Page 13 of Lovers in Lockdown

A quiet whimpering coming from the other end of the couch has my head snapping in Honey’s direction. She’s turned herself away from me, but her hushed sniffling and trembling body makes it clear that she’s crying.

And,fuck, my heart can’t take it.

Honey has been nothing but vibrance and colour since she crashed head first into me yesterday. And yeah, okay, that isn’t a very long time ago and she might have slammed the door in my face last night, but sadness and Honey just shouldn’t go together.

I don’t like it.

I don’t like it at all.

‘Honey?’ I whisper.

‘Mmm?’ she sniffs.

‘You okay?’

‘What? Yeah, I’m fine,’ she turns her face to look at me and blinks her eyes rapidly like she’s hoping the fluttering of her eyelashes will dry them up. Her eyes are puffy and her cheeks are red and she looks so dolefully sad, that I can’t stop myself from reaching across to her and brushing a tear away with my thumb.

She raises her blue eyes to mine and my heart stops. Her breathing slows and mine speeds up. She stops crying, hiccups and all the while, my thumb never leaves her cheek.

‘It’ll be okay,’ I whisper.

‘Will it?’

‘Yeah, us humans have a great ability to adapt. We’ll get used to this shitty situation and do what we need to do to get through it, even if we’re moaning about it the whole time.’ I sound a hell of a lot more confident than I feel, but it makes her smile.

And what a smile it is. It’s bright and shy and bashful and it makes my heart race in a way that it shouldn’t be racing for my best friend’s little sister. Because,fuck me,the woman is beautiful and she’s making my lips sting with a burning desire to kiss her last few tears away, but I can’t ever allow myself to do that.

Because regardless of what Reid says, hooking up with his sister is a definite breach of the bro code.

I need a cold shower.

And a wank.

I can’t sit here with her any longer, because I won’t be able to stop myself from crashing my mouth onto hers. So, once I’m happy that she’s not going to start crying again, I mutter something about body odour and bolt for the bathroom.

If I’m really going to spend the next few months hauled up in this apartment with Honey, then my attraction to her needs to stop. Pronto. And that means no more almost-kisses. No more brushing her tears away with my thumb. No more saluting her with my dick as soon as I look at her.

All Honey can ever be to me is my best friend’s little sister.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Honey

Well that was weird.

One second Noah was acting like he was about to kiss me and the next he’s talking about sweaty armpits and shooting out of the room so quickly, I could make a claim for whiplash.

Men.

I don’t get them.

But does anyone, really? When they do shit like stroking your tears away whilst staring deeply into your soul, and then fleeing from the room like Forrest fucking Gump, it’s really no surprise that more and more women are deciding that life is just easier without one.

I’ve even considered eternal singledom myself, but who am I kidding, I’m a hopeless romantic. And there are just some things that a man can do that my trusty vibrator can’t.

Supposedly.

I haven’t actually met any of these men, but I have it on good authority from my best friend, Ellie, that they exist. I’ll meet a man who can locate my clitoris without needing GPS one day, I’m sure.

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