“No, it’s okay,” he says, laying the dustpan and broom carefully atop the now-clear nightstand. “I think I sort of... like you wearing it. I mean, I like that someone’s getting some use out of it. And it looks... it looks nice on you.”
The intensity of Charlie’s gaze fades into something else, something fragile and sweet. It’s honestly terrifying. Because Gretchen has been here before. Standing in front of a man who looks at her like she might be something special, someonespecial. And the last time she let herself be honest in the way she wants—needs—to be with Charlie, that look transformed so quickly into disgust and hatred. She didn’t lose everything back then. But she did lose everything that mattered.
Arguably, there’s even more at stake now. Yet, as she weighs what to say next, it isn’t her spirit medium shop or money that she’s afraid of losing. It’s this place. It’s Charlie.
But she’s definitely going to lose him if she keeps holding back. So she can’t anymore.
Still, she inclines her head, not quite brave enough to look at him, to watch his expression shift. Gretchen takes a deep breath.Lean into the truth whenever you can. “What you said about the sweaters being full of the love of whoever made them... Charlie, I—I think I took this one because I wanted to feel what it would be like to be surrounded by yours.”
“Oh,” he says quietly, simply. There’s a long silence before he asks, “And?”
“And?”
“How does it feel?”
Her voice is wobbly when she finally answers. “Warm. Warm and... safe. Right.”
“Oh,” he repeats, with a small nod. Then: “What—” Charlie clears his throat. “What if I asked you to give it back?”
Said in any other tone, Gretchen might take this as a reprimand. But his question is full of heat, and his eyes have changed yet again, now darker, his pupils large.Not wanting you isn’t the issue.Those words from this morning clatter around her head like a dropped metal bowl on ceramic tile. She wants him too—so badly it makes her ache in every hidden corner and crevice of herself. Gretchen has already chosen honesty, and is there anything more honest than simplywanting? She bites her bottom lip. “Then I guess I’d be naked.”
“God, Acorn.” He closes his eyes as if it might keep him from picturing her bare body beneath the misshapen wool. By the rapid rise and fall of his chest, it’s clear that this strategy isn’t particularly effective.
She doesn’t want this to be too convenient. If they’re going to do anything now, Gretchen wants it to be incontrovertibly clear that Charlie made the decision of his own volition. So she gingerly pads over to the dresser and hoists herself atop it, putting more space between them—one small, final obstacle he’ll need to overcome before anything else happens.
Not that she particularly wants him to change his mind. “You can check, if you don’t believe me,” she says, and parts her knees an inch—just enough to be a suggestion, an invitation.
Charlie moves cautiously toward her. Not out of hesitation, though. More like a big cat approaching its prey. And then he’s there. Being on top of the dresser decreases their height difference, and Gretchen savors the way he looks straight ahead at her instead of down.
“I’d be a fool,” he says, wrapping his right hand around her left calf, “to believe anything that comes out of that scheming mouth of yours.” But even this is imbued with hunger and something almost like a sense of wonder. His fingers coast up her leg, leaving a trail of tingling heat in their wake. Gretchen shivers despite being the opposite of cold, and goose bumps rise up onher skin. When he reaches the crooked hem of the sweater draped over her upper thigh, his other hand joins in on the opposite side to slowly, slowly draw the wool up. As he nudges the sweater higher, Gretchen lets her legs fall open wider, and Charlie nestles between her knees. His breath is ragged and hot in her ear as the hem continues its painstakingly unhurried journey toward her hips, calloused hands warm and slightly abrasive on the skin of her thighs right below.
Everything is hot anticipation. The moment feels like it could go on forever. Gretchen wonders if she might never escape it, sentenced to be eternally enthralled and unsatisfied. But she doesn’t want to hurry him, doesn’t want to make a wrong move and break this fledgling accord between them. So she digs deep into her patience reserves, remaining calm even when he pauses for a second as he reaches her hips, finding no fabric beneath his fingertips.
“Guess you were telling the truth this time,” he says at last.
But while his tone is full of swagger, his cheeks are flushed. The special brand of gotcha euphoria she experiences only around him rushes through her, almost painful in its intensity. And Gretchen can’t take it anymore. She throws her arms around his neck and kisses him, muttering words of approval when his hips meet the dresser as he pulls her to its edge.
“I’ve tried so hard to not want this.” Charlie closes his eyes as Gretchen slides her hands over the work-hewn shape of his stomach, his chest, as she kisses and nips at his jaw. “And I can’t do it anymore,” he says. “I give up. I know I might regret it, but I give up.”
His words echo Gretchen’s feelings so exactly that it’s like they bounce around in her chest, ricocheting off her ribs and smacking into her heart. “You still think I’m a liar?” she asks in between frantic bites and licks at his bottom lip.
He matches her aggressiveness, digging his fingers into her hips the way she likes so much. “I don’t know what you are anymore.”
“Believe me. This thing between us is far, far from a lie, Charlie,” she says, taking one of his hands away from her hip and moving it to the apex of her thighs. “Do you feel how much I want you? I can’t fake that.”
His fingers part her, and one slides through her slickness, testing, as he lets out a quiet curse. Charlie runs the finger back and forth through her folds, then brings it up to paint Gretchen’s bottom lip with her own desire. He watches, rapt, his eyes hooded, as her tongue darts out to sweep over the evidence of her truth-telling.
Before she can register being scooped up, Gretchen is deposited on the bed. Charlie crawls up her body until she’s flat beneath him. She reaches for the hem of the sweater, lifting up slightly to take it off, but his hand comes to her shoulder and lowers her again. “Leave it on.”
He takes her arms and directs them above her head, then ties the too-long sleeves together around one of the wrought iron posts in the headboard.
Gretchen stifles a laugh, trying not to ruin the moment. “You know I could just slip right out of this if I wanted, right?”
“I know. But you’re not going to, are you?”
She bites her lip and shakes her head. This is exactly how she hoped he would be—this mixture of rough and soft that she’s been drawn to from the moment they met.
“Good girl,” he says, sending a new, even sharper jolt of desperation through her.
