“Both…”
His fingertip was on the side of my face, tracing a path down from my ear to my jaw that left wonderfully tingly skin and heat everywhere it moved. I closed my eyes and leaned forward, lips pursed. It was automatic. It wasn’t something I could’ve stopped if I wanted to, just like I couldn’t have stopped myself from gasping for air if I was drowning.
I felt the first contact of his lips against mine. It wasn’t rushed. It was soft and tender. Everything felt like it condensed around us, like my ears closed up and my senses dulled until every last inch of my brain was laser-focused on the kiss—on his lips.
Soft, but firm skin. Warmth. The perfect amount of wetness, and a subtle taste that I could get addicted to. It was bliss, and for those few seconds, I was consumed by him.
So I didn’t hear the knocking at first.
I felt the absence of those lips I’d barely begun to experience. I lurched forward, seeking more, but found nothing. When I opened my eyes, he was looking toward the door. “I think your locksmith is here.”
Of course he was.
I stood too fast and nearly fell when all the blood rushed to my head. Apparently, it had all been traveling to another part of my body. “Sorry I kissed you,” I said. “Not even sure what that was. I don’t do the whole spontaneous romantic thing. Probably just still half-asleep.”
He stood slowly. “Pretty sure I was the one who kissed you. I don’t know if you get credit for just sitting there and taking it.”
“Yeah, well, sorry you kissed me, then.”
“I’m not.”
I gulped. It was a full-on, cartoon-quality, dramatic and embarrassingly loud gulp. “Yeah, well, I should go.”
“I’ll come by to pick you up tomorrow at seven.”
I couldn't seem to find any reason to disagree or change my mind. All I felt was a swirling, excited buzz in my stomach, unlike anything I'd ever experienced. That, and a completely uncharacteristic desire to call Emily up and engage in some serious girl talk.
I wasn’t stooping to that level. For now, I was going to hold on to as much of my dignity as I could, even when it felt like Liam Hightower was a rushing current of charm, good looks, and swoon-juice trying to uproot me and every grumpy thing I’d ever stood for.
6
Liam
I woke up groggily with the sense that I wasn't alone. I blinked some of the blurriness from my eyes and could see enough to know that it was still very early. My alarm hadn't gone off, and my bedroom was only lit by the faint blue light from an electronic billboard across the street. For about the dozenth time since I'd been renting this small apartment, I was momentarily shocked to be in a different bed than my own—to see a different view out the windows.
A shadowy figure stood in the doorway.
I bolted upright as a rush of adrenaline blasted away any traces of sleepiness.
“Shame. I was hoping you’d started sleeping nude.”
“Celia? What the fuck are you doing in my apartment?”
I flipped the light on and got my first good look at her in a few months. Black hair that was almost always pulled back in a ponytail. Mischievous brown eyes, and a cruel mouth. As usual, she had so much of her boobs hanging out that it looked like a sneeze would set them free.
Ever since our parents had first married, she had been trying to seduce me. The thought always turned my stomach, but recently, she’d taken it too far, even by her standards.
“I’m here to see you, of course. Bob.”
“Get out. I can call the cops, or I can just throw you out myself. It’s your choice.”
She made a sound like a cat’s purr. “If you threw me out yourself, you’d have to touch me.”
“You’re right. I think I have a can of bug spray under the sink. Maybe that would work better.”
She curled her lips in a mocking smile. “Liam. I can make all of this stop. All the rumors. The trouble. You just need to give me what I want.”
“You’re never going to get it.”
She laughed. “You still think I want to fuck you, don’t you? It’s not about that. It never was, but I’m not surprised you were always too short-sighted to see it. Every other woman wants to wrap themselves around your fingers, so why wouldn’t I?”
I spread my hands out. “I don’t know Celia, but maybe you can wrap up the dramatic speech so I can get to the part where I kick you out of my life again.”
“I want you to be unhappy, Liam. It’s that simple. Maybe some misguided part of me wanted to have you for myself, once, but you lost that opportunity. I spread those rumors because I knew the only thing you cared about was work. But we both know that’s quickly becoming untrue, isn’t it? You do care about something else, and she lives right… across… the hall.”
“Get the fuck out.”
Celia laughed again, but this time she actually started walking to the door. “I just wanted to let you know I’m going to make sure I ruin whatever is going on between the two of you, too. And who knows, maybe when I’ve spoiled your little fling, I’ll let you have one night with me as my way of apologizing.”
“Out.” I pulled the door open and slammed it shut as soon as she was in the hallway.
I pressed my forehead to the wall and closed my eyes while I replayed her threat. I couldn't think of what she could possibly do to screw things up with Lilith and me, but I knew my step-sister well enough to be sure she had a plan.
Lilith sat down beside me. We were having Brazilian barbeque, which technically satisfied her request for raw meat. The waiters brought a platter of uncooked steak, chicken, and vegetables to our table along with an assortment of sauces. There was a steaming hot grill in front of us, along with skewers and tongs.
We’d been seated in a relatively private space near the back of the restaurant, which hadn’t quite filled up for dinner yet. Guests were seated around stove tops like in a Japanese steakhouse, but it was a more intimate arrangement where everybody cooked their own food and at their own pace. The sound of sizzling food cooking at people’s tables and the din of conversation provided its own kind of strange intimacy.
“As requested,” I said, gesturing toward the food.
She eyed me. Not for the first time, I was taken back by the sight of her. I’d seen women I found beautiful before, but I’d never felt so addicted to someone. Everything about her seemed to pull me in, from the solitary, freckle above the corner of her mouth to the adorable way she tried to seem so hard. I knew it wasn’t all an act, but it felt like I could see straight through the smoke and mirrors with her. I saw the sweet girl on the inside, the one she was afraid to show anybody. I saw the insecurity that made her put up walls and push people away. They didn’t scare me, and they never would.
“You did know I was only messing with you about the raw meat thing, right?” Lilith asked.
"I might have had a bit of doubt, if I'm honest."
She actually smiled at that. The rarity of her smiles made them feel precious, and I see how hooked I could become on chasing the next one. Lilith’s pale skin looked creamy and soft against the fabric of her dress. It was a dark purple with an exposed back but a high neckline. Her black hair was tied up over her head in a simple but attractive style. Then again, I think I might’ve already reached the dangerous point where just about anything on her would suit my tastes.
I marveled at how quickly it was happening. The change she was making spread through me. Where I'd felt cold and detached only a few days ago, I already could sense something stirring. It wasn't that I hadn't had an interest in dating, not entirely anyway. I'd just found less and less time to spend pursuing relationships, until I eventually all-but stopped. Chasing after Lilith didn't feel like time I had to carve out of my workday. It felt more like my workday now needed to fit itself around whatever schedule my hunt for Lilith demanded.
“You know,” I said. I was wrapping a piece of beef in some lettuce like I’d seen a colleague do a few years back—it had been my fir
st experience with Brazilian barbecue. I wasn’t sure if it was proper technique, but it had tasted good. “I haven’t done this in a long time.”
“Date?” She asked. Her eyes followed my movements. She mimicked me, setting the little package of meat down on the table and dousing it with sauce to steam.
“Yeah. I think it has been three years, maybe more. I just fell out of the habit, I guess.”
“I don’t think dating is supposed to seem like an obligation. It’s not flossing or mowing the lawn. You’re supposed to want to do it.”
“What about you, then?” I absentmindedly tossed a few vegetables on the grill to join the meat. Lilith mirrored my movements again.
“I just so happened to have not wanted to do it, for a pretty long time.”
“How long, exactly?”
“I don’t know. Six or seven?”
“Months?”
“Years…”
I laughed. “And you were giving me a hard time?”
She shrugged. “I don’t pretend to be a normally functioning person like you.”
“Hey, now. I never claimed to be normally functioning. Didn’t I tell you my step-sister is trying to ruin my life because I wouldn’t have an affair with her?”
Her lips twitched up at the corners. “That rings a bell.”
My own smile faded when I thought of Celia and the conversation I'd had with her earlier that morning. "She's just the beginning, and let's leave it at that because I don't want to spoil your appetite with the full story."
Lilith met my eyes, and there was something in her expression that I couldn’t quite decide what to make of. It was either frightening, or sexy, or maybe both. “Do you want me to take care of this step-sister of yours? I can tell her I’m about to pop out her perfect step-brother’s baby, so she might as well call it quits. Or, you know, I could just stab her in her sleep.”
“So you think I’m perfect, do you?”
She rolled her eyes, but there was a glimmer of humor in her features. “That was your takeaway?”
I shook my head and focused off into the distance. “You don’t want to make Celia think there’s anything serious between us. It’d only egg her on more.”
“So? Is she ever going to stop if you don’t confront her?”
“I can’t imagine a scenario where she really ‘stops.’ I can picture her getting bored for a while, but I don’t think it’ll ever end. Not entirely.”
“Then we egg the bitch on.”
I laughed at the intensity in her voice. “You know, a few hundred years ago, I think you would have made a really good spy or assassin. Actually, not a spy. Your little espionage operation at the coffee shop was a pretty big bust, but I can absolutely see you stabbing someone.”
She flashed that rare smile of hers, and I drank in every second of it.
“One: I wasn’t spying on you, so you can stop flattering yourself. I just happened to be carrying around my bird watching gear, which could be mistaken for spy gear. You were the one who went all psycho and chased me into the subway. Two: I’m not sure if the stabbing thing was meant as a compliment, but I’m taking it as one.”
I pointed to our food sizzling on the table. “We should turn these. Pull the meat out of the lettuce and let it sit on the grill for just a minute or two so it sears now.”
She nodded and followed my movements, then stirred up her vegetables along with me. They had already started to blacken along the edges.
“This place is kind of cool,” she said. “I feel like a cavewoman.”
“You handle your utensils like one,” I noted.
She glared at me. “Want to find out if I can handle the knife better than these goofy tongs?”
“It’s not a knife I want to see you handle.”
She looked confused for a few seconds, then her eyes widened slightly and she stared back toward the food. “Can I say something honest? And I want you to promise you’re not going to think I’m digging for some lame compliment, okay?”
“Yeah,” I said. My stomach lurched a little at her question. Qualifiers like that usually meant somebody was about to tell you they didn’t think it was going to work out after all, or that they have a terminal illness, or that you’ve had a giant piece of food in your teeth all night. “Go ahead.”
“I can’t stop feeling like all of this is a practical joke. You’re not the type of guy who asks me on dates, and you’re definitely not the type of guy who has ever seemed interested in sleeping with me. Can you just promise me this isn’t a joke?”
“What? Why would you even think I’d mess around about something like that?”
She shrugged, and all her hard edges seemed to melt away. For a few seconds, I thought I saw what she hid so well behind the sarcasm and the dark humor. She didn’t push people away because she was mean or cruel, she pushed them away because she was afraid of getting hurt, of showing them the real Lilith and getting mocked or rejected. “I guess experience has taught me to be skeptical when people are nice?”
I wanted to ask her what happened, but it didn’t feel like the right time. She didn’t need to dig up her old ghosts right now, she just needed to feel secure. She needed me to convince her that she could feel safe when she was with me—that I’d never take any part of her for granted.
I slid my hand into hers under the table and gripped it as I met her eyes. “How about this. I’ll give you a key to my apartment. If I ever give you a reason to think I have tried to trick you somehow, you can come in at night and do the whole stabbing thing you’re so into.”
She bit back a crooked smile. “I don’t actually like stabbing things. It’s just one of those things I say because it freaks people out.”
“Well it works,” I laughed. “I’m serious, though. I’d never try to trick you. I asked you on a date because I felt a connection. I wanted to get to know you because I think you’re interesting. And I wanted to sleep with you because, well, look at you.”
“You weren’t supposed to compliment me. Now I feel like I was fishing for that.”
“You’re burning.”
“Huh? Is that how the cool guys are saying ‘hot’ now? Because it’s kind of lame.”
“No,” I grinned. “Your food.”
She peeled her food from the grill, which had started to skirt the line between charred and burnt. “Yours isn’t looking so great, either.”
“Totally intentional. It’s blackened. That’s all.”
“I think it’s more like carbonized.”
I cut off a slice of the meat and popped it in my mouth. I chewed into the thick shell of burnt matter and my mouth was blasted with an ashy, bitter taste. I felt my eyes watering as I forced myself to swallow. “No way. Totally delicious.” I coughed into my hand and then shrugged. “Or not.”
I knew it was a successful date, at least on some level, because the burnt food didn’t spoil our moods. We ate around the worst parts, talked, and I even managed to squeeze another laugh or two out of Lilith before the bill was paid.
We shared a cab back to our apartments. It had just been a little chilly when we were leaving for the restaurant, but a more biting cold had quickly settled in as the night drew on.
We stood on the sidewalk outside our building while a few people came and went around us. Lilith was clutching her arms around herself, and I pulled her in toward my chest without thinking. She was stiff at first, but then she relaxed, resting her head against my chest. I slid my hands up her back and squeezed her into me. It felt good to hold her. Damn good.
I looked up into the darkness between the skyscrapers above us and saw the first specks of snow start swirling down. I closed my eyes, trying hard to memorize the moment. It shouldn’t have been anything remarkable. One date. One long hug. She should have just been another girl that would end up drifting out of my life.
I didn’t buy it, though. I’d never wanted to hold on to someone this badly. This desperately. Was it only because Celia was trying so hard to ruin th
ings for me? Maybe my fixation on Lilith was nothing but a competitive urge to prove I could keep a relationship alive despite Celia’s best efforts.
Maybe. But I doubted it. I didn’t think I could fool myself this well. What I felt seemed real.
I felt my fingers press a little harder against her back, and she let out a soft, contented sigh.
“You’re so warm. Like a werewolf from Twilight. Are you really a werewolf, Bob Smith?”
I smirked. “There won’t be a full moon for another few weeks. If you want to find out, I guess you’re going to just have to stick around.”
“Damn. I was hoping this was going to just be a one-night stand.” She stiffened again, and I could almost picture the surprise on her face.
Hadn’t planned to admit you were thinking about sleeping with me, had you?
“So you’re saying sex is on the table?” I asked.
“I usually prefer it on a bed.”
I slid my hand into her purse and found the metallic ring of her keychain. I slid it out and dangled it in front of her eyes. I shoved them in my pocket and gave her a meaningful look. “I think you forgot your keys in your apartment again. Looks like you’ll need to hang out in my place for a couple hours while we wait for a locksmith.”
She raised an eyebrow. “What do you take me for, some kind of harlot who will jump at any excuse to hook up with you?”
7
Lilith
We didn’t make it past the entryway of his apartment before he had me pinned to the wall. His mouth was hot and hungry against mine. I felt like I’d been swept up in the current of somebody else’s life. I’d had sex before. Sort of. If a fumbling, awkward encounter in my high school years counted. It hadn’t felt like a compulsion, not like this, like something deep inside my chest clawing to get out.
I had my doubts about Liam. I’d met the man under a false name, for starters, but I couldn’t deny the connection I felt on a basic level. We clicked. It was as simple as that. After tonight, who knew where it would go, but right now, I didn’t want to fight my instincts. I wanted to put on a blindfold, handcuff myself, and let my instincts take over.
His Package Page 6
