Page 74 of Darling Venom
Not that I wanted him that way.
I just wanted to talk.
And maybe eat.
Well, definitely eat.
I scrambled to my feet before he was forced to kick me out. “I’ll take the books now and drop them off at the library some other time. It’s late, and I don’t want to—”
“I’ll call you a cab.”
“You don’t have to—”
“It’s the least I can do,” he snapped.
I nodded.
It occurred to me that he always called me cabs home. If this was not a great metaphor for our relationship, I didn’t know what was.
I pulled; he pushed.
I popped up at his door; he sent me away like a rejected puppy.
Seriously, it was a good thing we wouldn’t be seeing each other after this.
We didn’t hug or even look at each other as I piled into the taxi with the stack of first-edition books. Tate had said he’d call a company to get all the rest. It was just the expensive ones he wanted to see getting a good home.
“I’ll send you the tax whatever in the mail,” I said, tired. “Since I don’t have your number.” I had the decency to cringe at myself when I said this.
Subtle much?
“Sounds good.”
When he slammed the door shut after me, I noticed that he didn’t even wait on the curb to see me off as the taxi slid back into traffic, disappearing among silhouettes of other vehicles under the twinkling New York lampposts.
I hugged the Wizard of Oz set to my chest.
In the end, this was all I had left of either Marchetti brother.
I charged upstairs as soon as Little Lottie left.
Little. Lottie.
As in—teeny, tiny, twenty-two-year-old Lottie.
Who used to hang out with my baby brother.
I didn’t need her to be illegal to be completely off-limits.
You did not have an erection after she shared her Big T with you.
You did not have an erection after she shared her Big T with you.
You did not have an erection after she shared her Big T with you.
Spoiler alert: I did.
Fuck my life sideways, she’d cried in my arms, and I’d popped a boner like a thirteen-year-old.
