“Fuck,” I wheeze. It’s Laphroaig.
I fucking hate Laphroaig.
I take another drink, a longer one this time. I don’t deserve a scotch I like to drink right now—or maybe it’s not that I don’t deserve it, but it’s more like I can’t imagine any part of this night being pleasant or enjoyable. Not with my ex-girlfriend fucking just yards away from me right now.
No, I want my drink to taste like shit. I want my mouth to taste like old ashtrays, and I want to get dizzily, pukingly, disgustingly drunk. Because if I’m drunk, then I don’t have to process Raven and her fucking mind games. I won’t be tempted to scroll through her Instagram to find out when she got back to L.A., if she’s still with Italian Guy, and I certainly won’t be tempted to text her.
I pull out my phone, taking another long drink of the smoky liquor and open up my messages. I deleted her number long ago, but I still have it memorized, and maybe I could just send her one text. Just one. I could call her a bitch and tell her to go to hell. Tell her I knew exactly what she was up to.
Or I could beg her to come over to my house and just fucking talk to me. We haven’t exchanged a word since the day she left, and all I’ve wanted these past three months is an explanation or an apology maybe, or even some fucking closure.
I tap in her number and open up a new message. My thumb hovers over the keyboard, the first golden glow of the scotch beginning to dull my anger. Maybe I would invite her to talk—that’s what grown-ups did, right? Talk? And if it led to me fucking all the lies and deceit right out of her skinny body...
Jesus. I’m like the werewolf who needs to be chained to a radiator during the full moon. Of course I can’t text her. Eliciting that kind of reaction is probably exactly what she wants, and fuck me if I’m going to do anything that she wants me to do.
I spin around and throw my phone as hard as I can into the pool.
It lands with a small splash, sinking like a brushed-aluminum stone straight to the bottom. My momentary satisfaction is eclipsed by immense regret, because I just got that phone a few weeks ago. Fuck it, I can get a new one tomorrow. If that’s the price I have to pay to keep myself separate from Raven, then so be it.
I take a few healthy chugs of the Laphroaig.
“I hope you’ve got a good warranty,” a cheerful voice says from next to me. Even over the smoky scent of the whisky, I smell her. Cinnamon and sunshine.
I inelegantly swallow the scotch still in my mouth, turning to face the person next to me. “Devi.”
She flashes me her sunny grin, and then returns the greeting by playfully bumping her shoulder against my arm. Heat flares across my bicep, emanating from the place where our bare skin touched, and the heat slowly migrates towards my chest, independent of the blood now pumping to my groin.
I am suddenly very aware of the fact that Devi and I have never been alone. Strange, given that we’ve given each other orgasms, but Raven’s Real Playdates was the only time we’ve worked together, and there are so many people on a porn set that it’s impossible to feel any sense of alone-ness, even when you’re staring someone in the eyes while they suck you off. And even though we’ve seen each other at parties and events since then, we’ve only ever said hi or how are you or where’s the bar? Not exactly the basis for a deep understanding of one another.
So I should probably explain to her why I just chucked a brand new phone into the water, and also maybe not reveal the fact that I have a massive crush on her.
I try to muster the casual, flirty guy I was earlier tonight. “Devi, I…”
I jack off to you almost every day.
“…I, uh, didn’t know anyone else was out here. Or I wouldn’t have, you know.” I mime throwing the phone.
She laughs and then bends down to unfasten her leather heel. “If it’s in a good case, it might still be okay,” she says. I watch, transfixed, as she kicks off both shoes, shimmies out of her shorts, and then walks to the edge of the pool. She’s wearing what legally might qualify as underwear, but only just barely.
Have I mentioned Devi Dare’s ass? Because I should. She has one of the best asses known to mankind. Plump and thick and juicy, the kind of ass that invites biting and squeezing, and the way it slopes out from her small waist is pure poetry. And those legs—despite the obvious muscles in her calves and thighs, they still move as she walks, like her ass does, and there’s something so healthy about it, so tantalizing about her body with its wide hips and slightly soft stomach and full breasts. She’s sexy in such a visceral, biological way, the kind of way that says you want to make babies with me. My cock lengthens as I watch her, tens of thousands of years of evolution telling me to haul her off and impregnate her.
She turns, hands on her hips. “Are you going to join me?”
“I was just enjoying the view,” I say, and it comes out a little too raspy, a little too honest, but then I follow it up with a weak grin, and then she laughs and jumps into the pool. With a final gulp of whisky, I put the cork in the bottle and then fling myself in after her, clothes, shoes and all.
The water is cool and it’s the best kind of contrast to the dry heat of the July night and the warmth of the scotch in my stomach—and to the new kind of warmth that’s agitating in my chest, something frictive and thrilling pressing up against my anger and my broken heart. Something that started the moment Devi brushed against my arm.
I jumped into the deep end, so it’s a few beats before my feet press flat against the bottom and I can push myself back up. I break the surface, sputtering, and awkwardly try to swim over to Devi with one hand still clenched around my scotch bottle. She treads water as steadily and gracefully as a water nymph, her long hair floating around her shoulders and her gold top drifting away from her skin, giving me just the barest glimpse of one nipple, dark rose and peaked into a tight furl. Water droplets cling to the thick fringe of her eyelashes.