“Oh my god!” I turn away from him and start walking in the opposite direction while I clear out the corners of my eyes.
“Hold on,” he calls after me. “It’s no big deal,” he says. He continues to laugh, and I’m trying to be annoyed like I should be, but it’s getting harder to suppress my own laughter.
“This was supposed to be a sexy night. I’m not going to let you clean my eye-boogers.”
“I’m sorry if you’re upset,” he says. “But I’m not.”
“You’re not?”
“No. That’s the best night’s sleep I’ve had in a long time.”
“Me too,” I admit.
“See? It wasn’t a total waste. But I am sorry we missed our night together. I’m sorry for falling asleep. Not that it’s an excuse, but I had a long shift at work yesterday.”
“It’s on me too. I can’t just blame you. Even if I wanted to,” I say.
“I don’t have work today,” he says. “Do you?”
I shake my head. “Do you still want to . . . ?”
His expression changes from that playful-young-boy demeanor of his into a dark one full of hunger. It’s like he has two personalities, my very own personal Jekyll and Hyde. He draws me to him and kisses me with greed I have never known before. He crushes his lips to mine and nibbles at my lower lip when he comes up for air. Then he plunges in again to play, his tongue on mine. His beard grazes my skin, and I whimper into his mouth. A groan comes from deep within his throat in response, and I bunch up the fabric of his shirt in my hands.
I push him away, and we are both panting. I touch my lips that now feel bruised. I can’t believe I slept with him in the literal sense of the word and hadn’t so much as kissed him. “We need to get a car,” I say. He nods and pulls out his phone.
“Your place or mine?” he asks. “I have roommates. They’ll be up soon.”
“My place is fine. I live alone.”
We ride in the back seat together and can’t help giggling as we look at each other conspiratorially. He tries grabbing my hand, but I pull it away. He chuckles, and I can’t help smiling around him. I should be mad. So mad. And with any other guy, I would be fuming if this had happened, but sleeping with him didn’t seem like a waste of time—not even with the precious few days I might have left.
“Valentina?”
“What?” I try to snap but fail.
“How do you say eye booger in Spanish?”
“Oh my god. Why do you want to know?” I look over at our driver, who doesn’t seem to care about our odd conversation.
Rory shrugs. “I think I’d like to learn Spanish.”
“And you think the best place to start is with ‘eye booger?’”
He presses his hand to his heart. “The word has sentimental value to me.” He chuckles as he says this, and soon I follow with my own laugh. Have I ever laughed this much? Rory radiates a warmth that makes it hard to be mad at him and instead has me smiling and laughing like I wasn’t already walking on death row.
“Lagaña,” I say.
“Lagaña,” he repeats.
“Excellent pronunciation,” I say, a bit proud. “But next time, let’s teach you something more useful.”
“I don’t know. It would have been useful today,” he jokes, and I smack his arm as we turn onto my street.
Dawn breaks as we enter my apartment, and Rory stares into my living room with an expression not unlike Mandy’s when she first saw it.Here we go again, I think, but unlike Mandy, he doesn’t comment on how nice it is.
I’m locking the door when he comes up behind me. He wraps his arms around me, tucking his thumb under the hem of my blouse. It lingers there as he kisses my neck, his beard tickling a trail after his lips.
“Mmm, Valentina.” He groans into my ear, and my skin breaks into goosebumps, forcing my hand to move of its own accord. I take his hand currently over my lower midriff and help him into my legging’s waist-band. I turn to face him, and his lips crush mine once again like they had at the park. He’s about to tuck my pants off when I stop him. “Wait,” I say.