Lawless (King #3)(60)

“You mean the day your friend held a gun on me,” she corrected.

“Yes, I mean the day the little kid version of you almost took out a biker seven times your size,” I said.

“Well, serves him right. He shouldn’t have been trying to rob a kid,” she argued.

“Technically, he was trying to rob a store, not a kid,” I countered.

She shot me a look that said ‘oh please.’ “So you’re saying that if it was Emma May at the counter it would’ve somehow ended things better? Because I can tell you right now, it wouldn’t have been a lick better for Skid or Skud or Skuzz or whatever his name was, because Emma May is a shoot-first, don’t-care-about-asking-questions kind of old lady. Just ask her first husband.” She scratched her chin and wrinkled her nose. “Or her fourth…”

The way Thia talked with her hands, reminded me of a character you would find in a comic book.

One with really, really nice tits.

“See what I mean?” I pointed out. “I’ve never heard anyone say the kind of shit you say. You’re just…different.”

“Different,” she said the word slowly like she was examining it, turning it over on her tongue. She twirled a strand of her hair around in her fingers. “Isn’t different just a nicer word for bat-shit-crazy?” she asked, her face serious.

She looked down at her feet.

I reached over and lifted up her chin so she could look at me.

So she could SEE me.

“No, I said different and that’s exactly what I meant. In my world that’s a good thing. No, that’s a f*cking GREAT thing. You ain’t like other girls, certainly nothing like the BBB’s.” When Ti wrinkled her nose in confusion I filled her in. “Beach Bastard Bitches, club whores,” I clarified. “When I’m positive you’re going to react one way to something, you keep surprising me by doing the complete opposite and I’m a hard man to surprise,” I said, stubbing out my cigarette on the bottom of my boot.

“I bet you tell all the girls they’re different. Bet that line’s worked a thousand times.” Ti pulled her chin away and stared down at the table, picking at the old red paint that had bubbled up on the surface. There was a hint of jealousy that crept into her question, and if it had come out of anyone else’s mouth I’d probably already ended the conversation and left the second she asked it. But it didn’t come from anyone else.

It came from Thia.

It was…cute.

I could have lied to her and said she was the only girl I’d ever said that to, but there was already a lingering lie between us, or rather an omission of truth on my part, and I didn’t want to add to the growing pile. “There was a girl, just one other. She was different, but not in the same way you were. I thought she could be different for me too.” I admitted out loud for the first time, remembering the sting of pain I felt when I saw King and Ray f*cking up against the pillar under the house the night I tried to make her mine, and failed.

“What happened? Why did it end?” she asked, looking up from where she’d just picked off a huge chip of paint, exposing a bright blue strip underneath the red.

“My best friend knocked her up. They’re getting hitched.” I said, and then I waited. But it didn’t come. The regret. The bitterness that usually followed all thoughts of my best friend being with the girl I thought I’d let get away.

Nothing.

“You mean King and…Ray? You and Ray?”

“No, me and Ray nothing. Never even started. It was an idea in my head. An idea that got snuffed out quickly. I never cared about a woman in my entire life and kind of confused my feelings for something it wasn’t.”

“I’m sorry,” Ti said and I genuinely believed she was sorry, any bitterness or jealousy was gone from her voice.

I shook my head. “Don’t be. I’m happy for them.”

I really meant it.

“Ti, are you jealous?” I teased, although I knew she wasn’t. I nudged her a little too hard and she almost fell off the table, but recovered quickly, using her hands to regain her balance.

I’d officially lost my god damned mind. Not only was I flirting but I’d resorted to pushing her around like a school kid with a crush.

“No, I’m not jealous,” she argued. “I shouldn’t have even asked. It’s none of my business. Besides, you don’t need to tell a girl that they are different to get them into bed, you probably just smile and say ‘Darlin’ and the panties start dropping,” Ti said, crossing and uncrossing her legs that made me want to spread them apart and sink my face down into her tight heat.

I put my hand on top of hers to ease her rambling, but when our hands met I didn’t expect the volt of static energy that sparked between us from a simple touch. Ti looked up at me and her jaw dropped open.

She’d felt it too.

I tried to take away my hand but I just couldn’t.

Better yet, I didn’t want to.

I clasped my hand around her much smaller one and yanked her onto my lap, she shrieked in surprise. I almost forgot what I was about to say when I noticed that my lips were lined up perfectly with that little indented spot where her neck and shoulder met. She struggled to get off of me, but I held her tight and leaned into the spot as close as I could without actually touching her. “You’re right, you know. I’ve never in my life said anything to a chick that wasn’t true to get her in my bed,” I said right against her skin.