by Lexi Ryan
“I thought . . .” I bite my bottom lip. “I thought you liked me too.” Stupid alcohol.
“I do like you, Liz.” He gives me a careful smile—the kind you give a child before you break the news that Santa isn’t real. “But you’re my friend.”
“What better way to lose my virginity?” Oh my God, why am I still talking?
His breath draws in with a hiss, then he shakes his head. “You’re my friend,” he repeats, ticking the reasons off on his fingers. “You’re drunk.”
“Not anymore,” I promise.
“And you’re a virgin.”
Liz
Present Day . . .
The memory fills me with old mortification. There’s a reason I haven’t pursued Sam in the last four years. I don’t want to be the desperate girl who threw herself at him. I don’t want to remember how his rejection made me feel.
Sneaking into this room seemed like a great idea when I was on the dance floor with him, his hard body pressed into mine, but alone in the quiet conference room, I’m pretty sure this could be the most reckless thing I’ve ever done.
What if someone catches us in here? Hell, what if he doesn’t come? What if he does? I’ve thrown myself at Sam before, and it didn’t end well. He has no idea how hard I took his rejection, or the decisions I made after I left his room that night.
I should leave. I should . . .
The door clicks and then Sam steps inside, his eyes raking over me.
“Hey,” I whisper. “You came.”
He closes the door behind himself, turns the lock, then stalks toward me.
Thank you! the girlie bits shout. Stupid brain upstairs was about to ruin everything!
“Are you sure you want to do this?” His voice is a low rumble that I swear I can feel right between my legs.
Hell yes, I want to do this.
But I also don’t. Because Sam’s no longer some unrequited crush. He’s a friend. And if this goes to hell, it’ll make my life exponentially more awkward.
“We need rules,” I say quickly.
He takes another step closer. And another. Until I’m looking at his chest, smelling his aftershave. He tilts my chin up with his index finger then traces my lips with his thumb. “Hold that thought?”
I nod, nearly breathless at nothing but the touch of his thumb skimming my lips.
“I need to do this first.” He cups my jaw in his big hand and brushes his lips over mine. My lips part in surprise at the gesture that’s almost . . . sweet. He deepens the kiss, slanting his mouth over mine and sliding his tongue inside.
He tastes like beer, and I want to get drunk on this kiss—to overindulge until I can’t see straight, to imbibe until sobriety is a distant memory.
This is how kisses should be. I love the way his hand slides into my hair as he samples my lips, love how his kiss manages to be simultaneously gentle and demanding. It’s the kind of kiss that makes your toes curl, the kind worth remembering in five years when you’re lonely and bored and wondering if kissing had ever been so sweet.
When he pulls back, his eyes are hooded, darker. Sexy as sin. “Now, what were you saying?”
I have no idea. “Ru . . . rules?” I manage.
“Ah, yes. Well, I’ve never done well with rules, but tell me yours and I’ll see what I can do.”
I take a breath and try to figure out a rule that isn’t just Kiss me like that every time, or Please don’t make me fall for you.
“You keep looking at me like that,” he warns, “and I’m going to kiss you again, and we may never get to discuss these rules of yours.”
Right. “We can’t tell anyone,” I say. Cally and my sisters will try to make more of this than the one-night stand I know it to be.
His expression shifts and becomes unreadable. “Okay. What else?”
“This doesn’t change anything between us. We’re friends.” Something in my chest objects to that rule. It feels like a betrayal. But I want to say it before he does. I have to.
“Sex changes everything, Liz. That’s half the fun.”
“It doesn’t have to. I want us to still be friends after tonight.”
“Oh, we can be friends.” His breath ruffles my hair as he skims his fingertips down my bare arms, sending delicious shivers through my body that land low in my belly and turn my insides to goo. “But it’ll be different.”
“How so?”
“We won’t be able to look at each other without remembering what it was like. And if I have my way—” He dips his head to my ear and tugs the lobe between his teeth. A shudder rocks through me. “—every time you look at me, your panties will go damp as you remember what I did to you.”
“Oh.” I can’t begin to form a more intelligent response, not while his lips are running along the side of my neck. His hands move to my hips and his fingers massage delicious circles there.
“And I have my own rules.”
I blink up at him. His honey eyes have gone dark and intense. “What are they?”
“No expectations beyond tonight. If you give me tonight, I’m going to touch you and taste you and fuck you until your legs shake.”
I swallow. Because dear God, I want that.
“And then I’m going to walk away.”
“Understood. What else?”
“You tell me to stop if it’s too much for you or if you don’t feel completely safe. We can always slow down or stop.”
My lips part as questions fill my mind. Namely, what on earth does he plan to do with me that might make me feel unsafe or make me want to stop? But instead of asking, I say, “I trust you.”
He takes a fistful of my dress and tugs it up to my waist, then he lifts me onto the conference table and steps between my legs. “We don’t have much time,” he whispers. “They’re going to be looking for us. But I can’t go back out there until I feel you.”
Then his hand is between my legs and he’s rubbing my clit through my panties. From our talk alone, I’m already wet and swollen, and my back arches at his touch. My hips lift off the table, pushing into his hand.
“I love that you’re already wet for me.” He tugs my hips to the edge of the table, and I have to balance by propping myself up on my hands behind me. He steps back to peel off my panties. Then he spreads my legs and looks at me.
For a second, I feel ridiculous and want to cover myself. I must look absurd, sitting on this table with my dress bunched around my waist, the most private part of me bare, exposed to him.
Then I look at him and I stop worrying. I stop thinking. His eyes are locked on that intimate flesh between my legs, his nostrils flaring as his breathing goes shallow.
I know that men like to look, and that’s not what surprises me about this moment. What surprises me is the intensity in his gaze. What surprises me is that watching him look at me could turn me on so much. That watching him look at me could intensify this ache, make the need I feel so powerful it could swallow me.
Staying where he is, he softly pinches my clit with two fingers, and I close my eyes and bite back a moan. I want him closer. I want the weight of his body on top of mine.
“Open your eyes,” he commands. When I obey, he says, “Look at how beautiful you are.”
Chapter Four
Sam
She likes it when I tell her what to do.
Her eyes follow my hand, and she watches as I circle her clit then slide one finger inside her.
She gasps at the contact, and hell, so do I. I don’t intend to do more than tease her in this room—not with my family on the other side of those doors. But she’s so fucking tight all I want to do is drop my pants and drive into her, hold her hips and fuck her right here on this table. She’d let me. Beg me, even. I see it in her eyes.
When you spend four years wanting something, you don’t rush in. I’m going to take my time with her tonight, and this—right here and now in this room—this is just the warmup.
Her breasts thrust forward as she arches her back. I keep
my hand between her legs and step closer. With my free hand, I tug down her dress and expose one lace-covered breast.
“You’re beautiful. I can’t wait to undress you, to see all of you.” I suck at her nipple through the lace, and her pussy clenches tight around my fingers.
I love a woman with sensitive breasts. I pull back and tease her with my tongue, circling her nipple before drawing it into my mouth again, all the while pumping my fingers in and out of her.
She squeezes me. Tighter and tighter, and I know she’s close to coming. I need her to come before I go back out there. Once she left my arms on the dance floor, I felt like I was drowning again, looking at my father and knowing what he’d say if he knew how badly I’ve fucked up.
She moans, and the sound washes away some of the chaos in my mind. I need more.
“So fucking beautiful.” My lips brush her ear as I speak. I want to taste her there. Everywhere. “I’ve always liked to look at you. Always loved the way you’re comfortable in your own skin, the way you own a room the minute you walk into it. But you’re even more beautiful when you’re about to come.”
I circle her clit with my thumb. Someone knocks on the door.
She startles in my arms, but I hold her still.
“Stay with me.” She’s so close, and I want to feel her come on my hand, around my fingers.
“Samuel?” My father’s voice. “Did I see you go in there?”
“Come for me,” I say into her ear as he knocks again.
Then I kiss her hard, swallowing her moans as her body contracts and she squeezes around my fingers.
Liz
Sam ignores his father’s voice and cups me for a few more breaths, allowing me to come down from my orgasm before he pulls away.
“Didn’t you say you saw him go in here?” his father asks someone.
Sam puts his finger to his lips, telling me I should be quiet. The door clicks at the lock as someone turns the knob.
“Call him,” another female says. I recognize the voice as belonging to Della. Despite our jokes at the bar last night, I don’t think she’d be thrilled to find me indecent with her brother. “Here. I’ll do it.”
Sam grabs his phone from his pocket just as it starts to ring. He silences it, but not before they hear the distinct ring tone.
This would be hilarious if it weren’t mortifying.
His father clears his throat. “Come on, Della. He’s clearly . . . busy.”
Della snorts. “God, leave it to Sam.”
We listen to the sounds coming from the other side of the door. After a minute or two passes, we both relax and Sam chuckles.
Standing, I smooth my dress down then smack his shoulder. “I can’t believe we almost got caught.”
Sam grins and grabs me by the hips, pulling my body against his so I can feel the evidence of his erection. “I think you liked it.”
“Liked what?”
That cocky grin again. That I know what gets you off better than you do grin. Hell, he might. “You liked almost getting caught,” he says.
“I didn’t!”
“Nothing shameful there, Rowdy. There’s nothing wrong with a harmless exhibitionist fantasy or two.”
I roll my eyes and scan the floor. “Where’s my underwear?”
Sam shrugs and points over his shoulder as he backs toward the door. “I’d better get back out there.”
“Give me my underwear back,” I grind out between my teeth.
He smirks. “Not a chance.” The lock clicks as he releases it, and then he’s gone, leaving me alone, red-faced, panty-less, and holy shit, so not done with him.
I’m not going to play his game. Hell, I’m not sure what kind of game has a girl going to a wedding reception without panties.
Sam Bradshaw’s kind of game, the slutty angel on my shoulder purrs. But I only go commando in public on my own terms, not because some cocky bastard steals my panties.
Okay, and maybe I’m too embarrassed to go back out there. Maybe I don’t want his dad to look at me and know I was the one holed up in the conference room with his son.
I sneak out a few minutes after Sam and make a beeline for the exit.
I’ve just reached the door when Connor calls my name from behind me. “Wait up a minute.”
So close.
“I don’t want a lecture,” I warn him.
“Tell me you’re not driving and I’ll have no reason to lecture you.”
Turning, I see that he has no clue I was with Sam. I shake my head. I drove here, but I’m still too buzzed to drive home. I’ll leave my car in the lot and walk the half-dozen blocks to the house I rent with my twin sister. “I’m walking. I live close,” I say.
Connor shoves his hands in his pockets and nods. “Just making sure. Do you want me to walk you?”
“I’m okay, but thanks.” Something tugs in my chest—that old regret that I couldn’t want a nice guy like Connor. That night Sam turned me down at Notre Dame, it was Connor who found me sitting on the porch. He’d been cleaning up from the party and shooing the stragglers out the door. He was that guy. The one who made sure everyone had a ride home, the one who got the worst of the mess cleaned up so the house didn’t smell like the bottom of a beer keg come morning.
We talked on that porch under the moonlight for a long time before he even acknowledged that I’d been crying when he found me. As I walk home through the crisp autumn air, the memory consumes my thoughts.
Four Years Before . . .
“So, who’s the asshole who broke your heart?” Connor asks me.
“The asshole is trying to be a nice guy,” I say. We’ve been sitting on the back deck of the house for half an hour, making casual chitchat about nothing. Me, trying to shake the sick weight of rejection, Connor pretending I hadn’t been crying when he found me. “I’m just a stupid girl who thought being with me might be more appealing than being a good guy.”
“I see. So, he has a girlfriend?”
I shake my head. “I’m friends with his little sister. And since he sees her as a little girl . . .”
He drew in a sharp breath. “Ouch.”
I’m covered in goose bumps, but I’m grateful for his company. Before Connor found me out here, I was feeling sorry for myself, wishing I were one of my sisters—anyone but myself. All my life, I’ve been the fun one, the wild one. The stupid one. No one takes me seriously. I wanted Sam to be the exception. “I think my age is just an excuse,” I say. “A good one, I guess, but even good excuses are just excuses.”
“You’re gorgeous, Liz. If this guy doesn’t see that, he’s blind. Hell, the thirty minutes sitting here with you have been the best of my day.”
“Thanks,” I whisper. But looks have never been my problem. My insecurities are about what’s on the inside.
Connor and I talk more. Laugh a little. He’s good at making me laugh, and I like that he doesn’t seem to take himself too seriously.
“Tell me what would fix this night for you,” he says.
I look up to Sam’s window. The light’s on and I see him standing there, looking down on us. When I turn back to Connor, I say, “Kiss me?” I know it’s wrong to ask for this just to make Sam jealous, but I can’t help it. I’m hurt and embarrassed, and I want Sam to see that I’m worth wanting.
Connor smiles slowly and releases an exaggerated sigh. “If I have to.” He winks, then slips one of those big hands around my neck and slowly lowers his mouth to mine.
The kiss isn’t long or especially heated, but it’s nice. When he pulls away, he leans forward, settling his elbows back on his knees. “If you ever want me to kiss you when he isn’t watching, give me a call.”
Guilt stabs my gut. “I’m sorry.”
He shrugs. “Tonight, I got to kiss the most beautiful girl at the party. Don’t apologize. Whatever your reasons, it was still the highlight of my day.”
The back door squeaks open and thumps closed again. “Come inside, Liz. It’s late. Nothing good happens at this
hour.” Sam shifts his gaze to Connor as if to support his point.
“I’m good. Connor and I are just going to hang out for a while.”
“She’s seventeen,” Sam tells Connor, a warning in his voice.
Connor nods. “Noted.”
The door rattles as it slams behind Sam, and I look at my hands, embarrassed.
“Seventeen?” Connor says.
“Afraid so. Not for long, though.”
Then he kisses me again. His lips warm my cold skin, but the heat doesn’t spread any further. He isn’t Sam and he doesn’t light me on fire, but it’s a nice kiss.
When he pulls back, I frown at him.
“What’s that look for?” he asks.
“I guess I thought you’d run the other way when you found out how young I am.”
He smiles. “Being with you is way more appealing than being the good guy.”
Chapter Five
Liz
Knocking. Someone’s knocking at my front door. Thank you, sweet baby Jesus.
I texted Sam as soon as I got home. One sentence. Seven words. An invitation.
I have the house to myself tonight.
I’ve sat here for nearly half an hour, waiting, staring at my too-silent phone and wondering if I’d be better off drawing myself a bath and sinking into it with a dirty book and a large glass of wine.
Grinning, I peek through the peephole and see Sam on the stoop. The top buttons of his dress shirt are undone and his tie is loose around his neck. In one hand, he’s holding a bottle of wine.
As casually as I can, I open the door to greet him, but deep down inside, I’m like an ill-trained dog that wants to jump on him, lick his face, and hump his leg.
“Hey,” I say softly, leaning against the doorjamb.
His gaze skims over me, and my nerve endings fire to life in the wake of his appraisal. “You left.”
“You stole my underwear.”
His lips quirk into a grin. “Yes, I suppose I did.”