Love Me Crazy (16 page)

I contain my smile but my insides want to burst. Looks like win-win for me. Secrets or kisses. “I choose the secret.”

Her
lips curve up on one side and she stares intently.

“I have tattoos.”

“Not a secret.” She pinches my elbow, then presses her fingertips below my ear above my shirt. Her fingers flatten against my chest, precisely where my inked heart rests. With each touch, her pressure softens, and I harden. How is this so fucking intimate it sends shockwaves to my dick?

I grab her hand, maneuver her pointer finger straight and draw lines with it, tracing the trailing wire and vines over my shirt. I take both her hands, wrap them around me, and guide them up my spine as far as I can reach. Her eyes stay connected with mine. I want badly to lean closer, while she can’t push away, to suck her cute, pouty lip into my mouth.

Her fingers curl in and tug at my shirt as her chin drops. Her forehead taps against my chin. I inhale slowly, clenching my jaw to keep from licking my lips, kissing her until she can’t breathe or taking her right here in the kitchen. I tuck her fingers under the edge of my shirt and trace her fingertips over the vine that plunges south. As I near my waistband she curls her fingers into a fist. I hold my breath, wishing for more, being okay with less.

“Guess that one’s the secret, huh?” Her hand slips from mine and our private little bubble busts.

“My deepest secret. My deepest guilt.”

“Your tattoos represent guilt?” She turns back to the countertop, two shades redder than before we’d touched. It’s a sexy color on her.

“That’s another secret for another round.”

“Why do you hide them, you know, around your mom? Aren’t they a part of who you are now?” She pushes questions like a shrink.

I
want to answer her, but she’s got to give a little, too. “I’ll drink a shot to that question.” I tip one back. The burn eases down my throat. I’d rather it fucking scald me senseless. It scares the shit out of me how easily she reads me. Reading her is like learning a different language, but I’m determined to become fluent in all things Cassidy, even if it means exposing more of me than I’d planned.

She grabs the empty glass and waggles it. “I believe you owe me a kiss with that shot.”

“You said
you’d
give a kiss if you chose to drink. I never said I’d give away
any
kisses.”

Her mouth pops open. Just enough to glimpse her warm tongue within. “You play dirty.”

“That would be you, Sweet Cheeks. I’m playing clean.” I tap the phone and read the screen. “Never have I ever received oral sex in a moving car. What? You get ‘flying a plane’ and I get ‘oral sex’?”

“Unfortunate for you, you don’t actual
get
oral sex,” she snickers. “We both know the answer’s false. Regardless, someone as fly as yourself probably got a fair share of head in a vast array of moving vehicles.”

“Wrong. I’ve never been given head in a car.”

“Then what the heck do you call what I did?”

“Foreplay. I never came. I’m a car-moving, blow-job receiving virgin.”

The flare in her eyes does nothing but aid the vivid picture blooming in my mind of her mouth wrapped around my cock. Again. I don’t fucking care if it’s in a car or not.

“You’re full of crap, but that’s okay, I can handle the shot.”

“That means a kiss. Sure you don’t want to tell me about
your
tattoos?”

“Don’t have any. A shot, please.” She gestures for me to pour it in her mouth then bites the air until the burn mellows. She grabs my shirt, jerks me close and plants a whiskey-laced kiss
on
my cheek. It takes all my willpower not to show her a real spine-curling, blue-ball-making kiss.

Instead of letting me go, her lips slip across mine, not really kissing, just being in the right place at the right time. I growl and she nips my lower lip with her teeth, pulls until I can’t take it, sucking it in her mouth and dancing her tongue over the surface. I grab her around the waist and show her how much better the kiss could be. I press into her until she walks backward into the counter. I keep pressing, hoping she’ll just lean on back, hop on the island, and let me have my way with her.

Her hands press against my chest, pushing me away. I concede and finish our kiss with one last attempt to make her melt to her knees. When I pull back, she flattens the wrinkles from my shirt, runs her tongue over my lip, and sucks it hard between her lips. “That’s how
I’d
give head in the car.” She pats my shoulders then grabs the phone. “Next time, maybe I’ll finish.”

Me? I’m breathless.

“Never have I ever kissed a girl.” She frowns. “You seriously play this with people?”

“I’m playing it with you, aren’t I? True.”

“Wrong answer.”

I rap my knuckles against the counter and stare at her. Aren’t I learning quite a bit about the mysterious, play-by-the-rules Cassidy Beck. I pour a shot, get it close to my mouth, then set it down. “Another secret.”

She steps back and waits.

“My sisters hate me because I left after our dad died.”

“Again, not a secret.” She points at the shot.

“
I left for two reasons. One was my mom.” I run my fingertips across my chin. “When Dad died, Ellie and I became the parents. Mom traded our well-being in for a liquid bandage and sleeping pills. I left so she’d deal. I never came back because it was easier than . . . Just easier.”

“So the tattoos. Guilt from leaving them? Pain from losing them?” Her fingers tap through several screens. “Isn’t it weird how the unseen is what fucks everyone up?”

It would be easy to pour out the truth to her. Tell her everything from start to finish. But how would the truth impress her? We’ve gained more ground in this conversation than all our others put together. I’m not about to fuck up our progress.

“Is your mom better?” she asks when I don’t answer.

“Look how often she comes around. I don’t expect her to forget, but she hasn’t come close to forgiving, so “better” is a relative term to loosely describe her.”

“What was reason two for leaving?”

“You get one secret at a time. Plus, you need to catch up.” I shove my hands in my pocket, feeling more naked than I would if I were standing here in my birthday suit.

“Fine. Never have I ever scored on the first date.”

I examine her green eyes and how they play in the light as they track back and forth, watching me and waiting for my answer. I can’t tell if she hopes I get it wrong, or hopes I get it right. “Define scoring. Is that kissing, touching, oral, or sex?”

“I’ll amend.” She clears her throat. “Never have I ever had sex on the first date.”

“I’m going with false.”

She pauses, pulls her lips to the side, then sighs. “Wrong. Take a shot.”

“No way! Surely you date.”

She
shrugs. “But he doesn’t score, not until I figure out if he’s clingy or not. No need to get anyone’s hopes up.”

I drum my finger against the counter. “You mean like me.”

“With you”—she shrugs—” I’m not sure first dates or scoring are an option.”

“Not sure?” I stand a little taller. That’s better than straight up “aren’t” an option.

“I can’t figure you out. I can’t figure
me
out when I’m with you. There’s a tug or a pull between us that’s unsettling. For me.”

I grab the phone from her hands and slip it on the counter, then take hold of her arms. God, is this my one chance? Better not fuck it up. “Another secret.” I rub my hands down her arms as slowly as possible. “I want to kiss you. Long. Slow. All over.”

Her gaze pops to my lips. She licks her own so slowly I groan.

Invitation? I think so.

I cup her cheeks and pull her to me. She pushes to her toes, making it easier to find her lips. Easier to taste them and feel them sliding across mine. Her hands twine up my neck, pulling me closer to her. I set her on the island and she wraps her legs around me.

I tug her shirt, pulling it free of her shorts. Her body shudders as I snake my hand up her back. She moans against my mouth, then pulls slowly away.

“Cassie.”

Her face reddens, then her neck. “Quinn.”

“I want a secret from you. I want to know how you feel around me. How you feel
about
me.”

She forces me back and slips off the counter.

I grab her elbows, cupping them with my hands. “Just tell me.”

She
turns her head and her lip bobbles. “Safe. Confused. Falling for you scares me. I don’t invest
me
in other people’s lives because I can’t afford to let them invest in mine.”

“Try, just this once.” Come on, I’m not a fucking serial killer.

She shakes her head. “You don’t get it. Relationships are a waste of time. You give, give, give and please, please, please, and all you get in return is a mediocre pat on the back and the notion your two hundred percent is worth ten to the other person. Relationships fuel disappointment.” She leans back on her elbows, grabbing all the distance from me she can. “I have no use for disappointment, and with you . . . I foresee monopolized time, emotions, and quite possibly my heart. That equals disappointment. Long term isn’t an option and cannot happen. And you want long term. You want heart and soul. I don’t have that to give.”

My heart stops beating, like physically stills in my chest for one, two, three seconds, then
whoosh
, I inhale and holy fuck. I get it. I totally get it. I understand how having something, then losing it fucks with your heart and mind. It made me cautious, leery even, of new people entering my life, and old friends who don’t know the half of what I’ve suffered. Not so cautious I never avoided relationships. I dated. And yeah, maybe slept around a little—or a lot in the beginning, but I know what I want out of a relationship and I know they take work. I blink Cassie back into focus. And this one’s going to take a fucking front-end loader and a wrecking ball to make happen. “None of that changes how much I want to kiss you.”

“I think I should go to bed.” She ducks under my arm from where I pinned her against the counter. The glance she casts over her shoulder leaks her uncertainty into the air.

Fuck if I’m going down that easily.

I push open her door, grab her around the waist and pull her into me, taking her lips without caution. Her hands ball into fists and press against my shoulders. She turns away and I
give
her a second to think this through, to really consider what she and I could have, right now, right here. If she wanted. And I need her to want me.

“You can walk away,” I whisper, “but
I
can’t walk away without a fight.”

Her hands soften as her glazed olive-green eyes consider my offer. I let her go and hold my hands up, waiting for her choice. Will she choose me, or herself?

“Don’t stop fighting,” she whispers. “I want you to win.”

I lock the door and move swiftly to her side, afraid I’m imagining this. Afraid I’ve drunk too much—highly improbable—and am experiencing the most elaborate hallucination ever.

She takes my hands and walks me around the edge of her bed. Her hands slip over my chest, lower to my belt and undo me in a matter of seconds, both physically and mentally. I tug at her shirt hem and shimmy it up, exposing her gorgeous map of freckles. I lean down and kiss her neck, her shoulder, and the dip where her collar bones meet.

Her hands thread through my hair and direct me up. Her kiss settles on my lips. Her tongue traces their seam. I back her into the bed, no longer wanting to take it slow. She pulls her shirt over her head and reaches for the hook on her bra, but I hook her elbow with my finger, wanting to enjoy the sight a bit longer—loose red strands falling from her messy bun, curling just above her navy lace bra. I trace the outline of her nipples and they harden against the sheer material.

She sits on the edge of the mattress. I drop to my knees and lean over her legs, inhaling her and tracing a kiss across her breasts. She arches back and collapses on the bed, but not before grabbing a handful of my shirt and inviting me to stretch out with her.

She
pulls my shirt over my head and traces the trail of tattoos across my chest before pulling me closer. I roll on top of her and settle a kiss on her lips. Warm fucking lips. Hot fucking body. Sexiest damn woman I’ve ever met.

“This is our first date, right?” she asks.

“No way.” I kiss her and stretch her arms overhead so I can trace the curves her body makes. “You don’t score on the first date.”

‘Thought we could change that.”

My gaze pops to her. I’m so fucking done. I hop off the bed and rip my boxers down. I eye her shorts and she lifts her ass off the bed so I can help her out of them. In record time, I have her naked and under me. “You still think sex equals scoring?”

“I think you better get a condom.” She points at her suitcase lying on the floor with clothes draped over it. “Inside pocket.”

“Are you always this prepared.”

“Always. Except when it comes to you.”

I don’t want to leave the bed, or her, afraid she’ll have second thoughts. Plus, I rather enjoy dragging my fingers over her hot skin and watching the flush settle in. I massage her legs, bending her knee to press her foot against my stomach when I stand. Cassidy, stretched out for me. Waiting for me. Better get a move on then. Not like me to keep a woman waiting.

I search through her suitcase, finding the pocket on second try. I grab a condom from the unopened box and flip it onto the nightstand. “Where was I?”

“You were ripping that open and rolling it on.”

Skeptical
of jumping right into it, I laugh her comment off. I return to kissing her freckles and tracing her curves. She wiggles out from under me, pushing me down on the bed and grabs the condom.

“May I have the honors?” she asks. “Or do you need more foreplay?”

“By all means, go for it.” Goddamn sexy, her on top of me getting all sassy.

She rolls the condom on my cock. It gives her an agreeable nod when she pumps her hand down to the root. She shifts over me, stroking my abs. I grab her hand and jerk her forward, folding her over me so I can kiss her tits and taste her lips.