French Kissed

by Chanel Cleeton

I was glad her head was on my chest because I wasn’t sure I was ready for her to see the stupid grin that spread across my face.

  “I’ll be there.”

  I felt her lips part against my bare skin. “Okay. Thanks.”

  I waited for a beat. “What should I wear? I know there’s a dress code for these things. I can go shopping or something—”

  She lifted her head up and kissed me, her lips soft and sweet. She pulled back and stared into my eyes.

  “I was an asshole to ever say anything to you about the shoes last year. It wasn’t about you, it was about me being a bitch and taking it out on you. You wear whatever you want. I like you. I don’t care what anyone thinks. I’ll have the hottest boyfriend there regardless of how you’re dressed.”

  She kissed me again and then pulled back. I’d never seen that look in her eyes. It was fiercely possessive. It reminded me a bit of the way she’d looked at me at Mist right after my interview, and yet it was more.

  I only heard parts of what she said, because most of it was drowned out by the one word that had come through loud and clear.

  I was Fleur’s boyfriend.

  My heart skipped and stumbled before it fell headfirst in love.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Fleur

  I hated the walk back to my room. If I’d had my way, I would have spent the night at Max’s. But there was George to think of, and the lack of privacy that came with university. Maggie was lucky Samir had landed a single when he was in school here.

  I walked down the hall, not caring that I was in Max’s boxers and a T-shirt that advertised some basketball team in Chicago. It was pretty late at night, and kind of quiet, but there were still a few students hanging around the dorms. I ignored the stares and the whispers. No one knew whose clothes I was wearing, but I figured the sports T-shirt screamed “American,” and that in and of itself was shocking enough. I didn’t care. I was too happy to care.

  When was the last time I’d felt this way? When had I ever felt this way?

  It was the difference between a fake bag and a real one. One looked good on the surface, from a distance. But the closer you got, the more you noticed the stitching was all wrong, the colors slightly off, some essential mark that should have been there missing. That had been Costa and me. We’d been the shiny couple that everyone had wanted to be, and yet it had never been real. And I’d never been happy. Not like this.

  It made a huge difference when you weren’t choking on drama.

  I liked that I didn’t have baggage with Max. He didn’t press me about my past besides that one conversation at the burger restaurant, and for the first time in over two years, I felt like I could breathe.

  And all the little holes that had been inside me, now felt full.

  I got to my dorm room and unlocked the door. I walked inside and stopped short as Maggie and Mya both saw me. Their jaws dropped.

  “Is there a basketball on your T-shirt?” Maggie asked at the same time Mya blurted out, “Do you know you’re wearing plaid boxers?”

  I looked down at my outfit in mock surprise. “Ohmigod, I thought I was wearing a Versace dress. How’d this happen?”

  Mya rolled her eyes. “Well, if she’s had a lobotomy, at least we know her attitude’s intact.”

  Maggie closed her mouth, opened it again, and then her lips twitched. “I take it you went for home plate?”

  What was with these bases? I mean the sex part I got, but the rest of it was just weird. Americans.

  “I’ll have you know that I stayed very firmly on second,” I replied airily, sinking down on my bed and pulling my arms up around my knees. I could smell Max on his clothes, and now on my bed, and I decided right then and there that he wasn’t getting his shirt or his boxers back.

  Maggie laughed. “Um. I don’t know what Max has been telling you, but just FYI, second does not usually involve changing clothes.”

  I felt myself reddening. “It’s complicated.”

  “Did you just blush?” Maggie asked, her expression knowing.

  “I hate you both,” I announced.

  “What did I do?” Mya interjected.

  “You’re giving me shit about this. We’re not talking about it.”

  Maggie’s eyes got as big as saucers. “I never thought I’d live to see the day when Fleur Marceaux was shy over a boy.”

  “I’m not shy.”

  “You blushed.”

  “Fuck off,” I growled.

  Maggie grinned. “Okay, but just one question.”

  I groaned. “I’m tired. It’s late. I want to go to bed. What?”

  “Do you like him or do you like him?”

  Actually, I think I’m falling in love with him.

  “Something more than the second one,” I mumbled, burying my head in the pillow.

  Silence greeted me.

  Finally, it was Mya who spoke.

  “More than . . . ?”

  I knew what she was asking, and it was the easiest question in the world to answer.

  “More than anyone.”

  ###

  I woke up the next morning still in my second-base-orgasm haze, dressed in Max’s clothes, a silly smile on my face. I’d dreamed about him last night, and while the reality was better than anything, the dream was pretty fucking great.

  I grabbed my bathroom stuff to head to the shower on our floor and stopped as I caught sight of a piece of paper taped to our door. I pulled it off, heart pounding. Was it from Max? There weren’t words for how adorable that was.

  I unfolded the paper and froze at the sight of the black ink. I read the words, once, twice, before I could process them.

  I saw your walk of shame. Do you think he’d still fuck you if he knew who you really are?

  My heart clenched as fury poured through my veins. I crumpled the paper in my fist, wanting to make those words disappear, wanting to take the ugliness away from the best night of my life.

  Would Max still look at me like I was everything if he knew it all? That I’d gotten pregnant, that I’d miscarried, that my boyfriend had cheated on me and dumped me for someone who I’d thought was my friend two weeks after I’d miscarried, that I’d then been so stupid that I’d started hooking up with Costa again while he was with Natasha, or that when he’d treated me like shit, I’d taken so many pills that Maggie had to call an ambulance and I’d nearly died.

  Maybe.

  But add that to the fact that Costa had shared naked photos of me with someone and they’d ended up all over the school, and the shit with George, and I was pretty much the worst bet ever. Max knew pieces, but not the whole story. The pieces were bad, but the whole story was so much worse.

  Max looked at me like I was special. Like I was more.

  When I was with him I wasn’t the washed-up party girl, or the girl who had no clue where her life was going. I didn’t want to lose that.

  I couldn’t lose it.

  Maybe he’d understand, but we were still so new, so shiny, and I didn’t want to tarnish that with the drama that lived inside me. I didn’t want him to wake up one day and realize that I wasn’t who he thought I was, that I was broken.

  I wanted to hold on to him for as long as I could.

  I threw the paper in the trash as if that alone would make it all disappear.

  ###

  “You look gorgeous.” I ran the flat iron through Maggie’s long brown hair again. “Seriously gorgeous. Samir is going to have a fit when he sees you.”

  She grinned. “Thanks. And thanks for doing this. No one does hair like you do.”

  I smiled. “It’s your anniversary. Big date with Samir. I had to make sure you looked your absolute best.”

  She was my best friend and someday in the not-too-distant future we’d officially be family. I couldn’t imagine my life without her. How many times had we done this? Getting ready together for a night out in our room. Sometimes the pre-parties were more fun than actually going out.

  “What do you have plan
ned for tonight?” Maggie asked.

  “Just hanging out with Max.”

  Samir’s plan was to take Maggie to dinner and then surprise her with everyone at Babel. He’d ordered a cake for her and everything. It was cute how much thought he’d put into it. I never would have predicted that my cousin would be such a good boyfriend, but he really was. Probably because he loved her so much.

  “How are things going with Max?”

  “Good. Really good.”

  Maggie’s tone softened. “This is it for you, isn’t it?”

  “I don’t know,” I answered, surprised I was even talking about it at all. “I like him. A lot. I could love him really, really easily.”

  “But?” Maggie prodded.

  It had always been the easiest to talk to her. On the surface, we were both so different—she was quiet where I was definitely not—but deep down, we carried similar baggage and recognized that in each other. Neither of us trusted easily, and we each had our walls. I’d watched her struggle with letting Samir in, so I knew on some level she understood. And at the same time—not entirely. Maggie was a mess because her parents had taught her not to trust people. I was a mess because of me.

  “I’m a disaster. Is he going to be able to handle it?”

  “You’re not a disaster. And you won’t know until you tell him.”

  “I don’t know how. I don’t want to.” I fought back against the rising panic. “He’s a good guy, and as far as I can tell, he’s lived a fairly normal life. I’ve been a fucking soap opera.”

  “So you made a few mistakes. Have you considered the fact that for over a year now you’ve had your shit together? Don’t tell me the overdose didn’t change you, because I’ve seen the effects myself. You’re not the same person you were back then. You were trying to destroy yourself, and you’ve been picking up the pieces ever since. He’s not going to judge you for your past.”

  “Isn’t that what everyone does?” I asked bitterly.

  “Isn’t that what you’re doing to him?” Maggie countered. “It’s not fair to judge Max based on how everyone else has reacted. The people who love you are still standing here with you, and Max would be too if he knew it all. You didn’t do anything wrong. Trust him.”

  I wanted to believe her, but I’d been burned one too many times.

  “I’m not saying I’m never going to tell him. We’re just starting out, just becoming a something. We haven’t even had sex sex yet.”

  Maggie made a face. “Do I want to know what the difference between sex and sex sex is?”

  I made a hand gesture that simulated penetration, and Maggie cracked up.

  “Got it. Thanks for that.” Her face scrunched up, and I could tell she was trying to work out the problem that was my fucked-up life. “So you want to wait?”

  “Yes.”

  “How long? When is it going to be the right time?”

  That was the question I couldn’t find an answer to.

  Frustration filled me. “I don’t know, okay? I can’t put a number on it. When it’s the right time, I’ll know. Would you want to go on a few dates with a guy and then immediately lay every bad thing that ever happened to you at his feet? At what point did you start opening up to Samir? And then consider the extent of my baggage versus yours. Then tell me you wouldn’t do the same thing.”

  She nodded after a moment. “Fair enough. Just make sure no one outs your secret before you get a chance to talk to Max about it.” Worry filled Maggie’s brown eyes. “Have you gotten any more blackmail messages?”

  I sighed. “Note on the door.”

  “Here? When?”

  “The morning after I came back in Max’s boxers and T-shirt.” Which I’d slept in every night since.

  “You should confront Natasha.”

  Costa’s girlfriend was never going to take pity on me. There was no point. “Even if she is doing it, we don’t know what she knows. So far I’ve received threats, but I have no actual proof of who they are from.”

  “What about the picture?”

  “Maybe she found it at Costa’s. Maybe he hasn’t told her shit. I’m not going to let this rule my life.”

  Maggie frowned. “Aren’t you, though? Are you taking things slow with Max because that’s what you want or because you’re scared?”

  “If I’m scared it has nothing to do with my blackmailer and everything to do with the fact that I have horrible judgment at life. It was mainly Max’s idea to go slow, but it just feels right. I need this to feel safe so I don’t freak out and fuck it up. He’s too important for that.”

  Maggie reached out and gave me a hug. “So are you.”

  ###

  Max

  I heard the sound of the code being punched in on our door, and panic filled me. This was possibly the last thing I wanted George to see. Well, the second to last thing.

  The door swung open, and he froze in the doorway, shock all over his face.

  “Were we robbed?”

  The floor was covered in every shirt, shoe, pair of pants I owned. Even the suit I’d bought with Fleur.

  I grimaced. “Not exactly.”

  George walked the rest of the way into the room, shutting the door behind him with a soft click. “Okay, then why is all of your stuff on the floor?”

  Because I was freaking out. The last and only time I’d gone out with Fleur and her crowd, I’d made the apparently unforgivable mistake of wearing tennis shoes to a club. How the hell was I supposed to know that was the one cardinal rule of London’s party scene? Fleur had noticed, of course, and the whole thing was just another searing memory of how out of place I was in her world.

  I wanted tonight to be different.

  “I’m going out,” I mumbled, not entirely sure I should even be discussing this with George. He’d dated Fleur, so he knew better than anyone what these evenings were like. He understood the challenge of keeping up with the girl who ruled London’s social scene. Still . . .

  George looked at me, a knowing smile covering his mouth. “With Fleur.”

  I nodded.

  “And you’re afraid you’re going to make an ass of yourself.”

  “Pretty much.”

  He laughed. “Never thought I’d see the day.”

  Me, neither.

  “Well, don’t wear trainers for a start.”

  I made a face. “Got that, thanks.”

  “Just wear jeans or something. I don’t know.”

  I nodded again, like it was that simple. Like it was just a matter of throwing on jeans and taking my girlfriend out. But it was so much more.

  Not having money had never been a huge deal for me. It was what it was. People like Fleur and Samir Khouri were so far out of my social circle it wasn’t even funny. There wasn’t anything I could do to change the fact that I would never, ever be able to keep up with them. There wasn’t even a point in trying, but I was still a guy trying to impress a girl, and I hated that I couldn’t give her everything she was used to. In a decade, maybe. If I got this job and built my career, I could give a girl like Fleur the life she expected. But now I didn’t stand a chance. And I hated knowing I’d be sitting at Samir Khouri’s table while his money paid for the champagne we drank.

  I didn’t have thousands of pounds to drop on one night out, didn’t have a reputation that got me into London’s most exclusive clubs. But I couldn’t say no to Fleur. This was her world, these were people she loved, and I wanted her to have a great time. Even if it meant swallowing my pride and hanging out where I didn’t belong.

  Right now things between us were good. I knew she was into me; the chemistry between us spoke for itself. But how long would it be before she tired of my kisses, my body? At what point would the sex between us—or the promise of it, at least—start to wear off?

  I’d suggested that we take things slowly because it seemed like she still carried a fair amount of baggage, like her reputation and all the things that had come before me wore on her. But that wasn’t the only
reason. The other reason was that right now the promise of sex felt like the biggest chance I had of keeping her interested. I wasn’t stupid. I knew she liked my body, knew she loved how good things were between us. But what would happen when we settled into a routine, when the new and exciting became familiar? Would the gulf between us then seem insurmountable?

  Would she leave?

  ###

  Fleur

  Nerves and excitement jittered in my stomach as I knocked on Max’s door.

  This was the first night out with my friends as a couple, and I wanted everything to go perfectly. Maggie and Mya already liked him, and Michael wanted to do him, so I figured we were good there. Samir was the wild card.

  I knew he wanted me to be happy. And that meant he could go either way—grudgingly accepting Max or going into overprotective dick mode. Since I was feeling more than a little protective of Max, that was what I feared the most. I wanted tonight to be drama-free so I just hoped everyone could get along. On the bright side, I figured Samir felt the same way, considering how crazy he was about Maggie.

  The door opened, and instead of Max, George stared back at me.

  Merde.

  We’d seen each other since the breakup, of course. At a school like ours it was impossible to avoid it since the campus was pretty small and the student body even smaller. But that still didn’t mean I relished facing the boy whose heart I’d broken.

  “Max is in the laundry room.” A smile slipped on to his face as if he were trying not to laugh. “He’s been getting ready for tonight for a while.”

  So awkward. I nodded, my throat still tight.

  “I think he texted you.”

  I winced inwardly. Nice to know I could have avoided this. “I didn’t check my phone. I was in a hurry and didn’t want to be late for him.”

  George’s eyes widened slightly—apparently my tardiness was legendary—and then he stepped back. “You can wait for him here, if you want. He should be back soon.”

  I hesitated.

  “I’m on my way out,” he added, obviously aware that his presence was making me uncomfortable.