Fly With Me (Wild Aces #1)(81)

But what should I say? I’m already in a relationship was a blatant lie that Rachel and Julie could easily debunk. And I didn’t want to hurt his feelings and make him think it was something wrong with him. And, Sorry, but you have the same job as my former fiancé who I have not managed to get over in a decade, sounded really f*cking sad.

“Listen—”

“There he is,” Bandit interjected.

I would later appreciate the irony as Taylor Swift filled the bar, singing about a guy being trouble, at the exact moment—

I swiveled in my chair, my world stopped, and my wineglass hit the ground.

Eric—heart-crushing, would-rather-slide-inside-a-jet-than-me, one-that-got-away Eric stood in front of me, his arm draped around the shoulders of a stunning blonde.

He was just as tall as I remembered—tall enough that it was an effort to look up at him. His reddish blond hair was the same—or was it just a touch lighter? His blue eyes seemed more intense than I’d remembered, which was just stupid because of course they hadn’t changed—maybe it was just me and my reaction to him. Or that the way he looked at me had changed. Before, his gaze had been heated and affectionate; now, it just looked . . . I didn’t even know. His shoulders were broader, his body much more impressive than I’d remembered, but I figured that came with the territory and his job.

He looked good. Really good. Better than the mental image I had kept tucked away in the recesses of my mind, which was a pretty impressive feat considering I’d had some good memories to keep me company in his absence.

His hair fell over his forehead, his gaze boring into me, and his teeth sunk into his bottom lip—a lip I’d sucked over and over again—and a little wave of light-headedness hit me. Or maybe it was the sexual drought finally hitting me full force, or the wine, or the loud music, or the fact that my heart hammered in my chest.

More likely, it was the force of Eric. Six-feet-two-inches of Eric.

Fuck me.



THOR

No f*cking way.

I blinked, convinced I’d somehow hallucinated her, that Becca Madison couldn’t possibly be here, standing a few feet away from me, Bandit’s arm brushing against her side.

The sound of breaking glass shattered the haze, everyone around us scrambling to pick up her dropped wineglass. We didn’t move; it was like time stood still for the two of us while the world went on.

“Becca?”

I had to say her name, as though somehow that would confirm that this wasn’t a case of mistaken identity or a dream, that she was really here, in front of me.

She looked different and somehow the same—maybe that was the effect of ten years. Her dark hair was up, exposing the curve of her neck and highlighting the deep vee between her breasts. Glasses perched atop her nose, dark frames that somehow complemented her deep brown eyes and made her even more beautiful. She’d never been in-your-face sexy; instead, she’d cornered the market on the sexy librarian fantasy, the good girl who you wanted to play with until she turned bad.

And considering how many times I’d had her naked, my body sliding into hers, drowning in her tight, wet heat, I knew just how mind-blowing the sex could be.

“Do you guys know each other?” the girl next to me—Mandy or something—asked.

“Yes.”

“We used to,” Becca answered at the same time.

I took a step away from Mandy, still feeling like I was in a dream.

“I can’t believe it’s really you.”

She didn’t answer me, her gaze unwavering, assessing. I struggled not to flinch under the weight of her stare, the measure of all that I’d lost.

“How have you been?”

Had it really been ten years? Did it feel like less because there hadn’t been a day when I didn’t think of her? When I didn’t wonder where she was or what she was doing?

And now she was here, looking up at me with those big brown eyes that I was helpless in the face of, her presence a punch in the gut and a knee to the balls as she knocked the wind out of me.

Finally she spoke, her voice making me ache.

“Good. Great, actually,” she squeaked.

“Good. Good.” I swallowed, losing a bit of myself as I stared at her. “You look great.”

A flush of color spread across her cheeks. “Thanks.”

I heard Easy calling my name, felt the blonde tugging on my arm, watched as Bandit slipped his arm around Becca as though he could somehow claim the girl I’d fallen in love with when I was seventeen f*cking years old.

I wanted to reach out and hold on to her, wanted to keep her in front of me even as I felt her getting ready to pull away, wanted to fall to my knees and fix the mistake I’d made a decade ago.

I swallowed again, trying to steady my voice, wondering if I sounded as desperate as I felt.

“Do you want to get out of here—”

“I’m going to go.” Becca lurched off her chair, her gaze darting around the group, looking everywhere but at me.

Look at me. Please. Give me a chance.

“Becca—”

She didn’t look at me, didn’t react. It was as though I hadn’t even spoken, and after a hasty good-bye—swallowed up by the white noise rushing through my ears—she was gone as quickly as she’d crashed back into my life, her brown hair gleaming, bobbing through the crowd until even that disappeared and I was left standing by the bar, feeling like I’d just been hit by a Mack truck, surrounded by six pairs of curious eyes and one pissed-off blonde.