Page 18 of It's Complicated

I just had to get over whatever the fuck was going on with me and everything would go back to normal.

An accidental kiss between friends wasn’t the end of the world.

4

JAMIE

“I thinkthese will work better than my knife.”

I looked up from where I’d been staring at the floor as Isaac came into my room, a pair of kitchen shears in his hand.

Hopefully he hadn’t noticed how distracted I’d been since he’d saved me in the bathroom. I’d hoped that sticking around and hanging out with the guys for a while would help me get over my weirdness, but all it did was give me more time to obsess over our sort of, but not really, kiss.

“Definitely better than a pocketknife,” I agreed.

He came to stand in front of me, his expression guarded. “Do you want to do it?”

I shook my head. “It’ll be easier if you do it.”

Liar.

I ignored the little voice in my head calling me out. It would be easier, but that wasn’t the reason I suggested it.

Something about watching Isaac cut me out of the shirt, seeing how careful he’d been, how gentle, had shaken something loose inside me.

I didn’t get to see Isaac’s tender side often. No one did. He had a giant heart and was one of the kindest people I knew, buthe covered it up with sarcasm and bravado because it was safer than letting people see the real him.

The little glimpses of his softer side always felt like a gift, like I was getting to share a part of him no one else did. It made me feel special, and I liked it way too much.

Those usual feelings had been multiplied by about one hundred earlier, and I still had no idea why.

“At least I’ve got more room to move now.” He cracked a smile that didn’t reach his eyes and snipped the scissors a few times. “Ready?”

“Ready.”

I couldn’t look away as he meticulously cut through the shirt, moving in a straight line up my stomach and chest and shearing through each individual strip of material before moving to the next.

He had to lean in for a better look when he got close to the neckline. My brain went fuzzy and my nerves a bit haywire from his proximity.

Something about his closeness was fucking with me.

The heat from his body, his soft breaths moving over my skin, his gentle touch, and the focused look in his eyes were intense in a way that didn’t make any sense.

My body was hyperaware, my skin almost buzzing with energy as my lips tingled. Memories of the sort-of kiss flooded my senses, leaving me feeling even more off-kilter and raw, like I’d been flayed open, my every thought and feeling written over my head in neon script.

I still didn’t know what exactly happened. All the pulling and tugging on the shirt had made breathing harder, but it was being squished into the tiny stall with Isaac that had created the worst of my discomfort, and it had nothing to do with the shirt and everything to do with him.

The grunts and little noises that slipped out as he’d tugged on the material reminded me of the soft pleasure sounds he’d made during our threesome, and especially when he’d come.

Watching Isaac come had been as confusing as it was sexy. Seeing the heat in his eyes go from intense to almost desperate had affected me more than I’d ever admit.

But it was the moment he tipped over the edge that I couldn’t get out of my head.

Seeing his big, powerful body stiffen, his expression shifting from pleasure-slack to surprised as he let out a shuddering groan that sounded restrained, like he’d held back and hadn’t allowed himself to fully let go.

I wasn’t supposed to know what my best friend looked like when he came. I never should have been staring into his eyes when it happened, and I sure as hell shouldn’t have come too, my thoughts only on him and not on the girl we were supposed to be focused on.

Thank fuck April hadn’t noticed any of what went down that night. She’d left our apartment happy and smiling, raving about our skills and wearing a pair of my old flip-flops because she couldn’t find her other heel, the one that had been jammed under the couch.

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