Page 10 of Puck & Make Up

More gentle, and swear to fuck, it’s like she’s wrapped her hand around my cock and squeezed. I don’t often get to see this side of Dessie, and it’s intoxicating as hell.

“I’m luckier than Rosie in a lot of ways,” I go on. “I never dealt with what she did, never had to feel like I wasn’t wanted.” A beat. “She deserved better.”

Guilt slithers through me.

“She did,” Dessie agrees.

And for a moment we exist in perfect harmony.

But her stare drifts back to mine and she lies with that gorgeous mouth. “I don’t have a problem with you.”

The edgy tone makes me smile.

“Youdon’thave a problem with me?” I ask, not able to smother the laughter in my tone.

“Nope.” Her shoulders tense.

“Are you sure?”

“Yup.”

“Seriously?” I press, my temper beginning to fray at the edges. “That’swhat you’re going with?”

“Fine,” she snaps. “Yes, you’re annoying, and everyone knows it.” She rolls her eyes, picks up a cookie sheet, and carries it over to the oven. “But aside fromthat, no, I don’t have a problem with you.”

I laugh, watch as it makes her shoulders lift higher, the tension in her frame ratcheting even more tightly, until she resembles a coiled spring ready to explode.

“Right,” I say dryly.

Her chin comes up. “Idon’t.”

“Such a beautiful liar.”

A flush spreads out on her cheeks, but she just snags the other cookie sheet and shoves it into the oven. “I’m not a liar.”

Ha.

This woman is full of secrets and deceptions and distance.

But…

I know her well enough by now to bite back the urge from pushing this further.

Instead, like I do on the ice—or maybe like I’ve learned fromherover the last year—I pivot.

“Well,” I say quietly, “if you really don’t have a problem with me…then prove it.”

Immediately, her head swivels, gaze snapping toward mine, mouth pressing into a firm line. “I don’t need to prove anything to you.” Those deep brown eyes blaze as she glowers at me.

“Hmm,” I say. “Maybe that’s true.” I lift one shoulder with a careless shrug that I know will piss her off.

“Maaaybe?” she asks, drawing out the word with deadly intent.

Yes,maybe,”I say, stepping a little closer, clenching my hands into fists at my sides, desperate to touch her, to stroke the velvet of her skin, to run my fingers through the silky black locks held tight in a ponytail that teases her nape, but also knowing that she won’t welcome the contact.

That if I so much as dare to lay a finger on her, my balls will be in my throat.

Her eyes are filled with fury. Her chin comes up higher. Rage sparks across her expression.

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