Page 23 of Taboo

“Kali, why don’t you do the honors this time? What are we toasting to?” Noah puts her on the spot and I watch her shift in her seat while she thinks about a toast. My eyes fall to her long braided hair, still damp from her shower.

“To taking it one day at a time.” I watch him smirk and lift his glass, so I follow. This one didn’t taste as smooth as the other one, but it might be me choking on the thoughts swirling around in my head.

“I’m headed up to shower.” She turns toward me and surprises me with a soft kiss. I let my tongue slide over hers a few times before I pull back and look her in the eyes. “I’ll be back down in a few.” Her smile allows me to leave her with a confidence that she’s still feeling me, even though I’m not pushing.

“Sounds great.” She gives me one last kiss before I leave the two of them alone. I decide I need to hurry my ass up and show back up as the usual Levi and leave this tired asshole upstairs.

Kali

Noah is playing games even though he said he’d leave me alone unless I approached him. I can tell Levi caught on to his shenanigans and I know I’ll need to tell him everything soon. He deserves the truth from me and I can only hope he doesn’t hate me for what has happened the past few days.

“Was that little show for me?” Noah’s irritation is obvious by the sound of his voice.

“It wasn’t a show, Noah. You know I’ve been spending time with Levi lately. He’s actually really nice to me.”

“Oh, I don’t doubt that.”

“Don’t be like that. You have to give me time to process all of this.” I stand with the intention of going upstairs to escape his rude demeanor when he moves around the bar to meet me.

“Tell me. Do you think he could still taste my kiss on these sexy lips of yours?” He rubs his thumb over my bottom lip, wiping away any moisture Levi left behind.

“What makes you think I didn’t scrub my lips once you left?” He squints his eyes before he responds with a mischievous grin on his face.

“Because we both know you slid two fingers in that pussy of yours and thought of me while you were left wanting the real thing.”

“Is this you keeping your distance? Because to me it feels like you’re coming at me from all angles.” He puts his hand down at his side and allows his eyes to brush over my face. I can almost feel him as he takes all my features in.

“You’re fucking gorgeous and you have no idea. That alone makes you dangerous.” I don’t respond to him; that’s what he wants from me. He’s making it very clear that he won’t be giving me my space to figure things out. He’s going to be very aggressively torturing me until I either give in to him or leave so he can’t get to me.

Levi has been amazing to me and I can’t shake how I’m beginning to feel about him, but at what point do I try to process how I’ve felt for years and try to compare that to what I’ve been experiencing with Levi the past week or so?

“Drink with me. Maybe when Levi comes down we can all get to know each other a little better. Since we’ve missed out on so much of each other’s lives.” He leaves me standing by myself on this side of the bar while he pours another drink for both of us.

“Is your plan to get me drunk?”

“And what if it is? Truth tends to come out when someone has liquid courage.” He watches me closely as he reaches over the bar once again, handing me my glass. “Something tells me you’ll react differently after another one of these.” I wonder if Noah is only acting like this because he’s mad at Levi for what we’ve been doing and this is his way at revenge.

Maybe he hopes I’ll give in and then he can rub it in Levi’s face while he throws me out to the world alone once again because he can’t handle our connection. Who knows what he’s up to, but I can handle a few drinks and remain clear headed. He has no idea what I’ve been doing with my life if he thinks two drinks will have me spilling all my secrets.

The only thing I know is I can’t lose Levi right now. He makes me feel secure and safe and that’s something I haven’t had in my life. It’s something I’m not willing to lose.

“I’m not one of your light weight floozies, Noah. I can hold my own. You pressuring me into drinking won’t change my dilemma.” I won’t go into how much I’m starting to care about Levi; he won’t believe me anyway. With Noah, everything is about him so he won’t understand how I’m feeling, even if I try to explain it to him.

“I’m hearing a challenge!” Levi yells out from the stairs before he enters the kitchen to join us again.

“That’s what I’ve been saying.” Noah looks to Levi as if he’ll help encourage me to drink.

“Maybe we should hit the golf course for a little round of glow in the dark, like the old days.” Noah smiles the second the words come out of Levi’s mouth.

“Have fun, boys. This girl still doesn’t play golf.”

“I’ll teach you.” Levi towel dries his messy hair while his blue eyes work to convince me to do anything he says.

“Yeah, he can teach you.” Noah throws back another shot before he walks out of the room. “I’ll call Mike and tell him we’ll be on the green so he doesn’t send the cops out to get us like the old days.”

“Is he harassing you?”

“I can handle Noah.” Levi moves close enough that his scent hits me just before he pops the towel toward my leg.

---