerged from the beige laminate flooring. She had no substance or color, only wispy, smoke-like outlines.

  “She’s in the floor,” I remarked.

  Boston nodded. “Think about it. This house didn’t exist when she did. She’s standing on the ground. I guarantee she has no idea that house or the family is even there.”

  “A Shade?”

  Boston nodded. “A Shade.”

  “Unlike our own personal Earthbound?” Trevor joked. I hadn’t realized he’d even taken off his headphones.

  Boston stuck her tongue out. A couple months back when we were working on her sister’s house, Horeland Estate, she’d met Ian, her now-fiancé. Ian was a super-strong, super-solid spirit who lived at Horeland. He looked, smelled, and felt like a real person, but could disappear like a ghost. Boston had had to reevaluate her early theories on the different types of haunts, and had come to the conclusion an Earthbound was merely the next stage of existence after humanity. Not a spirit.