by Lauren Layne
Really liking it.
Maybe he did want to talk. Especially now that Aaron had muttered something about having done his “share” of the cleaning and gone back to join the women at the table.
“That one’s a winner,” Jake said.
“We’ll never see him again,” Mitchell said decisively. “Now shut up. Sam was about to explain how Riley’s got his balls in a knot.”
I was? “I’m not really sure what’s happening,” Sam heard himself saying.
Jake snorted. “Who is?”
“She’s my best friend’s baby sister.”
“Nothing baby about Riley McKenna,” Mitchell said. “And I say that in a platonic, observant kind of way,” he hurried to add when Sam glared.
“Seriously though, is the brother thing a problem? I’ve hung out with Liam a few times. Seems like a reasonable, twenty-first-century type of guy. Not at all one to come after his best friend with a shotgun,” Jake said, looking completely at home drying wineglasses and placing them on the rack.
“And isn’t this sort of thing supposed to be the dad’s problem?” Mitchell added.
Sam grunted and tipped the beer back. “Josh might actually be okay with it. I think he’d rather me with his baby girl than one of the other losers she’s brought around.”
“But Liam wouldn’t feel the same? Wouldn’t he prefer a guy he trusts over a stranger to be the one taking care of Riley?”
It was a valid point, but Sam couldn’t afford to think that way. He couldn’t afford to be wrong and lose Liam. “I promised him I’d keep my hands to myself.”
Mitchell frowned. “When?”
Sam looked up as he mentally added the years. “More than a decade ago.”
Jake set the towel aside to pop the cap off his beer. “Doesn’t count. It’s expired. Plus, he has to know his sister isn’t a delicate little flower in need of protecting. I mean, you’ve read her stuff, right? She knows more about male anatomy than most penis doctors.”
“They’re called urologists,” Mitchell said. “Or an andrologist, depending on the issue.”
Jake pointed his bottle at Mitchell in warning. “Seriously? Don’t be that guy.”
Sam wisely refrained from mentioning that Riley wasn’t quite the penis expert that everyone believed her to be. Although she was a brilliantly quick study.
And that was complicating the matter. Sam had lost his own virginity his sophomore year of high school to a very experienced senior cheerleader. He’d certainly never dealt with the whole deflowering aspect before.
Riley swore up and down that she hadn’t been a virgin that first night, and technically she was right, but … damn. It was a lot of pressure, being the first one she’d let into her bed in adulthood. And he still maintained that her clumsy first time with Deacon or whatever that guy’s name was hadn’t counted.
But the pressure and guilt weren’t even the real problem. The problem wasn’t that he’d been her (almost) first.
It was that some deep, dark, moronic part of him wanted to be her last.
“Uh-oh, he’s got the look again,” Jake said.
“What look?” Sam asked.
“The one that I had on my face when I realized Julie wasn’t just going to be a shits-and-giggles fling, and the one Jake had on his face when Grace handed him his balls at a softball game.”
“Hey!” Jake said in protest. “It wasn’t like—”
“It was,” Sam interrupted. “I was actually there, although I didn’t really know you then.”
“Oh yeah,” Jake mused. “I’d forgotten you were Riley’s plus-one at that game. So this isn’t really a new thing between you?”
“Well, the naked time is,” he said, figuring he might as well throw it all out there. “I just never remember sex making things so … complicated.”
“That’s because you don’t have ovaries,” Mitchell muttered as he moved to put away the glasses Jake had dried. “Sex is always complicated to women. To men it’s only complicated when shit’s about to get messy.”
“Messy?”
Jake and Mitchell exchanged a glance. “Important,” Mitchell clarified.
“Or one might say forever,” Jake muttered into his beer, not making eye contact.
Sam’s stomach clenched, and he didn’t know if it was in horror or hope. “Now hold on. We’ve only been a thing for two weeks. It’s mostly just sex.”
“Really? Then how is it that you’re at my apartment for his engagement party,” Mitchell asked with a gesture toward Jake.
“That’s not on me! You two are the ones out buying engagement rings and cohabiting—”
“Cohabiting? Grandma? Is that you?”
“You know what I mean. You two and your … love stuff will put ideas in women’s heads that will make life complicated for the rest of us.”
“Ideas in women’s head? Or yours?” Mitchell asked, cutting him with a level gaze and getting right to the heart of the matter.
Sam opened his mouth to retort, only to realize he had nothing to say. The truth was, this whole cozy-couple scene that the other two men had going on was oddly appealing, and nothing like the awkward dinners and epic fights over laundry he remembered with Hannah.
He was beginning to realize that just because he had a marriage under his belt didn’t necessarily mean that he knew a thing about relationships. Not the good kind.
This was new. And he didn’t like it.
“Shit. Shit. Now what?” he asked, more to himself than to the other guys.
Jake clapped him on the shoulder, pity in his eyes. “First up? You’ve got to realize there’s nothing you can do until you know what she wants.”
“So, I, like, what … talk to her?”
The other men’s silence said it all.
“Shit,” Sam muttered again.
“Exactly,” Jake and Mitchell said at the same time.
Chapter Seventeen
“So, what were you boys talking about?” Riley asked as she and Sam walked hand in hand toward the ice cream shop where they’d decided to stop for a second dessert. Her idea. Really, Julie should know by now that in Riley’s world, “a piece of delicious fruit” did not a dessert make.
“Guy stuff. What were you ladies talking about?”
“Girl stuff.”
“Ribbons and ponies?” he asked.
“Dildos and ingrown hairs on the bikini line.”
Sam nodded solemnly. “That’s what we were talking about too.”
“I can’t believe Grace isn’t going to do a traditional wedding,” Riley muttered. She’d been kidding about the flower-girl bit, of course, but she’d always imagined that of the group, Grace would be the one to get hitched in a big old church with the big old white dress.
Now Grace seemed perfectly content to wear a cute little white cocktail dress on a beach somewhere. Hell, she would probably have been content to wear a black trash bag in the Bronx, because the only thing that really mattered to Grace was Jake.
Riley was jealous.
“What’s the big deal?” Sam asked, tugging her hand to get her to hurry across the crosswalk. “Weddings are a pain in the ass. Even the small ones. Trust me.”
Ouch.
“I know, it’s just … I guess it never occurred to me that the wedding of Grace and Jake would be different than Grace with Greg.”
“Well, of course. Didn’t you say her ex-boyfriend was a womanizing jerk?”
Riley hissed at him. “Stop being rational. I’m trying to ruminate here.”
“About your friend’s fictional fantasy wedding? Aren’t women supposed to ponder their own wedding?”
Riley was a little thrown off by his direct approach. This was the kind of early-relationship talk that was generally strictly off-limits. But then she and Sam weren’t exactly new to each other. And he seemed genuinely curious and removed, as though her eventual wedding had nothing to do with him.
Which of course, it didn’t. Riley may have been a bit smitten
with the man, but she wasn’t a total sap. She hadn’t doodled his name in a notebook since college.
And she hadn’t daydreamed about walking down the aisle with him.
Well, okay. Maybe once. Or a few times.
The truth was, Riley had never let herself do much thinking about her own wedding. She didn’t know why. She guessed she’d figured she’d always be a spur-of-the-moment let’s-just-stop-by-the-courthouse kind of girl.
But hearing her best friends talk about vows and flowers and cake versus cupcakes (Riley had voted for both) had gotten her thinking about the whole white dress thing.
And wondering why she hadn’t put much thought into it before.
Maybe because it was hard to imagine yourself marrying some future Prince Charming when there was a guy in the here and now taking up all your thoughts. “Hey, Sam, you didn’t, you know … tell Mitchell and Jake about …”
“About …?”
“The fact that I’m a sexual sham.”
Sam frowned and pulled her to a stop outside the ice cream shop. “I thought we agreed you were going to knock that off.”
She avoided his eyes. “But you didn’t tell them?”
He lifted her chin. “You’re not a sham. You’re a gorgeous woman who knows herself well enough to wait for the right moment.”
Riley couldn’t hide the little smile. “You sound kind of like a mom talking to her fifteen-year-old daughter.”
His eyebrows lifted. “Did you want to get laid tonight? Because keep it up, and I might be on the next train back to Brooklyn.”
“Fine by me,” she said breezily, skipping away from him to open the door to the shop. “But then you can kiss that oral bit goodbye.”
“What oral bit?”
She grinned and headed into the shop. “Never mind, I think I’m changing my mind …”
Strong fingers gripped her wrist, and then she was being hauled back toward the curb, his hand already in the air for a cab. “Hey,” she exclaimed. “I want ice cream!”
Sam ignored her. “Later. If you’re good.”
“At what?”
He gave her a look.
“Oh,” she said, giving a satisfied cat smile. “That. Don’t worry. I will be.”
Sam groaned as a cab pulled to a stop. “You really will be the death of me.”
“Well,” she said, lowering herself into the cab. “At least you’ll die happy.”
* * *
Riley had done a lot of thinking about time between the sheets in her time at Stiletto. But there was one area she hadn’t covered. Hadn’t even considered it, actually.
Cuddling.
It was phenomenal.
She’d never imagined that the slight rasp of a man’s chest hair against your back, the weight of his arm around your waist, his breath warm against your neck, could feel better than Christmas morning.
“I’ve been thinking—” Sam said, shifting and rolling onto his back.
“Aha! I thought I smelled smoke!” Riley rolled onto her side so she could see his face.
He smiled. “I’ve been thinking about your most recent performance.”
“And?”
“A minus.”
Riley sat up at that. “A minus? That was an A-plus performance and you know it.”
He shook his head, his eyes playful. “It was over much too quickly.”
She pinched his arm. “That’s only more proof that I was good at it.”
“I suppose we’ll have to try again to settle this,” Sam said with a sigh.
Riley flopped back against the pillows. “I should sleep. I have a staff meeting early tomorrow morning, and it’s my turn to fetch coffee for the girls. And Grace has been on this soy, extra-hot, half-decaf thing that takes, like, eight extra minutes at Starbucks.”
He tucked an arm around her, pulling her closer until she snuggled against his shoulder. “What are you doing tomorrow after work?”
“You’re not suggesting we hang out two days in row?” she asked, keeping her voice teasing because it was better than revealing the burst of glee that went through her at his words.
“Just for the sex,” he said, putting his lips to her forehead. She felt his smile.
“Well, I do need to make up for lost time …”
She pulled back slightly when he didn’t respond, noting the pensive expression on his face. “You doing that thinking thing again?”
To her surprise, he didn’t smile this time. “Got any regrets?”
“Um, what?” she asked, trying to keep up.
“You’ve waited a long time to get your jollies—just making sure it wasn’t a disappointment.”
“Mr. Compton, are you asking for a grade now?”
He snorted. “Please. I’m shocked your neighbors didn’t call the cops after your third—or was it fourth?—orgasm.”
She kicked his shin.
“And of course you’re a screamer,” he said, shaking his head. “Are there no surprises anymore?”
Riley flopped back down, unrepentant about her rather noisy appreciation for sex. “Since you seem to know exactly how good you are at this, what’s with the asking me if I have regrets?”
He went quiet, playing with her hair. “I just meant—shit. I don’t know what I meant. Never mind.”
She melted a little at his self-doubt and tilted her head up to look at him. “My only regret is not doing it earlier.”
With you, she added silently.
She expected him to look mollified, but his frown deepened. “But you have nothing to compare it to.”
Irritated, Riley sat up, running her fingers through her hair. “What do you want here, Sam? A trophy? Why don’t you just say whatever it is you’re dancing around?”
“Just that most women of your age—”
“Careful.” She held up a finger.
“Most women of your still-very-young-age have had a handful of partners by now. Now that you’ve dusted off your sex moves, you’ll likely want a little variety.”
“We have got to work on your pillow talk,” she muttered.
“But I’m right,” he said, sitting up and leaning back on his hands, looking inexplicably tanned and perfect against her white sheets.
He looked … amazing. Maybe I don’t want variety.
But that was not the sort of admission you made to a man who seemed to be all but ordering you to jump into another man’s bed.
“Do we have to talk about this now?” she asked, pulling the sheet up to cover her chest more fully. “It’s a little disconcerting to be discussing other partners when we’re both naked.”
“So you are planning on making up for lost time?”
“Stop it!” she said, exploding. “Are you trying to be crass?”
He closed his eyes briefly before running an apologetic finger over her back. “I’m sorry. I’m phrasing this wrong.”
“You think?”
“I just mean that I don’t expect anything from you. If you want to play the field a bit, I’d, well … understand.”
She narrowed her eyes and turned around to face him. “It wouldn’t bother you? Knowing that tomorrow night someone else could be in that very spot?”
His jaw tensed but his eyes revealed nothing.
“Or that maybe I’d try to improve upon my A-minus score with another guy?”
This time his eyes definitely flashed.
“Or maybe my upcoming Stiletto article could be something like ‘Ten Guys in Ten Days.’ Would that appease you?”
“Riley …”
She started to climb out of bed, realizing that her anger was deteriorating into hurt, and not wanting him to see it.
He gently grabbed her arm, pulling her back toward him. “You know I’m not good at this.”
“Good at what?” she asked, determined not to let him retreat to his comfort zone.
He swallowed. “Relationships. Or whatever.”
“Which one are we? The relationship or the whatever?”
/> His eyes begged her to let him off the hook.
She didn’t.
“I just didn’t want you to think I expected anything,” he said. “We’d always talked about this being just one night, and well, obviously it’s been more than that.”
“Do you want to see other people?” she asked timidly. “Has this whole awkward conversation been your way of suggesting that we not be exclusive?”
He looked away and her heart sank. But then his fingers tightened briefly on her arm and he pulled her closer.
“No one else compares,” he said quietly.
Riley’s heart flipped over in her chest, and she couldn’t help the smile that spread over her face. She leaned over and kissed him softly. “This is great news, because I want to show you the wedding dress I’ve been eying.”
Sam went pale, and Riley burst out laughing. “Kidding.”
He gave a half smile, but he wasn’t ready to let her out of the conversation yet. “Anything you want to tell me? Maybe about this whole exclusivity thing?”
Her eyes skimmed over his familiar features, and she felt her expression go a little soft. “Nobody else compares to you either.”
His arm pulled her even closer. “So you’re really not itching to see what else is out there? See if there are any moves someone else does better than me?”
“Well, now that you mention it … no.”
He grinned and rolled over her. “We should have done this a long time ago.”
“Says the guy who wasted precious years ignoring or picking on me.”
“Self-preservation. I suspected you’d be lethal to my sanity, and I was right.”
Her hands moved up over his biceps and shoulders, and then she locked her fingers behind his neck. “And now?”
“Still lethal to my sanity. But in a much more enjoyable way.”
“So you only like me for my body.”
His hand moved upward, cupping his favorite part of her body. “Maybe.”
“Prove it.”
And he did. Very well.
Only afterward did Riley let herself wonder if that would always be enough.