Running Back Read online

  The stones came into view almost immediately, jutting out between the straw colored grasses. “There are around two hundred dolmens in Ireland, and most of them are up north. But Cork—Cork is filled with them too. Standing stones and portal tombs. Whole megalithic complexes.”

  Before us, the landscape sprawled out, a majestic patchwork of rolling greens, of dark bushes and pale grasses and startlingly bright mosses. It looked endless, almost, except you could see the blaze of fire far out over the water.

  Staggered stones rose out of the ground, massive boulders roughly shaped into points. We climbed a small hill and stopped before the portal tomb. A heavy, ancient capstone lay tilted across a handful of backstones, looking like it might slide off any minute and cause a small earthquake.

  Mike traced a ridge in the stone. “When was it built?”

  “Maybe five-thousand years ago. Older than the pyramids.” We slowly started around the monument. “I get why they believed in fairies here.” I glanced over at him. In the darkness, only his hair glinted. His strong jaw and broad shoulders made him look like he’d stepped out of the tales himself. “You’re perfect, actually.” He met my eyes, startled. “Put you in a tunic and give you a torc instead of a tie, and you could have been here for thousands of years.

  “We did a unit on fairytales in seventh grade, and my project was about fairy portals. Rings of stones or mushrooms. I used to daydream about going through one. Ending up in Fairyland. Where everything was beautiful and perfect and magical.”

  He reached out and planted a hand against one of the supporting boulders. And then, before I realized what he was planning, he planted his arms on the stone and swung himself onto the capstone.

  I gasped and grabbed for his leg, but he evaded me easily. “Are you crazy?” My heart beat frantically as he sprawled across the stone. “You have to get off!”

  “Do I?” He grinned down me. Mad, beautiful, just as a fairy king ought to be. He reached down. “Come on.”

  I shook my head resolutely. “No.”

  “Natalie.” A wicked gleam lit his eyes. His hand taunted me. “Now.”

  And then, because I was clearly mad, too, I placed my hand in his, braced my leg and was pulled up onto the capstone. I landed half across him, and he righted me in his lap, his arms at the small of my back. His scent mingled with the summer night, grass and earth and stone. “This is very wrong.”

  He laughed. “Are the fairies going to punish us?”

  I wound my fingers through his hair, admiring the play of silver and fire. “You are very bad at being Irish.”

  He kissed me. His hands slid along my back, pressing me closer, and his tongue met mine in a slow, perfect dance and I no longer cared what was right and who we were. Not tonight, with a dome of fast stars blazing far above us. Not here, on this portal into a different world, a different reality, one that was just us and warmth and beauty. I wanted to have him, for him to have me, to belong to each other here in this wild land on the edge of the world. So I packed my reasons for coming to Ireland away in a little box at the back of my mind, and when he lay down on the cold hard stone, I followed.

  My knees landed on either side of him, my dress rucked up around my waist. I bent my body toward his, needing to be closer, to edge out the air between us until we were a seamless blend of heat. I’d never felt so urgent before, never ached with desire until I felt like my body might combust. Maybe because I’d never slept with anyone who I’d understood so entirely, inside and out, who fascinated me and drew me and pulled me apart. I’d always been so comfortable, so relaxed, like sex was just one more recreational activity that wasn’t so important one way or the other, but I wanted Mike like I’d wanted Kilkarten, and I wanted him now.

  My hair fell in thick, pale waves over my shoulders, dangled down to brush his chest. He kissed me as his hand moved to the zipper of my dress. Cool night air brushed my spine, followed by the warmth of his fingers.

  But. “We can’t.” I sat up, my hands planted firmly on his chest. I wanted to tear off his suit jacket, to rip off the buttons.

  “Why not?” He sat up slowly, his hands holding me at the small of my back. My legs wrapped around his waist as he rose, and my hands slipped up to clutch at his shoulders. I could feel how much he wanted me, feel every hard inch moving against me as we shifted, and I let out a low moan. His lips found mine again and I pressed against him, rocking my hips forward, one hand walling down toward his waist. Pressure surrounded me, enough that I thought I might lose everything there.

  Except some tiny piece of sanity made me pull my head back. “Pyramids.”

  He didn’t stop kissing me. One hand twined in my hair as he angled my head back. I groaned, and his other hand slipped under my dress. His fingers slid along the curve of my leg while his thumb brushed my inner thigh. Heat shot through me as he teasingly inched his hand higher. “I dunno. Didn’t the Celts have some giant fertility festival? They’d probably cheer us on.”

  “Beltane.” I pushed back as the word fertility sunk in. “No, we really do need to stop. Unless you have a condom in your wallet.” I jumped off the dolmen and looked back up.

  For a minute I just stared at him, disordered and gorgeous and unworldly, but staring wasn’t enough. “Come on.”

  His eyes lit and he jumped down much more gracefully, and we ran with locked hands to the truck. In a minute I had it blazing down the path, still shaking with need and at the withdrawal of his touch.

  He slid his hand over my thigh, and my breath hitched, my hands tightening on the wheel. He traced the hem of my dress, and slowly, slowly pushed it up my thigh with one finger. I reached down with one hand to press his still, then hurriedly let go as the road turned. “You’ll make me crash. Um...” I tried to think. “Anything I should know? About health.”

  “No, I’m good. You?”

  “I am great. As long as we get to the inn alive.”

  I’d barely put us into park before Mike was kissing me. We were cramped and twisted and laughing in the car seats, and then he pulled me to his side and I banged my elbow and my knee. “Ow.”

  We tumbled into his room in a whirl of hands and kisses and skin. “Zipper,” I gasped between kisses.

  “Turn around.”

  I could barely make myself move, but I did, and instead of pulling down the metal tab, he slid his hands over my hips and pressed his lips to the juncture of my neck and shoulder. I rolled my head to the side to give him greater access, and tried to keep breathing as his tongue stroked my skin and his fingers played patterns against my lower stomach. I reached my hands up and behind so I could weave my fingers through his hair, and the motion pushed my breasts high up. He groaned and I let out a tiny huff of laugher, turning my neck and trying to reach his lips with mine. He refused to meet them, and instead traced a long line of kisses from my temple to my ear.

  When he reached the sweet spot behind it, his teeth and tongue pressing and tugging, my knees buckled and I gasped, air coming in little breaks as shudders ran through me. He laughed low, and pressed his body against mine until I was caught up between him and the door. With one hand, he gathered my wrists and pressed them above my head. The wood was cool against my cheek; my breasts and pelvis strained against it as my thighs trembled. Behind me, Mike was hot and hard and strong. I leaned my head back against him, too shaken to move.

  Then he pressed his lips against my shoulder and stepped back. Still, he kept my hands trapped as he slowly, slowly unzipped my dress, the fabric peeling back. “There,” he said softly, and he let go.

  I turned, and he was watching me with fire in his eyes, the kind of liquid flame so strong it could burn on water. Mike O’Connor, charming, good-natured Michael O’Connor, had no masks now, no smiles except that slow, crooked one as I reached for the sleeves of my dress with studied slowness. I didn’t take my eyes off his face as I
slid the fabric down, barring each centimeter of skin languidly, until the dress caught for a bare second on my breasts before falling in a wisp of black to the floor.

  “God, you’re beautiful.”

  And my lips rose in the most perfect smile, a smile I felt in my eyes and my head and my heart, because I believed he meant it. I’d never been able to appreciate being found beautiful without getting tangled up in thoughts of my mother and the commodification of beauty. Now, I just wanted to be beautiful for Mike. “Your turn.”

  But he didn’t obey the rules. Instead, he caught me up in his arms, dragging his lips over mine. He was greedy and demanding and I responded in kind, wrapping myself around him until even the thin layer of his shirt was too much between us. I yanked at the cloth, fighting with the abominable buttons even as he unhooked my bra and slid the straps down my shoulders. And then we separated for a bare moment, long enough to turn our clothes to heaps on the floor before we tumbled into bed.

  I had meant to be deliberate, a change from our desperateness on the hill. But he groaned my name and pressed his lips to mine, and then there was nothing in me but the frantic desire to be close to him, to touch him, to see the want in his eyes and know I’d inspired it. His mouth blazed hot down my neck while his thumb spiraled closer and closer to my nipple. Then his mouth replaced his hand and I groaned, arching beneath him as my whole body shuddered with desire.

  I pulled at him until the full weight of his body lay against me, wonderful and strong and mine. My hands ran across his back, learning the contours of his muscles. He pressed hard against me, moving with aching, teasing slowness as I craved more.

  “Get the goddamn condom,” I gasped, and he laughed, low and husky. For a moment there was cool air that didn’t belong between us, and then he drove into me, whispering my name as I cried his. I clung to him and met his rhythm, hot and wild and beautiful. And then golden sensation swept through me, and I wrapped my arms around Mike and hoped I’d never have to let him go.

  * * *

  I woke completely intertwined with Mike. I tried to pull away, but he towed me back. He pulled me on top of him, his eyes still closed as his mouth found mine. He kissed me deeply, possessively, and I responded, my fingers tangled in his hair, inebriated by his mouth and his body. This time we were slow and gentle as we traced each other’s contours and learned our rhythms. Afterward, I lay with my head on his chest, thinking that I was pretty hungry but that I didn’t want to move. Conundrum.

  “I was thinking.”

  I turned my head a little but only succeeded in seeing his jaw. It was a very nice jaw, though, so I kissed it. “About what?”

  “Why do you always act so nice and cheerful to people you don’t know?”

  I rolled over to face him better. “Didn’t you say you do the same, once? That you smile because it makes life easier.”

  “But I’m curious about how you arrived there. Why do you to do that?”

  I thought about it. “I guess it developed naturally. I smiled all the time growing up, to be polite. And then I went to college and decided I wanted to be someone else, and—I don’t know, I just found it easier to be happy, and interested, and pleasant. Because then everyone likes you.”

  “Or they like who you’re presenting.”

  “It didn’t make a difference to me. I didn’t really have a personality—just—obedience.”

  “So you manipulated people because then everyone thought it was their idea and they still liked you. Easier than confrontations.”

  I drew my knees up to my chest. “I wouldn’t have put it like that.”

  He let out a breath. “I was going to go to UMass. Then I picked Notre Dame instead, because it was further away. My dad had been dead six months, and no one there knew, and I just smiled and played ball and they liked me.” He half laughed. “I didn’t have to talk for months. I just smiled.”

  I traced a pattern on the comforter. “I can tell the difference in your smiles.”

  He raised a brow. “You cannot.”

  “Yes, I can.”

  He smiled a slow, seductive smile, his eyes heavy. “Okay. So what does this one mean?”

  It meant we were late down to breakfast.

  * * *

  We drove out to Blarney Castle with Mike’s family for the afternoon. MacCarthys built the fortress six-hundred years ago, and today tourists flocked to see the stronghold and to receive the gift of gab by kissing the bluestone block.

  Which I wouldn’t do, because any stone worth kissing had usually been peed on.

  We crossed grounds filled with gardens and a meandering brook before reaching the tall, rectangular keep, and then we climbed a narrow, spiraling staircase to the battlements. When we emerged, we looked over the lichen spotted, weathered stones to a view of apple green lawns and trees. To one side we could see the 19th century Blarney House, while to another we saw the brook we’d crossed and a picturesque round tower. Anna commandeered another tourist as a photographer, and positioned us all before the fields and then the Blarney Stone, which looked much like every other stone. And she kissed it of course, and then Lauren and Mike and I caved as well and hung backward over the steep drop. A gentle looking employee held me securely, his tip jar crammed with euros and pounds and dollars. The blood rushed to my head as I pressed my lips against the cool rock.

  Mike raised a brow when I came back up. “Like you need more reasons to talk.”

  “But now I will babble eloquently.”

  Anna even managed to bully Kate into kissing it. She actually acquiesced easily enough. “I’ve already spent most of my life bending over backward for my children. Why should today be any different?”

  We walked through the gardens and the rock close, where everything was named Witches Stone or Fairy Glade or Wishing Steps, and then we stopped by the stable before heading for the house tour. I leaned against the low stone wall and stared at the water and fields while Anna took pictures.

  After less than a minute, footsteps padded behind me, and an easterly breeze washed his scent over me and lifted my hair. He braced his arms just as mine were and didn’t look my way. “So. Tamara Bocharov.”

  When had he even—Kate had mentioned I’d looked like her yesterday. I’d completely forgotten. Had he looked it up before or after last night?

  I forced a soft laugh. “If you call her a MILF, I’m going to throw up.”

  He turned his head. “Why did you just do that?”

  I’d thought I’d handled his discovery fairly well. “Do what?”

  “Turn the source of one of your issues into bad comedy material.”

  I stiffened. “I think I’m allowed to react however the hell I want to about my family.”

  “Yeah, but that wasn’t your reaction, you just slapped it on so I wouldn’t see how you really felt. You know, it’s okay to talk about your family issues. I find it kind of helps.”

  I turned so my back pressed against the wall and my elbows rested on it. “Really?”

  He gave me the crooked grin I loved. “Don’t let it go to your head.”

  I smiled apologetically. “Sorry I snapped. But I’m fine with my mom. Really.”

  “Then how come you never once mentioned she spent ten years modeling all over the world?”

  So, he’d done his research. Or at least read her Wikipedia page. “I’m not going to run around inserting her into conversations. That’d be awkward.”

  “No, but you shouldn’t hide from it. It’s not a badge of shame.”

  “Are you kidding?” I was hot and embarrassed and angry. “Of course it is.”

  We stared at each other and I felt even sicker. “Don’t tell anyone I said that.”

  “I won’t.”

  I took a deep breath and collapsed on the swing. “How’d you know it was one of
my buttons?”

  His arm brushed mine. “The first time I complimented your eyes you freaked out.”

  What? No. When had that happened? “No way.”

  He tilted his head.

  I sighed. “It’s just weird, you know? Like, she thinks what I’m doing is so weird, and she doesn’t even realize how messed up her own career and life was.”

  He didn’t say anything, so I let my thoughts verbally roll out. I didn’t talk about my mother often—with my brothers, I always felt like I had to defend her, and the same with Cam, though I knew my best friend only meant to be supportive. “She grew up in this small town in Eastern Russia, where the talent scout from Paris found her when she was only fourteen. It just seems so wrong—these scouts pluck these kids, who didn’t speak any French or English, and move them to model homes in France.”

  “Did she like it?”

  I flipped my hand over indecisively. “If you talk to her about it, she makes it sound like the best thing in the world. But she’s the least happy person I know. I can’t imagine she was ever that happy.”

  “And she wanted you to model.”

  Startled, I glanced up at him. “Did I say that already?”

  “You said you were a bad doll.”

  “Right.” My jaw worked and then I let out a breath of old, stale anger. “I did a couple times when I was a kid.”

  For a brief instant, he looked uncomfortable. “I know. I saw them.”

  No way.

  He ducked his head. “I have powerful Google-fu.”

  I shook my head. So he’d seen me as a twelve-year-old in pastel dresses and round curls. Fine. “Did you see the ones of my mom? The Goddess series?”

  He shook his head.