Page 21 of Licks

Oh, was right.

Oh, we’re both single.

Oh, we’re both still attracted to each other.

Oh, I might finally be able to work out my Gwen addiction in a rough session between the sheets.

Except my remorse resurfaced, the stupid decisions that had brought me here tamping the urge.

Trembling slightly, she pulled her hand back, and that silly PI patch clung to my shirt, an echo of our past. Heat echoed from her touch. A reverberation I’d felt for nine years. This connection was probably why I’d never had a real relationship. I could blame it on my music and traveling all I liked, but every woman who’d moved through my life had been a bridge, a transition that filled song gaps. Gwen was the refrain and chorus, the addictive hook that wormed into your mind.

A habit I was struggling to break.

Staying seated, I slowed my breaths and plucked the badge off my jersey. I tucked it into the waistband of my shorts.

She watched my every move, crossed and uncrossed her arms. “Rachel, who you met, wanted me to meet them for drinks in”—she glanced at the microwave clock, her hips still in grabbing distance—“a couple hours. I’d like to go home and read the journal a bit beforehand, but you could come, if you want. To the bar. Since you know Owen and Jimmy.”

“You want me to meet your friends?”

“They’re your friends, too.” She huffed out an incredulous laugh. “Because, you know, today isn’t strange enough, we also have the same friends. Which I totally don’t get. How’d I never meet them?”

I thought back to those years, my hours split between playing guitar, school, soccer, and Gwen time. “We hung out after practice, nights when you were studying.” Always cracking the books, struggling with her grades.

“The soccer guys,” she mumbled, as though to herself. Then louder, “That’s what you’d say: ‘I’m going out with the soccer guys.’”

Guys who’d turned into men that Gwen now knew. We shared baffled looks.

It really was one hell of a coincidence. Fate, that sneaky little devil, toying with our lives—the way her betrayal had launched my music career, and her mother had launched me back into Gwen’s life. Like both of us single now, launched together.

I still hadn’t answered her about searching for her father, hadn’t said yes or no or admitted my screw-up. There was also this unrelenting thing between us that went beyond fierce attraction and residual resentment, that maybe, maybe she’d always be the one for me. There’d been no one since Gwen. No one meaningful.

Here, with her, there was meaning in every breath and pause.

That left me existing in no man’s land, wondering if those weighted beats meant Gwen and I still had a chance at…something, yet I was withholding vital information from her.

Unsure how to proceed, I nodded. “I need to shower and change at my hotel, but I can meet you there.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“You’re coming with me?”

“I’m coming with you.” I hated that we’d been reduced to this—once inseparable, now questioning a simple outing with friends.

“Will you keep repeating everything I say?” she asked.

“Only if you keep stating the obvious.”

She flicked my shoulder, and I squeezed the sensitive spot above her knee. She squealed, a sound I’d always loved. Happy Gwen. Giddy Gwen. She went to pinch my nipple, her go-to move, but I batted her hand away. I grabbed her waist and tugged her onto my lap, her back flush against my chest. Nowhere for her hands to roam. “You’re getting slow in your old age.”

She quit squirming. “You’re getting faster.”

And harder. She probably felt it, my erection free to roam in my workout shorts. Minimal contact was all it took. Like I was a teen again, my body always quick to respond to her. Needing to regain control, I eased her off my lap, but gripped her waist too long. Felt each of her lean muscles through her thin tank top. “You’ve been working out.”

“CrossFit,” she murmured while she stepped back and faced me, adjusting her camo pants. “But I’m considering taking up pole vaulting.” Her eyes focused on my groin.

The pole in question twitched, and my mind was back to ricocheting, too much stimulus—good and bad—to focus on one thing. I could handle this, though. Subtle flirting while we figured out what the hell to do with each other. While I figured out my next move. “I’d think you were already a skilled vaulter.”