“How about you tell me what happened?”

Something sharp and thorny turned in my chest. “A guy showed up and almost beat up his wife. Nearly ruined his kid’s birthday party. I ran away but this other woman just…charged right in. Made the guy leave.”

“Christ, that was risky.”

“I know. But it was really brave, you know? And I ate the kid’s birthday cake for breakfast and that’s my brave and I just felt…stupid. And awful.”

“Well, that’s not really fair, is it?”

“Fair has nothing to do with anything. Ever.” I sounded bitter, far more bitter than I thought I felt. But it was there all along, this bitter and angry sea, dark and awful and full of monsters, just waiting for me to dive in and get eaten.

Dylan laughed. “This is true. My whole life…I just wanted to be like my brother. My whole life. He was the toughest. The bravest. The most badass guy around. And I just followed that guy around trying to do the shit that he did.”

“What happened?”

“I learned I’m not that badass. And that some people just don’t give a fuck what happens to them. And I don’t know if that’s brave or just crazy.”

I thought of Joan beside the pond today and how she seemed to have a thick armor of I-don’t-give-a-shit. And how lonely that was.

And Ben. God. So lonely it hurt. So lonely he was like a feral mountain man or something. Cooking food that reminded him of a woman he’d driven away.

“I’d rather care,” I said, thinking about the night I ran and the dozen nights before that, when I felt myself slipping, slipping, slipping into not caring. I’d run away so that I could find something to care about.

That was my brave, I realized. Risking everything so I could feel something again. And I suddenly felt proud of myself.

“Me too. Every time. All the years I spent not caring. Or pretending I didn’t give a shit—they were bad years. I’m not saying she wasn’t brave trying to protect that woman. I’m just saying what she did doesn’t make you not brave.”

“Thanks,” I said, more sigh than anything else.

“No problem. But the dessert…what was it?”

“Yellow cake with chocolate frosting.”

“And?”

“Can’t say I loved it.”

“You gotta try tres leches cake.”

“I have no idea what that is.”

“It’s pretty much the best thing going.”

“Noted,” I said with a smile.

“So dessert for breakfast was a bust,” Dylan said. “How about skinny-dipping?”

I smiled and rolled onto my back, eager to think of something else. Eager to not be lonely. This connection with Dylan was strange. But it was real. And the world could be a cold place without connection.

“Skinny-dipping was awesome.”

“Yeah?”

“It was so hot today and I’d been working hard and the water was so cold. So…perfect.”

“Sounds like you did it right.”

“There was another woman there.”

His chuckle lit me up from the inside. “Do tell.”

“We just…swam. You know?”

“Tell me swam is some kind of code word for making out.”

I laughed, but I couldn’t lie; I felt hot at the idea. A blush rising up my body making me dizzy. “No…but I saw her kind of naked and…she has an amazing body. She’s a stripper.”

“Oh Jesus, baby…”

Somehow, somehow I’d gone from uninterested and sad to hot. Hot and wet in no time. A chuckle from this man and I was ready to go, my hand in my underwear, testing the swollen edges of my lips.

“I want you to touch yourself tonight,” I said.

“Why?”

“Because…I don’t want to do this alone. Alone…isn’t the point when I’m with you.”

“With me?”

“You know what I mean.”

“Baby, you can’t be building any fantasies around me. Around this. I’m not…”

He trailed off and I held my breath, waiting for him to reveal something about himself. “You’re not what?” I prompted.

“Anything a girl like you should build fantasies around.”

“A girl like me?” I asked.

“Innocent, young…”

“You’re only twenty-nine,” I said, because if there was one thing I didn’t feel most of the time it was young.

“On the outside,” he said. “Inside I’m ancient.”

Inside I’m ancient. I totally got that. Maybe that’s why this thing we were doing worked. Because we were ancient on the inside.

“But what we’re doing…this is all this is. All it’s ever going to be.”

“How do I know you’re not building fantasies around me?”

“Oh, I am,” he laughed. “I’ll be thinking of you and a stripper swimming later on tonight. But a man’s got to have rules, and I know nothing comes out of breaking them.”

Nothing comes of fantasies.

“I know.” Because I’m lying to you and you might be lying to me, and I’m breaking every rule there is because I’m married. “But I still want you to touch yourself tonight.”

He was silent for a long time, as if he were sizing up the reality from his side. God, he might be married too. And he said he wouldn’t lie—but he could have been lying. “Okay.”

“I want you to do it right now.” I bit my lip, incredulous at my boldness.

I heard the clink of a belt, the loud undoing of a zipper.

The connection between us buzzed and I wondered if he was waiting for me to tell him what to do—like he’d done the other night.

Good lord, if he was waiting for that, this would take forever.

“I don’t…Tell me what you’re doing,” I whispered.

“Where’s your hand, baby?”

“Between my legs.”

“Good. Keep it there, but don’t come…”

“What?”

“Not till I tell you. Not until I let you. You feel yourself about to come, you pull your hand away.”

Sweat broke out across my body. Between my legs I was wetter than ever. “Okay.”

“Say yes.”

“Yes,” I swallowed. “Yes, Dylan.”

“You been doing this all week?” he asked. “Touching yourself.”

“Yes.”

“You figured some stuff out? Shit you like?”

“Yes.”

“Details, baby. You need to give me details.”

“I used my underwear the other day, between my legs. It hurt a little—”

“Good hurt?”

“Yes. Good hurt. I got so wet. So…it was all down my legs and my underwear was soaked.” His groaning laugh made the hair stand up on my body. “Now, you tell me.”

“I’ve been hard all day thinking about you,” he said.

I doubted that was true, but whatever. It was hot.

“And it’s quiet here now. Quiet and dark, and I got you in my ear and my cock in my fist.”

My breath shuddered in my throat.

“You like that word?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“I stroke myself slow, because that’s how I like it. Hard and slow. Bottom to tip.”

I whimpered, closing my eyes, imagining it as best I could, a dirty movie on the back of my eyelids, gathered from bits and pieces. The book. That one time when I was sixteen with my cousin in town. Dylan’s voice.

“I got come leaking out the tip, and I smear it all over my cock…”

Again that word. I pulled my fingers away from my body, the tension in my belly, between my legs, about to explode.

“I go faster,” he said, his breath sawing in my ear. And I could hear his movements. The click and squeal of the chair maybe. The slap of his skin.

“Tell me,” I whispered. The lake of bitterness and anger was gone, replaced by a desire for everything. A hunger for it all. I felt empty and wide open to the world. Waiting for experience to fill me up. To satiate me.

“I gotta slow down,” he moaned.

“No,” I said, reaching for myself again because I could feel the orgasm coming, touching myself or not.

“Stop, Layla.”

I pulled my hands away. “Come on,” I moaned.

“No, let’s slow down for a second.”

I growled at him but he only laughed, panting a little.

“How many men you slept with?”

“Why?”

“Cause we’re taking a break…slowing shit down.”

“One.”

“One man?”

“Yes.”

“Other than that dirty book of yours, you ever watch any porn?”