Fighting Shadows (On the Ropes #2)(27)

His lips finally lifted at the corners, sending excitement thrumming through my body. I was winning the war he didn’t even know we were fighting.

Victory was within my reach.

And he was my prize.

“Yeah? How much is a smidge, exactly?”

“Oh, I don’t know. I’m not an expert or anything. Maybe like . . .” I paused, tapping my chin. “Maybe just increase it by say . . . ninety-nine percent or so?” I finished as seriously as I could.

“Really? Ninety-nine percent?” He busted out laughing.

I closed my eyes and sucked in a deep breath as if I could physically absorb the sound. I didn’t need the extra laughs; I produced more than enough of my own.

But that one was his.

I wanted to keep it forever.

“I think you have problems,” he teased when he sobered.

I absolutely did. And the newest one of them was sitting directly in front of me.

It was no coincidence that I was standing in his apartment. Sure, Quarry thought it was his idea, but I’d planted that seed days earlier. It had started out with subtle questions here and there about where Flint had disappeared to, but by that morning, I had talked Q into a full-blown conspiracy theory in which Flint was lying about his injuries in order to collect disability checks from the government. Sweet, na?ve Quarry had fallen right into my trap. He’d no longer been able to resist knowing the truth about where his brother was really hiding out. It had taken a few days longer than I would have liked, but I’d patiently sat back and let Quarry lead me to Flint.

“Come on, Flint. Go with us. Just think about it. We can paint all of our troubles on that building then watch ’em knock it down.” I crossed my arms over my chest, pushing my breasts up.

And like a moth to a flame, his eyes dropped.

Flint raked his eyes over my breasts and slowly up to my eyes. I gathered my long hair and twisted it, pulling it over my shoulder. Holding it with the ends just above my nipple, I led Flint’s eyes right back down to my chest.

“Ash, if you think he is going to graffiti a building, you have lost your f*cking mind. He once turned himself in to the principal at school for accidentally making a pencil mark on the desk,” Quarry said, falling into hysterics at his own joke.

But I was focused on the guy in front of me, who seemed just as interested in my boobs as I was in him.

“You have to come,” I whispered, and his lips twitched. “It can be your newsie for the day. And I’ll even let you have first pick of the paint colors,” I added.

“Seriously, give it up. He’s not coming.”

Oh, he was coming.

I innocently batted my eyelashes as I pressed my bottom lip out in a pout.

“You’re ridiculous,” Flint said, shaking his head.

My shoulders fell as I feigned defeat, but I was nowhere near done.

His eyes flashed wide as I took a step forward and leaned down. Stopping just a breath away from his mouth, I raked my teeth over my bottom lip before I whispered, “Please come.”

“Ho. Lee. Shit,” Quarry gasped behind us. “You told me you were a lesbian.”

“Nope. Just didn’t want you getting any ideas,” I answered without tearing my eyes off Flint.

The side of Flint’s mouth tipped up in a mischievous grin, and his eyes twinkled with something else completely. Leaning in even closer, he said, “Fine. I’ll come.”

Game over!

A huge smile spread on my face, and I started to back away, but Flint caught the back of my neck, dragging me forward.

“And eventually, Ash, you’ll come too.”

My breath hitched.

I was wrong. I might have conned Flint into hanging out with me, but as he backed away, holding my gaze with a sexy-as-hell smirk, I realized that Flint Page had just completely hijacked my victory.

Cheater.





THE DRY SPELL WAS OVER.

Thank.

Fucking.

Christ.

I had no idea what the hell Ash Mabie wanted or, better yet, why she wanted it from someone like me, but I knew with one hundred percent certainty that I was going to give it to her.

She was hands down the strangest woman I had ever met. The jury was still out on her sanity, and her social awareness might as well have been nonexistent. She simply said whatever-the-hell thought was passing through her brain at the moment her mouth opened.

But God, she was gorgeous.

She was terrible at flirting, and she’d more than proved that back at my apartment. But then again, that might have been the best part. Even as she licked her lips and awkwardly thrust her boobs at me, she was unbelievably confident. Watching her try to get me to go out that night had been as humorous as it’d been cock hardening. She was a woman with a clear mission and didn’t give one f*ck what she had to do to complete it.

Really, it worked out well for me, because I had full intentions of giving her that one f*ck.

Which was exactly why I’d ended up in front of a brick wall, holding a can of spray paint while I listened to her argue with a middle-aged homeless woman over a pair of shoes.

“They were buy-one-get-one-free, Donna.”

“Green though? You couldn’t have gotten black or brown or something? I’m fifty-seven years old. Girl, these shoes are for kids. I’m surprised they don’t have cartoon characters or some shit on the side.”