Cheater (Curious Liaisons #1)(72)

“Me? I ruined your family? And Brooke? What did she do? Nothing?”

Avery gasped. “You tried to seduce her!”

“What?” I hissed. “What did you just say?”

“You. Seduced. Her. In. Her. Bedroom. MINUTES after kissing me.”

“I was drunk—I stumbled into the wrong room, saw red hair, and thought . . .” Shit. I’d gone too far. Shit. Shit. Take it back, take it back.

“Thought what?”

“So, a story?” I pasted a fake smile on my face. “I say we go with—”

“Thought. What?” Her fingers gripped my T-shirt and twisted.

With a groan, I broke eye contact and looked down at the ground. “I thought it was you. In my muddled drunken brain, I thought it was you, not Brooke—so, yeah, she wasn’t the sister I’d planned on seducing.”

There. I’d said it.

Let her hate me.

“You thought you were crawling into my bed?”

“I figured if I could just talk to you and see how you really felt—then I’d be brave enough to call everything off, or if that failed, at least I’d be drunk enough to pull the plug on the wedding.”

The silence stretched out long past uncomfortable, making the tension between us nearly unbearable.

“You felt that way because you were drunk.”

“No, Avery Bug, not because I was drunk.”

She waited.

I exhaled through my clenched teeth and finally admitted the truth. “One day you were my friend, and then you became something completely different. Because I wanted you. Because I’ve always wanted you. Because even when it was wrong—and you were only seventeen years old—I wanted you.”

“And now?”

I kissed her.

She didn’t kiss me back.

Not at first.

And then slowly, her hands snaked around my neck, her lips parted—and I was completely awakened to what it would feel like to belong to Avery Black.

“Stay,” I heard myself begging between each heated kiss. “Stay.”

“You’re a bad habit, Thorn.” Her chest heaved, and her green eyes glistened. “An addiction I can’t kick—each kiss gets me drunker than the first, until I lose all sense of right and wrong.”

“This is right,” I urged, already backing her up against the wall and parting her lips with my tongue. Her body melted under my touch. I was pretty sure I could taste her forever and still be ravenous for her mouth.

Her hand slid down my chest, pushing me away, putting maybe two inches of space between us. “What about your Monday?”

“Screw Monday.” I slid my hands under her shirt and slowly inched it off her body. “I’m talking about today. Do you think you can handle that?”

She nodded.

“Thank God, because plan B involved duct tape, rope, my bed, and an infrared sensor.”

“Classy.” Avery’s questioning gaze had me ready to bolt already, but if she needed more, I needed to be willing to give it. “One question.”

I waited.

“Are you even capable of commitment?”

I wasn’t sure how to answer.

“Thorn?”

“Honestly? I don’t know. The last time I tried I fell for someone else. A girl with bright green eyes and strawberry-blonde hair who smelled like grape gum and called me by my last name. She made me feel alive. I think she’s the only one capable of giving a cheater a reason to change his ways. That’s all I can give you, the truth.”

She brushed a kiss across my lips. “It’s enough.”





Chapter Thirty-Six


AVERY

I yawned behind my hand. My eyes watered a bit, and my vision was starting to double and then triple. “Two months ago. Starbucks. You stood in line and yelled obscenities at the poor old lady getting trained. I, being the hero in this scenario, stepped in, punched you in the face—we both ended up in jail and then started dating.”

Lucas gave me a thumbs-down, and his abs glistened beneath the soft glow of the bedside lamp. “Is there a reason that every story you come up with involves you being the hero, while I end up maimed, in prison, or almost murdered?”

I giggled. “I think my favorite one was when you got jumped, and I saved your life with my kung fu.”

His menacing grin did funny things to my stomach. “Admit it. The closest you’ve been to kung fu is the movie Kung Fu Panda, which you probably watched because you’re convinced the panda is your spirit animal since it’s always eating.”

My mouth dropped open.

“Next!” Lucas pressed down on the red beeper I’d stolen out of one of his board games and yawned. “And please let me keep all of my teeth this time.”

“Flaws make people human!”

“Avery Bug, in one of the stories you were wearing a crown . . . Now, something realistic, please.”

“Okay, okay.” I moved onto my knees and started crawling across the king-size mattress toward him.

His smile fell, replaced by a heated look that had me ready to jump all over him—again—and get distracted—again—and fail to come up with a believable story for our families—again.

“How about . . .” I licked my lips and grinned. “I’ve got it. The perfect story.”