America’s Geekheart

by Grant, Pippa

  I shake my head.

  “Best town on the entire planet. After Copper Valley, I mean. And maybe the island of Capri off the Italian coast, but that’s not a fair comparison, since the Blue Grotto is magic.”

  One-tenth of his enthusiasm would be utter magic. “What’s special about Shipwreck?”

  “Cooper Rock’s from there, but don’t tell him I said that makes it special. What’s really awesome is that it’s a pirate town in the mountains.”

  “I’ve been in Copper Valley for over a decade, and I still don’t get how that works.”

  “Like eight hundred years ago, this pirate dude, Thorny Rock, was getting ambushed by the Norwegian army off the coast of South Carolina, so he snuck all his Chinese galleons onto a covered wagon and let unicorns pull it inland until they lost their horns, and that’s where he buried his treasure and founded a town, and now his descendants keep the pirate tradition alive every year out there. Ellie and Wyatt hooked up at the Pirate Festival last year, then went back this year to get engaged. It’s fucking magic. And one day, I’m gonna take a metal detector over the whole town and find that treasure. You watch. Don’t laugh. I’m serious.”

  “Eight hundred years ago?” I’m not touching the unicorns, but I am laughing. “Norwegian army? Chinese galleons?”

  “I’m really bad at geography.”

  “History.”

  “That too.” He shoots me another grin. “I’m really glad you like to laugh, because that’s basically all we’re doing tonight.”

  “You’re making up stories?”

  “Nope. We’re hitting amateur hour at the comedy club. No, no, don’t make that face. It’s awesome. There’s this ventriloquist—”

  “No. Way. Hard stop.”

  “Don’t get freaked. She’s funny. And she’s super smart. Like smarter than you and Ellie and Davis and Cupcake all rolled together.”

  “Cupcake?”

  “Dude. Pigs are smart. Science says so.”

  “She freaked over a piece of green onion on the floor when Mom was making omelets this morning and ran head-first into the table leg and almost gave herself a concussion.”

  “Understandable. Green onions are terrifying.”

  I throw my hands up, laughing. “Okay. You win. You are officially the funniest man on the planet, and I will never win an argument with you, ever.”

  “You maybe could. I mean, it might cost you lessons in double orgasms, but I’d let you win an argument.”

  Zing! And there go my panties. “You’re not going to let that go, are you?”

  “Not until I’m sure I don’t have a chance.” He slides to a stop again, and this time, when he looks at me, his goofball side has retreated and that very manly mannish side is front and center. “And right now, I know I have a chance.”

  I suck in a shuddery breath, because whoa, yes, he really does.

  And it’s not just because he’s using the smolder.

  It’s because I can still remember the feel of his lips on mine. It’s because every time he touches me—hand, leg, back, face—my skin buzzes to life like a neon sign. It’s because I should hate him for his ignorant tweet last week, but he’s still managed to sneak past my defenses with his apology, because I honestly believe there’s a vulnerable human being capable of true regret and determination to do better and a whole hell of a lot of love for everyone around him hiding under that gorgeous surface.

  I can pass on the smolder. I grew up around schmootzy smolders.

  But the man underneath is getting to me.

  “We’re temporary,” I remind him. “And this isn’t real.”

  “This is very real. And it doesn’t have to be temporary.”

  I don’t have a solid argument for him, so I just sit there and stare at him dumbly with heat spreading over my skin and my heart pumping a fist in the air and shouting Yeah, baby!

  He doesn’t smirk. Or grin. Or fluff his feathers.

  Nope.

  The man squeezes my knee and turns his attention back to the road.

  “Why did you stop kissing me yesterday?” I whisper.

  For once, he doesn’t answer quickly, and when he does, he’s still just as quiet and serious. “I’ve been…taken advantage of before. And it sucks. And your parents aren’t the only people who’ve ever had to pay someone off to protect someone they love.”

  I choke on a breath, because that’s not what I expected him to say.

  “I get it, Sarah. You didn’t sign up for this. You didn’t ask to be shoved back in the public eye. So no rushing. I like you. I want you. But I don’t want you to think I’m kissing you just because we have a contract, because I’m not.”

  My heart squeezes and my lungs tighten and my breath gets short.

  He knows the right things to say. And I trust the raw honesty in his eyes and in his voice, which is scary.

  Because Beck isn’t just Beck.

  He’s everything I ran away from when I left high school. Famous. Followed by paparazzi. Navigating celebrity politics.

  How can someone so deep in the game of putting on a face for the world feel so real?

  “When I kiss you, I want you to know I’m kissing you because I want to,” he continues, his voice dropping into husky territory. “Not because it looks good. Not because you just happen to be the woman saving my ass in a business deal. But because I like you.”

  My hesitant hand goes to his thigh, and I squeeze the tight muscle. “I like you too.”

  “Scary as hell, isn’t it?”

  “Scarier.”

  He grins, and I sink back into my seat with an embarrassed laugh. “I’m sorry you’ve been taken advantage of,” I say softly.

  “I chose this life. I knew the risks.” He covers my hand with his and squeezes.

  “It shouldn’t have to be a risk to do what you love.”

  His lips curl up in a smile, and I want to kiss him, because gah, that smile.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” he says. “I’m starting to think the things most worth having are worth working for.”

  And there go more bubbles fizzing in my chest, because he makes it sound like he’s talking about me. “Like being a pediatrician?”

  “Ah, the lady’s aiming for the heart.” He clutches his chest in mock injury while he grins at me. “Dangling impossible dreams out there for me to never hit.”

  “Would you have? If this wasn’t working, if your fashion empire tanked, would you go back to school?”

  “Trying to talk me into staying?”

  “Who we could’ve been is always a part of who we are. If I hadn’t been an environmental engineer, I would’ve wanted to be a travel writer.”

  His smile’s going affectionate, which is just as dangerous. “I can see it.”

  “So? Would you have gone back to school? What else would you do if you weren’t the famous Beck Ryder?”

  “Become very, very good at giving double orgasms.”

  Twenty-Eight

  Beck

  We have a back door pass to get us into The Laugh Track, the comedy club downtown, which is just as effective at getting attention as buying a ticket at the front door since the paps were tipped off that we’d be coming, except we don’t have to wade through everyone else buying tickets, which is really just an excuse by my team to save my ego from the people who’ll tell me to suck dick and die.

  I agreed to the back door because I didn’t want Sarah hearing any of the bullshit that people are spouting on Twitter about her looks that the occasional dumbass is brave enough to utter in person, and also because Charlie flat-out warned me that she’d quit for real if I punched anyone.

  That would be like Ellie refusing to buy me any more Christmas presents for the rest of my life, and Ellie gives the best Christmas presents.

  Like the Justin Bieber electric toothbrush she got me two years ago.

  Epic. Prank level infinity right there. How’s a guy supposed to live without that in his life?

  “Spoiled
asshole,” one of the bouncers mutters as we pass through the back door.

  “I’m working on it,” Sarah replies cheerfully. “Seriously, I asked my parents to donate my usual birthday Ferrari to a B-lister this year. That’s not being an asshole, is it?”

  I suck in a surprised grin and tug her in the door while the bouncers choke on their own spit and my bodyguards shuffle her faster too.

  “What?” she mutters. “Like they’ve never stuck their feet in their mouths.”

  “That was awesome. Did you practice sassing the paps when you were growing up?”

  “No, I always thought of the perfect comeback five minutes too late, and Mom always said it wasn’t worth baiting them anyway.”

  “She’s right,” one of the bodyguards grunts.

  “I know,” Sarah sighs. “But that felt really fucking fantastic. For like two seconds there, I was the girl with the comeback. It’ll never happen again, and honestly, my heart’s about to pound out of my chest, but it was worth it.”

  I am definitely practicing double orgasms with her when this contract is over. Triple. Quadruple. Can a woman go for a quintuple, or would that kill her? Because I’m pretty sure a quintuple would kill me.

  I’ll have to ask a doctor.

  We’re steered around the back of the stage to a round two-person table off to the left in the open seating area, bodyguards at the table beside us. We’re both angled with a good view of the black curtain blocking the stage, and our server rushes right over, only giving me a small lip curl before turning her attention to Sarah. “Hi, hon. What can I get you? We have a strawberry cosmo that’s delicious. Makes the company more bearable. By the way, I cannot stop watching Persephone. Do you think she’ll have the baby this week?”

  “I—she could go another couple weeks, but it’s really exciting, isn’t it?”

  “She is so pretty.”

  “I love her tongue,” I say.

  “We have the best cheese fries in Copper Valley,” the lady tells Sarah, completely ignoring me. “Bacon, scallions, and we don’t just use goopy orange cheese, though that’s totally delicious at the ballpark. We melt gouda, swiss, and cheddar together.”

  My stomach grumbles.

  “I’m really hungry tonight,” Sarah says. “Do you have hamburgers? Like half-pounders?”

  “I can totally get you a half-pound burger. Bacon? Barbecue sauce? Fried egg?”

  Sarah orders the mother of all burgers, with everything from avocado to bacon to provolone to fried onions on it, and I have to surreptitiously wipe the drool off the corner of my mouth.

  What? I worked out today. On a fucking treadmill instead of out in the glorious summer day, but hey, I live in a time when I can run in a three-foot-by-two-foot space so I don’t have little old ladies spitting on me or other little old ladies asking me to kiss their dogs since those other old ladies actually believe I’m honestly sorry for the tweet heard ’round the world last week.

  Not that I snuck out of my apartment this morning for a stroll to the Apple store and had any of that happen.

  Really.

  Don’t tell my team, okay?

  Sarah finishes her order by asking for a large Cobb salad with extra bacon, sweet potato fries, onion rings, steamed broccoli, a sweet tea—just bring a jug, please, because I’m extra thirsty—and a Nutella almond malt.

  I’ve never fallen in real love before—I mean, with a human, because I’ve fallen in love plenty with fried cheese sticks and a solid steak—but I’m growing more and more convinced that feeling after the taser incident wasn’t just residual voltage.

  When the server finally dashes away, I angle closer to her, draping my arm around the back of her chair so I can whisper in her ear. “Can I kiss you? Right now? Because that was the sexiest fucking thing I’ve ever heard in my life, and I’m having a really hard time keeping my hands to myself.”

  She pretends to be puzzled, which makes her eyes sparkle and shine and yeah, definitely not residual voltage. “That sweet girl insulting your interpersonal skills and asking about Persephone?”

  “You, ordering mounds and mounds of food. I’m having these fantasies about spreading it all over your body and feasting for hours.”

  “If you’re not careful with all that dirty talk, we’re both going to regret what those photographers post to the world in about two minutes,” she breathes, her eyes going dark like yes, she wants me eating all over her.

  And now I’m wondering what color her nipples are and if she’s the silk, lace, or cotton panties type, or if she’s in a thong, or boy shorts, and fuck, is it possible to be aroused in your stomach at the same time as you’re sporting a redwood, because everything’s pretty much revving engines right now.

  “I don’t care about the photographers,” I tell her. “I’m so turned on right now.”

  “Oh, because you think I’m going to share?”

  Her lips are smiling and teasing, but her eyes are dark. So dark. Not just normal Sarah dark, but intense and deep and shadowed by her lowering lids, but still sparkling. The room’s dimly lit, but it’s glowing just for having her sitting in here.

  “Name your price. Anything. You want my Frogger game? My car? A house in the mountains? A willing student with an eager tongue who really really wants to learn that double orgasm trick?”

  “I think you’re cheating,” she whispers.

  “I think you’re the world’s most perfect woman and I’m in serious trouble here.”

  “It was really that sexy?”

  “If I was lying, I’d say you were the alien queen of a distant planet come here to hypnotize all the men and steal pieces of our spleens to start a master race of sex slaves on your own planet.”

  She cracks up even as she leans closer to me, her fingers coming to rest on my cheek. “How did you ever become a fashion mogul? That’s more cutthroat than Hollywood, and I swear you’re a thirteen-year-old boy in a man’s body. Which I’m completely okay with, by the way. I like you this happy and goofy.”

  “How has no one ever noticed before how gorgeous your eyes are? They’re like pied piper eyes. You should have men following you like puppies everywhere you go just for opening those beautiful eyes every morning.”

  “Looks aren’t everything.”

  “But your eyes are. Your eyes are everything.”

  Inches. Inches. I could be kissing her in mere inches. And I’m completely dead serious about everything I’m telling her.

  She is hot and sexy. And her eyes—yeah, I could drown in those eyes. Happily.

  “Lavoie. Lavoie, look. It’s the underwear guy.”

  Sarah jerks back and looks up.

  Two solid-looking familiar dudes are sizing me up. I know these guys.

  “Ohmygod, Nick Murphy and Duncan Lavoie,” Sarah gasps.

  Right.

  Hockey players. The Thrusters.

  They steal two chairs from the table on the other side of us and shove me out of the way to box her in. Murphy smiles at her and I want to punch his smarmy goalie face. Lavoie takes her hand and presses a kiss to the back of it, and I want to dunk his entire upper body in a toilet.

  “This guy bothering you?” Lavoie asks.

  “No,” she assures him with a smile. “He’s very good company. And harmless.”

  “I am not harmless,” I object. “I can kick your ass in Pac-Man.”

  Murphy looks at me again with his dark green gaze. “You learn your lesson about talking to women yet, or do we need to step outside?”

  “Stop,” Sarah says. “He’s definitely learned his lesson. He even just offered to let me have his car. He’s very, very sorry. And his mother chewed him out and apologized on his behalf too. Sorry, bud, but you can’t touch that.”

  Nick’s brow furrows. “Yeah, I got a mom like that. Except I never fuck up.”

  “Dude,” Lavoie mutters. “Are you fucking serious?”

  “Hey, I wouldn’t tweet that shit to my sister or any other woman.”

  “
Just to your sister’s exes,” Lavoie supplies.

  “I’m avenging the fucking world.” He points at me. “And that’s my sister about to go up on stage, so you better laugh your ass off. But only at the right spots. And don’t even think of tweeting anything about her. Anything. Even anything good. I’ll be watching you.”

  My bodyguards are useless.

  Or possibly they’re enjoying this.

  Hard to tell. But I’d be enjoying this if I were them.

  “Can I get a picture?” Sarah asks. “My friend Mackenzie loves the Fireballs first and foremost, but the Thrusters are her second favorite.”

  “Distantly,” I add. Helpfully.

  Sarah grins, and these two hockey players have clearly taken one too many pucks to the head, because neither of them falls at her feet and worships her just for that gorgeous sight.

  “Well, yeah, but they’re still second,” Sarah agrees.

  “You haven’t asked for a picture with me,” I point out.

  “Oh, I think I have a lot more than a picture with you.” She tosses me another smile that hits me so hard in the chest that I almost fall out of my chair.

  Or maybe that was a server tripping over the chair leg.

  Possibly on purpose while trying to hit me in the head with a serving tray.

  But still.

  I feel that smile all the way to my bones.

  And not just the boner growing harder with every passing second behind my fly.

  The server delivers Sarah’s drink and milkshake and a complimentary basket of fried pickles while they’re taking pictures. After Sarah texts Mackenzie, Murphy gives me the same double-fingered I’m watching you point that Judson got me with before we left Sarah’s house.

  “Laughing. You. In the right spots. Off Twitter. Got it?”

  “I giggle when I’m nervous,” I tell him, which makes Sarah snort sweet tea out her nose. “Oh, shit. Sorry. Here.” I lunge for napkins and dab at her nose and mouth, which are fuck, so pretty.

  How in the world has she hidden this long?

  “I’m okay,” she sputters around a laugh. “Thank you.”