So she’d finally taken off running, and here she was. And now what?
***
Gus told her more stories as he cooked and as they ate, and she told her share back. His stories were all about growing up in a big, boisterous, close-knit family, in a town full of people who had known him since he was born. Hers seemed pale and lonely in comparison. She had grown up in a suburb where no one knew her outside of her block, and her parents had sold that house as soon as she left for college.
Still, Gus listened intently. He never interrupted her, never jumped in to tell his own, better story before she was finished with hers.
And all the time she was aware of being drawn to him. She wanted him, in a physical way that she had rarely wanted anyone. For once she felt sure that he wanted her too. He leaned in, closer and closer, as they ate. Not like a guy trying to crowd or intimidate her. It was just like he couldn’t stand to be too far away.
Finally, when they’d been sitting and talking over empty plates for a while, he said, “So, dessert?”
“Gus,” Cara said. There was only one thing she wanted for dessert, and it wasn’t anything in the kitchen cupboards.
She saw Gus’s eyes go dark and hungry, and he leaned across the table to take her hand. The contact jolted through her like electricity.
They were both on their feet suddenly, and Gus’s arms went around her. His hand slid into her hair as she tilted her head back to look up at him and his mouth lowered to hers.
Cara had never really understood what people meant about kisses setting off fireworks, but this one definitely lit a fire. She felt her whole body heat up at the first touch of his lips, and she opened up shamelessly to him, letting Gus’s tongue plunder her mouth. She was barely aware that she was holding on tight to him, pressing as close as she could get, until she realized that she could feel his cock pressing against her through the layers of their clothes.
That was enough to make her pull back a little, panting. Gus’s eyes searched her, and he gave her another kiss, just a light touch.
“Maybe I should…show you the rest of the house.” Gus murmured, stepping back and taking her hand.
He led her toward the front of the house. Cara’s heart was beating fast, excited and aroused and still disbelieving a little what she was about to do.
She did her best not to be distracted again by the contents of his house, but her eye caught on glittering brightness as they passed an open door. She tugged against Gus’s grip to look.
“Oh,” Gus said. “That’s…”
Cara towed him after her as she stepped up to the doorway of the room. There were lights on in the room, and the curtains were open, so it was probably bathed in sunlight during the day, which must make it shine even brighter. Tapestries with gold and silver threads shining among the rich colors hung side-by-side with children’s paintings doused liberally in glitter and paintings in gilt frames. The rest of the room held low shelves displaying everything from popsicle-stick sculpture coated in gold glitter to an actual tiara on a stand.
Cara turned and looked up at Gus, her mouth open on a wordless question.
He smiled sheepishly. “We call it the treasure room. It’s—there’s this tradition, people in town give the mayor gifts every year. Usually…shiny gifts. And they’re displayed in the house for a while after they’re given. There are crates of this stuff in the attics, we never get rid of any of the gifts.”
“Hoarder,” Cara diagnosed fondly, looking around the room full of sparkling things again.
Gus made a weird little choking noise behind her.
She looked back at him and smiled. “Oh, no, you’re rich, aren’t you. Rich people aren’t hoarders, they’re collectors. Right?”
“I might,” Gus murmured, dropping a kiss on the back of her neck that made her shiver, “be a little bit of a hoarder, actually.”
“Well, the first step is acknowledging that you have a problem,” Cara told him, trying to keep her voice steady.
“Come on, let’s continue the tour,” Gus said, and this time Cara didn’t resist as he led her to the stairs.
She wanted his lips on her again. Not just on the back of her neck. Everywhere.
“Second floor,” Gus announced as they reached the top of the flight of stairs and he led her immediately around to the next. “Not very interesting—art, guest rooms.”
Cara caught a few glimpses of yet more opulent rich-people furnishings, but Gus was already hustling her up to the third floor.
“The boys’ rooms are up here,” Gus said, leading her down a hallway. “None of them are home, so also not very interesting, but…”
Gus opened the door at the end of the hall. “This is me.”
The space revealed was a long open room, cluttered but bright, lined with windows that reflected back the room, hiding the darkness outside.
“We could stop here,” Gus murmured, gesturing to a comfortable sofa tucked in among the tables and shelves. “Or—if you wanted to continue the tour…”
Cara knew what he meant. They could try to hold back from this. He wouldn’t push her, even though he felt the same connection she felt, and the same desire.
She’d been looking for an adventure, hadn’t she? Here it was. The dashing stranger, the whirlwind romance.
“Let’s go all the way,” Cara said, reaching for his hand, and then she added mischievously, “upstairs, I mean.”
Gus laughed a little and kissed her softly again, holding her hand tight. She melted a little under it, but he pulled away enough to speak much too soon. “All the way, then. You’ve got it.”
They wound through the crowded room—there were all sorts of tables and shelves, piled with books and little boxes and yet more assorted artworks of polished metal and delicate ceramics and gorgeous colored glass and crystal that caught the last of the light. There were also some chairs and couches in amongst them, so Cara could see how this was, theoretically, a living room.
A narrow staircase at the end of the room led up to the next floor, which Cara realized must be in the square tower at the corner of the house.
The room at the top of the stairs was utterly empty, with windows on all four sides. It was a strange sight; Cara felt as if she must have suddenly gone blind, or if she’d stepped into a whole other world from the rest of the house below them.
“What…?”
“This room isn’t needed right now,” Gus said hastily.
He tugged her toward the stairs without meeting her eyes.
He led her up another flight to the top of the tower, which turned out to be his bedroom, once again full of shiny clutter and sumptuous fabrics. There were more tapestries here, hung between the windows, and another portrait that looked like it contained parents as well as a crowd of young boys. Gus didn’t give her a chance to look at it, nor at the huge wood-framed bed piled with pillows and soft, dark fabrics.
There was a spiral staircase in one corner of the room. Gus grinned and led her toward it, gesturing for her to go first as he finally let go of her hand.
“You did say all the way, did you not?”
They were five stories up already, but why stop now?
“All the way,” Cara agreed, and trotted up the tight spiral of the stairs. There was a trapdoor at the top, and when she pushed it back she emerged onto the roof inside the railing she’d glimpsed from the ground. It set off a square space, ten feet by ten feet, with the sides of the roof slanting down around it.
Cara scrambled out to let Gus follow her, turning slowly on the spot. She could see the lights of the town down in the valley, and the dark shapes of the trees. The next ridge was black against the dark, dark blue of the western sky.