Blurred Lines (Love Unexpectedly #1)(45)

“No,” she says, holding up a hand and sounding so weary my chest squeezes. “He was perfectly nice. I may even see him again. I just wasn’t feeling it tonight.”

She looks down at the floor and crosses one foot over the other. “Sorry.” Her voice is quieter now. “I know that was part of our deal. Me hooking up with him, and you with…”

She waves a hand toward the door, I’m assuming to indicate Cora downstairs.

Then her head lifts. “Hey, the music stopped.”

I nod. “I had Jason clear everyone out.”

She stares at me. “Why?”

The easy answer would be to tell her that I thought she was upset about something, and that I cleared them out on her behalf. And that’s the truth. But only half of it.

So I tell her the other half. “I guess I wasn’t feeling like holding up my part of the bargain, either.”

Her eyes search my face. “Didn’t look that way from where I was sitting.”

“You mean where you were sitting for all of thirty seconds,” I correct.

Because had you stayed you’d have seen that I wasn’t even remotely into that girl.

Parker licks her lips nervously. “So are you going to, like, go out again? Find another girl?”

I take a step nearer to her, relieved when she doesn’t step away. Those few moments of weirdness between us seem to have faded, as though we’re back to normal. Or, at least, our new normal. The normal that involves us seeing each other naked.

“I’m not going to find another girl,” I answer quietly, lifting a hand to her face. “Not tonight, anyway.”

My other hand comes up to cup the back of her neck, and her fingers wrap around my wrists as she looks up at me.

“What about your crippling fear that your cock’s going to fall off if you have sex with only one person for more than two weeks?” she says quietly.

I grin. “Well, at least I’ll rest easy knowing that I’ll be in the company of my best friend when it happens.”

I lean my head down for a kiss, but she pulls back just slightly, her gaze worried. “We’re still not going to let this get weird, right? We’ll still be able to go back to how we were when this is over?”

I pause. “I’m not going to do anything that would jeopardize our friendship. So if you want to use the safe word…”

She opens her mouth, and for a heart-stopping moment I’m afraid that that’s exactly what she’s going to do, and for the life of me I don’t know how I’d feel about it.

Then she smiles. “Nah.”

She lifts to her toes and I meet her halfway, and the second our lips meet, I realize that this is the reason I couldn’t get into Cora.

Because the only person I want to be kissing is right in front of me.





Chapter 19


Parker


One of these days, sex with Ben is going to get old.

I’m sure of it.

Eventually we’ll know each other’s bodies so well that there will be nothing left to discover and we’ll be able to chalk this whole arrangement up as an experimental time in our friendship and go back to how we were before.

But today is not that day. Tonight is not that night.

The kiss is a little hesitant at first. Both of us testing to make sure that this is really okay—that we’re totally fine with the evening’s carefully laid plans going up in flames.

Then his tongue touches mine and it becomes rapidly clear that we’re both fine with it.

More than fine.

Ben’s hand slips under the ugly T-shirt he pulled over me—bet he’s regretting that now—and his palm is hot against the small of my back as he pulls me closer.

I mimic the motion on him, sliding my hands up and under his shirt until they’re against his back, taking in his warmth, pulling him to me.

And it’s perfect.

But the longer the kiss goes on, the longer it’s not enough, not nearly enough, and when he tugs impatiently at the hem of my shirt, I lift my arms and allow him to pull it over my head with a lot more ease than when he put it on.

He groans in gratification at the sight of my admittedly pretty bra, and somewhere in the back of my brain, I wonder if I actually put this on for Brandon, or if I hoped all along that it would be Ben who’d be appreciating that I spent way too much on the navy bra with adorable pink bows.

Ben’s mouth dips to my neck and I think I hear him say my name, but then I get kind of preoccupied with his lips on my neck and the delicious goosebumps that result.

I need him naked.

My fingers are clumsy, all but tearing at the buttons of his shirt, but he doesn’t seem to mind. Only once I finally get the buttons undone, I find him wearing a stupid undershirt underneath, and I pull at it with a little growl of frustration.

He gives me a quick grin and a kiss before peeling off the last remaining layer between me and his bare chest.

Gratified, I lay my hands against his shoulders and lean forward, kissing him softly just for a moment, before my hands and lips go crazy, touching every part of his warm skin that I can reach.

He laughs a little at my urgency when my fingers move to his jeans. “Jesus, Parks.”

In response, I give him what I hope is a Hurry up and get your clothes off look before walking toward the bed, giving an extra little sway of my hips before I put one knee on the bed.