This seemed to bring something out in me but stilled him. I peppered his face and neck with kisses.
“What’s wrong?” I asked him.
“This isn’t right,” he told me, but his body told me differently.
“It doesn’t feel wrong,” I told him, sucking on the lobe of his ear.
“January,” he moaned before sitting up and bringing me with him.
I continued to kiss him and he kissed me back. He wanted this but he was fighting me the entire way.
“January,” he said softly, kissing the side of my neck. “This secret I’ve yet to earn. It’s not right for me to learn you yet. Please,” he said, kissing my forehead, “I can’t do to you what I’ve done with the others. I owe you so much more than that. You’re worth so much more.”
A heated embarrassment painted my entire body. “I’m so sorry,” I said, wrapping the robe tighter around my torso, feeling so ashamed of myself.
Tom stood and adjusted his clothing before helping me to my feet. He brought me close to him and hugged me, kissing the top of my head. “Don’t be sorry,” he said, running his hands down my back. “There’s nothing to be sorry about. We’re just going to do this right, is all.” He eyed me with a slight smirk. “It’ll be hard as hell, but I’m determined.”
“Thank you,” I told him sincerely.
“No, thank you,” he said, kissing my temple.
I startled when someone knocked on my door.
“January?” I heard Grandma Betty say on the other side.
Tom panicked but I stifled laughter.
“Yes, Maimeó?”
“Are you in there alone with a boy?” she asked.
“Yes, Maimeó, but we’re behaving,” I told her truthfully, running my hand along the side of Tom’s face, he buried it in my hand and kissed my palm.
“All the same, young lady...out.”
This time we both laughed. “Yes, Maimeó.”
“Also, there’s ’bout fifteen people sittin’ out on our front lawn. Would you know anythin’ about that?”
Chapter Fourteen
The Gambler
Six months later...
Thomas
“Move your hand a little to the left,” the photographer told me.
January and I were at a photo shoot for Junkie, a national music mag doing a piece on the people who helped shape the bands America knows and loves. We were honored, to say the least, because we were being featured in the article and might even earn the cover. Apparently, they were impressed.
They’d done a short interview a few weeks prior already and it was time for the shoot. They’d done a few posed shots and told us to take a minute while they made some adjustments to the set.
I threaded my hands through January’s while we waited.
“What do you want to do tonight?” I asked her.
She playfully leaned back, forcing me to hold her body weight upright for her. I couldn't help but laugh at her.
“I’m not sure. What do you want to do?” she asked, bringing her face up, her nose near mine and wiggling her brows.
I swung her in my arms and she laughed out loud.
“You mean besides you?”
“Stop,” she laughed.
“How about we grab a bottle and meet the gang for a game or something.”
“Yeah, that’s it. That’s what we’re doing tonight.” January got on with my friends better than I did, it seemed. “Well, that and making out.”
I grinned at her. “Oh, you’d like to make out with me, J?” I asked, wrapping my arms around her waist and blowing into her neck.
She laughed. “Hell yeah I do.”
Music was playing in the room so I swung her in my arms and began dancing with her, shifting her from side to side. Her hair swayed across the hand I had splayed against her back and I felt her shiver at my touch. God, how she affected me with her reactions.
“How about we skip the wine, our friends and the game and go right to the make out part.”
“Okay,” she said in a silly voice.
I attacked her neck with my lips, following up her jaw and kissing her lips softly and slowly. Lazily, taking my sweet ass time, I tasted her tongue, running my own against the ridge of her teeth.
“I love you, January,” I said, when the kiss broke.
“I love you too, Tom.”
I ran my hands down her face and lightly squeezed her cheeks, puckering her lips a little. I kissed them and brought my hands down.
That’s when we realized we had an audience, and a large one at that. January’s face lit up to impossible shades of red and I instinctively tucked her into my side.
“Sorry, we didn’t realize you were waiting,” I apologized.
“It’s okay,” the photographer smiled, as he put up his camera “you’re done. You’re free to go.”
“Oh,” January said, “but I thought - never mind. Cool.”
We wrapped up the shoot and decided to head to my apartment. Grandma Betty’s wasn’t exactly conducive to make out sessions, if that wasn’t already obvious. My lease was up a few weeks after I got the R&D position and January helped me move into my own place. Yeah, it was a studio, but it was mine and I’d never had anything to myself before.
“When do the mags come out?” January asked, rummaging through my fridge for a Coke.
“Next month, on the first. They’re sending us our own box.”
What I hadn’t told January and for a very good reason was that I ensured they’d go to her studio on a day I knew we’d both be there because this magazine wasn’t just an article on what we did for Seven. Oh no, it was much, much more.
“Oh, cool,” she said, popping the top off the glass bottle in her hand.
“Come here,” I said, tossing myself on my bed and flipping the stereo on.
She took a swig and set the bottle on the bar before coming over and cuddling into my side.
“I like this,” she said getting comfortable and kissing my neck.
Get used to it, I thought.
We kissed for hours. I didn’t know how many more make out sessions I was going to be able to endure. I found her fascinating and every time I touched her, I felt more and more drawn to her.
“Come on,” I told her later as she was falling asleep.
She groaned in displeasure. “Let me just sleep here,” she complained.
“No, come on. I’ll take you to Sam’s.” Sam’s is where January would sleep sometimes on the weekends. Sam didn’t care because she was barely there and I had peace of mind at Sunday night dinners with Grandma Betty and her curious eyes. That woman saw all. Especially since our last "conversation."
“Fine,” she huffed, blowing her hair out of her eyes and sitting up.
I looked on her. “Just a few more minutes,” I conceded, making her smile.
She fell into my arms and all felt right with the world.
April 1st, the next month
Thomas
I took extra special care to look nice that day. I wore the suit I wore to Callum and Harper’s wedding and even went to the trouble of buying new black Converse for the occasion. I cut my hair, but not so much that I couldn’t still tuck it behind my ears.
That entire morning I paced back and forth in my office. Suzanne asked if I wanted decaf and I told her that I wanted nothing. She kept looking at me with this worried expression. It made me want to laugh. My office felt stifling, so I cracked the window at the top of my ceiling with one of those circulating bars. I played with that thing so much when I first got there, I thought it was going to break. It was probably the only thing that kept me from messing with it so much.
I turned on a few tunes, thought better of it and shut them off then rethought that as well and picked a few Max Richter songs to rotate at a low volume instead. I messed with the pillows on my sleek black leather sofa a million times before finally realizing January wouldn’t even notice. I had Suzanne dust my long windowsill and water the plants the day before and those looked good.
I was just straightening my Warhol print when I heard January’s lively voice telling everyone around her hello. My entire body went bloody warm and my hands began to shake. I sat in my chair and picked up a book, thought twice and pretended to be working on my computer.
“Hello, Suzanne!” I heard her say and I had to clench my jaw shut to keep it from chattering.
“Hi, Miss MacLochlainn. You can go right in!”
“Thank you!” January said before bursting into my office like a breath of fresh air.
“Howdy!” she said, dancing into my office, swinging a cardboard box around.
“Hi, babe,” I spit out, barely.
“They’re here!” she sang, plopping the box onto my desk.
She took the scissors from the cup on my desk and opened them so the sharp part was exposed. She ran the length through the tape binding the entire thing and I swear to God I thought I could hear my heartbeat in my ears. I stood quickly and shut the door before sitting back down in my chair. I tried to rest my hand on my mouse but it was trembling so badly, I pretended I needed something from my shelf. I stood, retrieved the tape, the tape?, then sat back down. Thankfully, she didn’t notice and I abandoned the worthless tape in front of me.
I set my arms on the rests of the chair and folded my quaking hands over my stomach.
“Ooh!” she exclaimed, making me sit up a bit. “We’re on the cover after all!” She drank in the image of us and turned it toward me. “Oh my God,” she breathed.
I somehow brought my face down from staring at her eyes and noticed the pic they’d chosen. It was January and me, but not in one of the posed shots like I expected. In fact, it was a candid shot of us when we thought no one was watching. We were both laughing, my face almost buried in her neck, and her hair falling back. We looked so incredibly happy.
I swallowed.
“Can you believe how beautiful this shot is, Tom?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said matter-of-factly. “You’re in it.”
“Tom,” she choked, a small tear escaping her eye. She smiled gently, wiped it clear of her face and took a steadying breath. She flipped open the magazine and took a seat in the chair at the foot of my desk. She brought her feet up and crossed her ankles on the glass.
“Let’s see,” she said, looking up the index.
Oh my word, here we go, I thought.
She looked at me like she’d only just noticed me and smiled again, making my heart stutter. “Well, don’t you look smart today,” she said before standing up and kissing me, then sitting back down.
I think I’m going to have a heart attack. “Th-thank you,” I stuttered but she was too distracted to notice.
“Okay,” she said, “page seventy-nine. Seventy-nine,” she repeated, flipping through the pages. My knee bounced rapidly and my hand slapped down to still it.
She looked up at the noise. “You okay, buttercup?”
“Uh-huh,” I offered.
“Okay,” she sang and went back to searching. “Sixty-eight,” she teased. “Seventy-two.” My heart beat rapidly in my chest. “Ah! Here we are. Seventy-nine.”