No Interest in Love (19 page)

She ends up tugging the bottom of the back of her shirt over her head, like I used to do when I was a kid when my grandma rubbed my back, and then holds her arm out of the way so I can see her ink displayed all along her left ribs.

“Holy shit,” I say, ungluing from my frozen state, inching closer to get a better look. She's got one of those 3-D tats. Three Wolverine claw marks run over her ribs, and inside of them are the X-Men characters—all in original costumes—showing off their powers in an attempt to escape. It's badass. Not girly in the slightest, which honestly, I'd never expect from her anyway.

“And I thought
I
was a fan,” I say, tilting my head a bit to get a better look at the Phoenix and her incredibly realistic 3-D breasts.

“Yeah…it looks way better now than it did before.” She sort of chuckles to herself, but it's off. Shaky. Nervous. The air snaps like a stretched rubber band. And since I'm already not thinking straight, I reach out and touch the bottom edge of the tattoo, running my thumb over her chilled skin.

“How long did it take?”

“Three two-hour sessions.”

Ouch. “And no tears?”

“Well, I did bite a hole into the stuffed bear I was holding.”

The corner of my mouth picks up. “You had a teddy bear with you?”

“He suffered a very painful death.”

“His sacrifice is appreciated.” I shake my head at her ink. “Gotta say…I'm a bit jealous of it.”

Her lips press together, and a blush that starts from where my finger is touching her ribs runs up and over her pale skin. Adorable girl + adorable blush. I can't take it anymore.

She pulls the shirt from her head, and I catch it before it falls back over her body. The air snaps again, and I hold my breath, noticing
sweet hell
, she's holding hers too.

I move my thumb. It's just an inch or so, up a rib to the next claw mark, and I pretend to be fascinated by the tattoo still. I focus on the artwork, refusing to look up. But who am I kidding? I'm not fascinated by the ink. I'm enjoying the goose bumps patterning over her skin, the curve of her spine, the ridges in her sides, and the very small—
very small
—glimpse of breast peeking from her bright orange, ugly, yet still adorable shirt.

I move my thumb again. Up toward that glimpse of boob, but still very much on her tattoo. She's letting me touch without smacking my hand away, without throwing me a teasing comment. My heart pounds through my neck. I wonder if she can see my pulse.

So I look up.

Meet her eyes.

And lose my shit.

Her glasses have slid down again. Those hilarious glasses that suddenly seem so damn sexy. I imagine ripping them off in a moment of heat—kind of like this one—but instead I reach up and nudge them back into place.

I'm fantasizing about ripping her
glasses
off. When her shirt's mostly off already. What the hell is happening to me?

She lets her shirt fall back into place, the fabric cascading over her soft, inked skin. Something pants and howls right outside, closer than before, but her eyes don't move. Mine don't either. And I realize I'm starting to push toward her lips. The lips I suddenly can't stop looking at or thinking about. A drumroll starts up in the back of my head, putting a beat to the tension thick in the air.

Her eyes are on my lips too. She wants this? Or is she freaking out about me wanting it? Because she's stone still.

I freeze. The drumroll takes a pause. Silence buzzes through my ears.

This is usually the part when something interrupts the leads, forcing them to take a step back and realize what the hell they're doing. But there's no slamming door, no car backfiring or cell phone ringing. There's absolutely nothing, actually, minus the short, labored breaths echoing between our mouths.

Nothing's interrupting.

Nothing.

But I'm still not kissing her.

And I'm not sure why not.

“Do you hear that?” she asks, and I back the hell up, confused about the noninterrupting interruption.

“Huh? What? I wasn't doing anything.”

She bites her bottom lip, and her brow furrows as she looks over my shoulder. When her eyes widen, I glance too.

It's just a dog.

A normal dog about the size of my calf.

Not a werewolf or a bear or Sasquatch.

“
That
thing was making all that noise?”

She pushes away from the ice machine, taking the heated air with her. I shake off whatever desire I had to rip her glasses off.

“Maybe it wasn't her,” she says, crouching next to the door. The dog paws at the glass, panting so hard its breath leaves a mark.

“You think it's hurt?”

“She might be, but I don't want to open the door unless I know she's not going to tear my hand off.”

“Ditto.” I've seen
Cujo
. I crouch down next to her, pressing my hand up against the glass. “You know it's a girl?”

She nods. “Looks like she's…” Shay's voice stops, and she kinks her neck to look at the dog's underbelly.

“Pregnant?” I finish for her, though the dog doesn't look it.

“No. I think she's…in
heat
.”

The words come out of her lips and not three seconds later another dog leaps from nowhere, sporting a pretty large red rocket. Shay and I jump back, both of us falling flat on our asses while Red Rocket gets into position and wastes no time pushing Ms. Heat against the glass.

Ar, ar, arroooo!

The dogs pound against the glass door, shaking the bell on the knob. I lean up on my elbows, glancing at Shay with a raised eyebrow. She looks back at me.

“I th-think,” I stutter, “I think you're right.”

And she laughs.

I mean, a bolting laugh. It's not silent or suppressed or one of those she uses to humor me. It's the most gorgeous sound in the world. It drowns out the banging and clanging and howling. It lifts the corners of her mouth, shows me her teeth, creates lines near her beautiful eyes, and next thing I know, my hand finds the back of her neck and I push my lips flush against hers.

She's cold. The hair tangled in my fingers is still damp from her shower, her cheeks chilled, and her mouth like ice. The smallest touch of her hand taps my wrist and squeezes at my pounding pulse.

I should probably break away. But I'm feeling her lips melt, her cheeks warm under my thumbs.

I suddenly have a million kisses I
have
to give to her.

Three million.

Like they were reserved for this moment right here, not for the countless lips I saw in my future but for the lips that own the most gorgeous laugh I've ever heard.

And it scares the hell out of me.

My mouth leaves hers with a heavy sigh that comes from deep in my gut. I'm not sure if what I'm feeling is guilt or embarrassment or
amazement
, but it takes me a few seconds before I can let go of her neck.

She's looking at me like she has no clue what just happened, and I wish I could tell her. All I know is that it felt good. That I want more, but I'm not sure
how much more
. She swallows hard, eyes darting to her shaking hand on my wrist. I realize then that she's not sure how much she wants either. Or if she even wants it.

“Shit,” I say, untangling from her. I rest my elbow on my knee and cover my eyes because I'm a damn coward. She should leave. Run as far and as fast as she can from me—the asshole. Shay deserves commitment, someone who's sure of themselves. As soon as the humping dogs are out of the way we'll go to our separate rooms and I'll make wishes for a time machine to go back and erase my lapse in judgment.

But the thought of that bludgeons me in the chest.

Then a slightly cold touch on my wrist makes me drop my hand, and I lock eyes with her for two seconds before her lips come crashing down on mine.

They're still cold, but her tongue…

Her tongue is blazing hot.

And it's in my mouth.

I push her back, lock eyes with her again, silently asking her if she really wants this, because I'm not even sure if I do.

She gives me a barely-there nod.

I grab at her neck while she grabs at mine and we fight for each other's tongues. She pushes me to my back, yanking my hands from her face and pinning them to the floor. Her stomach falls flush with mine, and it's hard. Firm. Surprising…

I thought she'd be fragile and soft
everywhere
, but she's not. She's better. She's a soft woman who is fighting me for control, clawing to get closer, relentless in her quest for satisfaction. It makes me want to fight back, claw back, be as rough and as anxious as I'm feeling. I manage to get out of her firm hold, swinging her around, pinning her with my hips to the floor. She rips her hands out of my grasp, scrapes her nails through my hair, and yanks on the ends
hard—
making sure I don't go anywhere, but I'm not going
anywhere
. I don't think I want to go anywhere ever again. Screw leaving the ice machine. Screw going back to separate rooms. Hell, screw the audition.

She makes a throaty noise and I realize how hard my fingers are digging into her ass. I loosen my hold and run my hand up that ugly, adorable shirt, clutching what I know is her tattoo. My lips make a hard path across her jaw and down her neck, and she arches for me to get better access. Then she shivers and flexes under me, her knees trapping my leg between hers.

Woody's getting anxious. He's urging my hips forward, trying to find the soft spot on Shay before we both get our heads back on. He's relentless, the horny bastard. Nudging me forward when I know I shouldn't. And like he hears me yelling at him to back off, he stretches harder, causing months' worth of pain that I just want to get rid of in the best way possible.

Shay's fingers tug on my hair again, pull my lips back to hers for one wet, hot kiss, before she breaks it.

And she bites into my shoulder.

I blink, gasp, grunt, and try to see, because I'm pretty sure I just blacked out.

When I come to, Woody has taken over. And he's not stopping.

I pull Shay up against me, stand us up, slam her ass down on top of the ice machine and rub against her. Shay tosses her head back, wet hair hitting my hands around her waist. She locks her ankles together over my ass, digging her heels in, urging me forward, faster, harder, moremoremore. She mutters a Korean curse under her breath, and when her eyes meet mine, I stop moving my hips for a second. Just for a second. To pull off those glasses.

They get a little caught on her ears, but I get them off and fold them up. I push them on top of the ice machine without dropping her gaze.

Shay is adorable.

She's cute.

Sexy.

Gorgeous.

All of the above.

I push her hair back, fisting it in my hand, watching her almond eyes drift over my flexed muscles. My thumb escapes her hair to stroke her cheek. I'm in absolute awe of this woman who's been in my life seven years and I'm only just
now
seeing.

She reaches up and pulls at my hair. She thrusts up against me. Her legs squeeze my hips tight. I ignore the request for hard and fast and continue to use the soft touches across her face.

Her eyes narrow, and the corner of my mouth quirks up. My fingers travel down to her beating heart, and it pumps against my palm. I count the beats, then realize that my own heart is alive in my chest, beating in the exact opposite tune. Together we'd sound like one continuous sound. I kinda like that. I like how romantic these thoughts are. Maybe I should say them out loud…you know,
directly to
the girl who's twisted me inside out. Tell her about that twitch in the corner of her mouth that I like. How adorable she is. How I like that she's tough and can take care of herself. That fingernail. How I'm digging that chewed-up fingernail. And confess that I've been waiting for an excuse to grab that sweet ass of hers.

Well, maybe that last one isn't as romantic, but hell, I may say it anyway.

I lean down and kiss her slowly, and laugh when she tries to move her mouth in a faster rhythm. She lets out an impatient sigh, which makes me grin wider, and then I link my fingers with hers.

“I've…” I whisper, eyes drifting from her kiss-swollen lips to our woven fingers. “I've never held a girl's hand like this.”

Shay quietly watches me as I tap her soft knuckles. I've accepted other girls' hands when they've given it to me, but I've never wanted to reach out, link fingers, hold on tight, and never let go. It's a feeling I'm so unfamiliar with that it makes the heated air around us shift. It washes over me, stops my heart, and I'm sucked in with a pleasure and satisfaction I've never known before. So much so that I have to press my lips to the palm of the hand I so desperately want in mine for much longer than one night.

Shay's eyes pop open wide, staring at our hands, my lips, and like she had no clue what's been going on for the last ten minutes, she shoves on my chest.

“Oh…oh no…” she mutters, and I let her slither off the ice machine. “Wait, wait, wait.”

“What's wrong?” I ask, but something tells me I don't want to know the answer.

She fixes her shirt as she puts a fair amount of distance between us. She paces the room, pointer finger out as she scolds…
herself
.

“No pen in the company ink.”

“Um…what?”

“No shitting where you eat.” She's still not looking at me. I try my best to adjust myself without her noticing, then head over to her.

“Hey,” I say, wrapping my hands around her tiny elbows. She stops pacing, stands in front of me without looking up. She's muttering in Korean to herself under her breath, and I start laughing. “Am I that bad of a kisser?”

“I can't do this,” she says, ignoring my joke. “Not with you.
Especially
not with you.”