Blue

NOVA did not care in the least that Harry Styles was landing in her airport, breathing her air, and smiling with that dimple dotted, seductive grin. We move slower in the South. It’s the heat or the gin, I’m not really sure, but there’s something delicious about the sultry, sassy South. NOVA also didn’t care because no one knew he was coming. Well, I knew. Harry knew. Maybe his assistant.

And then there was Ben.

I chucked his wallet at his stomach as he was sprawled out on the couch. “Come on, Thelma. We’ve got shit to do.”

“In case you didn’t notice, I’m busy.” He looked back down at his cellphone. “Don’t you have a job?”

“No, actually, I don’t. They fired me.”

He looked startled. “Oh….well…um…sorry to hear that.”

“I need a ride.”

“Do I look like I care what you need?”

“Ben.” I sighed loudly, crossing my arms over my chest and glancing over my shoulder. Lord only knew where my mother was lurking. “My license is still suspended. I need a ride.”

He burst out laughing. “Yeeeah, I remember that now. That was hilarious. I guess that will teach you to drink underage and drive into a telephone pole at six miles an hour, huh?”

“First? I’m now twenty-one and am physically incapable of drinking underage anymore. Second? Nobody cares what you think.” I leaned over and yanked his arm. “Get up and drive me.”

“That’s what she said.”

“This is neither the time nor the place.”

He made an over exaggerated groaning noise as he sat up, stretching his arms over his head like an old man. “Where am I taking you?”

I didn’t want to tell him. It was going to be markedly more difficult to get him to drive somewhere if he didn’t actually know where he was going. “You’re taking me to the airport. To pick up Harry.”

“Ahhhhhh, Harreh?” Ben raised his eyebrows with marked interest. “You’re bringing Harreh here to Richmond to see us? Well, well, bless my soul.”

“I will stab you in the face if you give me shit on this or if you give him a hard time. I swear to God.”

“Calm down, Delaney. I’m not going to give him a hard time.” He elbowed me in the ribs. “I bet he’ll give you something hard though, yeah? Am I right?”

“The less I have to talk about my vagina with you, the better.”

“If you get pregnant, you know Mom is going to have like, a stroke, right?”

“All the more reason.” I muttered, more to myself than to him.

He heard me anyway. “She might…you know, eventually accept what’s going on. I don’t think she…well…I don’t think she hates him.”

She didn’t even know him. How could she hate him? Again, was it the fact that I’m sleeping with an international music icon or is it the fact that I’m in a serious relationship? Because, really, that’s the most sexist thing she could possibly do. Ben fucks any female over the age of eighteen who slows down near him. He was kissing on girls in preschool—yet she’d never, ever said a word to him about being promiscuous. And really, was I promiscuous? I was in a committed relationship.

I wanted to slam my hand into the silverware drawer. Repeatedly.

Despite what appeared to be Ben’s better judgment (which wasn’t saying a lot), he strolled out to the car with me and we headed to the airport. Traffic wasn’t terrible, but it was frustrating enough that he flipped on the radio and began flipping stations. “I wish there was a One Direction satellite radio station. We could enjoy some tunes before you introduce me to the object of your affections.”

“Yeah.” I opened the glove compartment and pulled out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter, quickly popping a cigarette between my lips and lighting it. I took a fitful drag, blowing the smoke out through the window. “This was a bad idea.”

“Thanks for asking, sure, you can have a cigarette.” Ben tapped his hands against the steering wheel, in some kind of weird, overly white groove to Jamiroquai’s Virtual Insanity. “This song was so under rated. It’s as relevant now as it was in what, 1992?”

“We were negative two in 1992.”

“I’m just really into these jams right now.”

“Fine. But look, I’m going to tell you right now, if Mom dares to question him on anything other than if he likes bacon or sausage with breakfast, I’m going to have a fit. I mean, I’ll be out the door and I will not set foot in that fucking house again.”

“You’re not going to do that because the girls adore you.”

“Seriously, is all this shit because of Mark?”

Ben didn’t say anything.

I rolled my eyes. “Jesus Christ, am I going to be punished for a little…okay, a few mistakes for the rest of my life? Really? Don’t we all think that I learned my God damned lesson when I was eighteen?”

“Fuck, Laney, you almost died. And you were seventeen. And Mom almost had a meltdown because she was so worried about you.”

I clamped my mouth shut. It was one mistake. It was something I’d never even told Harry, one moment in my life that I desperately wished I could do over and not fuck up as bad. Mark and I had gone out with some of his friends: drinking, screwing around, breaking into an old abandoned hotel and getting high, dropping acid and doing ecstasy.

And then Mark pulled out an 8 ball.

I had too many drugs in my system anyway, but the 8 ball tipped it over the edge. Medically, I overdosed. Mark may have been a douche bag and an asshole, but he wasn’t unfeeling. He took me to the hospital—albeit leaving me there—and, eventually, I got better. At that point, my mom laid into me and life was shit for a while. I never trusted Mark again. But that didn’t mean Harry was Mark. He wasn’t. He was the polar opposite of Mark and if someone would just take the time to realize that not every person in the world was going to pump me full of drugs and abandon me in the emergency room—

“I’m giving him a chance.” Ben maneuvered the car into the turn lane into the airport. “It just makes everyone nervous. Well, Mom nervous.”

My phone buzzed in my hand and I glared down at it, angrily sliding my finger across the face to read all of Harry’s text. I’m here, Laney love. You should be able to drive straight down to jet way 5. Security will meet you but just give them your ID. Beth arranged everything ahead of time.

Beth was his assistant. She was awesome, like some kind of magic ‘Make way for Harry’ machine that set up all his arrangements, made sure he paid his bills on time, and got us the best hotel reservations ever. Ever.

Now to see if we could actually get to him without being arrested. Or tazed.

I am so excited to see you, Hazza. This week has been shit. “He says to meet him at jet way 5.”

“I’m not entirely convinced that we’re going to just be allowed to drive on the tarmac. You know.”

“Okay, well, he said jet way 5. Here, just drive into the side of the building and we can get a police escort.”

“Hilarious, Laney.” He slowed down a tic and glanced at a road sign. “Wait, like private jet way? Like over there?”

“I’m fairly sure he’s not flying economy like the rest of us peasants.”

“Shit.” Ben slammed his foot down of the brake, the force of the stop throwing me forward against my seat belt. He threw the car in reverse, flying backwards several hundred feet, and then took the rightmost exit. “Okay, I got this.”

“Keep it up and we’re going to get that police escort after all.”

Ben chuckled. “Fuck, Lanes, all the tabloids would have a field day with that. Poor Laney Lee, girlfriend of pop fiend Harreh Styles, arrested in suspicious missed exit shenanigans. Don’t worry, I’ll represent you. I know all of Virginia’s traffic laws.”

“Represent me? Shit, Ben, I’m going to tell the cops it was all on you. You can’t just reverse down a highway. They frown on that. You should check your Virginia traffic laws a little more closely.”

“More closely is poor grammar.”

“Well, try this instead: fuck you.”

Instead of responding, Ben was slowing the car down in front of a small guard’s shack and corresponding traffic block. Oh good, this looked promising.

He rolled his window down and pushed his sunglasses on top of his head, smiling at the approaching guard. Or cop. Of FBI agent, whatever he was. “Hello, officer.”

“This is a restricted area, son, did you see the sign? Private jet way?”

“Yes sir, but my sister is just here to pick up her boyfriend on jet way five. Laney Lee? That’s my sister, not the boyfriend. The boyfriend is—“

I leaned over Ben and handed the guard my driver’s license. “Here’s my ID. There’s apparently a list or something I’m on.”

“You’re probably on a lot of lists.” Ben snickered.

“Anytime but now, asshole.”

The guard returned to the guard shack and disappeared inside. Ben poked me in the arm. “He’s probably pulling up your rap sheet or running a background check.”

“Yeah, he’ll see I’ve been charged with public nudity or inappropriate sexual behavior with a member of a boy band.”

“Hilarious! That’s the Laney I know.” He abruptly stopped laughing. “Did you really get charged for public nudity?”

“No. But there’s really a ring of truth to it, yeah?” I giggled. “We had sex in a restaurant, though. In the bathroom.”

“More than I needed to know.”

The guard returned and handed my driver’s license to Ben. “Okay, everything checks out. You can drive down to jet way 5. You’ll see the sign: it’s the third right.”

“Shouldn’t it be the fifth?” Ben chuckled. “You know, five?”

The guard didn’t look amused.

“We’re just leaving.” I shoved my license back in my wallet and then slapped my hand against the steering wheel. “Drive.”

Ben slowly pulled the bar around the three positioned jersey barriers and then slooooooowly drove down the road towards the jet ways. Three rights later, sure enough, was a sign for jet ways 5 and 6. A slim black plane was stopped beside jet way 5.

And there he was.

He was leaning against the small, private terminal and talking to a blonde stewardess. Ew. I felt a tinge of jealousy flare through my entire body. Nope. Don’t even go there, Laney. He’d given me a ring. We were addicted to each other. I mean, he was going to talk to people, right? It’s not like he’d stuck his tongue down her throat or something. Keep it together, Delaney.

He noticeably perked up when Ben slowed the car next to the terminal. I opened my door before Ben had even put the car in park, jumping out and casually leaning against the door. “Hey stranger.”

“Hey, beautiful.” He turned back to the blonde. “It’s was nice meeting you, Laurie.”

Ugh, sometimes he got annoying when he was so nice.

My foul mood lifted the second he wrapped his arms around me, pulling me close to him. He crushed his mouth to mine, dipping me backwards. “I missed you.”

“I missed you too, ugh, it’s been unbearable here. Being with my family is like throwing yourself into a hurricane. Literally. For like, six seconds it’s really exciting, but then it gets violent and horrifying and rips you apart.”

He laughed, touching his forehead to mine. “I’m willing to go through it to be with you, Laney love. Whatever it takes to look into those big blue eyes—I’ll do.”

My brother finally got out of the car and opened the trunk. I rolled my eyes. He was doing this because his was a nosey bastard and because he felt that manually opening the trunk instead of popping it from inside posed less of a threat of needless wear and tear. Both were equally irritating. “Oh, look. There’s a family member now.”

Ben reached out his hand to shake Harry’s. “So you’re the British kid fucking my sister.”

Mother of God. I shut my eyes, dropping my head to Harry’s shoulder, and groaned. “Tell me this isn’t happening.”

He laughed. Forced or genuine, I don’t know, but he didn’t immediately run back to the private jet. “Uh…yeah, I’m Harry Styles. Her boyfriend.”

“I’m Ben Lee. Her older brother.”

Harry firmly shook Ben’s hand, his expression pleasant but serious. “I love Laney very, very much. Whatever you think my motivations are, you have to understand that I adore her.”

“Good. You’d better.” Ben motioned for Harry to put his bag in the trunk. “Because if you hurt her? I’ll fucking kill you.”

“Great. Great, good talk.” I shoved my brother towards the driver’s seat. “As much fun as it is hanging in an airport parking lot, let’s go.”

I shut the trunk and then scrambled into the backseat with Harry. He reached for my hand the second his seatbelt was buckled. “We had four proper sessions in the studio the last few days. We got a ton of work done on the album. They’re talking November for a release.”

“That seems crazy fast.”

“It’s always nonstop. Record, tour, record, tour, record.” He sighed, tracing our interlocked fingers with this free hand. “Having this month off and spending it with you is going to be amazing. I feel like I should take a class or something. Learn a trade.”

I grinned. “Or we could just get naked, drink tea, and play Scrabble.”

“Baby girl, you know I love that.”

Ben made a strange noise from the driver’s seat. “Laney.”

“Calm down, Ben, we aren’t getting naked to play Scrabble. We’re getting naked to have sex.”

“No, ugh, Laney stop it. No, I’m asking if you know how to get back to the highway.”

“I know with my stellar driving record and all it might surprise you, but I don’t frequently drive to the airport.”

“Did you see any signs?”

“Well, no.” I looked out the window. It looked like any other random road: the airport itself was behind us and the road in front of us was surrounded by open field. So, basically it looked like Virginia. And most of North Carolina. “Did you turn on the GPS on your phone?”

“Well, thank you for that insightful piece of advice. YES, I turned on the GPS. The road it’s telling me to merge onto doesn’t exist.”

“Harry,” I sighed, touching my cheek to his shoulder. “I have to be completely honest with you. My license is suspended. That’s why Captain ‘I’m lost again’ is chauffeuring us.”

“I don’t care.” His voice was rough in my ear, seeped in desire, “I want to feel your body, I want to taste you and lick you and touch you and have every single inch of you as mine. No one else’s. Just mine: mine to touch and kiss and lick and suck.”

Well, that escalated fucking fast. I leaned over and kissed him; he sucked my lower lip into his mouth and nibbled gently on the tender flesh. “So, Laney love, I’ve been thinking—“

“Mother fucker, I have no idea where to go.” Ben slapped his hand against the steering wheel. It felt like he was going 50 miles an hour—and he didn’t slow down a bit as he flew past a security booth.

The guard looked mortified.

I turned around slightly. “Uh, I think you were supposed to stop there, not blow through it like….well, like you did. That’s great.”

Ben slammed on his brakes, jerking the car over onto the shoulder. “Fuck, was that a toll booth? Is he like…did he follow us?”

Harry was laughing hysterically. I turned and looked out the back window. “You stopped like, twenty yards from the booth. He’s still in there.” I paused dramatically. “For now.”

“I just don’t know where I missed the turn. Or, wait, is it up further?” He was frantically poking his finger against his cell phone face. “Laney, why didn’t you drive?”

“We’ve been over this.”

“We’re heading back to the interstate, right? I mean, there’s an onramp from here. Wasn’t there an onramp last time? We picked Aunt Edith and Aunt June up last summer, shit, remember? Foster got a speeding ticket on the way home. I broke my sunglasses.”

“Have you ever actually been to Richmond before?” I looked at Harry. He pressed the back of my hand to his mouth, kissing me and laughing all at the same time. “Honestly. Do you see what I have to put up with?”

“I got it, I missed the turn.” Ben threw the car in reverse and did some kind of poor, weirdly done three point turn. He slammed his foot to the gas and then sped off the direction we’d just come—and past the security booth again.

The guard still looked mortified.

“Seriously, dude? Seriously?” I pressed my free hand to my forehead. “How did you even get your license in the first place?”

“Get out of the car, Laney.”

“You drove the Power Rangers power wheels we had when we were three better than you drive an actual motorized vehicle.” I tried to hold back a giggle, snorting instead. Classy. “And the state is going to give you a law degree? And yet, they took away my license?”

“Harry, man,” Ben was shaking his head back and forth, “this girl is the biggest pain in my ass. If you want her, you can have her.”

Harry draped his arm around my shoulders and pulled me close to him. His breath was hot in my ear as he answered my brother, “Oh, I definitely want her. Forever.”

****

Somehow, we managed to get back to the house without Ben getting lost or kicking me out of the car. Foster’s car was in the driveway but the girls and Alex were gone, still at school for the next few hours. Good.

And my mom’s car was gone too.

Better.

“Okay, well, great to see everybody. I have shit to do.” Ben popped the truck and handed Harry his bag. “You go and do…..yeah, whatever it is you do best. Just try not to be naked when everyone gets home, ‘kay? That’s like, four hours from now. Four. Set your alarm on your phone or something.”

I dug into my purse and pulled out my house key. “Foster’s here. We’re not going to like, fuck on the dining room table.”

Ben held up his index finger to silence me. “First, I don’t care about your sexual inappropriateness and vulgar escapades. Second—and I hesitate to tell you this, I really do—Foster isn’t home, he’s working today.”

Harry and I exchanged a glance.

“Yeah, great.” Ben waved at us. “Well, have fun. Remember, Jesus is watching.”

I started to wave at him and then promptly stuck up my middle finger. Without waiting for him to pull out of the driveway, I grabbed Harry’s hand and led him to the house and unlocked the front door. “Welcome to Chateau Lee, my childhood home. Don’t be appalled by any childhood pictures of me you might see. My mother insists on displaying the most hideous on the walls for public display.”

“Oh my God.” Harry pointed at an enormous framed portrait of our entire family, displayed over the piano in our entry. “Is that you?”

“Ehhhh, regrettably.” I rested my chin on his shoulder, shutting my eyes against the bleach blonde, pixie cut, fifteen-year-old me dressed in a dark blue dressed that matched the dresses my sisters were wearing and—even better—the ties my brothers were wearing. “So, that was a phase. I dyed it bright pink a few months later.”

“You’re adorable.”

“I was painfully shy.”

He slid his hands down my waist and pulled my body against his, pressing his mouth to the spot just below my ear. “You are definitely not shy now.”

“Not for you, anyway.” He crushed his mouth against mine, running his hands down my ass. “So…how much did you miss me?”

“It’s lonely in bed without you.” I smiled coyly. “Speaking of which, did you want to see my bed? Bedroom. I totally meant bedroom.”

He laughed, obviously pretending to consider it. “I’ll check it out, yeah.”

I slid my hand into his and pulled him up the staircase. I pointed out household things of note, like the bathroom and the laundry chute, and the broken molding in the hallway that Ben bashed his face off of when we were ten. When we got to the attic, I carefully shut the door behind us and flipped the deadbolt in place. Glorious privacy! “Sooooo, this is where you’ll be staying. The couch here folds out into a bed, you know, if you’d rather sleep alone.”

“I’m tired of sleeping alone.” He eased my shirt over my head and tossed it on the floor. “And tired of waking up without you next to me.”

I unzipped his jeans and tugged them down his slim hips. “I’ll be honest, Hazza, it’s been the worst few days of my life. I like the kids, but my mother drives me insane. I immediately remembered why I moved out in the first place.”

“Move in with me.”

“You’re never home.”

He laughed, sliding my panties off while running his hands down my thighs and legs. He kissed his way back up my body, running his tongue around my hip studs and taking time to reacquaint himself with my breasts and nipples. Straightening from his crouched position, he gently turned me around and pressed me put against one of the four posters on my bed. He nudged my legs apart with his knee and adjusted himself, entering me from behind.

I sucked in a deep breath, pressing my forehead to the wooden post. Fuck, every time was better than the last; not matter how many times he made love to me, I always craved more. We were addicted to each other, the feeling of each other’s bodies inside and out.

He pressed his chest to my back, leaning against me and pressing his mouth against my neck. “Fuck, baby girl, you feel amazing.”

“So do you, Hazza. I...I’m not sure I can cum this way. It’s hot, but it’s a weird angle.”

He slid one hand from my hip forward, gently rubbing small circles around my clit. That did it. I bit my lip, moaning softly in my throat. Pleasure was building—and fast.

He slowed his rhythm, pulling me backwards against his chest. “Laney love, I want to take you away. After the shows….after the shows in Europe, I want to go away with you. Just us.”

“Absolutely.” My eyes fluttered closed as he trailed kisses down my neck and shoulder. “As long as you promise to fuck me like this there too. Wherever there is.”

He chuckled, running his hands down my hips; he gripped them and again quickened his rhythm, grinding and thrusting against me with varied pace, hard and deep, slow and gentle. He mumbled something and pulled out of me, spinning me around and crushing his mouth to mine. We stumbled onto the bed and he laid me back, adjusting himself against me and sliding back inside. The feeling was enough to make me cum.

He slid his hand back into my hair, locking my face in position so he could stare into my eyes. “I want it to be special. Just time for us to be together and…and…no outside influences to bother us.”

I nodded, searching his eyes. They were a mixture of emotions, of passion and desire and love; of that slightly wide-eyed look as he got closer to his climax. But there was something else…a sweet, soft shyness I hadn’t seen in a long time.

Well, whatever it was, it didn’t matter to me. I pulled him to me, tangling my fingers in his curls. This boy. He could take me tent camping in Ohio and I wouldn’t care. Just being with him was all I needed.

Notes

I'm baaaack!!