Foreplay (The Ivy Chronicles #1)(19)

He held up both hands as though warding me off. His half smile mocked me. “If you say so.”

I made a growl of frustration. “Don’t do that.”

“What?”

“Condescend to me,” I snapped.

One of his dark eyebrows winged high. “Uh-oh. I made you mad. College girl is pulling out the big vocabulary now.”

How did this guy get girls to make out with him? He was a colossal jerk. I could blame it on his looks, but not all hot guys were jerks. Hunter wasn’t.

“Prick,” I muttered as I turned to slide into my car. “Why don’t you go back to serving beer and stale peanuts?”

His hand closed around my arm and pulled me back around. I looked down at his hand on my arm and then up to his face.

“Hey,” he said flatly, all hint of a smile gone. My pulse skittered at my neck and I resisted the urge to press a hand there and steady the wild thrum of my blood. I wouldn’t reveal his effect on me. “The peanuts aren’t stale.”

I might have laughed except there was no levity in his expression. His pale blue eyes fastened on my face. His fingers clung to my arm, burning an imprint through my sleeve.

Then those eyes dropped to my lips.

OhGodOhGodOhGod. He’s going to kiss me.

This was it. The moment of my second—scratch that. Third kiss. Unsolicited or not, I had to count last night. This one was the one I had been waiting for though. The one where I would learn to actually kiss. From a guy—a man—who knew how to do it properly.

He inched toward me. My heart erupted like a drum in my chest. His head dipped, and then all thought of what I was about to do fled. There was no thinking. No calculated logic. Just pure sensation.

Blood roared in my ears as he closed the last scrap of space between us. It wasn’t fast. Not like in the movies. No swooping head. I watched his face coming closer. His gaze moved from my mouth back to my eyes several times, studying me, watching my reaction. His hand touched my face, holding my cheek.

No one had ever done that. Well, not that I had a lot of reference, but the warm rasp of his palm on my face felt so very intimate. It made the moment so real, so powerful.

I jumped a little when his mouth finally settled over mine. As though the contact brought on an electrical shock or something. He pulled back and looked at me. For a moment, I thought it was over, that he was finished after just that brush of our lips.

Then his mouth pressed down on mine again and there was nothing tentative about it. His kiss was confident, demanding. Pure deliciousness. Still holding my face with one hand, his other one moved to the small of my back, drawing me closer. His lips tasted mine, angling first one way and then another. As though he wanted to sample every possible direction. His tongue traced the seam of my lips and I shuddered, letting him inside my mouth. My hands gripped his shoulders, fingers curling around the soft cotton, reveling in the warm solidness of him beneath the fabric.

Then it was over. Too soon. I staggered, losing my balance. I caught hold of my open car door with one hand, blinking like I had just woken from some sort of dream. I lifted my hand to my lips, brushing them, feeling them, still warm from his lips. I focused on him, watching in astonishment as he turned and left me standing beside my vehicle.

Not another word. Not another look back.





Chapter 7

After surviving my statistics exam, I trekked across the quad toward the Java Hut. Even though I’d grabbed a latte beforehand, I felt like I deserved another one after that hellish test. Plus, I hadn’t slept very well over the last two nights. Not since Reece had kissed me.

Emerson claimed it was a surefire sign of my growing irresistibility. Thinking of that, I rolled my eyes, getting a strange look from a girl passing me.

I ducked into the coffee shop, glad to escape the chill. I’d have to wear my heavy coat and gloves soon.

Walking across the wood flooring, I inhaled the aroma of espresso and fresh pastries. There were several pumpkin muffins and scones on display and even orange iced cookies shaped like jack-o’-lanterns.

The line was shorter than it had been two hours ago and I fell in behind a girl talking loudly on her phone. I tried to ignore her jarring tones as I stood on my tiptoes and eyed the scones several feet ahead. Deciding on the cranberry one, I let my thoughts drift back to the animated conversation I’d had with my roommates yesterday.

Emerson had insisted that Reece following me out of the bar translated into mad skills of seduction on my part. Her words, of course. I didn’t see it that way. Not when he walked off after kissing me without another word. I felt like I was in tenth grade all over again. Any moment I was going to turn around and find kids whispering behind their hands about me in indiscreet voices. Worst kisser.

Absurd, I know. This wasn’t high school. We weren’t fifteen years old. And we hardly moved in the same social circles, anyway. If he did want to share that my kiss left him uninspired, who would he tell?

Georgia simply thought I should go back and see what happened next—the assumption being that something more would happen between us. It was that possibility that made my belly flutter like it was home to a thousand bees. I was caught between the fear that he would ignore me and the panic that he wouldn’t.

“We really need to stop bumping into each other like this. People will think we’re having an affair.” Lost in my surging thoughts, I jumped a little at the voice close to my ear.