The Wright Brother Read online

  And she knew there was no way she really looked like that—because the girl staring back at her was breathtakingly soft and lovely, a graceful picture of femininity. Elisa was none of those things. She was an athlete who almost always wore her hair in a sloppy bun, and acted stupid whenever a camera was placed in front of her.

  Her fingers shook as she traced the line of her jaw. He’d drawn this, Julian had drawn this, and then he’d crumpled it up and tossed it away.

  ~*~

  The next morning she was just getting into the car when the Wrights’ door opened and Julian came running out with an anguished look burning in his sea-green eyes. He’d not been careful with what he’d picked.

  His shirt was red, his shorts a glaring shade of neon blue. She recognized the clothes as actually belonging to Roman.

  Neither one of them said anything as he rushed up to her and dragged her into his arms, hugging her as though he meant never to let her go. He smelled like Julian, like clean soap and mint.

  Elisa had clung to his back, wishing for just a moment that things had been different. That either she was only sixteen or he nineteen, that life hadn’t dealt them the cards it had.

  The kiss he’d planted on her cheek had felt full of meaning. Pain. Misery. And love, all of it rolled up in that touch and it made her tremble. Made her want to say words she knew she could never say again.

  His cheeks were wet when he pulled away.

  And when she got into the back seat of her parents’ SUV, she realized hers were, too.

  Chapter 6

  College was going smoother than she’d hoped and that summer spent with Julian and the boys was slowly becoming nothing more than a happy but weird memory.

  It was hard sometimes to believe how much had changed in the few months she’d been away from home. She had a boyfriend who she was crazy about, she still hadn’t really decided on a major yet, but there was still time for that.

  All her fears and worries now seemed so silly in retrospect. And her momentary strange attraction to Julian was absolutely gone. Distance had been the best thing for them.

  She did as she’d promised Loribelle and wrote to Julian once a week, updating him on her life, sending him pictures of whatever stupid thing she sometimes did. And while it was hard to judge emotions from words on a screen, she was pretty sure Julian was also over whatever crush he’d had on her. His emails were friendly, and most of the time short. Just a sentence or two. He’d sometimes ask for more pictures, but that was it.

  The day she realized he was over it, she finally told him about Thomas. And just as she’d suspected, he hadn’t seemed all that fazed by it. He’d simply written back a quick, “That’s good. Glad you’re happy,” email and that’d been that.

  Shutting her economics book with a weary sigh, she glanced up at Tom. He still had his nose buried in his anatomy books. He was studying to become a nurse. Something his parents didn’t approve of. They still had the notion that if you were a boy and going into medicine, it was doctorate or nothing. But Thomas was adamantly sticking to his guns and Elisa admired him for it.

  Thomas was a sophomore. They were actually teammates—it was how they’d met. Elisa’s heart had nearly flopped out of her chest the first time she’d seen him come out of the pool. With his shocking red hair and slickly muscled swimmer’s body, she’d almost drooled on herself the first time he’d smiled at her. That’d been almost five months ago now, and they’d been inseparable ever since.

  His keen blue eyes looked up. “You ready to go home?” His deep voice always made her shiver.

  They’d been dating for a while now, and Elisa was trying to decide if she was ready to go all the way. Some days she was sure she was ready, and other times, she wasn’t. She didn’t know why she kept holding back, he was hot, smart, and could swim his ass off.

  They got along great.

  She smiled.

  Maybe tonight would be that night.

  “Yes.” She grinned wider when his blue eyes twinkled.

  “What are you thinking, little fish?”

  His pet name for her was probably the most unattractive thing about him. She rolled her eyes. “Seriously, Tom, call me something else.”

  He tapped his pencil on his books. “Like what?”

  “I don’t know.” She kicked out her foot, tracing the length of his calf with her sneakered foot. Not nearly as sexy as it would have been had she been wearing sandals, but it was the second week of December and there was no way in hell she’d be walking around a snow-covered campus in sexy sandals just for her boyfriend. No matter how much she adored him. “Dolphin, or mermaid, or—”

  “Barracuda!” He chuckled.

  “Ssh.” The librarian glanced up at their loud laughs.

  Giving him a long eye roll, she got up. “Let’s go before the ogre throws us out, and if you call me a barracuda, I’ll—”

  Running around to her side of the table, he wrapped his arm around her waist and planted a kiss on her lips.

  Thomas kissed like he swam. With passion and intensity.

  Heart racing out of control, she broke off the kiss before she made a fool of herself, like going into full-on porn mode in the library. Not cool.

  Tonight would be the night, she was decided.

  She was nineteen, it was time to pop the cherry at some point, and preferably before she hit twenty. She hadn’t been hanging on to her virginity because she was scared, or because morally she felt it was wrong; mostly she’d hung on because she’d wanted to make sure that whomever she did it with for the first time would still respect her in the morning.

  “Come home with me,” she whispered, tapping her finger on his chest.

  Chastity was already home for Christmas break. Elisa would have joined her, too, if it wasn’t for the fact that her econ professor, Mr. Richards, had postponed the final for two days after Chas’s last class because of some sort of filing mix-up.

  The campus was pretty much cleared out and there really wouldn’t be a better time than now.

  “Fuck me.” He groaned, closing his eyes.

  “What?” She wrinkled her nose, because that had definitely not sounded like a yes.

  Elisa took a step back and hugged her books to her chest. But Thomas latched on to her elbow and moaned.

  “Baby, if you’re inviting me over for what I think you are, I think I might cry. Any other night and I would, but I have that stupid meeting to—”

  “Oh dammit,” she groaned, only now remembering that as Treasurer of the Phi Sigma Kappas it was his job to allocate funds for the back to school social scheduled the second week of January. This was his last day to do it before campus officially broke for break. “I did forget.”

  Tugging her into his side, he tickled her ribs and she smiled. “Later tonight? I’ll come over right after—”

  It was already almost ten. Her exam was scheduled for seven tomorrow morning. He wouldn’t get to her apartment until closer to midnight. She sighed. “No. My test is too early in the morning.”

  He grimaced. “Are you still going to be here tomorrow?”

  It was at least nice to see that he actually did want to. “Yes. I’m not leaving until Sunday morning. I have too much to pack up still.”

  “Okay.” He grabbed her wrist and placed an enthusiastic kiss against it. “Tomorrow then. My test is over by noon, we can spend the rest of the afternoon together.”

  “Bring lots of condoms.” She giggled when they exited the library, inhaling the frosty winter air deep into her lungs.

  Her words made him groan even harder and this time when he pressed her to him for a goodbye kiss something hot, hard, and long pushed into the lower part of her belly, making her stomach twist and dive to her feet.

  It wasn’t that she didn’t know what a penis looked like, or for that matter that she hadn’t held one before. She had, with him. Their make out sessions had become pretty X-rated at this point, they just hadn’t gone all the way yet.

  Plant
ing her hand between his legs, she gave it a gentle squeeze.

  “You’re a wicked woman, little fish.” His blue eyes gleamed with heat.

  Snorting, she rearranged his brown crocheted scarf around his neck so that it would cover him all the way up to his chin; it was cold out tonight. “Yeah, but you love it.”

  “I do.” He waved at her, heading off toward the frat house. “You know I do.”

  With a swift shake of her head and a smile still firmly latched on to her face, she turned on her heel and walked the quarter-mile to her apartment.

  The place her parents had chosen was pretty amazing. Almost centrally located on campus, she was surrounded by the nightlife and pubs that all college students craved. There was nothing super fancy about hers and Chas’s place, but for two freshman it was pretty damned good.

  Walking up the stoop to her red brick-faced apartment, she wiggled her key into the blue-painted door. This side of town was fairly safe, because of its nearness to the campus; police cruised up and down its streets on a regular basis.

  And even though it was practically Christmas time and the campus was almost entirely deserted, there were still enough locals milling around to make her feel like she wasn’t really alone.

  Turning on her light, she shut and locked the door.

  Walking into her kitchen for a drink of water. Their place was barely a thousand square feet. Not very big, but because it was more of a loft style, it felt wide and open. The floors were an engineered blond wood, and the walls were painted a cherry red.

  That’d been Chas’s doing. She loved color. From black to color. The goth phase was officially over for her quirky friend. Now it was embracing her island roots, and Elisa was glad for it.

  She grabbed a cup and filled it with water, sitting down at her kitchen table.

  They’d managed to scrape enough money together between the two of them to sparsely decorate the place. There was a couch they’d found at a salvation store, a large geometric-patterned rug Chas’s parents had brought over during a visit, and a kitchen table her parents had donated. Neither girl really had a decorating style, so it was mostly just a mash-up of things they saw in stores and wanted, like a coffee mug wall clock, and jellyfish-shaped standing lamp in the living room.

  But it worked for them.

  Even though the loft was small, both girls did have their own rooms. They weren’t big enough to fit more than a full-sized bed and a small dresser, but that was all they needed anyway.

  Moving her laptop from the couch to the table, Elisa opened it up. She’d not checked her messages all week because of last-minute crash studying for finals. In hindsight, it was probably good Thomas hadn’t come over tonight. Now that she was home she realized just how exhausted she actually was.

  But she had a few minutes left before bed and figured she should probably make sure her parents hadn’t written with any sort of new instructions to her.

  Last month Elisa had purchased her first car from the campus lemon lot. It wasn’t much to look at. A cream-colored Beetle that Dad had driven all the way up to campus to check out first before she’d taken out a loan from the bank—with the help of her parents, of course.

  It was the first car she’d ever owned and it wouldn’t be her parents but her making the payments. It made her feel proud.

  Mom and Dad had been freaking out for the past two weeks telling her to go get the oil checked, the tires checked, the heater checked. Which she’d done, or rather made Thomas do. She was pretty sure there’d be some more instructions waiting for her.

  But when she opened her Gmail account, she didn’t find any emails from them. She did however see an old email from Julian.

  She clicked on it.

  “When are you coming home?”

  She grimaced. The letter was dated six nights ago. Feeling kind of bad, she jotted off a quick note, letting him know it wouldn’t be until Sunday and clicked send.

  Just about to close it down for the night and go to bed finally, an instant message popped up.

  It was from Julian’s address—JulesWrightDreams. Sure she was about to get her ass handed to her, she groaned. Elisa was ready to type off a quick “I’m sorry” when the words registered in her brain.

  “Lisa, this is Lori, are you there?”

  Cocking her head, she nodded even though she knew Lori couldn’t see her.

  “Yeah, I’m here. What’s up?”

  “Are you home yet?”

  “Not for another two days. Why?”

  “Julian got into a bike accident.”

  It was like someone had suddenly dropped a ton of ice into her veins. The tips of her fingers became chilled and her skin broke out in a wash of goosebumps.

  “Is he okay? What kind of bike?”

  Her pulse grew fluttery and her skin flushed as the need to jump into her car and drive home immediately gripped her by the throat.

  The cursor blinked for so long that Elisa was about to pick up the phone and call, needing to know right away what was going on.

  “Race bike. He got really hurt.”

  “Oh God. I’ll come home now.”

  She didn’t know what she was going to do about the test. But she’d have to figure something out. Elisa was ready to dash into her room and just dump whatever clean clothes she could find into her suitcase when Lori responded.

  “No. Do what you need to do. He’s alive. He’s just hurt.”

  Feeling like an enormous weight had lifted from her shoulders, she quickly scribbled back.

  “I have a final exam in the morning. I’ll come right after. Tell him I’ll be there. Okay?”

  “Thanks, Lisa. Sorry to ruin your night.”

  “God no! You didn’t ruin it. I’ll be there as soon as I can. Which hospital?”

  “Mid-Coast. In Brunswick.”

  It was almost impossible to fall asleep that night, and the next day when she took the exam, she was pretty sure she’d missed almost all the questions. Her thoughts had centered almost entirely on getting back to Sunny Cove. She’d packed up her car last night and was just about to go when she remembered Thomas. He’d be expecting to find her at the apartment after noon.

  Cringing, she pulled out her phone and called him. But he didn’t answer. So she left a message instead.

  “Tom, I’m sorry, honey. But I just found out last night that my good friend got into a very serious motorcycle accident last night, so I have to go home. I really, really, really am sorry. But we’ll have to um…”—her stomach flopped—“do our thing after Christmas break. Sorry. Love you. Hope you have fun skiing the slopes in Utah, okay?” Blowing him an air kiss, she hung up.

  The drive to Brunswick took far longer than the normal two and a half hours; thanks to the gray skies and sleeting snow, she knew it wouldn’t be safe to go faster than fifty miles per hour on the road. If that.

  Suddenly grateful that her parents had forced her to get the car up to peak performance, because even with new tires on, she still slid on the icy roads. One time she’d fishtailed so hard she’d had to pull off the road just to give her jittery heartbeat a chance to calm down.

  By the time she’d pulled into the Mid-Coast Hospital parking lot, she was driving at a very grandmotherly speed of thirty-five.

  It’d taken her close to six hours to get home. It was almost three in the afternoon. When she’d stopped to top off her tank and grab a hot coffee two hours ago, she’d called Lori for an update.

  Julian had been moved out of the ICU that morning, and aside from being in extreme pain, was well on his way toward recovering.

  Jogging as quickly, but safely as she could across the frozen blacktop, she sailed into the elevator, punching the third-floor button. Wringing her hands as she watched each floor tick past, she wondered what she’d see when she got to his room.

  Let his hands be okay…

  The moment the doors opened, she spied Christian, Roman, her mother, and her father in the waiting room.

  She almost c
ouldn’t believe her eyes when she saw the guys. They were huge. It shouldn’t be possible that in just a short five months they could have grown so much, but they towered over her. Not only that, but there was definitely more meat on their bones.

  Which only made sense, in three days it would be their birthday. Seventeen now, they were practically men.

  She smiled when Roman hugged her. “My God, Rome, is that a beard?” She scratched at the hard scruff on his square jaw.

  Giving her a bashful grin, he rubbed the back of his neck.

  Christian hugged her next. “Glad you’re back, Lisa.”

  Turning to her parents, she gave them each a hug.

  “How was your trip?” her father asked almost immediately.

  “Fine. Fine,” she said, wanting to talk about what was really on her mind. “How’s Jules?”

  Suddenly the temperature in the room cooled. Christian and Roman blew out deep breaths.

  “He’s okay. Thank God.” Roman rolled his eyes, sounding both relieved and disgusted.

  She shook her head. “What happened? How did he get into a bike accident in December?”

  Christian glowered. “Right! That di—” He glanced at her parents and gave them a weak grin at their turned-down lips. “Dip weed.” He cleared his throat.

  Roman said, “Don’t know what happened, honestly. Past few weeks have been tough for him, he hasn’t told us much. And then yesterday he took off on his bike, barely got down the road when we heard a loud crash.”

  “By the time we got out there,” Christian took over, “he was on his ass and all we saw was the tail end of a van turning down the street, peeling rubber. God.” He shook his head and picked at his thumbnail.

  He look was so haunted that Elisa knew Christian had probably been the one to find Julian. The mere fact that Julian had been in ICU yesterday meant he must have looked half-dead. Bile rose up the back of her throat at the thought of it.

  She grimaced.

  “Where is he? I want to go see him.”