Big Rock(11)

Whoa.

That surprise over her holding my hand? It’s nothing compared to the surprise from what comes next.

She thrusts her coffee cup at Bradley, and in the blink of an eye she wraps her hands around my neck, and presses her lips to mine.





CHAPTER SEVEN


Charlotte is kissing me.

On the streets of New York.

Her lips are on mine.

She tastes fantastic.

Like cream and sugar and coffee and sweetness. Like all the good things in the world. Like I imagined she’d taste.

Not that I’ve been thinking about kissing my best friend.

But, look, you can’t help where your mind wanders sometimes as a guy. Any man who is friends with a woman has taken the old imagination out for a stroll to Kissing Avenue, then Lovers Lane, then Fucking Street.

Which is exactly what I’m going to be visiting in Ye Olde Brain if she keeps brushing those lips softly against mine in this fluttery? lingering kind of kiss. Because it is getting harder to think about anything other than turning up the volume on this lip-lock.

A lot harder.

She lets out the tiniest little noise—like a sigh, or a gasp, or an almost-but-not-quite moan. And if she does that again, I will be pushing her against the slate-gray brick wall of her building, caging her in, sliding my hands along her sides and turning this into a full-body kiss.

Because she is too f*cking sexy for her own good.

For my good.

She lets go of my lips.

My hard-on doesn’t get the message to chill out. It’s still pointing in her direction, wanting more. I cycle to my certified best buzzkill, picturing sweaty basketball players, and it goes down as Charlotte flashes a devilishly satisfied grin at Bradley.

While Charlotte was busy devouring me on Lexington Avenue, Bradley’s jaw had become dislodged from his face and fell to the ground.

Excellent.

“We got engaged last night. And I couldn’t be happier,” she says, snuggling up next to me and snaking an arm around my waist.

He tries to speak, but fish air bubbles come out instead.

Oh, this is priceless. I stare down at my shoes. I’m not smirking right now. I swear I haven’t got a big-ass grin on my face. I’m just the innocent bystander who got lip-smacked by the goddess.

“And like I said, it would be awesome if you could stop assaulting me with balloons and teddy bears and chocolate-covered cherries,” she says, and I make a quiet snort. Charlotte can’t stand chocolate-covered cherries. How does he not know this?

“I don’t even like them,” she says to Bradley, as she inches her fingers tighter around my waist. So tight that for a sliver of a second it seems like…like she’s copping a feel of my abs.

Okay.

That’s not even remotely a problem at all. Those rock-solid abs are there for your pleasure, m’lady.

“I had no idea you two were involved,” Bradley says. I look up to see the wheels turning in his head. “Were you always?”

Charlotte’s expression morphs into one of complete, slack-jawed shock. “What did you just say?”

He’s graduated. I didn’t think it was possible. But he just earned the title of Master Asshole.

Time to step in.

“No, Bradley. It’s all new. It’s all quite recent,” I say, meeting his eyes. “And to be honest, I really owe you a huge debt of thanks. If it wasn’t for you, and those quality control tests you performed on the kitchen counter, we might never have had the chance to be together. So thank you for f*cking up a good thing with the most amazing woman in the world. ’Cause now she’s mine.” Then to bust his chops one more time, I drag her against me caveman-style, bend her backward, and kiss her hard again.

In seconds, I pull her up, wave good-bye to her ex, and guide her into her building.

I’m not sure if she’s more shocked by what he just said, what I just did, or by her own spur-of-the-moment decision, but as soon as we’re in the elevator, she turns to me, and shrugs happily. “I guess I’m playing your fiancée for the next week, Snuffaluffagus. We’ve got to buy a ring at two, and I’m going to require a full debrief.”

There are other things I’d like to debrief right now. But this works too.

*

I do my best work in the bedroom. This is completely my domain. So it should be no big deal that she asked me to wait here. But something about being in Charlotte’s bedroom is wigging me out.

Mostly because there’s nudity transpiring mere feet away.

She’s taking a shower, and no matter how you slice them, New York apartments are thimble size. Let me spell this out—There is a wet, naked, hot woman in a ten-foot radius.

Got it? Okay. Moving on.

I pick up a picture frame on her sky blue bureau, a photo of the dog her parents have. A fluffy brown summa dog—some of this, some of that. I’m going to focus on this mutt. Zero in on him. Look at his tail. Check out his ears. Yup, this picture is doing the trick. It is helping me not to linger on the naked woman and how well she kisses.

Or how much I liked it.

Why the f*ck did I like it so much?

Of course you liked it, idiot. You’re a straight male and a pretty woman kisses you—you’d be stupid not to like it. End of story. Doesn’t mean anything. Stop analyzing.

Especially since she just turned off the shower.