My fingers start drumming on the book, and the heaviness returns to my chest.
I start when she pulls at the book, prying it free from under my hands. “It’s a boring book. Not you, Jet. The book. If you say you’re stupid ever again, I’m going to lick you back.”
“You promise?” I try for a lascivious grin, but my heart is pounding. I watch her as she gets to her feet, glancing at the shelf closest to us. “What are you doing?”
“I think we should start with something more fun.” She trails her fingers over the colorful spines of stacked books, her lips moving without a sound. “Something like… this one.”
She pulls it out and returns to her place at my feet. She plonks the book in my lap. “Read for me?”
I stare at her, then at the book. “Harry Potter?” I frown at it. “There were movies with this, right?”
“Yes, but the books came first. Have you read them?”
Is she kidding me? I shake my head. “Isn’t it for kids?”
“No, it’s for those who don’t want to grow up.” She smiles, and my heart is pounding even harder. My chest hurts.
She’s not giving up. Not yet.
And even though I never thought of the possibility of not wanting to grow up—why wouldn’t I want to? My childhood was hell. Leaving it was all I ever hoped for—the way her eyes sparkle when she looks at this book makes me want to prove to her that I can do it. That I can let her help me, and that it will make a difference.
So I open the book and start reading.
***
My head hurts from focusing on the letters and words for so long, but the book is funny, and her giggles have me grinning, despite my pitiful reading efforts.
She takes a look at me afterward, asks if I’m okay, and I pull her up, on my lap, and kiss her. Hard.
She’s breathless when we finally draw apart, and so am I.
Then someone is knocking on the door of the shop, staring through the glass, and I make out Joel’s form.
“I was waiting for you, asshat,” he grumbles the moment we let him in. “We were going to meet at the gym for some wrestling. You forgot again.”
Dammit, I did. I hang my head, until Candy whispers something in his ear and then her arms are around me—and Joel slips behind me, molding himself to my back.
Holy shit, it feels good to be held like that between them.
“Let’s go home,” he says, his breath warm on the back of my neck, making me shiver.
Fuck, yeah, let’s.
And as I turn around, I see for the first time his neck where I sucked on him last night, and I get dizzy, all my blood heading south, thickening my cock.
Holy shit, I marked him. He has a hickey, a dark bruise I left there. I wonder if he got into any trouble at work because of it, though I bet everyone thought it was a girl who put it there.
Their arms go back around me, thank fuck because my legs are unsteady. I’m caught in a time warp as they pull me, still caught between them, out of the shop and to Joel’s car. I’m hazy on the logistics—where Candy left her car, what she told Joel, what he said back, when it was decided that we’re going back to our apartment, together, all three of us.
Fuck if I care.
Candy slips in the back, and I take the passenger seat. Her arms slip around my neck as Joel heads out into the traffic. Her hair tickles my jaw, her lips ghost under my ear.
“You smell good,” she whispers, and all the blood rushes to my dick so fast I have to press down on my hard-on, trying to ease some of the pressure.
Joel glances at me, at us, and his gaze grows hooded and dark. He puts on some old rock, and we don’t speak. There’s a hum in the air, a tension, anticipation that’s driving my mind right into the gutter.
Not that it wasn’t there already, but you know… deeper. Images flash before my eyes of our bodies writhing together, and it’s all I can do not to come in my pants.