Total pages in book: 114
Estimated words: 109102 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 546(@200wpm)___ 436(@250wpm)___ 364(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 109102 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 546(@200wpm)___ 436(@250wpm)___ 364(@300wpm)
“That’s not what I mean.” His shoes scrape against the pavement as he comes around to face me. His features are somehow more handsome, cast in the dim streetlight, marred by frustration. He looks around us, as if contemplating whether he wants to get into this here and now. “I remember the day I got up the nerve to ask out the Scarlet Reed, even though people warned me you had this huge chip on your shoulder. You ended up being one of the coolest girls I’d ever met. You were smart, and funny, and sexy. I liked you a lot, right from the start.” He pauses a moment, as if waiting for his words to sink in.
“But you weren’t like any of the other girls I’d dated. I’m not saying it was bad. It was just … I don’t know how to explain it. You seemed so complicated. You didn’t trust anyone. You didn’t trust me half the time. You remember the night I asked you out? You wanted to know where Steve was hiding. You thought it was some big joke and they were all watching. When I picked you up that night, you were surprised that I showed up. Like I’d actually be that kind of dick. Like I couldn’t possibly be interested in you. Seriously?” He chuckles. “You were on every guy’s radar in that school.”
“Yeah, because they were hoping I was like my mother,” I counter wryly.
He shakes his head. “Nah.”
“I heard them say it. More than once.” Laughter in the hallway, conversations the second I left the room, locker-room talk that Jeremy relayed to me in a sheepish voice.
“Yeah, fine. Maybe some of them,” he acknowledges. “But not everyone. Not me. I would have held out however long you needed.”
“That’s easy to say now, isn’t it? You didn’t last past the summer. Guess you missed blow jobs too much after all, huh?”
His face tightens with anger as he glares at me. “Don’t pretend you don’t remember how that night could have gone down.”
I study my shoes as my cheeks flush. He’s talking about the night we broke up, in his car, when I—teary-eyed and desperate—offered myself up on a silver platter. I managed to get his belt buckle undone before he stopped me. If it had been up to me, I would have lost my virginity to him that night.
“Don’t paint me the asshole, Scarlet,” he says, his voice softer. “I just told you what I thought you’d want to hear—”
“That you were dumping me because you liked me too much! Really?” I glare at him, challenging him.
“I was seventeen! I was an idiot! I didn’t understand things back then. I think I’m starting to. I mean, you didn’t exactly have the best role model for relationships.” He nods toward Route Sixty-Six, to where my mother sits inside, unashamed and unapologetic of how her actions continue to affect me, even now. “You want me to say that what I did was shitty? Sure, yeah, it was. I was a dumbass with pro football on the brain. I wanted easy and straightforward, and you were not those things.”
“But why her?” Of all the girls he could have left me for, why did he have to choose the one who had tormented me for years?
“I knew what I was getting with Penelope.” His lips twist with grim amusement. “Ironic, how that turned out.”
Tension hangs between us as I struggle with how I feel about his admission. I don’t know if I feel better or worse. Or if it even matters.
He shakes his head. “Look at me, standing out here in the rain, still trying to convince you that I’m not trying to use you,” he mutters more to himself. “You’re still so fucking complicated, Scarlet.”
“I guess you better get back inside to what’s easy.” My voice cracks as I turn to walk home.
He grabs my hand, stopping me in my tracks. “Who says that’s what I want?” He tugs me gently toward him. Truthfully, it doesn’t take much—nothing at all—to lead me into his broad chest. “I’m not a seventeen-year-old kid anymore.” He leans in to press his forehead against mine. “And ever since you came back, I can’t get you out of my head.”
I close my eyes and revel in the feel of his nose grazing mine, of his lips so close to mine, of his shallow, ragged breathing. Right now, the only thing I’m sure of is that I am so far from being over Shane Beckett, and I don’t know why I keep fighting it.
He shifts and suddenly we’re kissing again after all these years, in the middle of this desolate side street with the rain falling over us. It’s everything and nothing like I remember. His lips are soft but more practiced, wasting no time in parting mine to grant his tongue access to my mouth, while his hands brazenly pull me into him, allowing me to feel every hard curve of his body. He tastes like the beer he was nursing for the past hour. I vaguely wonder what my Jim Beam-soaked tongue must taste like, but I quickly push that worry aside as our kiss grows deeper and more fervent, as our bodies press against each other, as the feel of him growing hard between us makes my body ache with need. His cool palm clasps the back of my neck as his fingers weave through my damp hair, vaguely reminding me that it’s raining and I’m soaking, but I don’t care.