Catch My Breath Page 6

  She blows out a small laugh and for a second I wonder if I said something stupid or stumbled over my words.

  “That’s crazy. I actually graduated from Fairview High last week.”

  I join her laughter, knowing had I ran into her back in high school, this would totally be considered fraternizing with the enemy. Our schools were extremely competitive against one another and the winning school always earned major bragging rights for kicking the other’s ass. Our schools loathed each other and football games with Fairview were especially brutal.

  “Did you ever go to any of the Fairview-Rosemore football games?”

  “I went to every single one. I was a cheerleader, so I cheered at all the football games. What about you?”

  My eyebrows bolt up in surprise and my chest rises with pride.

  “I played. I was the quarterback. Wow! I’m sure we crossed paths a time or two.”

  “I’m sure …”

  Silently, I start going over each Fairview-Rosemore game in my head. Other than a quick glance when they would do the whole leg kick, I really don’t remember checking out many of the cheerleaders from any of the schools; I was too focused in on winning the game and gaining a scholarship.

  “So are you going to the local college in Rosemore?”

  Suddenly, an awareness comes to me with this question. Here I am hitting on and tripping all over myself with this girl and I’m leaving in a little over a month.

  “No … I have a scholarship to play out in California, so the end of July I will be headed to UCLA.”

  An unexpected quiet falls over us and I cannot even find the words to speak. Here I’ve been in such a hurry to leave and right when everything is headed in the right direction, someone that totally captures me like no one else ever has decides to walk into my life. Timing is definitely not everything.

  Leaning closer to her, I nudge her shoulder with mine just as an excuse to touch her again.

  “What about you? Do you have any plans for the future?”

  Scooting my hand closer her way, I glance down and see her fingers only inches away, laying in the midst of pebbles, sand and dirt.

  “I got accepted to Purdue. I leave in August.”

  Well that’s just great. Where is that … Indiana? “Oh, I see. Do you know your major yet?” I ask, staring at how her skin lights up under the moon light and how every now and again she’ll lick her lips, making them glisten. I suck in a deep breath and try not to think; just listen.

  “You know, I have no idea,” she laughs as I tip my bottle back for another drink, but quickly find that it’s empty. Swapping the drink into my other hand, I then place my free one back down between us, making sure it is just a tad bit closer.

  I nervously laugh, grazing my fingers along the side of her hand and flames automatically ignite.

  “What’s funny?”

  Holy shit, I’m a dork. Did I just laugh at absolutely nothing?

  “I was just trying to figure out how I never noticed you at a game,” I say the first thing that pops into my mind. Smooth … real smooth. Make her seem like I didn’t notice her now. Had I looked her way, ever, I would without a doubt remember seeing her in a short skirt on the side line of a football field.

  A crazy beautiful smile breaks loose on her face and my whole body heats up as I slowly inch my fingers to feel her skin again. I notice her glance down, but I don’t move away one bit.

  “When’s your birthday?” She throws out giddily.

  It catches me off guard and seems out of context, but I smile, nearly embarrassed by such a simple question and excited that I see the same amount of nervousness in her as she searches for anything to talk to me about. I’m prepared to talk about the puppy I got for Christmas when I was five if I have to.

  “September … 8th.”

  “No way … ” she gasps.

  “What? Is yours that same day?” The smile on my face cannot get any bigger.

  She throws her head forward, laughing. “Oh no … mine is in September though.”

  I look at her, waiting.

  “Oh … it’s September 25th.”

  I nod my head, a strange sense of satisfaction coming over me from knowing the tiniest bit of information about her.

  Our conversation flows like beer at a frat party and before too long our friends are calling us in the distance. I could talk to her all night, but moreover, I am completely hypnotized by her lips. I do plan to kiss her. I’m not sure if it will be here or possibly when I walk her back to her cabin, but I will kiss her.

  My empty drink is still clutched in my hand with a grip that is certain to break it in half if I don’t calm down, but it is offering a nice excuse to move around and reposition my hand just a little closer to hers. I’m half tempted to just grab her hand up in mine.

  “Judd!” Evan’s voice calls out, closer now, and our time alone has come to an end.

  Of course, when I want to be left alone it doesn’t happen, but on a job site if I need help there’s never a soul in sight. Every fiber of my body is screaming for us to stay put, but I stand up with my hand held out.

  “We better go before our friends call the rescue dogs out.”

  With a solid grip, she pulls my hand and stands in front of me, falling forward before catching her balance. I place my hands as gently as possible at her hips to steady her; maybe she has caught up with her friends now.

  Gulping down this ball of nerves that has been wound up in my stomach all night, I pull her in and swear she is drawing closer to me as well. My heartbeat pounds up into my throat and although words are coming out of my mouth, I’m not quite certain what the hell I’m saying until she pulls back a bit.

  “I just think the alcohol rushed to my head or something …”

  I look down at her and a small smile emerges on her face.

  “I really like your smile, Alyssa.”

  I don’t even think; the words just tumble out of my mouth. God, I want to kiss her. Goose bumps form across her waist where my hands are located and her body shivers beneath my touch. For a second I think she may be cold, but as I move my hand a fraction of an inch across her bare skin, another shiver ignites. My confidence explodes with this.

  She keeps her eyes glued on my mouth and at this point it would be so easy to pull her flush against me and wrap my arms around her. A part of me already feels so comfortable with her that it is telling me to go for it. Instead I lean closer and ask.

  “Alyssa?” I barely hear her muffled murmur, but it sounded like a green light so I move forward hardly able to control my hunger.

  “Can I kiss you?” I say only a breath away from her lips.

  Her lips crash into mine and it’s abundantly clear that she wanted this as much as me.

  At first I go slow, unsure of her rhythm. Her bottom lip falls between mine like two puzzle pieces interlocking with one another. Our mouths move in sync, although as her chest grazes over my skin I have to focus on something other than kissing her. Don’t get turned on, don’t get turned on. Think of work. Think of …

  My head swims with visions of her skin as I slowly open my mouth. She follows my lead and I dip my tongue in on a soft, moist caress and taste the sweetness of her breath; nothing has ever felt this good.

  Although I want to run my hands down the length of her body, I hold back. However, when her hands roam over my chest in a soft wispy motion, I take in a sharp breath and my body reacts. I no longer have this situation under control. My thoughts race with the things I want to do to her and for a moment I’m confused. Has Tristan hijacked my mind? Visions of our bodies on the ground, in the water, on the dock, in my cabin, in my bed; they fog my head. What the hell.

  “Oh shit, I’m sorry,” Evan’s impeccable timing comes through. “I didn’t mean to interrupt.” The amusement in his tone sounds out loud and clear despite his words.

  “Sure you didn’t,” I mutter, even though I’m thankful for his shitty timing. Normally I would want to kill him for interr
upting such an intense moment, but something about Alyssa makes me want to slow down yet speed up at the same time. Up until a few minutes ago all we did was talk tonight, however I already feel completely at ease with her, as if I’ve known her my whole life. Last thing I want to do is screw that up by moving too fast. I’m not sure what is going on here, but I’m determined to make her mine.

  “GETTIN’ IT ON IN the woods, huh?” Evan sneaks an obnoxious look my way as we walk away from Alyssa’s cabin, but damned if I can’t get that kiss out of my mind.

  “It wasn’t like that,” I laugh, refusing to let him antagonize me over this.

  No longer able to resist the overwhelming urge to turn, I swing my head around, but instead of seeing her beautiful silhouette, I’m met by her captivating blue eyes watching me walk away. She looks right at me and her smile tells me everything I need to know; there is definitely something here. A huge grin emerges across my face like a dorky school boy with my first crush as I stare back.

  “And here I thought I had it bad...” Evan trails off and I snap my head back to look at him.

  “So what is the deal with you and her, anyways?” I ask, knowing I’ll more than likely get the same information that he’s told me before; she liked me, I liked her and now she hates me … end of story. He’s never been a big talker about his personal life, then again, we don’t sit around and share our feelings.

  His body jolts upright and he spits out a sarcastic no-way-in-hell-am-I-talking-about-this chuckle.

  “Not important,” he pauses, kicking at the ground as we walk. “So you and blondie?”

  Raising my eyebrows in amusement of him quickly changing the subject, I press my lips together to contain the silly ass grin that I’ve had glued to my face all night.

  “What time is it anyways,” I lamely counter his subject-change with my own.

  “Ha … you’re not going to tell me what went on out in the deep dark woods with your little dream girl, are you?” he pauses, but I keep my face free of emotion, carefully watching my feet tread along the pathway while still holding back a laugh. “Were you sucking face all night?”

  I remain blank, not giving in, but practically staring past the ground now and envisioning my lips on hers once again. Holy geez.

  Moving closer, Evan jabs me in the side with his elbow and I flinch, scrunching up my face at the jolt. From the corner of my eye, I see him raise his hands, cupping them both in claw-like manner as if he is squeezing something pliable.

  “Did you go in for the ole’ cup-check?” he pesters.

  A flash of her black bikini top spins through my mind and the way her chest rose with each breath she took, each word she spoke. I blow out a frustrated breath and shake off the thought. That’s an image that is sure to stick with me. I turn my head to look at Evan, noticing that the position of his hands has changed. A grin sneaks onto my face as he begins to slap his hand through the air in front of him.

  “… or did you slap that ass and make her scre …”

  “Ok..ok,” I snap with a chuckle as we near the cabin. “We just talked.”

  He spits out an exasperated snicker, “Ahh yeah, because from where I stood, it really looked like talking.”

  I roll my eyes, “Then we kissed, or well … she actually kissed me,” I say a little dumbfounded myself with that fact.

  “Wait, she kissed you? Whoa … and then what happened?”

  I crack up at his excitement, a bubbling sensation of laughter rising within me. “Then you interrupted us, you jerk-off.”

  “Oh yeah … sorry about that. The girls started asking about blondie and then her sister, Abby came and asked me to go find you two,” he drops his voice a couple octaves, trying his best to sound like a girl. “Oh.my.God, I need to find my sister. I don’t even know that guy she’s with.” He laughs. “Like you’re some serial killer or some shit like that. So basically, I had no choice in going to search you out. I was trying to steer off an angry mob of women.”

  Holding up my hand to stop his ramblings, I assure him that the interruption was needed, “Seriously don’t sweat it. My thoughts were moving us from vertical to horizontal real quick so I was thankful for the bucket of cold water, so to speak.”

  We step onto the porch of the cabin, silence all around us and only the dim lights from the shower house in the distance in front of us.

  “Why the hell would you be happy that I broke that up?”

  “You know I’m not like that. I could care less about putting notches in my belt. I actually like her.” I glance up to see if he is going to laugh, but all he does is nod, listening to what I have to say. With a grin, I add, “I did tell her where I would be working later today.”

  I look around, quickly noting the stillness of the water, the sounds of frogs croaking and crickets chirping in the night along with the soft swish of leaves and limbs brushing together right above our heads. I’m assuming it’s early morning and that means, I’ll be running on empty all damn day.

  “Ahhh, gonna get it on in the shower house, then?” He yells out a little louder than I’d prefer with his hand held up in the air as if he’s waiting for me to reward his smart-ass comment with a high five.

  Looking at his hand, then giving him a put-your-damn-hand down look, I quickly make him aware of the volume of his voice, “Quiet down … last thing I want is for Tristan to be giving me shit for this the next few weeks.” I crack the door open slowly, not wanting to wake Jake or Tristan.

  Lowering his hand with a chuckle, he shrugs as we walk inside. My eyes immediately swoop to the clock which just looks like a dark hole in the wall at this hour. As soon as I reach my bed, I grab my phone and hit the main button to light it up. 2:33 … shit.

  The annoying buzz of my phone alarm sounds less than a few hours after my head hits the pillow and I’m already dreading the exhaustion this day will bring. Mentally checking off each to-do through a sleepy fog, I grab a cup of coffee, pack a shitty excuse for a lunch, drag all the supplies from the work shed and gear up for a full day ahead.

  By mid-morning, adrenaline overpowers my sleep deprivation and I am running full-speed, ready for my work day to be over so I can find Alyssa.

  I manage to tear down all the old mirrors, paint the vaulted ceiling and walls and scrub down all the sinks. Rushing through, I check off one task at a time. Moving on to attaching the new mirrors, the entrance door that is also in bad need of replacing, creaks open behind me. Great! All I need now is to have to sit out a half hour of my work so someone can shower up. For some reason, campers from nearby grounds seem to have gotten wind that this side is temporarily closed down and have been showing up to use our shower houses. Today is not the day for this.

  Sighing, I put my best effort forth to hide my irritation, “Hang on a sec and I’ll get out of your way,” I call out as I strain to lift the new mirror into its updated bracket. These damn things are heavier than I had anticipated.

  I get it positioned in front of me and nearly drop it when my eyes land on an unexpected reflection dressed in a small animal print swimsuit and nothing else.

  “Hey,” I say with a ridiculous smile on my face. Geez, she looks amazing!

  “Hey back.” Her voice sends a shock wave through my body.

  For a minute I contemplate throwing the mirror to the floor and wrapping her up in my arms. That would probably get me fired; it’d be worth it though. She must read my mind on the whole dropping the mirror thought because within a second she is by my side snatching the screwdriver out of my hand.

  “I’ll screw, you hold the mirror.”

  I raise my eyebrows up, half turned on by her “I’ll screw” comment and half impressed that she knows how to use tools. My lips rise into a smile like there is a magnet constantly pulling them in an upward motion when she is near. I settle the mirror into the cradle of the bracket and we get to work.

  Now the day goes fast.

  “So what can I do?” she asks as I toss aside papers listing the job dutie
s for each site.

  I gulp and look around, nervous about giving her any of the tasks I have to complete. This shower house is pretty well as disgusting as they come. At this point, I have the choices of painting, which is a two person job as it is, putting the new fans up, no way am I letting her do that and then there is scrubbing the shower and putting up new curtains. That one is a definite hell no. Those showers are so crudded up with grime that I dread doing it.

  “I think I’ll put up the fans next, but I don’t have two ladders and honestly they are really heavy.” I say, half gritting my teeth and hoping I don’t offend her. Then an idea sparks to mind as I remember how easily she screwed in the brackets as I held the mirrors just a bit ago. “Can you hand me tools up, while I take down the old fans,” I ask, thankful that I left my tool belt back at the cabin.

  “Sure.” She gives me an easy, extremely contagious smile.

  Standing high up on the ladder, I loosen each tiny bolt and compile a small group on the top step. I carefully balance the fan with one hand which is hanging by a few wires, while glancing down when I hear the sharp yet quiet sounds of metal hitting a solid surface.

  “I got it.”

  I look down at the sound of her voice and see her bent down to the ground. My eyes flick to the top of the ladder, seeing a vacancy where the bolts and screwdriver were laying. Teetering back and forth on this ladder must have knocked them off.

  “Thanks,” I say, guilt crashing through my conscious until I see her bend over to grab up another run-away bolt.

  She pops up with a smile, a flaming red glow to her face and a bolt held up in her hand. “I think I got them all. Do you need them up there?”

  I shake my head, unable to summon any words at the moment. The weight of the fan knocks me out of my daze as my muscles begin to seize and fire up from the strain of the fan motor. She watches my every move as I twist the wire caps off and lower them to the ladder, instantly feeling a bit of a shuffle beneath me. Looking down, I’m greeted with her face, just below me, standing on the bottom step of the ladder with her hand reached up grabbing a hold of all the caps. A sense of excitement races through me, possibly from the brush of her chest against my pant leg or maybe even from the fact that she is so eager to help me out. I’m not sure, but it automatically has my mouth tugged into a grin as I hang onto the fan motor and slowly step off the ladder behind her. One step down and she instantly grabs the edge of it, so that it is steady.