Free Out of Bounds by Ellen Hartman

candle and lifted it out. “The reason I called—”
    “Wait, can I tell you what happened with Wes first? If I don’t spit it out now I won’t be able to think.”
    Posy remembered the charge she’d gotten when she pushed her hand against Wes’s back and he didn’t move. Her hand slipped and she knocked a fresh candle flying. She managed to catch it before it hit the ground.
    “Something happened with Wes?” Maddy asked. “Absolutely tell me that story.”
    “What? Why are you saying it like that?”
    “Just... There’s been a dry spell since Pete.”
    “It was recovery time. Pete was—”
    “A nice guy, but not right for you.”
    “I was going to say a wimp and a subpar lover, but we can go with your phrasing if it fits in better with your duties as a professional nice person.”
    “I was nice long before I took my vows,” Maddy said. “But we’re talking about Wes.”
    She bent to get a new candle and Posy took the opportunity to rush out the story while her cousin wasn’t looking at her.
    “I went to see him. I was going to bluff him. Get in and get out.”
    “Get to the mistake, Posy. I’m dying.”
    “I think I came on to him...?”
    Maddy raised her eyebrows and looked impressed. Posy stared at the lit candle in front of her, remembering how Wes’s dark blue eyes mocked at her as he wiped the blood off his face with the hem of his T-shirt. Then she remembered the casual, but incredibly sexy way he took off his shirt and continued to sit there with every single muscle and contour of his body in view while they chatted.
    “You...came on to him?”
    “Can you talk about this stuff at work?” Posy asked, suddenly aware that they were in the grotto where the very air felt like church. “They don’t monitor your conversations, do they?”
    “The sisters are aware that people have sexual feelings, Posy. The vow is celibacy, not prudery. Tell me what happened.”
    “I was angry and feeling trapped by all this stuff with my mom, and Wes. He’s, oh, man, you know the guy he is. He’s handsome and successful, he just retired from playing professional basketball, and he knows how to use that smile. Five bucks says he was prom king in high school, the fraternity social chair and the guy every one of his girlfriends’ moms was hoping they’d end up with. He’s never struggled for anything in his life. Never not been loved. He’s that guy. And you know that guy is never worth a second look.”
    “And yet, you came on to him.”
    “I know,” Posy practically wailed. “He said we should shoot around so we did. He’s tall, Maddy, and strong.
I kept trying to push him around. And then I realized I didn’t care so much about pushing him around. I mean, I wanted to push him around but it was because I wanted to touch him.”
    “Wow.”
    “Right.”
    She might be confessing to Maddy right now, and might be full of shame that she’d lost control, but later tonight, alone in her room, she’d be remembering exactly how he’d felt under her hands.
    “So did he...respond? Reciprocate?” Maddy gave a short laugh. “Did you have to lock the gym doors?”
    “We were outside.... I hit him in the face with the ball.” Posy shuddered. She could hear the smack all over again. “It didn’t break his nose. But there was blood.”
    Maddy dropped the candle she was holding and wrinkled her nose. “A bloody nose? In the middle of your big seduction? Oh, Posy.”
    Which got on his T-shirt. Which he’d taken off.
    “Hard to keep up a seduction once there’s blood,” her cousin added.
    “It wasn’t even a seduction, though,” Posy said. “I wasn’t seducing him, it was—wild.”
    Posy wished she could roll the tape back and get a redo on the whole day. “I should have brought him a cupcake from the Lemon Drop or potpourri from Wonders.”
    “That’s what I’m curious about,” Maddy said. “You’re good at covering up the parts of yourself that make you uncomfortable, but this guy