Country Kisses (3:AM Kisses Book #8)(4)
“So, what are you thinking?” Scarlett bounces that long dark-red hair of hers over her shoulder as if it were a cat. “Girls night at the club? I’ll tell them you’re working a shift?”
“Exactly that.” I bite down on a mischievous smile. I can just see Piper’s and Daisy’s sure-as-heck shocked faces once I—Caila Jace—strip down to tits and tails. “I’ll simply tell them I’m headed for the restroom and watch from a distance as they lose their collective minds.”
“And the big reveal?” Her brows rise up over her field green eyes. St. Patrick himself couldn’t be prouder of that sacred color. There’s no denying the fact Scarlett is an Irish stunner.
I glance back up at my new quasi-stalker at the bar to see if he’s shifted his attention to the iconic beauty in front of me, but his eyes meet up with my mine, and, as if on cue, my stomach explodes in a fireball.
My body shifts over my seat as I turn my full attention back to my friend and the dildo still warming in her hand.
“Yes—the big reveal.” I clear my throat. “I’ll run out and stuff Caila’s G-string with a fistful of dollars, and a good time will be had by all. My sister included.”
“Hilarious.” She averts her eyes as if she believes it’s anything but. “All right, Cassie the Comedian, I’m out of here. You hanging around?”
Everything in me demands I glance back to the boy at the bar, but I can’t bring myself to do it. He’s pretty cute. I don’t mind when a douchebag looks offended by my features, but a boy that riles up my hormones like that sure knows how to deal a blow to my already fractured ego.
“You know”—I offer up my best version of an indifferent shrug—“maybe I’ll hang out just for a bit.”
“All righty ’kay. See you on the flip side!” Scarlett takes off early on this Friday night, if you can call eleven-thirty early, but she’s sporty and up early doing things of a sporty nature even on weekends, thus the real reason she prefers to retire early. I, on the other hand, nary enjoy a sport where I’m forced to break a sweat. Except for sports of the hot, naked, physical variety, which in my case always involves a worthy opponent from the opposite gender—which brings me to my oh-so little friend. I reach over and molest the hell out of my new blue rubber boy toy. Not that I’ve partaken of silicone pleasure before. Although, to my sister’s point, I haven’t had the real deal in quite some time, so I can’t really see how this is going to dampen my non-existent down-and-dirty parade. Come June, it’ll be a year. My last dildo—that of the flesh variety, that actually came attached to a douche full of hot air. That entire nightmare went down at my high school graduation party. I was a little too loaded—he even more so, being that he kept calling me Caila. Most boys did. Anyway, it was a quick and rather disappointing quickie. Nothing to write home about as odd as that concept would be.
I swallow hard at the memory. Not sure why my poor, tired brain went there. I reach for my drink, only to find my glass empty of its fruity goodness, not even the cherry left to comfort me no thanks to my sister’s stem twisting tongue. Lord knows what else she’s able to contort with that thing.
“Let me get you another,” a warm voice hums from above, and I glance up, horrified and more than slightly pleased, to find my barstool suitor has upped the ante and is now strutting his handsome stuff before me, offering to ply me with liquor no less.
My mouth opens to flip back some saucy retort, dripping with the promise of Southern comfort, of course, when I take in those deep-end-of-the-night eyes, those features sculpted to perfection, thick lashes that look as if they’re growing as we speak, and my words bottleneck in my throat. Just the sight of him cuts a heated line across my stomach and sends my adrenaline pumping as if I’m about to jump on the ride of a lifetime. But, my God, this boy looks familiar... It’s as if I’ve seen him, woken up to him for the last few months straight… Then it hits me.
Gah! That face! I know those ocean deep eyes, those well-deep dimples, those gorgeous traffic-stopping features. It’s Piper! This is a dude that can pass as my roommate’s…
Oh my ever-loving God! I suck in a sharp breath.
“Cade James.” He holds out a hand, and I stare at it as if it’s about to morph into another head—this time his sister’s.
Cade James. Yes, of course, it is. Piper has mentioned Cade on more than one occasion. She worships the ground this boy walks on, and dear Lord up in Heaven, I can totally understand why.
I, of all people, understand how eerily similar one can look to their sibling, but, for the life of me, I can’t get over how alarmingly attracted I suddenly am to my roommate’s big brother. There’s something boyish under that tough guy, albeit slightly perverse veneer, and I find it outright adorable.
Piper is a sweetheart—with an iron will and the mouth of a sailor, but still, this is nothing short of dormitory incest brewing here.
He begins to retract his hand, and I’m quick to clamp my fingers over his with a yet firmer grip—not the limp fish I usually relegate to such occasions, but I’m not letting him think there’s the promise of a wrestling match brewing here either.
“Cassidy Clayton.” My voice swivels and swerves in sheer country delight, much to what would have been my sister’s chagrin. As much as she likes to denounce our free-range heritage, I like to wield it like a pitchforked weapon.