A Perfect Ten (Forbidden Men #5)(2)

So I let her have the full intensity of Ten. I stopped watching what I said when she was around, and I let all my base, disgusting thoughts bleed out of my mouth like I usually did. I stopped smiling at her, stopped paying her special attention with little courteous things like holding doors open for her or asking her how her day went. I completely stopped being a nice guy. I backed off and pretty much ignored her, unless I could think up something crude to say in her direction. I made sure to chase other women when she was around. And I felt like shit every night I lay in bed, unable to get to sleep, because I’d relive every awful thing I’d done to her that day.

No matter how deeply my actions bothered me, though, it didn’t stop me from making her hate me and killing any soft feelings she’d ever had for me.

It should’ve been easy to accomplish. Everyone who knew me understood how fast I could piss off a woman.

But nothing about Caroline has ever been easy.

That’s the curious thing about temptation. It festers and grows. You feed that bitch enough and she morphs into craving, and then craving turns into obsession. Pretty soon, nothing in your life is as important as that one thing you want but can’t have.

I wanted her and I couldn’t have her, so I fed the temptation, I flooded the craving, I would’ve f*cking nursed the obsession from my own tits if I could’ve. I made sure I got little doses of her here and there. Except something incredibly enlightening happens when you spend enough time in one woman’s company. You start noticing shit about her, little useless crap that actually begins to mean everything, like how she brushes the hair out her face—even if there isn’t any in her eyes—whenever she’s unsettled, or how she chews on the end of a pen during class whenever she’s listening to something that captures her attention. You learn all her different laughs and know what each one means. You learn what pisses her off the most, or what makes her the happiest. You discover how smart and witty and sarcastic she is, and that her mind is almost as dirty as yours. You see how passionate she becomes when she defends those she loves, and you start to fall. Hard.

So, this is my Pathetic Loser’s confession: I am Oren Tenning, and I have fallen. Hard.

Damn, I can’t believe I just admitted that about a girl I’ve never even kissed, much less f*cked. But I’m almost out of tricks here. I know I need to keep on keeping her away, except I’m getting desperate. I want her so goddamn bad.

It’s my own damn fault, really. I could’ve and should’ve turned her off of me for good by now. It’s just that every time I think I’ve finally done something that will make her hate me forever—something she’ll never forgive me for—the panic sets in. I can’t bear the thought of her hating me and never forgiving me. So then I have to go and do something to ensure her forgiveness.

She always forgives me, too, even though she shouldn’t. But I love that about her, that sweet, beautiful, over-forgiving, dirty-minded heart of hers. And so I keep plowing down this destructive path, knowing good and well I’m running myself insane, and probably her too.

Something’s gotta give soon or I’ll explode...most likely inside her.

I just hope it doesn’t end up with me dead at the hands of my best friend.





“Ooh, he’s cute. Caroline, don’t you think he’s cute?”

I sighed as Blaze—and yes, she’d given herself that name—shoved me in the arm for like the tenth time in the past five minutes, almost making me upset the glass of cola I was nursing.

“Yeah,” I said, not even bothering to check out the newest hottie she’d spotted. “He’s...adorable.”

Usually, I was all for checking out anyone within my age range who possessed a Y chromosome. But tonight, I was anti-Y, so freaking anti-Y that I’d rather throw a vat of flesh-eating acid on the lot of them than check out one of their annoying, irritating, cute smiles, or asses, or packages, or pecs.

Across the table from us, Zoey covered her mouth with her hand and tried not to laugh out loud over my lackluster response. I scowled at her and mouthed, “Shut up.”

She had nothing to be moody about. Her boyfriend was frigging perfect. Gorgeous, considerate, sweet, faithful, Quinn Hamilton was exactly the kind of guy I should crave. But no…oh no. The idiot I coveted was a loud-mouthed, politically incorrect jerk who shoved his penis into any willing woman who batted her eyelashes at him.

Except me. Me, he had turned down flat.

Twice.

Yeah, I said twice...because I was idiot enough not to get the hint the first time around.

Wrapping myself with my own arms, because just remembering his rejections made me feel all ugly, worthless, and gross, I glared at my drink, wishing I had even a hint of a bourbon in my cola. But my brother was working the bar, so that was a no-go.

Typically, his coworkers would slip me a little alcohol, but not if Noel was on the clock. No one crossed Noel Gamble where his eighteen-year-old sister was concerned, not even the biggest loud-mouthed, politically incorrect jerk of the century.

“No, wait. Check him out instead. Now there’s a stallion I’d like to mount and ride.” Blaze literally licked her lips as she gazed hungrily across the crowded club. “Just look at how thick that chest is. And those arms. Mmm, God. You gotta know the rest of him is just as big. Dayum. I want to see him naked.”

“Hey,” Zoey spoke up, her tone annoyed. “That one’s my boyfriend.”