The American Roommate Experiment (Spanish Love Deception #2)(50)

“Cheesy?” he rasped.

I moved on to the next crate, my fingers grazing the edge of a record, and I’d never know what the heck came over me, but the need to tease him over it overwhelmed me. “Yeah, it’s a little cheesy. But cute, I think. I guess that after that one line about me falling out of heaven or something, I shouldn’t be surprised.” I glanced at him over my shoulder. “Maybe you’re just a little cheesy.”

Lucas narrowed his eyes at me, his expression morphing. “You remember that line. Of course you do,” he muttered under his breath.

“Hard to forget something like that,” I said.

His expression morphed and before I knew what was happening, he was moving.

Somehow, in what seemed the ninja version of one of his hug attacks, his arm wrapped around my shoulders and he tucked me to his side. The first thing I felt was his minty breath on my cheek, then the line of our bodies pressing together. Him, solid and warm. Me, nothing but butter at the contact, molding myself to him. And then, he tickled me.

Lucas Martín was tickling me.

Pinching my side.

Pulling a yelp right out of me.

“You making fun of me, Rosie?” His voice was low, a grumble, and so close to my ear I shivered.

He tickled me again, and I broke into a fit of giggles, the skin under my sweater tingling for many different reasons.

The tickle attack itself lasted only a few more seconds. But when he seemed to be done, Lucas didn’t release me from his hold. Instead, he kept me right where I was, gently lodged into his chest, my side against his front. And as my laughter died, his chin came to rest on my shoulder, bringing our faces so close that I felt, rather than heard, his chuckle on my cheek.

“I’m sorry,” I thought I said, but it came out so breathy I wasn’t even sure he’d heard it.

“No, you’re not,” he said, still in that low grumble. His chin moved the tenth of an inch closer, my heart picking up. “You liked teasing me,” he added, and he wasn’t wrong. “And I loved that you did.”

“Oh,” I let out, together with all the air in my lungs. “Glad that we’re on the same page.”

At that, his hold loosened the slightest bit, and I took the chance to jump out of his reach, out of pure self-preservation.

His smile was nowhere to be found for a few seconds, then, the side of his mouth tipped up. “Get to work, Rosie. Find us a soundtrack.”

And he sounded so bossy that I had no choice but to do exactly that.

After a while, I pulled out what was probably the hundredth vinyl and inspected it in my hands. I glanced over at Lucas. “This is harder than I thought.”

“You’re overthinking it,” he pointed out, leaning forward so he could see the record I was holding. “What’s wrong with that one? Talk me through your thinking process.”

“It’s Coldplay, so technically, there’s nothing wrong with it.”

He hummed. “I feel a ‘but’ coming.”

“But, I had my first kiss to a Coldplay song,” I told him, unable to keep the grimace off my face.

“What the hell did he do?”

I pretended I wasn’t surprised by his assumption. “How do you know I wasn’t the one who messed it up?”

“I just do,” he said with so much confidence my gaze returned to his face. He smirked. “So? What happened?”

“In Jake Jagielski’s defense, he hadn’t known someone had spiked the punch.”

“Oh no.”

I sighed, because oh no indeed. “Prom night. Jake had been trying to kiss me the whole night, and I’d been dying for him to finally do it.” I chuckled at the memory of us dancing with almost three feet of space between our bodies. “He’d been so nervous, though. He’d forgotten my corsage, his tie was all crooked, and his palms were sweaty on my shoulders.”

“I feel that. Poor little guy.”

“You get sweaty hands, too?”

Lucas made sure he was meeting my gaze when he said, “I would if I was trying to work up the courage to kiss a girl like you.”

I stared at him, my head spinning with the possibility. The thought of Lucas’s lips on mine. Of his mouth moving against mine. Would he really be nervous? Was his admission… true?

This is experimental flirting, I reminded myself.

I cleared my throat. “So, anyway. We were dancing, spinning in slow circles, song after song after song. ‘Speed of Sound’ comes to an end, Jake leans forward very slowly, and I start thinking, Oh my God, he’s going to do it. Here comes my first kiss. I close my eyes and wait for that brush of his lips against mine and then, boom, they are there. Pressing tightly against my mouth. Just a peck. But I was so shocked that I opened my eyes just in time to see…” I trailed off, shivering at the recollection of what happened next. “Jake rearing back and hurling all over my dress.”

Lucas’s eyes grew wide, just as his mouth formed a big O. He whispered, “No.”

“Oh yes.”

He plucked the Coldplay album from my hands and put it back into the crate. “Okay, let’s stay away from Coldplay. I don’t want you thinking about that.”

He pulled a new vinyl out and held it in the air. “What about the Smiths?”