Page 89 of Falling for my Brother's Best Friend

Twenty-Seven

Savannah

“Bye, Grandma. Text me when you get home.” I hug Grandma Dori with Liam at my back. His hands have secretly landed on me the entire evening.

“Behave, you two. I don’t want the sheriff calling me and saying one of you got arrested for assault.”

“I don’t know, I think Sav can pull off a pair of handcuffs.” His hand slides down my side to my backside and gives it a squeeze.

I school my features so that nothing seems amiss to my grandma.

Dori laughs. “Thanks for keeping an old lady busy.” After directing him to bend down, she kisses Liam’s cheeks.

We shut the door and Liam leans over me to flick the lock, his hot breath on my neck.

“Time to strip,” he whispers.

Goose bumps rise on my skin. “I feel bad sending her in an Uber. What if the driver takes advantage of her?”

He slides my long hair off my neck, one hand splayed across my stomach. “It’s Duke Thompson. He does it as a side job from his airport security job. She’s fine.”

Using his strong hand, he turns me, one hand landing above my head and one steady on my hip. He’s caging me in. I remember the morning when he referred to me as his prey. The way he’s staring at me now makes me feel like a caged animal, but instead of feeling intent on escape, I’m more like a stray dog that’s starving and skittish from years of never being pampered. One who welcomes the cage—Liam’s cage anyway.

He brushes my hair off my forehead and tucks it behind my ear while his thumb makes lazy circles along my hipbone. “Do you know how long I’ve waited to kiss your tattoo?”

My palms are plastered to the door as shyness swells inside me. I haven’t been with anyone for a while, which Liam probably knows. Even though I’m five years older, his experience outweighs mine by a ton. His chest remains inches from mine, but all I can think about is having the weight of his body on top of me. How nice it will feel.

“I’ve been waiting since I gave it to you,” he says. “That night sealed my fate—I’ll never get you out of my system. I thought it was a typical crush on my friends’ older sister. But that night, the trust you had in me… a trust I know doesn’t come easy to you. I knew then that no other woman would ever satisfy me the way you would.”

Is he serious? My hand slowly leaves the safety of the door, and I run my fingers down his stomach. He inhales a deep breath, watching as my hand slides under the hem of his T-shirt.

He takes another step and leans in. My self-confidence locks in my throat. Almost sensing my hesitation, he runs his cheek along mine, his hot breath at my ear. “We don’t have to. We can take this slow.”

But his thumb hasn’t stopped running along my hipbone and my fingers have found their way inside the waistband of his jeans. I want this. I just have to take it. Pushing aside my demented belief that I’ll prove unworthy while Liam holds the Guinness Book of World Records’ title for best and most thorough deliverer of orgasms, I meet him toe to toe and strain my breasts toward his chest.

He inhales deeply and our eyes lock. “I’m gonna sound like a loser, but I’m kind of nervous.”

My lips tip into a grin. Maybe I’m not the only one unsure what to expect after we cross this line. “Me too.”

He bends and I raise up on my tiptoes. His eyes are open while my hand slides from under his shirt, up his strong biceps, and into his hair. We’re millimeters apart and my eyes drift shut as I wait to experience Liam again. Our first couple of kisses were nice, but we were frantic, and I’m not sure either of us was processing anything other than getting to a bed. This time is different. We’ve dished out our problems. We’ve laid our cards on the table. We might not have classified what this is, but we’re invested in seeing what can happen.

His lips are almost pressed to mine when a key sounds in the lock behind me. We can’t react fast enough before the door whips open, hitting me in the back and catapulting me into Liam. He stumbles, grabbing my upper arms but unable to stop us before we crash to the floor. As I lay on him on his hardwood, he glances over my shoulder with a gaze colder than ice.

I look over my shoulder to find Denver looking at us, shaking his head. “Ever heard of a bedroom? I thought you two were going to stay away from each other?” Denver laughs, stepping over us.

I look at Liam and he sighs, his eyes squeezing shut and his head falling to the wood floor, defeated. Even his arms have fallen off me and are now limp at his sides.

No. No. No.I wiggle off of him as gracefully as I can in a sundress and stand up with a hop.

Denver’s head is buried in the fridge when I reach the kitchen. “What happened to the salsa that was in here?”

“Never. Happening,” Liam whispers and sits up, propping his elbows on his knees and leaning against the wall.

He’s wrong. This is going to happen.

I march over to Denver, grab the back of his T-shirt, and drag him out of the fridge.

“Whoa. What’s going on?” He barely manages to set the open container of orange juice he just drank down on the counter as I push him forward. “What’s with this?”

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