I braced my hands on the bed, looking at her. “Ava.”
“The last guy just ghosted me,” she said, tossing her handbag to the ground. “He flunked out of law school. What does a girl have to do?”
I leaned in and kissed her.
She tasted like icy tequila and salt, like lip gloss and Ava. She kissed me back, arching into me and opening her mouth, running her hands up into my hair. It had been so long—so fucking long.
I remembered the last time I kissed Ava. I remembered the last time I’d touched her, the last time I’d seen her naked, the last time we did anything and everything. I remembered every second of it, while she’d probably forgotten. But she remembered me now.
She bit my lip and I bit her back, letting my teeth graze her as we fell back onto the bed. She wound herself around me as I braced myself over her, and we took the kiss deeper, deeper. I could smell her, the vanilla smell and something expensive she used on her skin mixed with her sweat and the smell of sex. I knew exactly how she liked it. I’d practiced with her dozens of times. I wondered if she still liked sex the way I did it, if she’d ever realized over the years that all of those losers weren’t me.
I wasn’t going to find out tonight.
I broke the kiss and we stilled, both of us out of breath. My entire body was on fire, from my head all the way down, deep into my balls. Ava’s legs were hooked over my hips, her ankles locked. The tie in my hair was gone and her fingers were wound into the strands, gripping me.
“You’re drunk,” I managed to say.
She said the two words that were the death of me, the two words that ripped into my gut, mixing painfully with the arousal: “Don’t go.”
I tried not to groan. I’d kissed her because I wanted her to stop talking, to stop thinking about those guys and only think about me, if only for a minute. But this… this wasn’t going to happen. I wasn’t going to be Ava’s drunken walk down memory lane. “I have to go,” I said, gently disentangling myself from her.
She let me go reluctantly, her hands sliding out of my hair. “I’m not that drunk.”
“Yes, you are.” Three margaritas. She made out with me because of three margaritas. I had to remember that.
“Dane.”
“Get some rest.” I glanced at her unzipped dress, her bare legs, her bare feet with their painted toes. Every inch of her was perfect, even when her hair was messed and she was glaring at me with drunken annoyance. “Call me tomorrow.”
Ava pushed herself up on her elbows, scowling. “Where are you going?”
“Home,” I said. It came out casually, though I was gritting my teeth. I made my feet move, made myself stride out of the bedroom and toward the door.
She didn’t speak again until the door was closing behind me.
“Dane Scotland!” she shouted. “I’m not that drunk!”
Then the door closed, and I couldn’t hear anything else she had to say.
Ten
Ava
* * *
The next morning
* * *
Ava: We’re both going to agree that never happened last night, right?
Dane: Who is this?
Ava: Very funny, nerd. So it never happened. I’m glad we agree.
Dane: I didn’t agree to anything.
Ava: Agree, or the suit you’r