Page 74 of First-Time Caller
She blinks at me, color rising in her cheeks. I don’t miss the way she shifts on her feet.
“All right,” she finally says. She steps forward and slips her hands over my shoulders. Her belly presses against the middle of my back and her knee hitches at my hip. It’s either the best or the worst idea I’ve ever had. Because I have to grip the smooth skin of her strong thighs when I stand and every step forward has her shifting against me.
She rests her chin on top of my shoulder with a happy sigh as I start down the moonlit street, her arms crossed over my chest. I have the insane urge to guide her hand down the front of my T-shirt. Warm her skin with mine.
“This is nice,” she says.
Is it possible to die from the feel of a woman’s thighs? Maybe. It certainly feels like a possibility right now.
“Yeah,” I agree. “It is.”
COMMENT FROM BALTIMORON78:
Petition forHeartstringsto air on Saturdays. I need to know what’s going on.
Iwake up face down on my couch with a horrendously dry mouth and a headache the size of a small European nation. There’s a blanket tucked around my shoulders and socks on my feet and I applaud my drunken self for having enough forethought to get comfortable before passing out in the living room.
Last night comes back to me in flashes. Sitting alone at the restaurant. The woman and her soup. Aiden jogging down the sidewalk, bathed in yellow from the streetlights. A tiny bar with a sticky floor and a jukebox in the corner. Skee-Ball. My arms wrapped around Aiden’s neck. His smile tugging, working across his face in increments. A broad palm squeezing against my bare thigh.
I blink open my eyes, startled. The pillow beneath me groans and shifts. I shriek, lose my balance, and tumble to the floor.
Aiden’s face appears over the side of the couch, his hair deliciously mussed and his eyes squinting. There’s a line on his cheek from where his face was pressed up against my couch cushions and we stare at each other in bleary confusion.
“Lucie?” he asks, scrubbing roughly at the back of his head. His hair sticks up even more and he glances down at his legs, still tangled in the blanket that’s a noose around my waist. He blinks slowly. “You okay?”
Okay as I can be after waking up spread across the man who is supposed to be helping me find my one true love.
“M’fine,” I squeak, trying to untangle myself from the blanket. I don’t remember the part of the evening where I decided to use Aiden as a pillow.
Aiden squints and then blinks some more. He’s unfairly adorable when he’s sleepy.
“You asked me to stay,” he explains, his voice rougher than usual. His hand reaches out and he attempts to help me undo the knot of fleece around my middle. Did I try to strap myself to Aiden in my sleep? Why am I so tangled?God.“And then you manhandled me to the couch. You’re . . . scary strong.”
Embarrassment floods my body, making me prickly and hot. I’m mortified. Whatever is worse than mortified. I know I’m an affectionate drunk. Grayson calls me acuddle monster. I think it’s my body trying to make up for the lack of touch I secretly crave. But it’s never been something I’ve had a problem with until I . . . until I latched myself like a barnacle to Aiden, of all people.
I finally get the blanket out from around me and toss the whole thing in his lap, retreating to the other side of the living room.
I need space. I also need a highly detailed report on what happened last night. What else did I do? What else did I say? I only have fleeting, fuzzy thoughts. A slow dance in the dark. My hands in his hair. An idling curiosity of what his mouth tastes like. My body pressing his down on the couch. My mouth against the hollow of his throat, whispering,Stay, please, you’re a good pillow.
His hands in my hair, his voice a low rumble.Okay.
“Did I kiss you?” I blurt out. I have a hazy memory of my face close to his, our noses brushing together. I remember wanting to kiss him and then . . . nothing. I don’t remember anything else.
Aiden continues to blink blearily at me, sleep-rumpled and confused. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him in a T-shirt before and I’m distracted by the curve of his shoulder through the thin white material. He rubs his palm against the gold chain around his neck and the muscles in his arms flex and release.
“What?” he asks.
“Did I kiss you?” I ask again, slower this time. Maybe if I pretend to be calm, I’ll start to feel it. Fake it till you make it.
The ghost of a smile flirts with his mouth. I want to fling a pillow at his head.
“No.” He collapses against the back of my couch, his knees tipped wide. One arm stretches to the side while he yawns and I’m pretty sure I make a distressed sound. All thatskin. All thosemuscles. Whatever fortitude I usually rely on not to notice these things is nowhere to be found. “Good to know you’ve been thinking about it, though,” he says, his hand settling at the back of his neck.
“Aiden,” I admonish. What for, I don’t know. Because he’s right. I have thought about it.
Occasionally. Once or twice.
Seven times, tops.
