by Emma Hart
Then again, he was the one who kissed me so hard he turned me—and him—on. It’s really all his fault. And, you know. If I had my boobs half out he’d be looking, right?
Human nature when you’re attracted to someone. That’s my story and I’m going to stick to it until the pages fall apart.
I push open the apartment building door and turn toward the small lot. His car is in the back corner, and I almost trip on a loose rock as I skip over the little bit of grass. My toe stings a little, but I successfully manage to make it to his car in one piece.
I hit the button on Cain’s key fob, and instead of unlocking the car, the alarm blares out at me.
I freeze.
How did that happen? Am I honestly that much of a disaster that I can’t even unlock his car?
I pat my pocket for my phone, but it’s empty. I don’t have my phone. It’s in my apartment. With Cain. And I’m here. With his car. Screaming at me.
“No, no, no.” I jab at all the buttons on the key, but it does nothing. The car is still blaring obnoxiously loudly, and its lights are flashing so hard it may as well be coordinating a school dance in the parking lot.
“What did you do?” Cain yells from behind me.
“I unlocked it!” I shout back. “Make it stop!”
He takes the keys from me and presses a small silver button on it. A long, silver key flicks out from the plastic fob, and he inserts that into the driver side door. He opens the door, sits inside, and turns off the alarm.
“Is everything okay, ma’am? I was driving past and heard a car alarm.”
I turn and stare into the face of a concerned police officer. I open my mouth and close it again several times.
“Ma’am?”
Cain gets out of the car, takes one look at me standing and gaping at the cop, and laughs. “Sorry, Officer. My girlfriend is technologically challenged and apparently can’t unlock my car without setting off the alarm.”
“My sister is the same. As long as everything is all right here.”
“It’s all good. Thank you for checking, sir.”
The officer waves, bids us goodbye, and walks away, presumably back to his car.
Oh my god. I just gaped at him like I was doing something wrong.
But Cain called me his girlfriend.
“You just called me your girlfriend.” My voice comes out squeaky.
Cain pauses by the trunk of his car. “Yeah, it kinda just came out. Are you bothered I said it?”
“No. I mean yes. I mean am I your girlfriend? No, I’m lying. I don’t know what I mean. Goddamn it, Cain. You know when to make me stop—”
His lips against mine do what I was about to yell at him for not doing. Stop me talking.
“There,” he says, pulling away. “That’s way more fun than putting my hand over your mouth,” he muses, stepping back to the car and popping the trunk.
I’m hard-pressed to disagree.
“Yes it is,” I say, waiting as he pulls a plastic bag from the car. “Well, I hope I never see that particular cop again.”
“I hope I never agree to let you unlock my car again.”
“That’s a little drastic. I didn’t know that silver thing made it into a real key.”
He laughs and locks the car. Then he puts his arm around my shoulders and pulls me into his side. “Of course you didn’t. Can we go upstairs and eat the pizza now?”
“Is it still going to be hot?” I ask, following him up.
“Maybe.”
We walk through the main door and turn toward the stairs. We take the flights up to my apartment in silence. Where I freeze, because the door is shut.
“Oh, shit. We’re locked out. I’ll have to call the—I don’t have my phone!” I turn to Cain in a panic.
With an amused smirk, he pulls his keys back from his pocket, selects one, and inserts it into my lock.
“Right. Spare key. For this reason,” I mumble.
He only laughs in response as he turns the key and pushes my front door open.
It’s just further proof that someone needs to fire my fairy godmother. I know he has a spare key because I remember him taking mine to get cut in case I ever happen to lock myself out of my apartment.
Although technically this time, he locked us out. I didn’t do it.
I go back to the sofa and my pizza while he opens a bottle of beer and pours me a glass of wine.
“So,” he says, sitting down. “You’re actually going to earn money for baking.”
I pick a slice of my—thankfully—still-hot pizza and nod. “Quite a lot of money too. She didn’t even bat an eyelid on the phone when I told her.”
“Why would she? Her husband is a millionaire. She’s not likely to be fussed over, what? A couple hundred dollars for cake?”
“Eight,” I say around a mouthful of pizza. “Eight hundred dollars.”
He chokes and hits himself in the chest. “Eight hundred dollars on cake?” he wheezes out. “Who in their fucking right mind would pay eight hundred dollars for cake?”
“Penelope Argyle.”
“All right, smartass.”
I grin and tear a bite off my pizza. “You asked.”
Slowly, he nods his head. “You’re right, I did. I should have known better.”
“I agree. You really should’ve.”
“Brooke? Shut up and eat.”
I roll my eyes. “Lord, that’s romantic. Excuse me while I swoon all over the place.”
“I offered you romantic and you turned it down. I assumed you’d be happy with my usual asshole responses in this case.” He shifts on the sofa, pizza slice in hand. “Did I assume wrong?”
“Your first mistake was assuming. But yes, you did. I can have a little romance without a romantic date, can’t I?”
“Do you really want me to be romantic?”
“You could try.”
“Fine.” He puts his pizza down in the box and turns back to look at me. Then he takes my slice from me and puts it in mine.
I look at the pizza and then at him. “Wow. I’m swooning again.”
“B.” He reaches over and literally slides me across the sofa to him. “Really, now, shut up,” he whispers, his eyes on mine.
The wolfish glint in his gaze makes me take a deep breath. It’s a darker, sexier glint than I’ve seen before, and right now, I’m guessing that his idea of romance is whole lot hotter than I ever thought it would be.
I’m guessing right.
Our lips come together in a hard kiss. Maybe I shouldn’t do this and maybe I should make him stop, but I know one thing.
Kissing Cain Elliott is addictive. It’s like opening a bag of chips. You can’t have just one. You have to have more and more until your hand is groping around in the bottom the bag and coming up with nothing. I think I could happily kiss Cain until my lips are puckered in thin air and attempting to find his yet again.
Cain’s arms circle my body until I’m moving up and over him. My legs settle either side of his body, and I sink my hands into his hair. His hands move across my back until one is cupping my ass and pulling me closer into him. His cock presses against my aching clit, and while my initial instinct is to move away because this is Cain, I also can’t.
Because this is Cain.
This everything right and crazy and wrong and perfect all at the same time.
So I kiss him. I kiss him until my ass is sore from his grip and my lips are dry from his kiss and my heart is beating so quickly I doubt it’ll ever be able to slow down.
Until I don’t want to stop at just a kiss.
“Shh.” I press my thumb against his lips when he opens his mouth to speak. “Don’t do it.”
He smiles against my thumb and whispers, “Run. Now.”
I do as he tells me. I climb off him and run to my bedroom with him on my heels. No sooner have I walked through the door than he grabs me, hauling me to him, and propels both of us toward my bed.
This isn’t awkward.
&nb
sp; It’s slutty.
But it isn’t awkward.
I grip onto him as we both fall backward onto my bed. “Cain.”
“No talking,” he whispers against my mouth. “You just said it. No, B.”
I nod and curl my body around his. With every heartbeat, I fall a little bit more in fucking stupid love with him. I want him and crave him and need him more than seconds before. Because with every ticking second of the clock, he embeds himself deeper into my skin.
He makes me want him.
The more I taste and feel and touch him, the more I want him.
It’s dangerous. God, this is so dangerous. It’s treacherous waters. An emotional tsunami.
But I can’t stop.
“Brooke? Are you here? I left my phone in the kitchen.”
“Holy shit!” I whisper, staring at Cain. “That’s my mom!”
“Oh fuck.” He gets off me so quickly that at any other time, I’d be offended.
As it is…
My freakin’ mom is right there.
I sit up and stare at him. When did he take his shirt off? And, no. I can ogle him in a minute. “Get in the bathroom! Quickly!” I grab his arm and shove him toward the door.
He goes, frowning at me over his shoulder.
“Brooke? Are you here?” Mom calls. “Where’s my phone?”
“Hold on!” Frantically, I search my room for a towel. Finding one on the floor by the window, I pick it up and lift it to my nose. It passes the smell-test, and I’m sure I used it when I came home earlier, so I flip my head forward and wrap my hair in it.
Then catch sight of my flour-covered cheeks in the mirror.
Shit. A shower excuse won’t work.
I yank the towel down and pull off my shirt. My drawer is still open a little, so I pull out a clean one and put it on. Then I grab the towel again and walk out.
“Brooke!” Mom calls. “I have plans this evening!”
“I’m here, I’m here.” I rub the towel across my face. “Geez, I was changing my shirt when you barged in.”
Her eyebrows shoot up. “With two pizzas?”
“Cain’s in the bathroom. Not that it matters.” I ball up the towel and toss it on top of my laundry basket. It hits the wall before it lands on it.
“Right.” She says it so dryly I know she knows it does matter that he’s here. “So, my phone? Where is it, Brooke?”
“Oh, yeah. Here.” I walk to my drawers and pull it out of the second one. “I put it here to keep it safe.”
“Thank you.” She takes it from me and peers toward the bathroom. “He’s in there a while.”
“Mom?”
“Yes?”
“Didn’t you say you had plans?”
She smiles, walking toward the front door. When she gets there, she pauses and turns back to me. “Have fun.” She throws me a wave and opens the door.
Almost as soon as it shuts behind her, the bathroom door opens.
I let go of a long, ragged breath and slump back against the side.
Cain walks into the room, his hand over his cock, and adjusts his pants. “Moment’s gone, huh?”
I grimace. “Moments gone.”
TWENTY-ONE
LIFE TIP #21: Never turn down the opportunity to shop on someone else’s credit card.
“Your dog hates me.”
“Delilah does not hate you.”
“Delilah is of the devil and she wants me dead.”
Carly rolls her eyes. “That’s the most dramatic thing I’ve ever heard. This week at least.”
I drop down onto the park bench. I’ve been working all day, and now I do not want to be running around the park with a Jack Russell snapping at my ankles when I could be lounging around at home.
I also don’t want the third degree on my date with Cain. Not that it’s stopping Carly.
“Can we go back to your date?” she asks, right on cue.
“No.”
“Why not? I’ll just ask him.”
“Then go ask him.”
“Did it go bad?”
I sigh heavily. “No, it did not go bad. It went fine, Carly.”
“Fine? Uh-oh. Fine isn’t good.”
“Fine is perfectly good.” I grab Delilah’s ball from her slobbery little mouth and throw it.
So what if I couldn’t look Cain in the eye again after my mom left? And not just on account of his lack of a shirt. Maybe I was right from the start. Maybe this is too awkward. Can friends as close as we are—were? —ever really be more successfully?
Or is it just me?
Am I using it as an excuse because I’m too scared? I don’t want to admit to that, but damn it, it’s getting more and more likely.
Getting. Got. Is. Whatever.
“I can’t help but think you’d be a lot happier if you simply threw caution to the wind and got on with it,” she says as if she’s reading my mind. “Cain might accept that you’re a mess, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to wait for you to tidy up.”
“Myself or my apartment?”
“Neither are likely.”
I hate it when she throws the truth at me. “I know. I thought it’d be easier to get past the awkwardness.”
“Stop calling it awkward. You wouldn’t call the Himalayas a hilly park, would you? You’re scared of being in a relationship with him. Accept it.”
I swallow hard and focus on Delilah coming back to us, the ball in her mouth. “So what if I am?”
Carly shrugs a shoulder. “Get the fuck over it.”
“Easy for you to say.” I cut her a dark look. “You’re not the one who could ruin everything.”
“Goddamn it, Brooke!” She stomps her sneaker-clad foot on the ground and turns to me. Her dark eyes are blazing in a peculiar sympathetic annoyance. “Look at me. Listen to me.”
“Yes, Mom.”
She hits me.
“Ouch!” I wince back, rubbing my upper arm.
“Then listen to me, Brooke Alice Barker.” Carly tucks one foot beneath her butt, wrestles the ball from Delilah, and then throws it. “I’ve watched you have heartbreak after heartbreak because of your feelings for him for years. Now, you have that chance you’ve always wanted. It’s right here in front of you, and you don’t swallow your fear and grab it, you’re gonna break your own heart.”
I open my mouth.
She cuts me off with a raise of her hand. “I can’t distract you. I’ve tried. All those dates and perfectly nice guys that never went anywhere? Simon? I tried to get you over him, but I couldn’t. So by fucking god, asshole, I’m not going to let you turn this into a disaster too.”
“I don’t know how not to,” I admit quietly.
“Talk to him.” She squeezes my hand.
“And say what? ’Hey, Cain, this might be a surprise to you, but to you, we’re dating, but to me, I’m already in love with you.’”
“Ahem.”
I jump and jolt around. My heart thumps against my chest, but I slump forward when I realize our apparent eavesdropper is Zeke and not Cain. “Asshole,” I say, hand pressed to my boobs.
He chuckles and, gripping the back of the bench, leans forward. “Don’t worry, Brooke. Your secret is safe with me.” He winks.
“It’s hardly a secret,” I grumble.
“It is if he doesn’t know.”
“Doesn’t know what?” Now Cain appears.
“Brooke’s a virgin,” Carly pipes up.
I get her back for her earlier punch to my arm by shoving my fist into her thigh.
“Owwww!” she whines, leaning forward.
“Payback. Dick.” I flip her the bird and look back around at Cain and Zeke. “What are you doing here?”
Cain gives me a lopsided grin. “Looking for you. I have to show you something.”
“Ew,” Carly mutters. “Save it for the bedroom.”
Zeke snorts. He quickly coughs into his hand to hide his amusement.
“Shut it,” Cain says, flicking her ear. “No, seri
ously. This is a big deal. Come with me?”
“Fine. Can we leave the dog?” I ask, standing up.
Carly puts two fingers in her mouth and whistles, causing us all to wince. Delilah comes rushing back as fast as she can on her little toothpick legs, so I’m guessing the answer to my question is no.
“Where are we going?” Carly asks.
Zeke looks at the dog. “I was going to take you, but I’m not putting that mutt in my car.”
Carly gasps. “She is not a mutt! She’s pure-bred, pencildick.”
His eyebrows shoot up. “Pencildick? Huh. You wanna draw a picture?”
My best friend purses her lips and looks to Cain. “My car is in the lot. I’ll follow you there.” Then she flounces off without another word to any of us.
I sigh as we all turn in the direction she’s jogging in. “You just can’t help yourself, can you, Zeke?”
He doesn’t reply.
“Zeke.”
Still nothing.
I turn to him and notice his eyes are very fixed on Carly. “Stop perving at her ass!” I shove him sideways.
He snaps out of his reverie and looks at me with a smirk. “Did you say something?”
Cain shakes his head, rubbing his hand across his forehead. “Try to control yourself, Zeke. You forget that when you’ve left, I have to hear it.”
“You have to hear it?” I ask him in disbelief. “How do you think I feel? I have to hear it times two, because I have to hear how you never stick up for her.”
“What is it with women in my life needing me to stick up for them? Do I look like a fucking superhero?”
“I don’t need you to stick up for me. I’m perfectly capable of doing it myself.”
“Untrue,” Zeke says, hands in his pockets. “You want him to stick something—”
“Ezekiel Elliott, if you finish that sentence, I’m going to accidentally tell the girls in the coffee shop that you have crabs before work tomorrow morning.”
He mimes zipping his lips, but his eyes are still glittering with his own self-amusement.
I know everybody thinks I should have my adult card revoked, but I think Zeke is operating on his puberty card still.
“Come on.” Cain presses the button on his car keys. His car beeps and clicks with the sound of it unlocking. “Get in.”
