The Original Sinners: The Red Years. Tiffany Reisz

won’t play that game with you,” he said as Nora continued relentlessly caressing the delicate skin of his chest and sides. “I won’t play this game with you, either.”

      “But it doesn’t have to be a game, Wesley.” She narrowed her eyes like a cat’s. “It can be very real.”

      “Don’t do this.” His voice was a plea. His breathing was getting harder, everything was getting harder now. “Not to me.”

      “Your heart is racing.” She let her hand rest on the left side of his chest.

      From his chest she traced a languid path down his stomach, his breath catching as she deftly unbuttoned the top button of his jeans.

      “Nora…”

      “I’m not holding you here. You can go if you want to. Do you?”

      She grabbed his belt loops and pulled him even closer until his hips pressed against her inner thighs. She knew she shouldn’t be doing this. But Wesley was a constant source of frustration. Sometimes she had to retaliate. And she knew that every now and then he forgot what she really was. It didn’t hurt to remind him.

      “I don’t know,” he finally answered.

      “Now that is a refreshing bit of candor on your part. Since we’re being so honest now, tell me, why are you being so pissy about Zach?”

      Wesley’s eyes widened. Nora bit her bottom lip as she waited for his answer.

      “You like him.”

      “I do like him.” She took another deep drink of the wine and set the glass down again. “But we’ve just met and we’re not fucking. Not even I work that fast.”

      At that Wesley gave a grim chuckle and looked up at the ceiling.

      “I couldn’t care less if you were fucking him.”

      “My God, did you just say ‘fuck’? You’re a good, clean Methodist. You don’t swear.”

      “You have no idea what I do.”

      “I do know what you do. I know you sleep with your bedroom door unlocked,” Nora retorted. “Expecting company?”

      “I know you stand in my door at night and watch me sleep. Expecting an invitation?”

      Now it was Nora’s eyes that widened. But she recovered herself quickly.

      “You’re pretty good at this game,” she said, nodding her approval. “For a beginner.”

      “I told you. I’m not gonna play with you.”

      “Too bad. I think you’d like the prize.” Nora went for the next button on his jeans, but Wesley grabbed her by the wrist to stop her.

      “Harder,” she instructed. Wesley let her go as if her skin had burned him.

      “I thought so. Go,” she said, dropping her hands to her sides. Wesley took a step back, his palm pressed into his stomach. “Go do your homework, kid.”

      She picked up her nearly forgotten wineglass and lifted it to her lips. But before she could drink, Wesley took the glass from her.

      He held the glass in his subtly shaking hand before raising it and drinking. Finished, he lowered the glass and set it next to her on the table. He left the kitchen without another word.

      Nora picked up the glass and stared inside.

      He’d drained it to the dregs.

      Nora set the glass back down and turned to follow Wesley. She hated when they fought even though it was almost always her fault.

      Wesley would be fine, she told herself. He needed a little toughening up anyway. She’d never forget the first day she saw him. She walked into his classroom at Yorke, and the first thing she’d noticed was a pair of big brown eyes looking at her like he’d never seen anything like her before. And the minute he opened his mouth and those soft Southern syllables came out, she knew this kid was going to be no end of trouble. She’d made all her students talk about their favorite story. Wesley had said his favorite was O. Henry’s The Gift of the Magi—the story of the wife who sold her hair to buy her husband a watch chain and the husband who sold his watch to buy his wife combs for her hair. Nora had called it a horror story. Wesley had objected and called it a love story. The debate had continued even after the class ended. Two people who give up their most precious possessions for love and end up with nothing—that’s a love story? she’d demanded. Wesley had argued that they still had each other. She’d laughed and told him he might see things a little differently when he was her age.

      She knew she’d been too rough with him tonight, but she couldn’t stop herself sometimes. After all, Søren had put her through ten kinds of hell when she was Wesley’s age. And now she was grateful for the discipline he’d taught her, the fortitude he’d instilled in her. Now a guy like Zach could look her in the eyes and tell her she wasn’t worth his time and energy, and she could look back and smile and ask him if that was the best he could do. Søren had made her strong and for that she’d be forever grateful. And Zach was making her a real writer, which was the one fantasy Søren could never make come true for her. And Wesley…she looked down at the empty wineglass and quickly refilled it in his honor—Wesley was just making her crazy.

      Nora turned and saw her book and Zach’s notes lying on top of the kitchen table.

      “Goddammit, Zach,” she said to herself and poured the wine down the drain. “Why did you have to tell me it was going to work?”

      7

      Five weeks left…

      A tear formed in the corner of Nora’s eye and fled down her cheek before she could stop it. She rubbed it off with her sleeve and made herself blink. She’d been staring at her computer screen for so long her eyes were watering. Stretching while she backed up her work, Nora decided to check her private email account before taking a bathroom break. She breezed through a note from her agent and deleted a few bits of spam. Just before logging out a new message popped into her in-box. From Zach, it bore the subject line “Regarding Sex.”

      “Why, Zachary,” she said, chuckling to herself, “yes, I think I will regard sex.”

      The email dragged on for two pages and detailed every reason why she needed to cut out the majority of her sex scenes. She stopped reading after the fifth use of the word gratuitous.

      You’re no fun, she wrote Zach back. Can’t I just keep three of my scenes?

      Zach was obviously still at his computer. He quickly replied with one word.

      No.

      Two? she wrote back.

      No.

      Nora was about to fall out of her chair laughing. She could imagine his stern but strikingly handsome visage right now, his brow furrowing deeper with each annoying little email from her.

      One? I promise I’ll make it good. Please? I’ll buy you a puppy.

      I’m allergic to dogs, he replied.

      Nora bit her lip as the wheels in her head turned.

      Let’s play a game, she wrote back. I’ll give you fifty extra pages this week if you let me keep three of my scenes—heavily edited, of course.

      She held her breath as she waited for his reply. An email finally popped up in her in-box.

      Fine. But any sex on the page must serve both the plot and the character development. Now stop playing and start writing. You’ve got five weeks left and over four hundred pages to rewrite.

      I’m keeping the puppy, she wrote back. She wasn’t surprised when he didn’t reply.

      Nora was rereading Zach’s most recent note on