Total pages in book: 147
Estimated words: 140742 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 704(@200wpm)___ 563(@250wpm)___ 469(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 140742 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 704(@200wpm)___ 563(@250wpm)___ 469(@300wpm)
“Why?” I manage to ask after a moment of silence.
“I don’t want to…” She looks away briefly. When her eyes land on mine, my chest squeezes. “What is this, hookup number four? Am I supposed to just—”
“I’m not counting,” I say, interrupting her. “I’ve never kept count with you.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” she whispers, eyes wide.
“Can we have this conversation inside?”
She swallows and turns to open the door. Inside, I watch her take off her heels and shrink about four inches.
“Do you…” She clears her voice. “Do you want something to drink?”
“I’ll take water, please.” I toss my folded jacket on the back of the couch and roll my sleeves up, as I debate where I should sit.
I walk around, glancing at the pictures I saw the other day as I make my way to the couch. I’m glad I’m sitting down, because when she heads my way, I have to bite my tongue so I don’t swallow it. She’s already my walking wet dream, but in that catsuit, she’s my teenage fantasy come to life. She hands me a glass of water and sits down on the opposite end of the couch. My eyes drop to her chest, then travel lower. Fuck, that outfit of hers is distracting. It’s so tight, I know I’ll have to peel it off. Slowly.
“Finn.”
I blink. “I’m waiting for you to start talking.”
She raises an eyebrow. “It looks like you’re checking me out.”
“I am. While I wait.”
She bites back a smile. “You know, I knew I shouldn’t have hooked up with you. I knew it at that party. I knew it the day after when you showed up at Onyx. I knew it in the bathroom on my birthday.”
“But you did it anyway.”
“But I did it anyway.” She shrugs, a sly smile playing on her beautiful lips. “I would say it was a lapse in judgment, but I’m pretty sure that excuse went out the window after the second time.”
The constraints on my chest loosen a bit when I smile back and see the look on her face. It’s hard not to feel special when she looks at me like that, cataloging each of my features as if I were a work of art. I know how I look. I’ve been admired by women and men my entire life. I’ve used that to my advantage on many occasions. No one has ever made me feel the way she does when she looks at me.
“I felt the same way,” I say, shaking my head as I add, “And after that night at Onyx, I knew I was in trouble.”
She frowns. “You disappeared after that.”
“You had a boyfriend, remember?”
Her brow lifts. “Yeah, you seemed real concerned about that when you told me to get on my knees.”
My stomach tightens. “Are you really going to sit there looking like that and remind me how you look on your knees? I thought you wanted to talk.”
Her lips part slightly and her eyes darken, as they drop to my very obvious hard-on. I know without a doubt she’s wet right now, but I force myself to stay on track. This conversation needs to happen. We need to get past the bullshit and lay it all out there. Maybe not all.
“What were you doing at Pearl?” I ask finally.
She licks her lips. “I went to Onyx the other day…”
“By yourself?” I snap, unable to keep myself from interrupting. Now that she’s said it, I can finally express the anger I’ve been harboring since I followed her in there that night.
“Well, yeah. I wasn’t there for sex,” she says. “I thought if I could prove Titus had nothing to do with it and find the person who might have done it, you could get your closure.”
My jaw tenses. “And? How’s your investigative work panning out?”
She shoots me a sour look. “Not great, and you interrupted a conversation that may have gotten me somewhere.”
I scoff. “That conversation would only have led to him trying to get in your pants, and that wasn’t going to fucking happen.”
She rolls her eyes.
“Why were you in a private room?”
She blinks hard and laughs. “Of course, you know about that.”
“Are you going to answer the question?”
Her eyes narrow. “Are you going to stop being an asshole?”
I take a breath and let it out slowly. “I’m trying.”
“Mal…” She bites her lip and sets the glass of water on the coffee table. “Your sister…” She takes a deep breath and shuts her eyes, as if trying to regain her thoughts.
“Just tell me,” I say, trying to keep my voice gentle despite the building pressure in my chest.
“How often did you talk to her?” she asks.
Now, I’m the one who looks away. My eyes land on the picture frames and stay there for a moment. Me being a terrible brother wasn’t what I wanted to discuss tonight, but that’s the root of this, isn’t it?