Layla Read online

  “Leeds Gabriel is a front man kind of name. Why are you playing in someone else’s band?” She keeps talking, apparently not really wanting an answer to that question. “Were you named after the town in England?”

  “Yep. What’s your name?”

  “Layla.” She whispers it like it’s a secret.

  It’s the perfect name. The only name she could have said that would fit her—I’m convinced of that.

  “Layla,” someone says from behind me. “Open up.” I look over my shoulder, and the bride is standing behind me, holding something out to Layla. Layla swims over to her, sticks out her tongue, and the bride places a small white pill in the center of it. Layla swallows and I have no idea what that was, but it was sexy as fuck.

  She can see I’m transfixed by her mouth. “Leeds wants one,” Layla says, reaching out her hand for another pill. The bride hands her another one and walks away. I don’t ask what it is. I don’t care. I want her so much I’ll be the Romeo to her Juliet and take whatever the hell kind of poison she wants to put on my tongue right now.

  I open my mouth. Her fingers are wet, and some of it has dissolved before it even hits my tongue. It’s bitter and hard to get down without coating or water, but I manage it. I chew some of it.

  “Who was the most important person in your life yesterday?” Layla asks. “Before I came along?”

  “Myself.”

  “I’ve bumped you out of the number one spot?”

  “Seems that way.”

  She moves fluidly and effortlessly onto her back, like she spends more time in a pool than on land. She stares up at the sky again, her arms stretched out wide, her chest rising with a huge intake of air.

  I press my back against the side of the pool and stretch my arms out, gripping the concrete ledge. My heart is starting to pound. My blood feels thicker.

  I don’t know what kind of drug she gave me, probably Molly or some other kind of upper, because it’s kicking in fast. I’m more aware of everything going on in my torso right now than any other part of my body. My heart feels swollen, like there isn’t enough room for it.

  Layla is still floating on her back, but her face is close to my chest. She’s right in front of me. If I leaned forward a little, she wouldn’t be looking at the sky. She’d be looking up at me.

  Fuck, this is good shit.

  I feel good. I feel confident.

  The water is so calm around us it looks like she’s floating on air. Her eyes are closed, but when the top of her head bumps against my chest, she looks up at me, her face upside down from mine, like she’s expecting me to do something.

  So I do.

  I lean in just enough so that my mouth rests gently against hers. We kiss upside down, her bottom lip between both of mine. Her lips are like a soft explosion, igniting hidden minefields under every inch of my skin. It’s weird and fascinating because she’s still on her back, floating on top of the water. I dip my tongue into her mouth, and for whatever reason, I don’t feel worthy enough to touch her, so I keep my arms where they are—gripping the pool on either side of me.

  She keeps her arms outstretched, and the only thing she moves is her mouth. I’m thankful our first kiss is upside down because that leaves a hell of a lot of room to anticipate kissing her right side up for the first time. I’m never going to want to kiss a girl again without being high on whatever it is the bride gave us. It’s like my heart constricts to the size of a penny and then balloons to the size of a drum with every beat.

  It isn’t beating like it’s supposed to. There’s no gentle bom bom, bom bom, bom bom anymore. It’s a plink and a BOOM.

  Plink BOOM, plink BOOM, plink BOOM.

  I can’t keep kissing her upside down like this. It’s making me crazy, like we don’t quite fit, and I want my mouth to fit perfectly against hers. I grab her waist and spin her on top of the water until she’s facing me, and then I pull her to me. Her legs go around my waist, and both of her hands come up out of the water and grip the back of my head, which causes her to sink a little because now I’m the only thing keeping her above water. But my own arms are too busy sliding down her back, so we start to sink and neither of us does anything about it. Our mouths lock together right before we’re submerged. Not a single drop of water passes between our lips.

  We sink all the way to the bottom of the pool, still fused together. As soon as we hit bottom, we open our eyes at the same time and pull apart to look at each other. Her hair is floating above her now, and she looks like a sunken angel.

  I wish I could take a picture.

  Air bubbles cloud the space between us, so we both kick ourselves back to the top.

  I break the surface two seconds before she does. We’re facing each other, ready to start the kiss over again. We link together, back into the same position we were in. Our mouths seek each other out, but as soon as I taste the chlorine on her lips, we’re interrupted by chants.

  I can hear Garrett over several of the others, all cheering our kiss on from where they’re seated. Layla glances behind her and flips them off.

  She separates herself from me and pushes to the side of the pool. “Let’s go,” she says, pulling herself out of the water. She isn’t graceful about it. She pushes up out of the deep end, five feet from the ladder, and has to roll onto the concrete to make it out of the pool. It’s clumsy and perfect. I follow her, and a few seconds later, we’re both running around to the side of the house where it’s darker and more private. The grass is both cold and soft beneath my feet. Like ice . . . but melted.

  I guess that would just make it water. But it doesn’t feel like water. It feels like melted ice. Drugs make things hard to explain.

  Layla grabs my hand and falls onto the melted ice-grass, pulling me down with her, on top of her. I hold myself up with my elbows so she can breathe, and I stare at her for a moment. She’s got freckles. Not very many, and they’re spread out over the bridge of her nose. A few on her cheeks. I lift my hand and trace them. “Why are you so pretty?”

  She laughs. Rightfully so. That was cheesy.

  She flips me onto my back, and then she pulls her dress up her thighs so she can straddle me. Her thighs suction to my sides because we’re both sopping wet. I rest my hands on her hips and soak up the intensity of this high.

  “Do you know why they call this place the Corazón del País?” she asks.

  I don’t know, so I just shake my head and hope it’s a long story so I can hear her talk more than she has. I could listen to her voice all night. In fact, there’s a room inside the bed and breakfast they call the Grand Room, and it’s lined with hundreds of books on every wall. She could read to me all night.

  “It translates to Heart of the Country,” she says. There’s excitement in her eyes and voice when she talks. “This location—this very piece of property you’re lying on—is the literal geographical center of the contiguous United States.”

  Maybe it’s because I’m very aware of my heartbeat right now, but that doesn’t make sense. “Why would they call it that? The heart isn’t really the center of the body. The stomach is.”

  She laughs her sharp, quick laugh again. “True. But Estomago del País doesn’t sound as pretty.”

  Fuck. “You speak French?”

  “Pretty sure that’s Spanish.”

  “Either way, it was hot.”

  “I only took one year in high school,” she says. “I have no hidden talents. What you see is what you get.”

  “I doubt that.” I roll her off me and pin her wrists to the grass as I roll on top of her. “You’re a talented dancer.”

  She laughs. I kiss her.

  We kiss for the next several minutes.

  We more than kiss. We touch. We move. We moan.

  Everything is way too much—like I’m teetering on the edge of death. My heart just might literally explode in my chest. I’m starting to wonder if we should keep doing this. Drugs coupled with making out with Layla is one thing too much. I can’t let her st
ay wrapped around me for another second, or I’ll pass the fuck out from everything I’m feeling. It’s like every nerve ending grew a nerve ending. I feel everything with double the magnitude.

  “I have to stop,” I whisper, unwrapping her legs from around me. “What the hell are we on? I can’t breathe.” I roll onto my back, gasping for air.

  “You mean what did my sister give you?”

  “The bride is your sister?”

  “Yeah, her name is Aspen. She’s three years older than me.” Layla lifts herself up onto her elbow. “Why? Do you like it?”

  I nod. “Yes. I love it.”

  “It’s intense, right?”

  “Fuck yes.”

  “Aspen gives it to me every time I drink too much.” She leans in until her mouth is against my ear. “It’s called aspirin.” When she pulls back, the confusion on my face makes her grin. “Did you think you were high?”

  Why else would I be feeling like this?

  I sit up. “That wasn’t an aspirin.”

  She falls onto her back in a fit of laughter, making a cross over her chest. “Swear to God. You took an aspirin.” She’s laughing so hard she has to fight to catch her breath. When she finally does, she sighs and it’s delightful, and did I just fucking say delightful?

  She shakes her head, looking up at me with a soft smile. “It’s not drugs making you feel like this, Leeds.” She stands up and makes her way around to the front of the house. Again, I follow her, because if that really was an aspirin, then I’m fucked.

  I am fucked.

  I didn’t know another person could make me feel this good without some sort of substance running through my body.

  Layla doesn’t go to a bedroom once we’re inside the house. She walks into the Grand Room, the one with all the books and the baby grand piano. When we’re both inside, she closes the door and locks it. My jeans and her dress are leaving a trail of water behind us.

  When I pause and turn to look at her, she’s staring at the water pooling beneath my feet.

  “The floors are old,” she says. “We should respect them.” She pulls her soaking wet dress over her head, and now she’s standing in the dimly lit room five feet away from me in nothing but her bra and panties. They don’t match. She’s wearing a white bra and green-and-black-checkered panties, and I kind of love that she didn’t put much thought into what she wore under her dress. I observe her for a moment—admiring her curves and the way she doesn’t try to hide pieces of herself from me.

  My last girlfriend had a body that could rival a supermodel’s, but she was never comfortable with herself. It became one of the things that irritated me about her because no matter how beautiful she was, her insecurity was the loudest thing about her.

  Layla carries herself with a confidence that would be attractive no matter what she looked like.

  I do as she requested and remove my jeans, leaving on my boxers. Layla gathers our clothes and puts them on top of a rug that’s probably worth more than the floors, but whatever makes her feel good.

  I look around the room, and there’s a brown distressed-leather couch against the wall next to the piano. I want to throw her on it and lose myself inside of her, but Layla has different plans.

  She pulls the piano bench out and sits on it. “Can you sing?” she asks, poking at a few of the keys.

  “Yes.”

  “Why don’t you sing onstage?”

  “It’s Garrett’s band. He’s never asked me to.”

  “Garrett? Is that the lead singer’s name?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “Is he as atrocious as his lyrics?”

  That makes me laugh. I shake my head and join her on the bench. “He’s pretty terrible, but he’s not as bad as his lyrics.”

  She presses middle C on the piano. “Is he jealous of you?” she asks.

  “Why would he be jealous of me? I’m just the bass player.”

  “He’s not lead singer material. You are.”

  “That’s a big statement. You’ve never even heard me sing.”

  “Doesn’t matter. You could be terrible, but everyone else still fades into the background when you’re onstage.”

  “Just like the rest of the crowd fades into the background when you’re dancing?”

  “I was the only one dancing.”

  “See? I didn’t even notice.”

  She leans in after I say that, and I expect her to kiss me, but instead she whispers, “Play me something,” against my mouth. Then she moves to the couch and lies down. “Play something worthy of that piano,” she says.

  She crosses her legs at her ankles and lets one of her arms dangle off the couch. She runs her finger against the hardwood floor while she waits for me to start playing, but I can’t stop staring at her. I’m not sure there’s another woman on this planet who could make me want to stare at her without blinking until my eyes dry up, but she’s looking at me expectantly.

  “What if you don’t like my music?” I ask. “Will you still let me kiss you?”

  She smiles gently. “Does the song mean something to you?”

  “I wrote it using pieces of my soul.”

  “Then you have nothing to worry about,” she says quietly.

  I spin around on the bench and place my fingers on the keys. I hesitate for a moment before playing the song. I’ve never performed it for anyone before. The only person I’ve ever wanted to sing it for is my father, and he’s no longer alive. His death is the reason I wrote this in the first place.

  I’ve never been nervous while playing Garrett’s songs onstage, but this feels different. This is personal, and despite the fact that there’s only one person in the audience right now, it feels like the most intense audience I’ve ever performed for.

  I fill my lungs with air and slowly release it as I begin to play.

  That night I stopped believing in heaven

  I can’t believe in a god that cruel

  Can you?

  That night I stopped praying on my knees

  But I don’t pray standing either

  Do you?

  That night I closed the door and closed the window

  I’ve been sitting in the dark

  Are you?

  That night I learned happiness is a fairy tale

  A thousand pages read aloud

  By you

  That night I stopped believing in God

  You were ours, he didn’t care, he

  Took you

  So that night I stopped . . .

  I stopped . . .

  I just

  Stopped.

  That night I stopped.

  I stopped.

  I just stopped.

  That night I stopped.

  I . . .

  When I’m finished playing the song, I fold my hands in my lap. I’m a little hesitant to turn around and look at her. The whole room got quiet after I played the last note. So quiet—it feels like all the sound was sucked out of the house. I can’t even hear her breathing.

  I close the cover to the piano and then slowly spin around on the bench. She’s wiping her eyes, staring up at the ceiling. “Wow,” she whispers. “I wasn’t expecting that. I feel like you just stomped on my chest.”

  That’s how I’ve felt since I first laid eyes on her tonight.

  “I like how it ends,” she says. She sits up on the couch and tucks her legs beneath her. “You just stop in the middle of the sentence. It’s so perfect. So powerful.”

  I wasn’t sure if she’d realize the intentional ending, but the fact that she does makes me all the more enamored of her.

  “Where can I find the song? Is it on Spotify?”

  I shake my head. “I’ve never released any of my own stuff.”

  She looks at me in mock horror, slapping the arm of the couch. “What? Why the hell not?”

  I shrug. “I don’t know.” I honestly don’t know. “Maybe because everyone in Nashville thinks they’re a somebody. I don’t want to be someone who
thinks I’m a somebody.”

  She stands up and walks over to where I’m sitting on the piano bench. She pushes my shoulders until my back is leaning against the piano, and then she straddles me, both of her knees resting on the piano bench. I’m looking up at her now, and she’s holding my face in her hands, her eyes narrowed as she speaks. “You’re being selfish by keeping your songs to yourself. It’s better to be a selfless somebody than to be a selfish nobody.”

  I think maybe I’m glad I met this girl.

  Like really glad.

  I grip the back of her head and bring her mouth to mine. I don’t know what’s happening here. It’s been a hell of a long time since I’ve liked a girl enough to wonder where she’s going to be the next day.

  But . . . where will Layla be tomorrow?

  Where was she yesterday?

  Where does she call home?

  Where did she grow up?

  Who is her favorite person right now?

  I want to know all the things. Everything.

  Layla breaks our kiss. “Aspen warned me earlier tonight when she saw me staring at you. She said, ‘Promise me you’ll stay away from the musicians. They probably have chlamydia.’”

  I laugh. “Did you promise her you’d stay away from me?”

  “No. I said, ‘It’s fine if he has chlamydia. He probably has condoms too.’”

  “I don’t have chlamydia. But I also don’t have a condom.”

  She separates herself from me and stands up. “It’s okay. I have one in my room.” She turns and walks toward the door.

  I grab our wet clothes and follow her out of the room and up the stairs. She doesn’t exactly invite me to her room, but I can tell she’s expecting me to follow her because she’s talking as she walks up the steps.

  “It’s been a while since I’ve done this,” she says over her shoulder. “I only have condoms because they were party favors for the bachelorette party.” She spins around, pausing on one of the steps. “I didn’t realize how much harder it would be to get laid in the real world. You don’t even have to make an effort in college, but after college . . . ugh.” She turns and begins walking up the stairs again. She opens the door to her room, and I follow her inside. “The problem with sex after college is that I hate dating. It takes too much time. You dedicate an entire evening to a person you can tell in the first five minutes is a waste of your time.”