Page 36 of Hot for the Jerk

Her head stayed down, but she did glance at me for a moment.

“Do I look like him?”

“Like who?”

“Your husband.Was seeing me in the café a trigger for you?Do you get …” I swallowed, attempting to dislodge the thick, spiky ball of nerves at the back of my throat.She lifted her gaze back to me.“Do you getabuser vibesfrom me?”

My fingers crossed themselves under the table before my brain even registered that they were doing it.I didn’t uncross them.

Slowly, enough to make me thoroughly sweat in my too tight shirt, she lifted her head, her focus on me.“No.You don’t look like Josiah.You also do not give off ‘abuser vibes.’If you did, I’d have risked hypothermia and slept in my car last night.As much as you drive me batshit bananas, I know you’re not a bad guy, Jagger.Josiah was a bad guy.”

I uncrossed my fingers, and my chest deflated as I exhaled the air I’d unconsciously trapped in my lungs waiting for her answer.“Thank you.”

She didn’t smile, but simply pressed her lips together and nodded, putting her head back down.

“As long as the people involved are consenting adults, we shouldn’t judge others for their sexual proclivities.Denying a person pleasure is only fun if you’ve both agreed on it ahead of time.If orgasm deprivation is part of the scene.”

Her cheeks grew pink.

“I, for one, get pleasure from giving pleasure.I enjoy—and get one hell of an ego rub—knowing I was able to please the person I’m with.I like going down on a woman.”

The scoff that came next surprised me.

My brows flew to my hairline.“You don’t believe me?”

Another shifty eye glance slid my way.“No, I don’t.”

“Why not?BecauseJosiah, the selfish lover, told you so?Newsflash, you little cactus, not all men are the same.And it sounds like your dead husband was wrong abouta lot.Not only how to treat a woman, let alone his wife, but also about sex, pleasure, and probably a million other things.Was he a flat-earther too?”

That broke her hard veneer, and her lip twitched—just barely—but I saw it.“He was, actually.”

“Fucking hell.”I rolled my head backward before giving it a shake.“You sure knew how to pick ’em.”

“Didn’t exactly pick him,” she murmured.“Fine, you’re not lying.”

The woman did not look convinced.Leaning forward, so the cute drunks in the sitting room didn’t hear me, I brought my voice down.“Do I need to show you?”

Her mouth dropped open.“Excuse me?”

“Do I need to prove to you that not all men are like your worm-food of a husband, and a lot of us actually like getting our beards soaked as you come all over our faces?”

Her mouth couldn’t drop open any more, even though it looked like she was trying.“I don’t think … this is not …” She glanced toward the sitting room where nothing but snoring echoed toward us.Then she sat back in her seat and moved her knee away from mine under the table.“No, thank you.”

I sat back in my seat as well, shrugged and picked up two puzzle pieces that matched.“No worries.Just offering.”

“Fine.And I’m just declining.Thank you, but no.”

“And I’m just saying, all right then, and no worries.”

We fell back into a tension-filled silence.Her gaze would slide to me, then mine would slide to her, and so the ping-pong eyeball game of sexy chicken was born.

Twenty minutes passed, with my cock hard as a rock against the seam of my sweatpants, before I couldn’t take it any longer.“You’re thinking about it,” I teased.Even in the low light of the candles and lantern, I could tell all of her visible skin was flushed bright pink.I wanted to push my face into her neck, feel that pretty heat all over me.We were close enough that I could even see the pebbles of gooseflesh rising across her upper arms and across her chest.It was all I could do, in that moment, to keep myself from leaning over and curling my tongue over those tiny raised hairs.

“So are you,” she shot back, catapulting me out of my debased thoughts.She couldn’t look at me.

I cleared my throat and tossed on one of my token grins.“Of course I am.Duh.”

Her smirk just had my dick getting thicker and those filthy thoughts returning.

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