Nothing Less Read online

  Why would the universe allow this to happen? Why would it allow two people who are clearly still stuck in the limbo of our last relationships to become so attached to each other?

  I don’t know why I let this mess continue, anyway. I should have left it as a flirty friend-of-a-friend relationship, but I didn’t. Mostly because he became an itch I couldn’t scratch, and partly because I just couldn’t keep my distance. My thoughts of him quickly became unmanageable and uncontrollable, much like his mouth on my breasts right now.

  I hold the back of his neck, guiding his mouth to be greedy.

  This probably isn’t the best time to think about all this, but this is the only time I have. I made a promise to Dakota that I had every intention of breaking, but the pinch of guilt is still there. She isn’t that bad when she’s not threatening to run her mouth about my life or kicking me out of an apartment that was just as much mine as hers. She can be funny, and even fun to be around. The first time I met her, she asked me to go dancing with her. I had just unpacked my boxes and wanted to get to know my new roommates, her and Maggy.

  Dakota got dolled up, in a tight red dress and sparkly black shoes. She had her curly hair straightened out down her shoulders. She looked smoking hot and ready to take on the world, told me she had just gone through a breakup and needed to clear her head. I suggested she dance with Aiden, the tall blonde from her dance academy. If I had known what kind of breakup she had “suffered” through, I would’ve never suggested that.

  I was used to the typical breakups: my friends’ boyfriends cheating on them, or one person or the other deciding to focus on a career. Those are the kind of breakups I’m used to being soothed by a night out with the girls.

  If I had known that half of her breakup was made up of Landon, I wouldn’t have pushed her toward that guy. Back then, Landon was nothing more than a tiny picture cut out from a high school prom picture. He was this college freshman living across the country. Not until I hung out with Tessa the first time in New York did I put it all together.

  I had already started paying attention to Landon; we had already had our little moment in his bathroom. Dakota acts as if I purposely sought him out to prey on him just to hurt her. I’m not that evil. I could have pulled back from him when I realized that Tessa’s perfect roommate—the epitome of everything I’ve wanted in a man wrapped into one—was also my roommate’s ex-boyfriend.

  Landon was the nerdy, devoted boy from Michigan, the one who was afraid of hurting a fly when fucking. Dakota told us so many stories about Landon and his fear of trying new things. She told us that she once tried to get him to take her doggy-style, and he finished before they even started. Which, well, isn’t good.

  I look up at Landon, the Landon who’s mine and mine to keep, at least while his body is under mine. His hands are digging into my hips. His mouth is so possessive. He’s saying the things his lips are normally too timid to reveal. I love how full I feel with him. It’s hard to explain. He just makes me feel taken care of, satisfied, important, and just full—of life, of happiness, I don’t know. But I feel a sense of peace with him.

  I drag my nails down his stomach, just hard enough to leave thin red marks. They’re lines drawn on a battlefield. He’s mine!, I want to scream to Dakota—but maybe he isn’t? Maybe he’s too good for both of us, and we would be doing him a huge favor leaving him the hell alone.

  She would never, though. She wouldn’t stay away from her crutch long enough for him to breathe, and I would like to think I open his lungs. I want him to be free around me, able to be himself and put his own needs first for once in his life. Dakota seems to want to keep him locked away in a childhood romance that she’s too afraid to leave behind. If I knew what it was between them, I would have a better footing while trying to navigate.

  When she confronted me about him time after time, I should have learned my lesson. She isn’t going away without a fight, and I’m too exhausted to give her one. Something has happened between them that made Landon her knight in shining armor and she the perfect damsel in distress.

  But what about me?

  Where the hell does that leave me?

  I don’t need Landon for the same reasons she does, but does that make me less worthy of him because I want to bring him up and hold him there, like he deserves?

  I don’t have the past that she shares with him, but I can make a good future for him if given the chance.

  Landon groans as I grind my hips over him. He’s hard. He’s hard for me. His hands are on my body, pulling and tearing at every inch of me. It’s a desperate fury that I’m enjoying getting to know. I pull at his hair and drop my mouth to his ear.

  “You’re so good, Landon. You’re too good,” I encourage, and he pants beneath me. He makes me feel like a queen—he isn’t some peasant to me; he’s the adored king. My king, and with him we would rule equally. I wouldn’t be stuffed into a dress and heels and forced to be a trophy wife for anyone. Not like Stausey.

  That was unfair. Ameen loves her. I know he loves her, and a part of me is envious that their life is what it is. It’s not that I want her life; I just want a partner. I don’t need a big house with matching towels and china sets, I just want someone to want to spend time with me. I would rather have someone listen to me talk through a movie than wake up to a Mercedes wrapped in a big red bow.

  Landon’s hands lift to my breasts and he fondles them, claiming the flesh in his strong palms. I would take this over any material thing. I could spend hours and days and weeks with him like this. But my time is running out; I don’t have the luxury of time here.

  Dakota does. She has years on me. That makes her relationship with Landon more than some child love. That I could handle—if it was over. That same old parable about two childhood neighbors who grow up together and share lemonade on the steps of their childhood homes. Their friendship grows into love, and the rest is history. I had that, too. Even though I find that predictable and a little cliché, there is something to be said about the convenience of it.

  I’m talking about something deeper; something happens when you share a tragedy. I know this firsthand. I remember when the worst thing in my relationship with Ameen’s little brother was when he told me that my sister was pretty. I was jealous, and only fourteen. I grew out of my jealousy and went on to be friends with him after our breakup. Well, the first breakup.

  Since then, we’ve created our share of adult problems, and now that our siblings are married, the mess has become too big to clean up. Our relationship has been over for a while, regardless of the fine print.

  Our siblings remind us how perfect we are and how we spent years eating their fancy cheeses and drinking their sour wine, which was twice my age at least. And now we’re going to share a baby, our little niece. The darling angel child that my parents are expecting to mend the crumbled bridge between the two families. I’ll be an aunt. He’ll be an uncle. But we won’t be together. I wouldn’t hold my breath if I were my parents.

  I know that my sister, and my parents, blame me for the hostile relationship with his parents, but they only blame me because it’s easier than admitting the truth.

  What was I thinking telling Landon that he can meet my sister?

  “What are you thinking about?” Landon kisses his way down the column of my neck and between my breasts. This sweet, sweet man. I can’t tell him that I’m analyzing every bit of our relationship and deciding our future while he kisses every inch of my neck and chest.

  “That I want you.” My lips are on his chin, peppering his jaw, before moving up to his lips. I lift my hips to him, letting him know what I want, and how I want it.

  chapter

  Twenty-three

  Landon

  THE UBER TO HER SISTER’S apartment feels longer than the thirty-seven minutes it was supposed to take. On my app it says we have six more minutes until we arrive at the building on West Thirty-fourth Street. I was going to take the subway, but this felt less chaotic. When I got home fr
om my shift, I had a text from Nora with her sister’s address, telling me to meet her there at eight. She didn’t go into any further details. Just address, time, and a smiley face.

  Nora was shy this morning when she left. She kissed me and whispered how much fun she had with me, but Hardin and Tessa were there, so she didn’t say much else.

  I have a feeling she wanted to get there before me for a reason. Maybe she wanted to talk to her sister privately first. I won’t know what exactly I’m walking into until I cross the threshold of the Manhattan apartment. During the ride, I text Tessa twice, but she doesn’t reply. I’m sure Hardin has her otherwise occupied.

  I glance down at my phone again and do a text check-in with my mom and Ken. I don’t mention my plans for the night. I don’t need to stir the pot any more than I already have, and I don’t want to give our parents any more table gossip than they’ve already got. I’m meeting Nora’s sister, so I’m sure word will get back to my mom sooner or later anyway.

  “Is this it?” my shaggy-haired driver asks. His turn signal is on again, and I hope the street isn’t a one-way this time. I think he’s used to driving in Brooklyn, not Manhattan. This intersection is busy; we’re between Ninth and Tenth Avenues somewhere. I haven’t spent much time in Manhattan since I moved here. Now I get why locals don’t spend a lot of time near all the tourist attractions.

  My driver repeats himself and finally turns down his radio. Apparently he really, really loves listening to Linkin Park. I wasn’t sure anyone was left in the world who still played their Hybrid Theory album, but this fateful Uber ride proved me wrong. That album came out when I was in elementary school, but liking Linkin Park was a staple of being cool during my youth. Something I wasn’t, but when wide-leg JNCO pants were a thing, I tried my best. I even wore a wallet chain.

  Oh, man, I’m glad there was no social media in those days. If I had a Facebook or Twitter back then, there would be too many leftovers of my wannabe-grunge days. To this day, I can’t stand the smell of lemons because I spent the summer spraying the ends of my hair with my mom’s Sun In. I have a feeling that my driver had his own relationship with Sun In.

  I glance out the window and read the all-capital white letters on the black awning in front of the building on our left: 408 WEST THIRTY-FOURTH STREET. “Yeah. I guess so.” Here we go . . .

  I climb out of the car and straighten my shirt. I went for a simple, nonthreatening look today. All-black. The shirt is a little tighter than I would have liked, but that’s what I get for shopping online and guessing at my size. It’s not too snug, though; I think it looks fine.

  Well, I hope it does.

  As I get closer to the doorman, he waves at me. He’s waiting by the entrance, sitting perched on a stool. He looks familiar, like a cartoon character or someone from a movie. When I approach him, I notice just how short he is. His little body is round, and his nose is a tiny bulb covered in broken capillaries.

  I brush my fingers over the manicured bushes lining the front of the brick building. Even the outside of this place looks expensive. I pick a small pink flower and toss it back. Why did I do that? Is it a weird impulse to pull a flower from its soil and rip it off? I can’t even count the number of times I’ve done that without thinking. Am I like some secret sociopath who loves to rip flowers out by their roots and toss them back into the dirt?

  Am I overthinking this?

  Probably.

  The doorman and I exchange simple pleasantries, and then he asks who I’m here to see. As he calls up to Nora’s sister, I look around the inside of the building, which reminds me of a hospital. White walls, shiny surfaces, and that clean like Pine-Sol and artificial aromas. It’s nice, but the only decorations, fake flowers, just add to the hospital feel.

  The doorman indicates I can go up to the something-or-other floor and points at the elevators. I was too distracted to hear him right, and I’m a little shy about asking him to repeat himself, so I peer down the long hallway and wander over to where he pointed. All the while I’m hoping Nora will pop out of nowhere and take me to the right place. This is the kind of building that I can’t just roam in aimlessly without the cops being called.

  Like a miracle, the elevator opens in front of me and Nora is standing inside. Her long, dark hair is sleek and shiny, running down her shoulders in two glossy lines. It’s beautiful; she’s beautiful. Her eyes are made-up, lined with black wings, and her eyebrows are darker, more defined. She looks so different—not in a bad way, just in a way that I haven’t before seen her.

  I’m used to her wearing makeup—the red lipstick from yesterday was hot—but today she looks like a woman. Her pristine black shirt and pants are gleaming, like her dark hair and dark eyes. The green is more prominent in her eyes now that the dark lines bring the color to the surface. Her outfit is sexy; the black shirt hangs off her shoulders, and the neckline scoops down like a heart over her cleavage. It’s almost inappropriate for her to look this good when I’m supposed to behave myself in front of her family.

  “This elevator is too small,” I tell her when I step inside.

  She smiles at me sheepishly. I take her hand in mine and kiss her palm. When the doors close, she presses a button with her free hand and I gently pull her to me.

  “How was work?” I kiss her forehead, then her nose, then the corner of her mouth. I give one last kiss to her hair.

  Nora’s lips part, and she moves her body into mine, letting me lean her against the wall. “Good.” Her lips taste like syrupy gloss. “Did you miss me?” she asks in a hushed voice.

  The elevator opens, and I look down at her as she pulls away. “Is the sky blue?” I ask, even tilting my head and smiling my best puppy smile.

  Her face lights up, and she shakes her head at me. She touches her long nails to her chin and grins back at me. “Actually, I think the sky is a little gray today.” I reach for her waist, but she moves away just in time. “Patience, little one.”

  I look past her down the hallway, and when she falls for my trick and turns her body, I catch her off guard and wrap my arms around her, pinning her arms to her chest. I use my left hand to move her hair away from her neck and press my lips to her perfumed skin.

  “I think you should look again.” I pin her gently against the wall of the hallway. No one is out here. Good. “The sky was pretty clear.”

  My fingertips follow the curve of her full breasts. This is the best shirt I’ve ever seen, Nora’s chest heaving up and down, up and down in it. She’s wearing a black choker, and it makes me want to take her back into the elevator and press the hold button.

  Nora licks her lips, and I feel her hands dig into the back pockets of my black jeans. “I guess you’re right; it’s pretty clear.”

  She nips at my lips with her teeth, and I groan, pressing her farther into the wall. A door clicks open, and I withdraw from Nora when I hear the clack of high heels on the floor. A woman, whom I immediately recognize as her sister, Stausey, is standing with her hand over her mouth and her eyes wide. She drops her hand the moment our eyes meet, but she can’t seem to blink.

  “Stausey . . .” Nora says, and I back away from her, tugging at my shirt. “This is Landon.”

  I rush over and reach for Stausey’s hand. She lifts it to me, and I kiss the top of it. She leans in to kiss my cheeks. I don’t know which way to turn, and—bam!—her lips touch mine and she pulls back, horrified. Nora’s eyes are wide but amused. Her sister, her very pregnant sister, is half-smiling, too, seeming to understand how that European kissing greeting could be confusing to most Americans and people new to New York.

  “Nice to meet you.” Stausey regards me, her eyes resting on each piece of my clothing, my hair, my hands, and back down to my shoes. She brushes her hand against her dress, and her fingers fuss with the bow around her waist. Her body looks so tiny to be holding such a big . . . a big ball of baby inside. “How was the drive? Long, right?” Stausey guides us to the door she just stepped out of.

  “It wa
sn’t bad.” I spot a man inside in the center of the room beyond, behind a bar area. The living room is huge, the size of my apartment, and Stausey’s perfect specimen of a husband is pouring red wine into a row of stemmed wineglasses.

  “I try to stay on this side of the bridge when we’re in town. Brooklyn is just so far,” Stausey huffs. Her heels click against the floor as we walk inside. Nora mumbles something about Miranda and Sex and the City, and offers me a drink.

  I don’t know what to say, and I could use a glass of courage. Taking her up on her offer, I follow Stausey to the bar.

  chapter

  Twenty-four

  THIS IS A QUITE AGED bottle of Château Moulin de Roquette, Landon. It’s from Bordeaux,” Stausey explains with a touch of a French accent.

  I have no idea what she’s talking about. I’m assuming she’s telling me the type of wine it is? But I wouldn’t know the difference, anyway.

  I nod and tell her that sounds great; it could be a bottle of $6 wine, for all I care.

  Stausey’s husband comes around the bar and reaches for my hand. His outfit is much more casual than his wife’s. His dark jeans are worn, and he’s barefoot. His plain white T-shirt gives me the impression that he’s much more laid-back than I expected.

  “Hey, man, nice to meet you.” He smiles—his teeth are amazingly white. “I’m Ameen, but you can call me Todd.” He shrugs and looks at his wife. “Or Ameen.”

  “Sophia told us a lot about you. I hear your parents live right by ours. What a small world,” Stausey says, looking right at her sister.

  So she calls her Sophia? Noted. “It really is.” I’m unsure what else to say. It’s a small world, Stausey, but you appear to live on the top of it.

  I look around the room, taking in the grand piano and the modern furniture. Everything matches perfectly, from the decorative pillows piled on the couch to the painting hanging over the entrance to the hallway.