Worth the Risk(51)

“Sid?” He sounds surprised when he shouldn’t be. “Is something wrong?”

“Nope. I’m fine. Just fine.” I turn my back to him and start spraying my tires again. It’s so much easier focusing on them than the incredibly sexy sight of him that I don’t want to acknowledge. The visual that immediately clouds the way I felt the other night.

“You’re fine? That’s universal woman code for I’m pissed at you.” His chuckle scrapes over my nerves as he reaches out to take the hose from me, and I yank it away.

“Don’t!” I spin around to face him and, of course, he’s way too close. The nozzle I aim at him is the only thing between us, and my car is at my back.

“You care to share what I did wrong?”

“No.”

“Okay.” He draws the word out. “I waited around for you at the festival the other night.”

The side that wants to believe the words he said in the office melts while the skeptical one who saw him with the strawberry-blonde snorts.

“What? You don’t believe me?”

Did I really just snort out loud?

“No, I don’t. I saw you.” I jab the hose nozzle in his direction, and a smirk tugs at the corner of his mouth, which only serves to infuriate me further. “I saw you and that woman—”

“What woman?” he laughs.

“The pretty one with the strawberry-blonde hair.” He snorts, and I jab the hose in his direction, suddenly on the defensive and more than aware that I think I’m going to look like an ass here. That all my overthinking was for nothing. “Don’t mock me.”

“I’m not mocking shit.” He puts his hands up, but his smile remains. “That was my sister-in-law, Grant’s wife. Her name is Emerson.”

Oh. Shit.

“I was playing the part you want me to play. Chatting up the ladies asking about the contest, urging them to go online.” Embarrassment flushes every ounce of my body. “I was whispering to Emerson how ridiculous it was, and she was there to laugh at it all with me.”

“Oh.” As in, Oh shit, I look like the craziest hormonal bitch ever.

All I want to do is crawl under this car and hide when his grin widens to epic proportions. “Am I forgiven?”

“No.”

His laughter rings out, and I hate that I love the sound of it. “Okay. What else do you need from me?”

His words throw me. Words no man has ever spoken to me during a fight. It’s usually, “Can we get this over with?” or “Are we done yet?” or “Can we have make-up sex?”

Make-up sex.

The idea sticks but only because he’s sweaty and sexy and so damn close that my every nerve is already attuned to him.

Like they needed any help.

“Sidney?” he prompts when I don’t respond. His gaze moves. A slow, languorous slide from my head to my toes that makes me feel as if he’s undressing each and every inch of me.

“Yeah?”

“You have some”—he reaches out and runs a hand over the curve of my chest just above my tank top—“dirt right there.”

I swear my breath hitches. I know my nipples harden. I react when I swore I wasn’t going to. Damn him. He showed up here with those eyes and those muscles, and hell, even I have to admit that I’m in trouble. I’m down the rabbit hole when it comes to him, when I don’t want to be.

And when he leans in and brushes his lips against mine, my mind fogs, and my body tenses and—

“Argh!” I accidentally spray him with the ice-cold water square in the chest, and he jumps back.

“Oh my God.” I can barely get the words out as I laugh hysterically. “I didn’t mean to—I’m sorry.” Tears pool at the corners of my eyes.

He shakes his arms so the water flies off them as his gaze lands on mine. “Turnabout’s fair game, Thorton.” His brows lift in a taunt. His fingers twitch as if he’s itching to touch.

He takes a step toward me.

“It was an accident. I swear.”

Another step.

“Uh-huh.”

Closer.

I can’t resist. The playful look on his face. The desire unrivaled between us. The relief that I acted like an irrational female and he took it with a complete grain of salt.

I tighten my finger on the trigger of the nozzle, sending a stream of water straight to his chest. He tries to jump out of the way, but he’s too close to avoid it.

“Oopsie.” I shrug and smile coyly.

“That wasn’t a very smart move.” There’s a roughness to his voice that electrifies the air as it telegraphs where his thoughts are. What it is he wants.

And I hope to God I’m right in thinking that it’s me.

“What are you going to do about it?” This time, I’m the one who taunts. I’m the one who teases. I’m the one who wants to finish what we’ve almost started a few times but had too much damn common sense to finish.

Another step.

I can smell the soap on his skin. I can see the beads of water on his neck and arms. I can hear the hitch of his breath. “There are a whole lot of things I could think to do about it, but I’m not sure which of them we’d regret the most once they were done.”

I squirt the hose again. This time, he flinches. This time, a laugh falls from his lips. This time, he lunges after me to grab the hose, and I dodge away from him, my fingers pulling the trigger so that I completely soak the front of his body.