Over the Fence Box Set Read online

  She takes some dishes and silverware out of the cabinet, and sets the table so I can sit at the head with her on my right side. I empty the contents of the bag and set the items out accordingly.

  “One loaded pickle cheesesteak for the beautiful lady.” I smile a Cheshire cat grin at her. I really, really need to win her over tonight. This constant rejection isn’t good for my ego.

  She rolls her eyes at me and climbs into the chair, sitting cross-legged while she eats. I watch her unwrap the sandwich as I do the same. I am constantly enthralled by her movements. She has such interesting tics. The way she tucks her hair behind her ears every ten seconds. How she blinks those long lashes whenever she looks another direction. The way she chews her ring finger when she’s nervous. Minka has so many movements and all I want to do is sit here and study them forever.

  “So, what did you do today?” I try for small talk as I take my first bite.

  “What is this, family dinner time?” She rolls her eyes at me. Another movement that she likes to do, a lot.

  “Well, no, I am glad that we are far from family.” I wink. “But I’d really like to know what you have on your plate for the rest of the summer.”

  She pops a pickle in her mouth. “Fair enough. I’m taking some university level courses down at the community college.”

  “Wow. That’s ambitious. Toward … nursing, right? You mentioned you wanted to be a nurse.” I take a massive bite of my cheesesteak. Just the right amount of meat to cheese to pickles to onions ratio. My stomach thanks me.

  “That’s right.” She looks a little surprised that I’d remembered that. “Biology 101 and some other pre-req courses. I’m trying to fast-track and earn my five-year degree in something more like four years.”

  “Why would you want to do that? I’m staying until they kick me out.”

  “Let’s just say that school is not my thing.” She looks down at the cheesesteak which she ahs yet to take a bite from.

  “But you said before that you were great at school. That mere mortals had to be smart because they didn’t look like Greek gods and have the ability to give any woman a mind-blowing org …”

  “Okay!” She cuts me off. “First of all, I never said those things about you, quit strok … er, building, your ego.” She blushes at her almost slip up. Damn, she’s cute. “Second, yes I’m super smart. It’s the classmates and social scene thing I can’t stand.” I can see the hesitation and a tinge of sadness in her eyes and I wonder who put it there. And where I could find them to pummel the living shit out of them.

  “That’s too bad. College is awesome. I have a feeling you might like it. The partying and the girls are fun, yeah, but being able to get away from your parents and their pressure … it’s so damn freeing.” I swallow, realizing I’m projecting my own shit onto her situation.

  “You feel pressure? That seems impossible.” She takes a bite, looking doubtful.

  “When your father is one of the best baseball players in the last seventy years, you’re expected to be just as good, if not better. Do you know how many college baseball players wash out before even making it to the minors? Do you know how many left-handed pitchers there are playing in the majors? Not many. I’ll be lucky to make it through my college career without throwing my arm out.”

  I blink, realizing I’ve just unloaded a ton of baggage onto her lap. When I look up, I meet her soft brown eyes. Thankfully, they aren’t filled with pity. They’re filled with … understanding.

  “I’m sorry. That does seem like a lot of pressure. For what it’s worth, I hear you really have what it takes to go to the big league.” She gives me a small smile.

  And just hearing those words from this girl has me more confident than I’ve ever been that I’ll make it to the MLB.

  “So, what else? Stalk any Jane Austen characters lately?” I tease her. She’d told me earlier that Pride and Prejudice was one of her favorite books and that she’d read it more than fifteen times.

  “Ha-ha, very funny. You’re no Mr. Darcy.”

  “No, I’m definitely a Mr. Bingley. Which is so much better since he’s the real dreamboat.” I bat my lashes at her, pretending to fawn.

  “You read Pride and Prejudice?” I can hear the shock in her voice.

  “Don’t act so surprised, your rudeness is showing.” She lifts her hands up as if to say she’s sorry. “Yes, I don’t live under a rock. I may have read it for school, but it didn’t suck.”

  “If only your buddies could hear that you enjoyed a nineteenth-century romance novel,” she chides me as she pops another pickle in her mouth. And if I keep thinking about her sliding pickles in her mouth I might die. Yes, the pre-pubescent boy in me can still get hard thinking about the most asinine of innuendos when it comes to Minka.

  “Where else would I learn all of my wooing moves?” She throws a fry at me, which I promptly catch in my mouth. “But seriously, I read it. I just finished the last Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. It was awesome. Swedes are badass.”

  She blinks and then gives me a smile I swear would knock me off my feet if I was standing. “Those books are awesome!”

  We eat the rest of our meal in relative silence, which is only broken up by brief small talk and her groans of satisfaction as she eats the entire cheesesteak. It’s refreshing to hang out with a girl who doesn’t pretend she only eats kale and yogurt.

  “Thank you for dinner,” she says with no trace of sarcasm at all.

  Here’s my opening. I mentally prepare myself for her rejection, when she beats me to the punch and lobs it off the side of the head.

  “Owen, whatever you’re doing. It’s not going to work.”

  Shit, I haven’t even gotten to get two words out.

  Charm, keep that charm. “What do you mean, gorgeous?”

  Minka rolls her eyes. “This. Whatever plan you have. Listen, I actually do think you might be a nice person. But believe me when I tell you, not only am I not looking for anything, but I’m definitely not looking for anything with a superstar athlete golden boy.”

  I frown at her summary of me.

  “Don’t give me that face, you know where you come from. And again, it’s not because you aren’t nice. You’ve been nothing but kind since we met. I’m just not in your league and I personally don’t want to be there.’

  Well, there it is. The underlying issue. This girl really does hate the popular crowd. Not that I blame her. And I also really hate that people lump me in there.

  “I understand your … feelings about people like me, as you say. But give me a chance. You have no idea who I am. I like you and I want to get to know you better. By shutting me out now, you are basically judging me the same way you think ‘people like me’ judge you.”

  I can see her warming to the idea. She knew that she was doing to me exactly what had been done or what I assumed had been done, to her for years.

  “Fine. But only because you played the ‘don’t judge a book by its cover’ card. And I love books.” She gives me a small smile. “So … I was planning to do a complete Lost marathon on Netflix. You could stay if you want …”

  She left the door open and there is no way I’m going anywhere. “Well, that depends. Are you Team Jack or Team Sawyer?” I eye her, plastering my big-time flirt smile on my face and placing my chin on top of my hands.

  “Team Jack all the way. He and Kate are meant to be together,” she answers quickly and vehemently.

  “Okay, then I can stay.” I nod, making a show of relaxing my body. “While Sawyer is a total badass, Dr. Jack Shephard is my ladies-man idol.”

  Minka glowers at me. I follow her into the living room after she dumps the dishes in the sink.

  Rounding the corner, I see the couch that holds the memories from that fateful afternoon. She catches my eye and as if she can read my thoughts, raises her brows suggestively at me.

  Is she taunting me? My dick does a happy jolt, wanting very much to be in between her legs, pressed up against her heat on that couch
. I adjust myself when she turns around. I really don’t need her bolting now. I take a seat more toward the middle of the couch, hoping she’ll sit close enough so I can feel her smooth body.

  She jiggles some wires in back of the TV and grabs the remote setting up the streaming on her Netflix app. Now, this isn’t an insult to girls, but I know plenty who have no idea how to turn on basic cable. The fact that Minka sets up the entire thing herself turns me on even more. Chicks who know technology are a turn-on.

  She settles on the couch and isn’t sitting on the opposite end, but she also isn’t close enough to touch me either. She presses some buttons on the remote and suddenly we are falling from the plane onto the deserted island. I study her out of the corner of my eye, itching to wrap my arm around her slim shoulders, massage the skin under my fingers, and feel it go warm under my touch.

  She’s tuned into the show now, so much so that she gasps when the engine on the beach explodes, forcing Hurley to grab the pregnant chick. Meanwhile, over on my side of hell, you could cut the tension in the air with a knife.

  It’s like there is this electric current running in the empty space between her and I on the couch. I want to breach it so bad, but don’t want to send her fleeing like last time. I ignore my stupid manly urges and try to focus on the TV. She asked me to stay and I don’t want to jeopardize my chance by doing something horny and idiotic.

  By the time Jack is getting stitched up by Kate, Minka and I have slowly inched into the valley that spanned between us. Her thigh is so close to mine now that I can feel the goose bumps running down my legs to the balls of my feet. Her scent wafts over me; citrusy and fresh yet sweet, like flowers. It’s driving me insane. I want to bury my face in her neck and hair, hear those whimpers she made for me when she was on her back in this very spot, my fingers milking her to orgasm.

  But, I’ll settle for cuddling. Hell, I would settle for being allowed to just look at her for several hours. But … I want to touch her so bad it hurts … so the bastard I am makes a break for it.

  Slowly, and with all the control I can manage, I lift my right hand up to my ear, scratching a fake itch. I hesitate with it there, my elbow in midair, and slowly arch it back as if I’m stretching, all while fake yawning in the process.

  Great. I’ve basically reduced myself to a twelve-year-old trying to touch a girl for the first time in the movie theater. But Minka just makes me so nervous. Something I’m quickly learning that I actually like. No girl has ever made me feel like this and I want to know why she does. I groan inwardly but keep going because there is no way I’m pulling back now.

  Finally, my arm lands on the back of the couch with a soft thud, and it’s more like she’s sitting in my embrace rather than snuggling. I let out a whoosh of breath, realizing I’ve been holding it, waiting to see how she would react.

  Minka looks cautiously at my arm draped over her space and then swings those beautiful eyes up to mine. I see amusement in them and a smirk dusting her pouty lips. Without saying anything, she burrows into my side, moving closer and drapes her arm across my stomach.

  My heart starts spasming and jumping for joy as I curl my arm protectively around her and adjust my body so that her head is in the crook of my neck. I try to forget that her hand is dangerously close to the tool between my thighs desperately calling for her.

  We sit conjoined like this for the next two episodes, not talking but simply watching and enjoying each other’s company. I’ve never hung out with a girl without the purpose of it leading somewhere. It feels nice.

  While I may want to strip her naked and get my mouth all over her, which is the understatement of the year, there’s no pressure on the situation. Which is strange.

  When I’m hooking up with a girl, because I rarely ever hang out with her on a platonic basis, there is always a clock on it. I want to get in her, get us off, and get her out of my room. I don’t usually want all the strings that come attached to anything more. But Minka could make me her goddamn puppet and I’d be so fucking happy.

  Allison was my only true girlfriend and with her, we’d been horny teenagers trying to prove something. We would go at it, not smoothly or successfully either, whenever we had alone time.

  We weren’t really interested in what the other liked or had to say because, in truth, we were just using each other. I was popular; she was popular, and people expected us to date. I liked the perks of having a girlfriend and she liked wearing my jersey.

  In college, I’ve had my fair share of drunken hookups and groupies throwing themselves at me, but it’s all been empty. The entire time I am fucking one of them, I am worrying about how I’m going to talk her out of my bed after.

  Netflix begins to cue up episode four and a wave of panic hits me in the chest as I realize how late it is and that I’ll have to let go of her soon. I tighten my arm around her, gently nuzzling the top of her hair.

  “You feel amazing,” I blurt out as I rub my fingertips up and down her silky arm. So much for not scaring her away, asshat.

  Minka chuckles. “You’re not so bad yourself, Mr. Washboard.”

  “Checking me out, eh? Does that mean I can return the favor?” I angle my body to semi-leer at her, which earns me a gentle swat to my cheek. I quickly cover her hand with my own, loving the feel of her soft palm caressing my stubble.

  We stare at each other, a buzz starting to form at the top of my spine. It’s like my whole body is vibrating; I want to kiss her so bad. I watch her big brown eyes drop to my lips and my heart hammers against my rib cage. Slowly, I remove my big hand from where it dwarfs hers on my cheek and reach for her heart-shaped face.

  I frame her face delicately, reveling in how her smooth chin feels in my rough hands. Minka leans into my touch, her upper body facing me now, legs tangled with my mine as we sit intertwined. I run my thumb along her cheekbone, feeling my skin spark with yearning as I go. Her eyes fill with lust, and a bit of apprehension, but not enough to stop me from my perusal of her flesh.

  It seems like hours that I sit there just feeling her face under my fingertips, mesmerized by her eyes.

  A sensation in my chest has me anxious only because I’ve never felt it before. When I look into Minka’s eyes, it’s as if she’s seeing me, right down to my soul. Like with her eyes she’s saying, “I understand you. Your fears, your doubts, what makes you tick.”

  And it should scare me, especially because we’ve barely spent any time together, but oddly, it’s like a puzzle piece has locked into place. We sit there, feasting on each other’s eyes, roaming the other’s face and all I can think is, complete.

  I crane my head toward hers, never breaking eye contact and hear Minka’s sharp intake of breath. Goose bumps trail down my arms and I’m literally shaking with the need to take her lips, fast and hard, but I hold myself back with all the control I can muster.

  I don’t want to scare her; I want to do this right. I trail my thumb from her temple down to her jawbone, stroking her skin and forcing her to pucker her lips toward me. Her eyes flutter closed as if she’s waiting for me to close the gap and initiate. But I can’t seem to. All I want to do is stare at her, like this, so ready and full of anticipation. The buildup is almost as good as actually kissing her.

  I move a fraction, feeling like I’ll explode if I don’t kiss her now and seal my lips over her soft and delicate lips. And fuck, I was wrong, this is so much better than the buildup. She rubs her lips over mine and I feel my dick go rock solid in my shorts.

  I slide my lips over every inch of hers, angling my head to taste her in slow and lazy kisses. Inside my chest, my heart is keeping a frantic beat and every time she makes a breathy sigh when we come up for air, I feel little electric jolts of need pulse through my body.

  I can feel her getting bolder, beginning to bite at my lips, which sends every ounce of blood in my body directly to the massive hard-on I’m sporting. I have to slow her down or I’m going to get carried away. I already want to swallow her whole as it is. But her
tongue is now doing a damn sexy twist with mine, thrusting into my mouth like I’ve imagined thrusting into her tight body.

  And now she’s pulling away. Eyeing me with a potent stare, her hands go to the hem of her cotton shirt. My mouth is dry and my hands begin to tingle. I want to touch her so bad in the place she’s soon to reveal to me that I might convulse. I probably look like a jonesing drug addict instead of the debonair stud I’m going for. I should stop her, but I’m frozen.

  And then it’s off. The little brown wisp of a shirt flutters over her head and to the floor. And now I think I’ve died and gone to heaven.

  12

  Minka

  I sit there, naked from the waist up, as Owen stares at me. He looks like a starving animal about to devour me, but all he can do is sit there with his jaw hanging open, staring at my now very alert nipples. And it makes me feel oddly … powerful.

  Powerful is not something I ever felt with Gregory. I always felt like I was being dragged under the ocean, willfully going with the current but not in control of my own body. And now that I feel this power, I am almost not regretting my bold decision.

  I’m very aware that I am a walking cliché. One minute I’m warning him off, the next I’m stripping for him so I can be completely naked for his hands to roam over me.

  But the way Owen was kissing me with such care, mixed with such scorching heat, something inside of me lit up and started burning down all my defenses. I was tired of denying my body what it wants, what I want, because of a stupid decision I made a year and a half ago. I’m not going into this blind and I can protect myself from falling for Owen. I just want his body.

  This has nothing to do with the fact that he brought me a cheesesteak from Mitch’s. I felt my heart sigh and dramatically swoon when I opened the door to that familiar smell. Damn traitorous heart.

  I’m still posed here on the couch for him and I start to feel too exposed. He’s still just gaping at me and I have the urge to cross my arms over my naked breasts. I start to move them when he says, “No don’t. I’m sorry … I’m just staring at you like an idiot … but, Jesus, Minka, you’re incredible.”