Page 112 of Death is My BFF

“Your tongue had a funny way of showing it.”

“I-I don’t remember that either,” I stammered. Thinking about his wicked tongue fueled my corrupted imagination in ways that made my reckless hormones perform enthusiastic backflips. Poker-faced, but burning all over, I tilted my chin up. “Next, you’re going to tell me I kissed you first, right?”

“That goes without saying.”

I barked out a laugh. “Good joke!”

He stole an apple from my basket and raised it to his shadowy mouth. A few crunches, and the whole apple, including the core, was polished off.Well, that was unnecessary.

Death braced a powerful hand on the roof of Aunt Sarah’s car, like a composed predator. “You got on your tippy-toes. All doe-eyed and awkward. I felt bad, so I let it happen. The end.”

“We kissed at the exact same time,” I said, fuming over this.

“Sure about that?”

I looked off into space, second-guessing myself. “No!” I shouted, pointing a finger at him as I placed the basket of apples on the ground. “No, no,no! You’re screwing with me again! It was at the same time! Might I add, I distinctly recall your hands grabbing my ass! And my thighs!” Shouting these things at him made that night somehow more real. “Which means you—you were into it, too!”

“Gaining your memory back, I see?” I could hear him grinning.

“Now do you remember the moaning?”

“I thought you didn’t like me,” I fired back.

“Idon’t,” he seethed, his voice slipping back into that preternatural growl. “You are, without a shadow of a doubt, the most annoying person to ever exist.” He leaned into me. “But I won’t deny that last night was . . . surprising. Your body felt perfect against mine. You have a great ass too. I love an ass I can get a nice handful of.”

Burn. Everything was burning inside me. “You need help.

Serious therapy, dude. Padded room, straitjacket, meds, the whole nine yards! We arenevertalking about this again. I’m so serious.

Never again. It never happened.”

“Fine by me.”

“Good,” I panted out. I had gotten so worked up that I’d barely been breathing. “Because I’d like to pretend my first wasn’t with death personified, thank you very much.”

He didn’t say anything for a moment. “Yourfirst? I was your first kiss?”

I wanted to push my hair in front of my face and hide like Cousin Itt. “You knew I was a virgin, but you didn’t know I’d never kissed before?”

“The virgin part was obvious. You wore slacks to the interview.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Says the virgin. Lucky you, having me as your first. The mortal boys would have drooled into your mouth like a faucet. Me? I pride myself on my flawless tongue technique.” He lowered his voice as he leaned into me. “It’s all about the teasing and the flicking.”

I crossed my arms over my chest, boiling again over the clear underlying innuendo in his sensual voice. My attempt at an intimidating pose didn’t do much, considering the virtual bulldozer before me, and that only made me angrier.

“That’s it! Back up!” I jabbed at the air in front of me, and as if I had popped a bubble of sexual tension between us, heat rolled from Death’s body and sank into my sweatshirt to my bare skin.What thehell?“Give me space. You always loom over me like a skyscraper. I get it, you’re big.”

He snickered at the back of his throat. “Damn right, sunshine.”

“And the whole game you play with your body and how you present yourself,” I continued now that I was on a roll. “Do you think I don’t notice how you always make that little growl at me?”

“Well,” Death began, lighting a cigarette, “maybe if you’d play with me more and gave me love and affection, I wouldn’t growl so much—”

“I’m not falling for this new playful act. We have one make-out session and suddenly you’re making the moves on me? What, did you buy catnip on the way over here and now you’re frisky?”

“The irresistible don’t need moves,” he said, exhaling cherry-scented smoke. “And FYI, catnip makes me sleepy. Souls on the other hand, now, they perk me right up.”

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