Page 48 of People Like Us

“Then it’s fine. I mean, you should probably tell Andy that at some point. But for now, it’s fine,” he assured me.

“You think?”

He nodded, and pulled me to my feet as he stood. We stayed like that, staring at each other while his thumb brushed back and forth across my knuckles for too long. He traced a single finger across the sensitive skin under my eyes and said softly, “Your eyes are so red, Lola baby.”

My eyes fluttered closed immediately, leaning into his palm. “Will you wash my face?” I whispered.

“Yeah,” he agreed without question, guiding me gently into his bathroom.

I sat on the counter as August ran a washcloth under the faucet. I caught my reflection in the mirror over my shoulder and noticed him staring at it, too.

“You’re so stunning,” he said softly.

“I look like my mother.” The words tangled in my throat, catching like a fly in a spider’s web, making them sound strained in the small room.

“Tell me about her,” August requested gently.

“I don’t remember much. She left when I was little.” I could see myself, as if I were outside my own body, standing in the tiny hallway of my parents trailer, staring at their unmade bed as my father smeared jam on burnt toast at the kitchen counter, crumbs going everywhere. He looked so tired, as if he somehow knew that time would be the last she’d ever leave. Like he could feel it in his bones that she was gone for good.

I wished I could feel it too, but I never had. I’d spent every moment of my life since then waiting for her to come back.

August took my chin in his fingers and pulled me to face him. It was the firmest his touch had ever been. “How could anyone ever leave you?” he asked, voice so soft it felt like velvet against my nerves.

“She was sick. The kind that lived in her head instead of her body. And she wouldn’t let anyone help her. My dad tried a lot, I think, but she kept leaving. And then, one day, she didn’t come back. And he stopped expecting her to.”

“Where is she now?” August asked.

“I don’t know,” I admitted.

August pressed the washcloth under my eye, its warmth spreading through me. He moved it slowly across the bridge of my nose to my other eye. A small, gentle moan escaped me at the feeling.

“My dad died when I was a kid,” he said, barely audible. “Drunk driving accident.”

I gave him a small smile. “I wish we were friends back then.”

“I don’t,” he said, looking me in the eyes.

“Why?” I frowned.

“It wouldn’t be like this,” he said softly. “It wouldn’t be honest.”

“I only want you honest, August,” I said into his wrist.

“I only want you honest, Sin.”

I shook my head in protest, squeezing his arm. “Say my name.”

He dragged the damp cloth gently down my cheek to my mouth. My lips parted on instinct as he ran the warm fabric over them.

“I only want you honest, Lola,” he vowed, voice raspy.

My eyes fluttered open, and August was staring at me with so much heat in his gaze that it took every ounce of willpower I had left not to wrap my legs around his waist and pull him into me.

Instead I took the rag from him, and dropped it into the sink. I straightened his two fingers and stuck my tongue out flat before leaning forward and taking them into my mouth. My lips fell gently around them as I began to move, slowly, up and down their length, even over the heavy silver band on his middle finger.

“Lola…” he breathed, his heavy lidded eyes fixated on the movement.

I shook my head softly, begging him not to speak. Not to ruin this. I kept going, flicking my tongue against his fingers, my saliva coating them. He leaned into me, not taking his eyes off my mouth while his own hung open.