“Fallon?” She turned around and froze. “What’s wrong?”
And just like the girl I swore I would never be, I burst into tears and ran into my mom’s arms.
Zane
Saint: Talk to me.
Saint: Fallon…
Saint: I’m sorry.
Saint: We need to talk.
Saint: Look, ignore me all you want but I refuse to go away. I’m like a disease.
I stared down at my phone. In all my desperation, I was pretty sure I just told the girl I care about that I was like a disease. And I wasn’t even drunk. It was a completely sober text. Damn it.
Saint: But a good disease.
Shit. I just made it worse.
Saint: The kind you want?
Fallon: YOU ARE DRIVING ME INSANE! Name one disease that I would actually want, and I’ll talk to you.
I frowned down at my phone and quickly Googled diseases that were helpful to humans, naturally I got nothing, so I made one up.
Saint: Zanism. Heard girls get all hot and bothered, some even faint. Ever heard of it?
Fallon: Nope. Sorry.
Groaning, I stared up at her house. It had been seven days of ignored texts and phone calls.
Seven. Days.
I didn’t text the first night because I knew it was smart to let her cool off, but ever since then it had been nonstop.
I even went to her work.
But I could never catch her — which just meant I would have had a horrible career as a stalker.
I grimaced as I took in my black jeans and black hoodie. Okay so maybe I was taking things too far. Showing up at her house at ten at night fully aware that her dad shoots things and eats them.
And not just small things.
But human sized things.
So there was a huge chance he was going to shoot me in the face and then apologize for being trigger happy all the while telling his little girl Daddy would take care of things. Like disposing of the body. Or mounting my head on his wall.
Hell. I was sweating, and I wasn’t even inside the damn house yet!
I had no idea which room was hers.
I fired off another text.
Saint: The moon is pretty tonight.
Bingo. Blue curtains pulled back and then a window opened.
Fallon: Yup.
She lived in a two story, but the lower level wasn’t really high, and if I was able to stand on the wraparound porch, I’d be able to jump to the next level no problem.
I tucked my phone back into my jeans and then stood on the porch and pressed my palms against the shingles. With a grunt, I pulled myself up and managed not to get a sliver in my ass as I quietly shuffled across the roof and located her window.
Well, either she was going to scream, at which point her dad would come running and shoot me dead.
Or she’d push me out the window, where I’d fall a whole story and snap my neck, and end up dead.
Or, she might find some way to forgive me, and I wouldn’t die.
Two out of three. Not the best odds.
Definitely not the worst either.
I hopped in through her open window and froze.
Because I hadn’t factored in one scenario, one pivotal point that I probably should have focused on.
Fallon getting ready for bed.
Correction, Fallon changing for bed.
And Fallon.
In nothing but a sports bra and tight blue and black boy shorts, the kind that makes a girl’s ass look like a juicy apple you want to sink your teeth into.
I sucked in a few deep breaths while she stared me down.
Her face was full of complete shock, which of course quickly turned to anger, and then embarrassment as she moved her hands over her breasts and then lower and then, finally she stomped her foot and ground out. “What. Are. You. DOING?”
“Taking a walk on the beach?” I offered lamely, my eyes still glued to all the places they definitely should not be looking. Shit, she was beautiful, curvy for being so short. My hands twitched with the need to touch where her hips met ass, damn it, she was pretty. Really pretty. Not just cute. Pretty.
And I suddenly had a horrifying realization.
The pretty girl had experience.
The jackass didn’t.
Oh, hell.
This would, of course, happen to me.
Everything I want, tied up in a nice little package of temptation, and I might as well be in the Garden; look but don’t touch, touch and die.
“A walk.” She repeated. “I’m curious how this walk managed to detour into my bedroom.”
“A mystery of the universe, I suppose.”
Her eyes narrowed just as a loud male voice yelled. “Pumpkin!”
I’m sure my horror matched hers as she quickly looked around the room then grabbed my arm and shoved me into her closet, closing it on my face before I heard her yell. “Hold on, Daddy, I’m changing.”
Sweet hell. I muttered a curse as her scent surrounded me, literally, choking the control away from my brain and disposing of it in my dick.
I could do this. I’d been in situations of temptation before. For shits sake, I was a celebrity! I had tits and ass thrown at me every hour of the day — when I wasn’t holed up in my manager’s house in Malibu or here in Seaside.
Whatever. “Shake it off, Zane.” I breathed in and out as a knock sounded on the door.
“What’s up, Daddy?” Oh shit, her voice sounded like she’d just been strangled. Why was it my luck that I was stuck with a girl who couldn’t lie to save her life and a father who hunted large animals for sport?
I tried not to move a muscle.
Which meant of course, I had to sneeze.
But her closet was freakishly small, like made for a midget or something. Legs burning, I kept myself in a semi-crouched position and thought about everything but the itch on the side of my nose.
I couldn’t even reach my marshmallows.
But at least I knew they were there.
What I couldn’t figure out, was how, after years of having that security, I had managed to simply forget to stock up before going out?
“You sound different,” her dad muttered. “Are you okay? Still sad?”
“Nope. Not sad! I was just getting ready for bed.” Her voice was way too loud and fake. Well, I was going to be on the eleven o’clock news. Goodbye cruel, cruel world.
“Baby…” Her dad sighed. “I know that he broke your heart.”
My chest felt heavy.
“He didn’t,” she corrected him. “I’m fine.”
“You were sobbing!”
Forget a heavy chest, it was cracking, splitting in two. What kind of bastard yells at an innocent girl who tries to save his sorry ass? I stifled a sigh. This one.
“I’m a girl,” she said cheerfully. “We have our moments, you know? Plus he’s my friend, and sometimes you hurt the people closest to you.”
That wasn’t a lie. Not even close. It was truth.
I knew it as much as she did.
Because somehow… I wasn’t just attracted to her. Oh sure, I wanted her body, oddly enough I was even starting to miss her glasses. But I liked her.
As a person.
As in, one of my favorite people.
And I’d met her a little less than two weeks ago.
Terrifying, to think of the multiplication of days and months — by Christmas, I was probably going to be writing her love songs and turning into all of my friends.
Complete saps.
Losers.
Not that I didn’t want a life where I came home to someone, to something — hell a home would even be nice.
But she didn’t fit with my lifestyle.
Nobody did.
I pushed the yearning deep down, just like I pushed down the wicked need I had to make her mine.
“Okay, sweetie.” Her dad sighed loudly. “I’ll make pancakes tomorrow morning, how’s that sound?”
I rolled my eyes. She h
ad no idea how good she had it.
Holy shit, was I actually jealous of her family?
That was new.
The feeling of wanting, not just the girl, but the whole package, even the crazy gun-wielding dad.
Hell, I needed to go back to L.A. Fast.
“Thanks, Dad, love you.”
“Love you too.” His voice was gruff, deep, dripping with emotion as the door shut.
I exhaled in relief then remembered the itch on my nose just as the closet door opened.
Ahh-choo! I sneezed all over the pretty girl.
Because that’s how you get laid, you sneeze to mark your territory. Sweet God, why hadn’t her dad just discovered me, shot me, and buried the body?
Fallon scrunched up her nose. “Bless you.”
“I’m the saint, I should be blessing you,” I countered, trying to recover from embarrassment. I gripped some clothes to stand and ended up falling down again, this time with dresses covering my face.
Shocked, I jerked back. “You have dresses?”
Fallon gritted her teeth and snagged them away from me. “For church.”
I smirked. “Care to confess?”
“Just because that’s your nickname doesn’t make you an actual saint, dude.”
I perked up. “Did you just call me dude?”
Fallon shoved her dresses back onto the hangers and hung them above my head. “You have five seconds before I call my dad — he was cleaning his rifle.”
I held up my hands, still sitting on my ass next to a clutter of shoes and — holy shit was that a Lego set? “You like Legos.”
“You climb into my window, and that’s all you have to say?”
“Yeah.” I was dumbfounded. “You’re a girl.”
“I like…” She fidgeted with her Portland State sweatshirt. “I like building things.”
“Me too.” Could I have been anymore quick to answer?
Her smile made my entire night better, the way it tilted her lips, forcing her to reveal her teeth and amazing tasting tongue. “You’re a child, you know that, right?”
“I did have an obsession with Peter Pan when I was little.”
“Like the tights, huh?”
“How’d you know?” I laughed and moved to a full sitting position. “I’m sorry.”
“Zane—”
“It wasn’t your fault.”
“It wasn’t yours either,” she said in a stern voice, almost accusing. “You know that, right?”
I looked past her, at the window, my escape. Because the thing about having friends or soul mates or whatever she was, they saw through your bullshit, and people like that, I avoided them because it was too hard to pretend to be anything but myself.
The very person I was afraid to be.
“Zane.” The way she said my name, like we weren’t strangers, it had me finally locking eyes with her. “I won’t push you now. You were mean. And cruel. And you weren’t you. And I hated seeing that. I hated that you took out your own issues on me.”
“I know,” I mumbled feeling about two feet tall. “It was badly done.”
“Completely,” she agreed way too fast. “But I hope we can still be friends.”
“No.” I said just as quick.
She stumbled back as though I’d just hit her.
I was on my feet in about two seconds.
My mouth on hers in less than a minute.
And my decision to cross that line?
Was no longer a decision, or a question, it was a promise.
One I sealed with a searing kiss.
Fallon
He needed to stop kissing me. It wasn’t fair. To either of us, but mainly in our current situation — it wasn’t fair to me. To girls like me in general.
His mouth hungrily nipped at mine, as his lips explored.
I put a hand between us to create some space and took a step back, Zane’s breathing was heavy, laborious, his eyes wild. “What’s wrong?”
“You.”
“Me,” he repeated dumbly, then took another threatening step toward me, this time tugging my body against his while he swallowed kiss after kiss until I lost count of how many times our lips brushed — or the number of moans he emitted out of me as he angled his head different ways, pressing his hands to my hips then running them up my body until I trembled.
I felt thoroughly seduced.
And taken advantage of.
“You’re,” I said between small, heated, wet kisses. “Paying.” He was persistent, I’d give him that, but I couldn’t let myself fall for it, fall for the guy who was ninety-nine percent wrong and maybe one percent right. “Me.”
“Then I’ll stop paying you,” he growled, his scruff brushed against my skin as he peppered more kisses across my lips. “Do you even realize how much you talk?” His calloused hands grazed the skin beneath my sweatshirt, my knees knocked together as I let myself give in to him, just briefly, just enough so that I’d be satisfied.
But it was Zane.
And every kiss was better than the last.
So stopping with the knowledge that he just got better and better, made me want to throw something across the room — mainly him.
He smiled against my mouth. “Stop thinking so much.”
“You’re a horrible influence,” I huffed, taking the lead in kissing as I tangled my hands in his hair and tugged his mouth harder against mine.
With a curse, he wrapped his arms around my body and crushed me against him.
None of my high school experiences had ever felt like Zane: pure, raw, masculine. I wasn’t kissing a teenage boy from the football team. He was worldly, experienced, playing me like his favorite guitar as his fingers deftly skimmed up my back and pulled off my sweatshirt, only pulling away seconds before his mouth was on mine again.
One minute I had a sweatshirt on.
The next, it was magically on the floor, joining my shorts as he tugged them down.
What was happening?
It was like I was watching everything outside my own body. The moans coming from my throat foreign as his tongue flicked across my lower lip.
Seriously, did he have a degree in kissing too?
Should I ask?
Was that appropriate?
“You’re beautiful,” he whispered against my neck, taking his time to kiss every inch of exposed skin until I squirmed.
“Don’t.” I finally caught my breath as he glanced down at me. “Don’t call me beautiful just to get me into bed.”
He frowned. “Is that what you think? Seriously?”
I didn’t nod. But I also didn’t answer.
“Fallon.” His voice was gruff. “Tell me you don’t really think I’d lie to you just so I could sleep with you.”
“Well.” I shivered and stepped away. “You do call me four eyes, and you compared my last pair of glasses to something you’d find in a donation box, so what do you expect me to think? That in the last few days you’ve suddenly developed a thing for me?” Finally thinking clearly, mainly because he wasn’t kissing me anymore but staring at me with this weird horrified expression like I’d just run over his dog or something, when clearly I was the injured party, I grabbed my sweatshirt and tossed it over my head tugging it down. “It’s fine. You just got caught up. I’m sure it happens to you all the time.”
He pressed his lips together then ran his hands over the back of his head, turning around in a small circle before crossing his arms. His gaze met mine again. “So… I’m just caught up in the moment?”
“Zane.” I rolled my eyes. “Stop making such a big deal about this. I’m not mad. I get it, you’re used to getting a lot of action, and I’m…” I shrugged. “Available.” I offered a small smile. “I’m honored you would stoop to my level.” He winced at my joke. “But, I’m a girl.”
“I noticed,” he grit out.
“And regardless of how hard I try, I will end up falling more, and that’s not fair, you know? I’m fully capable of understanding what th
is is between us.”
“Oh?” His eyebrows shot up. “And what is it?”
I shrugged. “Convenience and maybe a bit of pity.”
He glared.
“On your end, you pity me, which is fine. I just — it’s just not fair, and I’m pretty sure any girl in my position would hop into bed with you and take a selfie, but I’m not that girl. I think I’ve discovered I’m more fragile than that.”
Zane shook his head and then cursed out an. “Unbelievable.”
“Hey!” I wagged my finger at him. “You’re the one who climbed into my window. I just don’t want to be the reason you can’t finish your album, and honestly, the only chance we have of coming out of this friends is if you keep your promise.”
“And what was that?” he whispered hoarsely. “My promise?”
“You said you wouldn’t seduce me.”
“Hmm.” He seemed to think about that sentence way longer than necessary. “Does it work both ways, my promise?”
“Huh?”
“What if you seduce me?”
“Uh…” I took a cautious step back. “That won’t happen.”
“Sure it won’t.” He winked. “I suddenly feel so much better.”
“That concerns me.”
“It should.”
“Zane….”
“Fallon…” He grabbed my hand and kissed it. “I know you don’t believe me, but sometimes, a guy kisses a girl with pure intentions. Did you ever think that I kissed you simply because you looked pretty and I couldn’t help myself?”
No. Because it was a line. I shook my head.
“It would be nice.” He looked past me out the window. “Just one time, to be treated like a normal human. One who scaled a girl’s house because he wanted to see her, apologize to her, hear her voice. It would be nice, to be that guy, the one that she was waiting for. The one she didn’t reject just because she was afraid. The one she didn’t deny because she assumes things she shouldn’t.”
I opened my mouth, but nothing came out.
“Don’t believe everything you see or read, Fallon. I thought you were better than that.”
“What are you saying?” My eyes narrowed as he dropped my hand and walked past me. “Zane?”
“I’m saying,” He put one leg over the window then the next. “That things aren’t always what they seem. And I’ve never been desperate or bored enough to climb into a girl’s window and take the leap of faith by kissing her, especially with her armed father downstairs just waiting for a chance to try out his new gun.”
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