A Perfect Ten (Forbidden Men #5)(18)

He rolled his eyes toward the ceiling. “Jesus. You would like something strange like that.”

“I’m serious, man.” I scowled at him hard.

“So am I.” He blurted out a laugh. “And only you would start up an argument with a woman while you were inside her. Damn, Ten.” He shook his head again, but this time, he was at least grinning while he did it. “You’re a piece of work.”

Disappointment lanced through me. I was hoping he’d have experienced something at least similar before. “What about hair pulling, then?” I pressed. “You ever get your woman to come by pulling her hair while doing her?”

Eyebrows shooting into his hairline, Gamble sniffed. “As if I’m going to let you know about anything that gets my woman off.”

I opened my mouth to argue, but he held up a finger. “Let me get this straight. You argued with some girl and pulled her hair during sex? Wow. What are you? Five?”

“No,” I muttered, growing more irritated than ever. I didn’t like him bashing what might’ve possibly been the best sex of my life. “I’m Ten. And she liked it. A lot. Like, four times within twenty minutes a lot.”

Gamble pulled back, clearly impressed. He whistled between his teeth, but then his face filled with disbelief. “She probably faked it.”

I lifted my hands. “Why fake four times? Why not just once so I’d stop and leave her alone?”

He shrugged. “Good point, but I don’t know. To make you feel better, maybe?”

“Whatever.” I rolled my eyes. “She didn’t fake them. Trust me. There was no way to fake this. It was...” I shook my head, still stunned by everything that had happened. “Fucking incredible.”

A knowing grin lit Gamble’s face. “Well, holy shit. One specific woman finally left an impression on my Ten. What’d you say her name was? Anyone I know?”

I winced and sucked my bottom lip in between my teeth. “I don’t know.”

He blinked. “You don’t know what? Her name?”

With a shake of my head, I said, “Nope. I do not know her name.”

“Well, what’d she look like? Was she one of the usual football groupies?”

I shrugged. “Not sure.”

“You’re not sure about…what?”

“I’m not sure what she looked like.”

He scratched at the five o’clock shadow on his jaw and frowned at me. “How can you not know what she looked like? How drunk were you?”

“I wasn’t drunk at all. I just didn’t...see her.”

“You didn’t...” He shook his head, clearly confused. “What?”

“It was dark.”

“Okay, but... Wait, wait, wait.” He waved his hands. “Start from the beginning.”

So I did, telling him about my meeting with Kelly at the bar. He knew who Kelly was and how tightly corkscrewed her hair was. Then I told him about our darkened meeting plans. “But the thing was, the girl who came into my room had long, straight hair that was really soft.” And silky. And she’d smelled amazing...like Caroline.

Gamble studied me for a good ten seconds after my story before saying, “So, basically, you could’ve f*cked...anyone?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I guess. I mean, it was definitely a female, but other than that...yeah.”

His eyes went wide. “It wasn’t Hamilton’s woman, was it?”

I started at him a moment to wait for him to grow up. Then I said, “Really?”

He shrugged. “Well...it’s not an impossible suggestion. She lives in the same apartment as you and has long, straight hair. What if she got up in the middle of the night, and…I don’t know, used the restroom and was so tired when she came out, she mistakenly walked into the wrong room and crawled into bed with the wrong roommate.”

I stared at Gam, sure he’d lost his mind.

He snapped. “What? It’s not that unreasonable of an idea.”

“Yes, it is! Because it sure as hell was not Blondie.” Even though, okay, the body type and hair did kind of match. Oh, shit. It hadn’t been Blondie, had it? My stomach roiled. Quinn would never forgive me if I accidentally—

“Wait. No.” My shoulders slumped in relief. “It couldn’t have been her. She kept calling me Or—by my first name. So, the chick definitely knew who was doing her, which totally cancels out your theory that Ham’s woman accidentally crawled into bed with me and screwed the wrong guy. Twice.”

“Hmm. Yeah. I guess.” He continued to think about it before saying, “But did the girl realize you didn’t know who she was?”

“Yeah.” I sat forward again, lowering my voice. “That’s the strangest part. It totally spooked her when I told her I knew she wasn’t Kelly. She actually wanted me to think she was someone else. She even tried to buck me off and stop when I told her. And we hadn’t even finished round two yet.”

“Wait. You told her during sex?” Gamble gasped out. “And holy shit. It wasn’t even the first round? Can you possibly say anything else more bizarre right now?”

Yes. I think it might’ve been your sister.

But, yeah, I didn’t say that shit. I freaked myself out for even thinking it. So I blew out a breath. “It was the best f*cking sex of my life.”