“How did you meet?” he asks.
“He untangled his stepsister’s kite string from my braces,” I say, tapping my lips with my finger.
His gaze sticks for a second on my mouth before he lifts it to my eyes. “Braces . . .” he says with a tip of his head. “How old where you when you met?”
“Fourteen.”
“So, you knew him for a while before you dated.”
“You could say that.”
He looks at me curiously for a long beat. “There’s a story there.”
I blow out a sigh. “A long and extremely pathetic one.”
“I’m listening.” He settles deeper into the cushions and drapes an arm over the back of the sofa.
I just look at him for a second, trying to gauge if he’s messing with me or if he’s really interested. His liquid gaze is deep and his expression soft but intent. I tip my head back against the sofa and stare at the ceiling. “I was totally in love with him all through high school, and I held out for him for five years, even when he didn’t show any interest, because no one else measured up. So, yeah. I knew him for a while.”
“After all that time, you finally got your man. What happened?”
“He was in love with my best friend . . . who also happens to be his stepsister.”
There’s a long silence, and I lift my head, but I can’t bring myself to look at him as I tell him things I’ve never said out loud before. “He was practicing with his band in Lexie’s garage, and we were in the driveway flying her kite, but the wind gusted and it did this loop, and the string got caught in my braces. Lexie yanked, I screamed, and when the guys came out of the garage to see what was up, they all started laughing. But not Trent. He came over and got me untangled. And he told the guys to cut the shit when they started calling me Jaws and asking if I got good reception.”
I remember it so clearly.
Hold still, he’d said. He grasped my chin gently and leaned in to examine my mouth. He was a little sweaty from jamming with the guys, and I remember thinking I should think that was gross. But I didn’t. It was the opposite of gross. I’d crushed on a few guys in junior high, but I never remember my heart racing the way it did with Trent so close. He’d unhooked me from the kite, and when he let me go, he smiled this incredible sideways smile and said, Good to go, and that was it.
I sigh and sink deeper onto the cushions. “I fell in love with him right that second. But even though I was under his nose all the time, he never thought of me as anything but his stepsister’s best friend, so, for five years, I pined.”
Harrison shifts closer. “You never dated anyone else?”
I shake my head. “Not during high school. I finally gave up sophomore year in college and dated a little, but then right before my junior year, Lexie went off to Rome for a year abroad. She and Trent were really close, and I could tell he missed her. We started hanging out together, mostly talking about Lexie at first, and things sort of escalated from there.”
“Don’t tell me he dumped you when his stepsister came home?”
I shake my head. “He didn’t wait that long. He broke up with me in April.”
His eyes narrow. “So, you were just his bootie call when his stepsister was away.”
The other thing I’m not going to tell him is, we never slept together. Looking back, I can see he was never really all that into it. I mean, there was a lot of kissing and fooling around, but whenever we got close to doing it, he would find a reason not to follow through. I should have seen it coming, I guess, but when he sat in my car last April and told me there was someone else, I didn’t take it very well. When they both sat me down two months later and told me “someone else” was Lexie, it pretty much gutted me. It cut deeper than I could have imagined that my best friend and my boyfriend both chose each other over me.
“You know the worst part of it?”
“What’s the worst part of it?” He leans closer, his whole face so open I feel myself wanting to tell him everything. So I do.
“The worst part is, as much as everything with Trent sucked, losing Lexie was like losing a piece of my soul. She, Katie, and I had been the three musketeers since junior high—inseparable.”
“Have you talked to her? Maybe if she knew—”
“I can’t,” I interrupt. “I said some pretty terrible things . . . called her names that I’m not even going to repeat here.” I blow out a breath and give my head an embarrassed shake. “It was bad. There’s no way she wants to hear from me.”
He brings a hand up and tucks a lock of my hair behind my ear. “I’m sorry, Sam.”
“Yeah . . . well.” I pull my eyes away from his mouth. “Anyway, they’re engaged now, so I hear.”
“That’s just . . . a little scary,” he says, his face scrunching, making me smile despite myself. He shakes his head, returning my smile. “Love blows.”
I drop my head onto the back of the sofa. “You got that right.”
“You know I’m serious, right? That guy’s a fucking moron to give you up like that.”
I lift my head and look at him. “I was thinking the same thing about your fiancée.”
His blue eyes darken in the dim light, his gaze smoldering with barely contained desire. “You were amazing out there tonight,” he says, his voice low and rough around the edges. “The way you move is just so . . .” He trails off with a slow shake of his head.
Desire twists tight in my core at the knowledge that this man, who is by far the hottest man I’ve ever known, wants me. Looking at the need on his face and coiled in his body, I know for sure he wouldn’t go eight months without taking me to bed. That look makes me feel sexy, and beautiful. It makes me pulse with need and ache in my most private places. It tells me that he wouldn’t leave me waiting and wanting for even eight minutes.
I look at him a moment longer, then stand and move to the stereo, cranking up the music; a slow, haunting piece that I feel in my soul. I let it flow into me, through me, and when it’s filled me, I turn to face him and start to dance. I lift my arms over my head and move to the pulsing rhythm. I circle my hips in a slow belly dance, and his eyes are glued to me, his lips parted slightly, and animal need dances in his hooded eyes. He rubs a hand down his face and sucks his upper lip between his teeth when I drop low, and his eyes follow the path of my hands as I roll back up, my fingertips skimming my calves and inner thighs, finally settling over the outside of my shorts, with my thumbs hooked under the waistband.
The unabashed need in his expression starts an intense throbbing in my groin that I can’t ignore. So I don’t. As I move to the rhythm, I let one hand continue up my body, over my bare midriff and my breast, finally twisting into my hair. My hips work the beat as I straighten my other arm, tugging the waistband of my tiny satin shorts dangerously low and bringing my fingertips to rest over the sweet spot at the apex of my thighs. I’m all adrenaline, every sensation heightened, and want pulsing through my veins like fire as I roll my hips in a slow circle.
Harrison tips his head back, blowing out a long breath between pursed lips, then stands and adjusts his jeans around the bulge inside them.
I crook my finger, beckoning him to me. “Dance with me.” It comes out a throaty demand—all sex and desire.
His eyes flare as he stalks closer, stopping a foot away. “I thought there was a three feet rule,” he says, his voice rough.
“I’m modifying it to one foot.” He reaches for my waist, but I back away and shake my head. “Still no touching. Sorry.”
I lift my arms overhead, weaving my fingers loosely into my hair, and start to move again, letting the music have me but never breaking eye contact with him. He watches me for a full minute, then starts to move with the rhythm. He’s good—loose and comfortable in his body. He rolls his hips and I moan a little, knowing just by that movement that he would be amazing in bed.