Page 111 of Resist Me

Suddenly, he pulled back and leaned his forehead against mine. “Will you think I’m stupid if I say I’m scared?”

“Of course not. Why are you scared?”

His eyes closed and with my hand on his neck, I could feel his heart hammering. With his lips a fraction of an inch from mine, he let out a breath.

“Because if you don’t start acting like a dick again, I think I’m going to fall for you really fucking hard.”

Well, god damn. Did he have to say that when we were about to go to an event with a bunch of people where we had to act civilized? I didn’t want to move from this position for the rest of the night.

“You’re not the only one,” I admitted.

“I knew you were obsessed with me. I’m not actually falling for you. Just needed to trick you into admitting your guilt.”

After I shoved on his chest, I got to my feet. Ignoring his infuriating smirk, I picked up the tie and brought it behind his neck. He huffed but allowed me to do my thing.

“You ever think about how they named things?” he asked. “Like tie. You tie a tie. That seems like the laziest term for it. Some guy said, ‘What should we call this? Well, we tie it, so let’s call it a tie.’ It’s like calling a cow a moo. We can’t just turn action words into nouns.”

My fingers tripped up on tying the knot while I tried not to laugh. I failed miserably and had to take a moment before I started again.

“Well,” I said. “The color orange was named after the fruit, so I think we can just assume that humans are unimaginative.”

He grunted his agreement. Once I finished with his tie, I took a step back and admired him. If I wasn’t already falling for him, I would have in that moment. Beautiful bastard. I was inclined to ask how I got here again, but I didn’t really care anymore.

“This is the fanciest knot I’ve ever seen,” he noted as he looked in the mirror.

“Everybody will think you’re distinguished. I thought it’d draw attention away from your animalistic tendencies.”

“Animalistic? I’m not an animal.”

“You sorta are. I’ve seen you eat a hundred pizza rolls in one sitting. You need to be tamed.”

I fought the urge to groan when he sang ‘can’t tame me’ to the tune of ‘Can’t Touch This.’ Instead of letting him get too distracted, I took his hand and pulled him toward the door. If we didn’t get sidetracked again, we might not be the last ones there. When we made it outside, our ride was just pulling up.

“We’re taking an Uber?” he asked.

“Yeah, I don’t want to take the bike. Plus, my hair is…wasperfect and the helmet would’ve ruined it.”

“Good thing I got to it first.”

“Mm.”

I opened the back door and gestured for him to get in. He made an ‘ooh’ sound and winked at me before he scooted to the other side of the seat. It was entirely possible this guy was going to make a fool out of both of us tonight. I wasn’t second-guessing going public with him, but I did need to take a moment to prepare on the way. I loathed the sort of attention we were about to have on us. It might’vebeen easier if we’d been open about our relationship beforehand, but I wanted to give him up until the last moment to change his mind.

The car pulled up to the hotel. It had a banquet hall that they reserved for the event every year. After we stepped onto the curb, I turned to face West.

“Are you sure?”

He bit his lip, but it only took him a moment to nod. “We’re doing this. No regrets, Lincoln Porter.”

It was impossible to restrain my smile. I threaded my fingers through his and took the first step that made everything feel more real.

The woman at the front desk smiled at us, which made West tense a little. I heard him take some deep breaths as we continued further inside. If he bailed now, I’d be disappointed, but it was his decision. God, I hoped he stuck with this, though.

We reached the doors and came to a stop. It felt like the moment of truth. This was the point of no return. If he took this step, I thought we could handle anything that was thrown at us.

He turned to me and offered me a huge smile, then squeezed my hand and threw the door open. I might’ve hyped the moment up in my mind too much. It wasn’t like I’d expected this to be some grand entrance, but it just felt a little anticlimactic when only a few heads turned toward us. People were standing around chatting and laughing. It was the picture of class aside from the rowdy guys grouped together in the middle of the room.

“Come on,” I said, tugging him toward them. He looked a little less optimistic now, but he came willingly.

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