Fighting Solitude (On The Ropes #3)(31)

“Wow. How enlightening from a man who hasn’t been on a real date in over four years. And don’t even say it! Hooking up with a girl after a fight doesn’t count.”

Mid-bite, I swung my gaze to hers. “What the hell are you talking about?”

Unfortunately, I knew exactly what she was talking about. I just didn’t know how she knew what she was talking about.

Did I sometimes pick up a girl after a fight? Yes. Did I ever once let on to anyone that it happened? Fuck no. Not Till. Not Flint. And sure as f*ck not Liv. It didn’t happen very often, and the women always knew the score. But f*ck…as much as my mind would rather be in the peace and quiet of my own apartment, my body was twenty-four years old. Back when it had started, I’d been struggling, and while I had known that those empty orgasms weren’t helping anything, they definitely hadn’t hurt anything, either. If nothing else, they at least relaxed me so I wasn’t a pent-up, miserable bastard all the time. Well, maybe they just helped with the pent-up part of that equation.

It was either screw girls after fights, jack my dick until it fell off, or find someone I actually wanted to date. And no f*cking way were the last two options happening.

So yeah, on occasion, I wrapped my cock in a condom and found a warm body to essentially jerk off inside.

Fuck. I was a douchebag of a completely different variety.

“I have eyes, Quarry. Just because you don’t tell me doesn’t mean I haven’t seen you carting some skank back to your hotel room.”

I huffed, unimpressed. Though, secretly, I was seriously impressed that she’d actually noticed. I’d thought I’d done a damn fine job of keeping that part of my life hidden.

“Your eyes didn’t see shit. All of those kinky books you read are f*cking with your head.” I stood, twisting the top on the peanut butter then snapping my fingers for her empty wine glass. “Another?” I didn’t bother waiting for her answer before taking the glass and walking to the kitchen.

“It doesn’t make you a bad person, Quarry,” she called after me.

“Drop it,” I growled.

“You don’t have to hide the fact that you might actually be moving on. Honestly, I’m just hoping one of them figures out how to pack a twenty-pound lunch box and relieves me of my duties. You know I won’t always be here to feed you.”

I should have shut the conversation down right then and there, but for some reason, I snapped back entirely too roughly, “Oh, yeah. You want to be relieved of your duties? Consider it done. But I’m not getting a girlfriend just to cook for me.”

As I rounded the corner carrying her second glass of wine, her soft, brown eyes met mine.

“It’s been four years, Q,” she said. “It’s time to move—”

“What are you doing?” I asked. “Hosting an intervention for my cock? Till and Flint gonna bust up in here any minute with condoms and lube?”

Her eyes turned hard, and her lip curled. “Lube? Ew! I did not need to know that.”

And, just because I felt the need to be a dick and make her just as uncomfortable as I already was, I popped a shoulder in a half shrug and grabbed my dick, giving a firm shake as I said, “This big, Liv, lube becomes a necessity.”

As her eyes grew wide, I realized my attempt at making her uncomfortable had backfired.

Monumentally.

Taking the glass from my hand, she asked, “Noted. Should I start adding lube to your travel bags for the girls after the fights, then?”

It was a snarky comment that proved she wasn’t buying my story, but that wasn’t why my plan went haywire.

No. That question was only the beginning of the biggest mind-f*ck I would ever experience.

Her heated gaze dropped to the hand cupping my cock. Then, within seconds, her nipples very noticeably peaked beneath the fabric of her clingy dress.

What. The. Fuck.

But that wasn’t even the worst of it.

The head of my cock responded by swelling while I drank her in…drinking me in.

“Uh, no,” I mumbled, twisting away before she could spot the bulge growing in my sweats.

Shocked, I stared down at my cock as if it could somehow tell me why it was standing at attention after I’d checked Liv James out. Christ. How hard up did I have to be to sprout wood over my best friend?

Apparently, it was time to find one of those girls I had been lying about. ASAP.

Wait. I wasn’t the only one who’d been turned on by our awkward exchange. How hard up was she?

“When was the last time you got laid?” I blurted, my back still facing her—not wanting to display the flagpole currently tenting my pants.

“A while, but you can’t blame me. Douchebags suck in bed.”

Not this one.

Oh, God!

I jumped in surprise when her arms suddenly folded around my waist from behind.

Goddamn it!

“Don’t be mad,” she whispered into my T-shirt.

My heart raced as her front came flush with my back. Liv hugged me all the time, but never—not once—had I noticed how firm her tits were as they pressed against me. Right then, in the middle of what was clearly some kind of sexual psychotic episode, it was all I could think of. Every breath I took ground her large breasts into me. And, with the rate in which my lungs sped at that realization, it left us only one step away from dry-humping.