12.

Z OEY

A noise woke me up, and when I tried to lift my head, I found that I couldn’t because my hair was tangled in . . . Garvey. Holy shit! Garvey Forrester spent the night in my house!

I resisted the urge to jump up and do a happy dance, not just because it might rip my hair out, but because when I danced, I felt like I looked like someone who had a cramp in both legs and was trying to walk it off. Inside, though, I could do all the dancing I wanted - and I was, merrily, I might add.

“Mornin’, Zo,” Garvey murmured as he reached across me and hooked his hand around my hip. As if I were light as a feather, he pulled me over so that my body was draped over his and then patted my ass before he started snoring again.

I propped my chin on my hands and studied his face and had to resist tracing the scar that split his eyebrow. That scar, and the wreck that caused it, was one of the reasons I had set my sights on becoming a police officer.

I closed my eyes as I went back in time. As I was remembering what went on before the officers arrived on scene, Garvey’s warmth and even breathing relaxed me so much that it felt like I was back there in the dark of that night.

“How much time do we have?” Garvey asked.

“Ten minutes,” I warned him. When I felt the car start to accelerate, I had a brief moment of panic, so I said, “I can be a little late, Gravy. Don’t speed. If we get pulled over, we’re toast.”

“They’d have to catch us first!” Garvey replied, but his voice was so slurred that it sounded like someone hit the button for slow motion on the remote that controlled him which was such a funny image that I couldn’t help but giggle. He looked over at me and smiled before he asked, “You wanna go faster, Zo?”

Before I had a chance to tell him to be careful, there was a loud sound - screeching tires and then metal on metal - before it felt like we were flying. I put my hands up to protect my face but didn’t even consider what might happen to the rest of me. I felt an explosion of pain on the side of my head. The crunch of metal and shattering glass was the last thing I heard before darkness enveloped me.

“Zozo!Holy shit!Zoey!Wake up!”

It felt like he was yelling at me through a wrapping paper tube, so I turned and looked at Garvey before I gasped in horror. His face was covered in blood with bits of glass and . . . Was that a leaf in his hair? When I tried to turn my head further, the pain was too much to bear and I whimpered.

“Oh my God! I thought you were dead,” Garvey slurred.

“What the fuck happened? Where are we?” I asked, wincing at the pain even that caused.

The seatbelt was cutting into my legs and shoulder, and I wondered how it had gotten so tight, but when I tried to look down at my lap, I saw that it wasn’t down anymore. My lap was where the roof of the car should have been. I gasped at the realization and turned my head when I heard my brother screaming my name. Corey was yelling, too, and I thought I heard Janis and Lark, but that couldn’t be. They were still at the party when we left.

“Zoey, can you hear me?” I heard Zane ask.

Before I could answer him, I heard Lark somewhere nearby, giving directions to someone so they could come help us.

“She said that we’re not supposed to move them,” Lark ordered. “Don’t let them shift around.”

“This fucking seatbelt is stuck,” Garvey grumbled before he said, “Get me out of here, Corey. The cops are gonna . . . Fuck! I’m in so much trouble.”

“You’re in trouble? My sister could have died, you motherfucker, and you’re worried about the cops?”

“Give the stuff to them,” I urged Garvey. “Hurry before the cops get here.”

“Shit,” Garvey hissed as he tried to reach into his pocket. “Fucking seatbelt is . . . I can’t get . . . Shit!”

Sirens were getting closer, and all I could think about was how much trouble Garvey would be in if they found us like this, so I made eye contact with Zane. “There’s stuff in his pocket. Get rid of it for him, okay? I don’t want him to get in trouble.”

“Fuck that,” Zane barked. “He could have killed you, Zozo!”

“Oh God, there’s so much blood,” I heard Janis wail right before her face appeared in front of mine. She scooted across my line of vision, and I could feel the car rocking as she tried to get Garvey’s seatbelt off. She finally whispered, “Got it!” right before she scooted back out of the car. “Now what the fuck am I gonna do with it?”

“Get busted, and go to fucking prison?” Lark asked. “Give me that shit, and brush off the glass. They’re gonna know you were inside.”

“My head is killing me,” I said quietly, sure that no one could hear me over Janis and Lark arguing.

Garvey must have because he grabbed my hand where it was resting on the crumpled roof of my car before he whispered, “I’m so sorry, Zo. So sorry. I promise I’ll never let you get hurt again.”

It wasn’t again that I was worried about, it was right now. My head hurt so badly that I wasn’t sure I’d make it out alive or if I even wanted to with this much pain. This was the worst thing I’d ever felt, and I didn’t know how much more I could take.

A sharp pain at the back of my head let me know that it could get worse, and when it radiated down my neck, I gasped and heard Garvey getting frantic. “Zo? Are you okay? Zoey! Wake up!”

I opened my eyes and then squinted when the bright light of day hit me. It took a second to get my bearings and understand that I wasn’t in the car anymore - I was laying on top of Garvey in my house, years later, with a completely different pain in my skull.

“Shit,” I whispered as I pushed myself up and straddled him. “That was one helluva dream.”

“What did you dream about?”

“That night,” I told him honestly as I moved my neck around to work out the kink. “It was like I was there again.”

“I dream about it sometimes, too, but it’s hazy like I’m in a cloud.”

“Because you were fucked up,” I reminded him as I touched my head where it had broken the passenger window. “I wasn’t exactly sober myself.”

“Does your head hurt?”

“No,” I replied as I let my hand drop. “I have a crick in my neck from sleeping on the couch.”

“We should have gone to bed.”

“I thought we’d behave better if we stayed out here.”

“I don’t like behaving,” Garvey muttered as he ran his hands up and down my thighs. “It’s hard to do when you’re near me.”

“That’s not the only thing that’s hard,” I pointed out before I wiggled my hips on his erection.

“You’re not making it any better.”

“What would?” I asked rhetorically as I rested my hands on his chest and started moving up and down his length in earnest. “Is this better?”

“No,” Garvey choked out as his grip on my thighs tightened.

Since he was wearing pajama pants and I was in a long T-shirt that I used as a nightgown, there wasn’t much between us, but it was still too much. I decided to take the bull by the horns and change that.

When I lifted myself off of him, he groaned and lifted his hips up to follow mine, which just helped my cause since it was easy to pull his pajamas down over his erection to bunch at the top of his thighs.

“You’re making it very hard for me to remember that we should take things slow.”

“We can go slow,” I assured him as I pulled my underwear to the side and notched his cock at my entrance.

“Condom,” Garvey ground out as I slowly slid down his length.

The stretch as he filled me felt perfect, and by the time I was fully seated with him inside me, I was breathless and ready for more. I looked down at Garvey’s face as I lifted myself up and watched his eyes flutter closed when I slid down again. He moved his hips in perfect rhythm with mine, and before long, I was bouncing up and down with my head thrown back in ecstasy.

As Garvey held my breasts in his hands, I let my hand slip down between us and started massaging my clit. I heard Garvey groan when my body clutched at his with the first flutterings of my orgasm. I held off as long as I could, prolonging the pleasure for both of us as I rubbed my clit just enough to give me pleasure, but not enough to throw me over the edge.

The sound of our bodies coming together echoed through my house, peppered with moans and gasps as we each got closer to that peak. I could tell by the set of Garvey’s jaw that he was holding on and waiting for my orgasm to crest before he let himself go.

I gave up and rubbed myself in earnest as I lifted my hips up and held them there, letting Garvey push into my body at his own pace, until I finally reached the peak and let out a loud shout as my pussy squeezed around his cock. Garvey’s shout came just seconds after my own, and I held myself there as his hips stuttered before he slammed into me one final time and then relaxed.

I could still feel his cock twitching inside me as I moved my hand back to join the other one on his chest. When I smiled down at him, he smiled back and mumbled, “Fucking magic, just like always.”

“Damn, you feel good inside me,” I whispered before I leaned down and gave him a kiss. I pushed myself up again and rotated my hips, then smiled when he gasped before I asked, “I know we’re older now, but back in the day, you could . . .”

I felt his cock start to harden again and smiled as he curled up so that we were almost face to face. His hand came around my back and clutched me to him as his other hand combed through my hair and held my head steady as he kissed me long and hard.

The new position put my clit in the perfect spot against his pubic bone, and I thanked my physical therapist for all of those squats she’d insisted on when I gripped his hips and lifted myself up over and over again, just an inch or two every time before I dropped myself down again.

I wasn’t sure how it was possible to come again so soon, but then I remembered how Garvey and I could spend hours exploring each other’s bodies with him deep inside me and was happy to see we’d found that same rhythm again. When my orgasm crashed into me, I heard Garvey groan before he muttered my name and knew he was coming deep inside my body one more time.

We were still face to face and trying to catch our breath when I heard a beeping noise coming from somewhere far away - outside the universe where Garvey held me so close as our breath mingled between kisses - and then the front door suddenly opened, and I heard my mom’s voice.

I reared back and stared at Garvey in horror and saw the same reaction mirrored on his face.

“It’s me, Zozo,” my mom called out a split-second before I heard her drop her purse and keys onto the table in the entryway.

“Mom! Don’t . . .”

“Your dad insisted that we wait until a decent hour, but I came over as soon as I . . .” Mom stopped dead in her tracks. Her look of shock would have been comical if my father hadn’t appeared right behind her.

“Zoey! Corey!” Mom shouted before she spun around and ran straight into my father. He grabbed her arms and stepped back until the wall was between us again as my mom called out, “We’re gonna go now!”

The door opened, and I heard my dad say, “What the fuck?” right before it shut again.

I slowly turned to look at Garvey and saw that he was frozen in place with his eyes as wide as saucers. He swallowed hard and then cut his eyes to me before he whispered, “How many times did we fuck on the couch and never get caught, but now, when we’re grown ass adults, we get walked in on?”

“I know, right?”

“Are you going to get dressed and go outside to tell them that it’s me and not my brother here with you?” Garvey asked in a choked voice.

“No. I’m not going to tell them a thing. I’m going to drive off the dam into the abyss and hope they don’t find my body until the fish have had time to nibble away my mortification and I’m back to myself again.”

“Zo, we don’t have a dam around here.”

“I’ll drive until I find one,” I choked out before I yanked my T-shirt over my head and pressed it between us to catch the mess I was sure we’d made.

I was waddling toward my bedroom with my shirt between my legs when my phone started ringing, so I snagged it off the coffee table on my way.

Without even looking at it, I hit the button to answer and heard my mom calmly ask, “How is Corey Forrester locked up with you on your couch when he’s standing next to your brother on his front porch?”

“Um, it’s obviously not Corey on my couch, Mom.”

“Really? Are you sure? Because if it’s not Corey, then that would mean it’s Garvey and . . .” Mom’s laugh was dripping with sarcasm, and I grimaced as I walked into my bathroom and tossed the soiled shirt toward the laundry basket. Finally, her maniacal laughter abated and she said, “I know you wouldn’t be having sex with the man who almost killed you and then stole your heart along with everything else that wasn’t nailed down , would you? ”

“Actually . . .”

“Hmm,” Mom hummed, and I knew from years of experience that meant she was biting her lip to hold back so she didn’t set fire to her target with just her words alone. “I’m trying very hard to remind myself that you’re a grown woman who can make her own decisions, but it’s difficult when I think of all that man put you through. What he put his family through. What he . . .”

“Mom, I understand that you’re upset, and I appreciate the fact that you realize I’m a grown woman, but . . .”

“I’m going to drag your father home and regroup while we try to figure out the most effective way to erase what we just saw from our memories,” Mom interrupted.

“Mom, listen to me,” I pleaded.

She sounded calmer now, but I knew that didn’t mean anything. She eventually blew out a long breath and asked, “Is he the Garvey we knew before he lost himself, Zoey? That’s all I want to know.”

“I think he is. He swears he is. I want to find out.”

“I don’t want you to lose yourself in him again, baby,” Mom said frantically. “Please don’t let him hurt you like he did before.”

“I’m a different person than I was all those years ago, Mom, and so is he. You, of all people, know it’s possible to find love again years after you thought it was lost.”

“Zoey, do not use our story to make your own sound good,” Mom warned.

“I’m not trying to. I’m just saying that you know it’s possible to find that spark after years away from each other, right?”

“I do.”

“So, help me fight off everyone around us who is going to try to blow that spark out, okay?”

“I expect the two of you at our house for dinner tonight. No excuses,” Mom said firmly.

“We’ll be there.”

“Okay.” Mom sighed before she said, “That gives me about ten hours to find some sort of tranquilizer that might be able to stop your father from choking that boy until his head pops off.”

“You’re the best mom in the entire world.”

“Don’t be a suck-up, Zoey. I taught you better than that,” Mom snapped. “Dinner. Our house. I love you.”

I didn’t have a chance to say anything else before she hung up. As I set my phone on the vanity, I noticed that Garvey was standing in the doorway with a traumatized expression.

“So, dinner at my parents’ tonight,” I said cheerfully. “Are you as excited as I am?”

“Where do you think we can find a dam?”