Erin Nicholas's Blog - Posts Tagged "heavy-petting"

Heavy Petting ~ Sneak Peek!

“Jordan!” A male voice yelled through the door. He pounded again. “Jordan! It’s me, let me in.”

Jordan froze with shock.

That was Fletcher’s voice.

Immediately her eyes filled with tears.

“Jordan! Dammit! Let me in!”

She ran to the door, twisting the deadbolt, fumbling with the chain, and finally yanking it open.

Fletcher Landry was on the other side, his fist raised, ready to knock again.

He froze.

They stared at each other for a long moment.

Then she launched herself at him.

He caught her easily, his big arms wrapping around her. He stepped through the doorway with her, her feet dangling three inches off the floor. He kicked the door shut behind them and then just squeezed her.

There was nothing better in her life than Fletcher hugs. That had been true since she’d been six years old and had fallen on the playground at recess, scraping her knee, and he’d come over to check on her and hugged her. That was it. Fletcher Landry had been hugging her and making things better for the past twenty years and this moment was no different.

But, as she buried her face in his neck, she realized this was totally different.

He hadn’t had to come.

Things had been awkward between them for months. She’d cried the last time they’d been together. He’d asked her to choose between him and Jason.

And clearly, she’d made the wrong choice.
But still, he’d come. Now her best friend in the entire world and the person who could always make everything okay was here. As if by magic.

Of course, it wasn’t magic. Fletcher had, clearly, gotten on a plane immediately after finding out what happened and had flown to her.

He let go of her with one arm and reached behind him to re-lock the door and replace the chain. Then he walked to the sofa in the living room of the suite.

He sank down onto one of the cushions, taking her with him. He pulled her into his lap and continued to hug her tightly. Jordan curled into him, her arms around his neck. He was warm and solid and familiar.

So familiar.

They sat together on the couch, hugging, for several minutes.

Eventually, she lifted her head from his shoulder and looked up at him.

He met her gaze, but didn’t say anything.

He didn’t really need to say anything.

“Thank you,” she told him. She didn’t need to say anything either, she knew, but she wanted to.

He just gave her a single nod.

She pulled back slightly studying him. His jaw was tight and though he was holding her and hugging her, his eyes were stormy.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

He gave a soft snort. “I think that’s my line.”

She shook her head. “Well, obviously I’m not okay. I’ve never been more humiliated in my life. But you look…” She narrowed her eyes. “Really pissed.”

“Accurate.”

Yeah, that made sense. Fletcher wasn’t a huge fan of Jason’s. In spite of her best efforts and desires over the years, Jason and Fletcher had never been friends. They tolerated one another. Mostly because she insisted on it. But there was a tension between the two and always had been.

Jason had, at times, been jealous of Fletcher. At least in the beginning. When they were fifteen and had first started dating, everything about relationships had been new to both of them. Her being close to Fletcher had made Jason suspicious. But after some time, he’d realized that she and Fletcher truly were just best buddies.

It probably helped that Fletcher had been a playboy from a young age. He was a Landry and the Landry males were well known for being too charming for their own good. They all had more than their share of female attention and they all wallowed in it. Fletcher had been no exception. He’d dated extensively through high school and had been very familiar with back seats and lost panties long before Jason even got lucky with his longtime girlfriend.

For some reason, thinking about that now, she became acutely aware of the fact that she was in Fletcher’s lap.

She’d sat in Fletcher’s lap lots of times. Usually when there had been too many people packed into someone’s pickup heading down to the bayou for a bonfire.

Was that the safest situation? Of course not. Would they have been pulled over and ticketed by the cop if he’d seen them? Probably. But if they were ever short on seats, whether in the pickup or on someone’s couch for movie nights, she’d always plopped down on Fletcher. Sometimes not even just because they were short of seats. She’d sat on his lap and shared blankets around bonfires and ballgames a number of times.

But it had been a while.

And for some reason, at this moment, she was aware that he was bigger and harder than she remembered from past lap-sitting situations.

Of course he was. He was twenty-six now. This was definitely not the same body she’d cuddled up with in high school on the pontoon boat when the sun dropped and things got chilly on the bayou.

It wasn’t just him in general that was bigger and harder. There is a specific part of him pressing into her right butt cheek at the moment that definitely could be described as big and hard.

She wiggled.

His hand clamped down to keep her from moving. And that was when she became aware that one of his big, hot hands was resting on her hip.

Her mostly bare hip.

Because she was wearing the t-shirt she slept in and panties. And she hadn’t covered up to answer the door.

So now she was sitting on Fletcher’s lap, barely dressed, in a hotel suite, and he seemed very happy to see her.

“Fletch—”

“Ignore it.”

Yeah, he knew what she’d noticed. As always, they were on the same page without exchanging many words.

She shifted again, his grip tightened on her hip, and she was shocked to feel tingles dance across her skin.

“I don’t know if I can.”

“I’m ignoring the fact that you’re half-naked. You can ignore my reaction to it.”

It was completely stupid, and probably inappropriate, but Jordan snorted.

“Your ‘reaction’ would indicate that you’re not actually ignoring me being half-naked.”

Fletcher gave the soft chuckle and squeezed her hip again. Then he nudged her off his lap.
Jordan stood and gave him a smile. “You’ve seen me in less.”

They’d swum together many, many times. She’d worn bathing suits, bikinis, and they’d even skinny dipped a couple of times. Never just the two of them and, as far she knew, he’d never gotten a good look. But he’d probably seen a flash of her ass at least. And she’d gotten one really good full frontal view the summer after they’d graduated. It had been quick, right before he dove into the water, and she’d, of course, been completely caught up in Jason, but she’d understood what the girls of Autre and the surrounding area had been gushing about.

Fletcher stretched up from the couch and Jordan had to take a step back to give him space.

“Who’s saying that I didn’t have this ‘reaction’ then too?” he asked.

Jordan grinned. This relationship was so easy. They could talk about almost anything and there was very little filtering of language or topics. At least it had always been that way. She was incredibly relieved to think that was still true. They hadn’t really been “them” for a while, but now standing here, looking up at him, after two years of being physically apart and three and a half months of things being awkward and tense in phone calls and texts, she desperately needed them to be them again.

“Thanks for saying that,” she told him.

“Thanks for shaving your legs,” he returned. His eyes drop to her bare legs.

Again, he’d seen them many times in shorts, skirts, and bathing suits. But he’d also known her through many awkward growing-up stages. Like before she’d started shaving her legs. And after she started shaving her legs and hated it. She’d sometimes go a few days even in the summer when she was wearing shorts and he always gave her shit about it. To which she would always reply, “I’m only hanging out with you, it doesn’t matter.”

Right now, though, she was really glad she’d shaved her legs too.

“Get your stuff," Fletcher said.

“What?”

“I’m taking you home. Get your stuff.”

“Home?”

Fletcher blew out a breath. “Well, what else are you going to do?”

He had a point. But if she went home, she couldn’t not have the conversation with her mother that she didn’t want to have.

She was suddenly single. And homeless, since the apartment in Nashville was Jason’s. And even if she was going to get her own, she didn’t have a job—also thanks to Jason and her quitting her job to travel with him four months before he told her he was in love with someone else.

But she didn’t want it to be in Nashville anyway.

She’d clearly taken too long to respond, because Fletcher said, “You need to come home.”

“Sure, why not? Everyone already saw the most humiliating moment of my life, I might as well slink back home with my tail between my legs, jobless, boyfriend-less, pathetic, and miserable.”

It took Fletcher about three seconds to answer. “Yeah, you might as well.”

That was not going to make it into the pep talk Hall of Fame, but Jordan felt her mouth curving into a grin. “At least there’ll be moonshine and good coffee.” It seemed no one outside of Louisiana believed in chicory coffee, which was a true travesty. She paused. “I’m really glad you’re here."

His eyes flickered with emotion but he just gave her a little nod. “Of course I’m here.”

Of course he was here. She probably should’ve been expecting it.

“I just really —”

“Jordan,” Fletcher interrupted.

“Yeah?”

“You need to put some clothes on.”

She looked down at herself. Her shirt was a pale peach color and hit about three inches below the lower curve of her ass.

“But I shaved.”

Fletcher tucked his hands into his front pockets of his jeans and braced his feet apart. He nodded. “Yep. And I’m wondering just how much shaving you do.”

Her eyes widened in her mouth dropped open. She stared at him. There was very little off limits between her and Fletcher, but there were just some things they naturally steered away from. How much shaving she did was one of those things.

“I can’t believe you just said that to me.”

He shrugged. “It’s the truth. Also that shirt is a little see-through when you’re standing in front of the window.”

She glanced behind her. The sun was coming in through the huge window. She looked back at him. “I—”

“And I can see your nipples.”

Again she felt her mouth dropped open. She was very rarely speechless around Fletcher. Then again, Fletcher very rarely talked about her nipples. In fact he had never talked about her nipples.

She crossed her arms over her chest instinctively. It seemed that her nipples liked being talked about because they were a little perkier than they had been a moment ago.

“Wow,” was her only response. Very eloquent.

Again, he just shrugged. “Thought we could always say anything to one another.”

“We…can…I just never…had you comment…my nipples before.” She couldn’t believe she was stumbling over her words with Fletcher.

“You sure?”

“Very.”

“Huh.” Fletcher seemed to be thinking about that. “Well, I’m sure I’ve noticed them before, so I must’ve been trying to be a gentleman by not commenting.”

“And you’re not feeling gentlemanly today?”

“Not especially.”

“And why is that?”

“It just you and me, Jordan. And you’re now single. Do I need to be a gentleman?”

She took a deep breath, studying him.
Fletcher seemed a little wound up. Not his usual laid-back, easy-going self. She realized he was worried about her. So no, he did not need to be a gentleman.

“Nope,” she said.

“Good. Now go get dressed.”

Or else what? She thought. But she didn’t say it out loud. She wasn’t going to taunt Fletcher about her near naked state and her nipples.
That was ridiculous. And inappropriate.

Probably. For some reason.

Why didn’t that feel inappropriate and ridiculous?

That was probably something she should think about later. But she was acutely aware now of her near-naked state and her nipples and getting that all covered up seem like a good idea.

“Be back in a bit,” she said, pivoting on her heel and heading for the bedroom. She closed the door behind her and took a deep breath.