10. KAI #2
"They are absolutely not the same." She angles them toward me, offended. "Coastal calm has a grey undertone while pacific blue is cyan blue. Completely different emotional registers."
"They're both blue."
She stares at me with the expression of a woman considering violence.
"Never say that to a designer. We will end you." She angles the swatches toward me. “Take another look and tell me what you think.”
I lean in, my mouth close to her temple. I inhale the citrus scent ofl her shampoo.
“So what are you going to tell your client?”
She turns her head to respond and finds my face right there. Her breath catches. Those hazel eyes flare wide.
She doesn't lean back.
Neither do I.
"You smell good," I murmur.
"That's not relevant to the discussion."
"I'm changing the subject."
"Don't start something you know I won't finish," she whispers.
"I think you'd finish it. That's what scares you."
I tuck the strand behind her ear. My thumb traces the curve of it, following the shell down to her earlobe.
Her hand comes up and wraps around my wrist.
Her fingers press against my pulse point and I know she can feel how fast it's going, the same way I can see hers hammering in the hollow of her throat.
We stay like that; my hand at her ear, her fingers locked around my wrist.
"You know what I keep thinking about?" My voice is conversational, like I'm discussing a play, not the woman pressed against my side.
"Hockey?"
"That sound you made when I kissed you in the hospital."
Her throat bobs. "I don't remember making a sound."
"Small. Low. Right here."
My fingers find the loose strand of hair at the back of her neck. I twist it once, slowly, letting my knuckle graze the skin behind her ear.
She shivers, a full-body tremor she can't disguise because I'm pressed against her from hip to knee and I feel every inch of it.
"You grabbed my shirt with both hands and pulled me in,” I say. “Then you pretended you didn't want it."
"I wasn't pretending."
I tuck the strand behind her ear. My thumb traces the curve of it, follows the shell down to the soft lobe.
"Your hands wanted me. Your mouth did too."
Her lips part. "Kai."
"Do you think about it?"
"About what?"
My thumb moves from her ear to the hinge of her jaw, tracing the line of it down to her chin.
"Don't play dumb. You're terrible at it." I tilt her face toward mine. "Do you think about what would have happened if Mira hadn't walked in?"
Her pupils go wide, black swallowing the green and gold until her eyes are mostly dark.
"No," she whispers.
My thumb drags across her lower lip. The flesh is full, soft. Her breath comes hot against my skin.
"Liar." I smile. "You know what I think about? I think about how your hips rocking against me once before you caught yourself. You remember that?"
Her breathing becomes ragged.
My hand slides down from her face to her neck, fingertips trailing the tendon, settling at the base of her throat where her pulse is slamming hard enough for me to count it.
"You pressed into me and made this quiet little whimper. Then you tried to act like it didn't happen. Your heart's doing the same thing right now."
"That's a cardio workout… a… a cardiovascular response. It doesn't mean anything."
"Sure. Very convincing."
My fingers trace her collarbone, following the ridge of it to where the sweater has slipped to show off her bare shoulder.
I hook one finger under the fallen strap and slide it back into place, letting my knuckle drag slowly across her warm skin as I do.
She sucks in a breath through her teeth. Her hand grabs my knee. Her fingers dig into the muscle above my kneecap and climb up.
"You should mind what you’re doing to me," she says.
"You should take your hand off my leg."
She looks down, sees her own hand moving up my thigh. It keeps caressing my leg.
"That's involuntary," she says.
"So is this."
I lean forward and press my mouth to the spot below her ear. My lips rest against her skin, feeling the heat, breathing her in.
Her whole body goes taut against mine. A tremor rolls through her stomach muscles.
"Kai."
My name comes out wrecked, low and rough and scraped raw.
"Still just friends?" I murmur against her throat.
"Yes."
Her hand slides further up my thigh toward my hardened cock.
I pull back just enough to look at her. Flushed from her chest to her hairline. Lips parted. Eyes dark.
"My mom thinks we're dating."
I don’t tell her it’s Mira who believes that. Mom is already halfway to accepting Ava as my girlfriend anyway. Twisting the truth a little won’t hurt.
The desire in Ava’s eyes dies. She leans back, hand leaving my thigh. The distance she creates is inches at most, but I feel the loss of contact down my whole side.
"Then you should correct her," she says.
"Why would I do that?"
"Because we're not dating. That's usually a solid reason to not let your mother believe otherwise."
"You could tell her yourself. I’ll give you her number."
"That’s not the point."
"Call her. Explain how you kiss her son like it means something, then insist you're just friends. I'm sure she'll understand."
A small, involuntary laugh escapes her. She kills it quickly, pressing her lips together.
She turns away just as a flush crawls from her collarbones up to her jaw. It takes everything in me not to put my mouth on it.
"This is insane," she breathes.
She drops the swatches and pulls her knees up, wrapping her arms around them.
I turn my body toward hers. My hand finds her hip, fingers settling against the strip of bare skin where her sweater has ridden up. It’s warm, impossibly soft.
She sucks in a breath through her teeth.
I smile. "My parents organized a family weekend at our lake house to celebrate my recovery. The extended family will be there, so there’ll be nothing intense."
"Good for you. That sounds nice."
"Come with me."
"No."
"Ava."
"Absolutely not. Meeting extended family is not a casual thing."
"My parents already invited you."
She presses her forehead against her knees, holds it there for a while, then lifts her head. Her cheeks are flushed.
"I'm not your girlfriend."
My thumb draws a slow line along the skin above her waistband. Back and forth. Her stomach muscles flutter under the touch. Her breathing goes shallow and uneven,
"Sure. If you won't be my girlfriend, fake date me for the weekend instead."
She goes still. "You're not serious."
"My family already believes we're together. You show up, we play along for two days. Nobody gets let down, and Monday morning you can go back to telling me we're friends."
"I'm not telling you. We are friends."
"Then this should be easy. You help me as a friend. You wouldn’t want to disappoint your friend’s mother."
"That is the most manipulative thing you've ever said to me."
"Two days. That's all I'm asking."
Her hand drops to my wrist, grip tight Her fingers dig in, and I don't know if she's about to pull my hand away or press it harder against her skin.
Her eyes find mine. Wide, furious, burning with desire.
"This is a terrible idea."