Page 43 of Some Like It Hott

My cock.

“God, Natalie” is all I can manage.

“Thentakeit,” she says. “Take what you want.”

Holy fucking God. This woman.

But I take a deep breath. Drop a kiss onto her forehead.

“It’s not fair to you,” I say. Instead of devouring her, instead of tasting every inch of skin. “It wasn’t fair of me to kiss you like that when youtoldme you never want to be someone else’s fun-times girl ever again. And then I went and did exactly what you said you didn’t want.”

“What if I changed my mind?” she whispers.

“But you haven’t, have you?” I ask.

Slowly she moves away from me. The glazed look leaves her eyes, and her shoulders sag. She says, “It just sucked. What happened with Lloyd.”

“Yeah,” I say.

“To know he’d slotted me in that way. So I was just good times and good in bed, and she was—everything real to him.”

I hope I never meet this guy because I will pulverize him and end up in prison.

“He was a spectacular idiot,” I tell her. “If he couldn’t see all the things that are amazing about you. I think you’re?—”

“Don’t say ‘great,’” she warns, and there’s a tease in her voice now. I’m glad to hear it because for a second I was worried I’d ruined everything—whatever tentative friendship we’d forged, our working relationship. “And quit flattering yourself that I want anything more from you than fun, either, Mr. Tie’s-So-Tight-I-Can’t-Breathe.”

She scoots away from me, leaning against the edge of the pool. It’s smart of her and the right thing for both of us—her putting that extra distance between us.

And also, shit, she’s right. What an arrogant son of a bitch I am to have made her into the needy one whenIkissedher. When I took what I wanted, even though I didn’t have much to give. “God,” I say. “I’m a dick. I know I’m no prize. If the events of the last two years have taught me anything, it’s that.”

“No,” she says. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to strike a nerve. She gave you shit about that? About being?—”

“Uptight? A workaholic? Inaccessible? Rigid?”

She flinches.

“Maybe not exactly those words,” I say. “But yeah.”

“What’s she like?”

“An artist. She lives big. Bright. Lots of colors and people around her. Lots of big ideas. Some of them come to fruition, some of them don’t. She wanted to live in SoHo, so we did, but—I always felt like the asshole there. The interloper, the money guy. I didn’t fit in with her friends. They were always talking about art and the artist’s life. When she told me she’d fallen for one of her artist friends, I wasn’t surprised. I was the wrong guy for her. I’d always been the wrong guy for her. My grandfather was right about that.”

“No.”

I’m startled by the anger in her voice and on her face.

“He wasn’t right. He was an asshole. Things didn’t work out between you and Kali because sometimes things don’t work out. But you didn’t miss the signs. For all anyone knew, you could have been the perfect opposites-attract couple.”

“‘Opposites attract’ isn’t a thing,” I say bluntly.

Something tightens in her expression, and I instantly regret my harshness. But it’s true. Kali taught me that.

She shivers. We’ve been standing with our shoulders out of the water, and I don’t let myself look to see if she’s pebbled with gooseflesh, if her nipples are hard in the cooling evening air. Not my right.

“You’re cold,” I say. “We should get out.”

We climb out of the pool side by side, wrapping ourselves in our towels. We don’t look at each other. But I couldn’t be any more conscious of her.

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