Page 76 of One More Time
‘You can’t tell me what to do,’ Devin said, shaking the crab leg at Nicky. ‘You’re fucking my wife.’
‘Ex-wife,’ Nicky said murderously.
‘Oh-kay,’ Kim said from down the table. She rose to her feet. ‘I think it’s nighty-night time for Devin.’
James appeared from somewhere and placed a hand on Devin’s shoulder. ‘I’ll help,’ he said brightly, as though to a child.
James, who was clearly stronger than his size would let on, lifted the muscle-bound Devin up by his armpits while Kim slowly peeled the man’s fingers off the crab leg.
‘All right, Dev,’ Kim cooed as James nimbly maneuvered the stunned Devin to his feet. ‘Is your little keycard in your pocket? Think you could get it for us?’
As Kim and James hustled Devin out of the room and the clinking of cutlery around the place resumed, Nicky saw Lucy mouth the words ‘I’m sorry’ to Chloe.
Chloe smiled serenely – earnestly – and mouthed back, ‘It’s okay.’
To the table (or really, to her cornbread) Lucy said, ‘He’s kind of a fitness nut. Doesn’t drink much.’
It was clear enough to Nicky that Lucy was mortified. She wouldn’t even look at him, even though he stared at her and sent her a bunch of really eloquent telepathic messages to get her to look up.
‘Which one was that?’ Chandler’s dad mumbled at Nicky. ‘The last one? Or the gay one?’
Nicky knew that Lucy had heard the man because he watched her shoulders fold in on themselves as though she could make herself disappear.
He wanted to punch Chandler’s stupid dad in his stupid fucking mouth. But Nicky realized that, while satisfying, smashing the man’s teeth into his colon would likely get Nicky disinvited to any future Heylen-McManis family gatherings real quick. So, instead, he slapped a smile on his face and replied, ‘So, I hear you’re from Iowa. What’sthatlike?’
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
NICKY
Nicky tucked Lucy closer to his right side, snuggled in his bed, basking like a house cat in her warmth and nearness. He could feel every curve of her naked form and would happily hand over every single one of his Grammys to spend his life in that position.
‘What’s this one about?’ she asked, lifting his left arm and pointing to the narwhal tattooed there.
‘A bet with Hoop.’
‘You lost?’
‘Fuck no,’ Nicky bellowed. ‘I won. And now he can’t ever get a narwhal tattooever.’
Lucy laughed. ‘How aboutthisone?’ she said, pressing her finger into the ridge of muscle over his left hipbone in a way that made his cock twitch.
He moaned, and threw his head back enjoying the lick of tingles she’d sent to his middle. ‘I don’t know – what is it?’
‘You don’t know what you have permanently tattooed into your skin?’
‘Maybe?’ he answered, glancing down for a look.
‘Nope,’ she said, slapping her hand over the spot, her forearm dragging over what was rapidly becoming a chub situation. ‘No cheating.’
With her arm putting pressure on his dick, his brain wasn’t firing on all cylinders. He asked, ‘Color or black?’
Lucy barely lifted her palm and leaned over him, bringing her head in close like she was peeking at a poker hand. Her warm exhaled breath skated across his cock. And, yep. Fully hard.
‘Color. Also, don’t think for a second I don’t notice what’s going on down here. It’s not going to work. Guess.’
‘Uh,’ he said, trying not to focus on the fact that her breasts were rubbing on his thigh. ‘Okay. It’s the stylized “s” from the cover of the first Super album.’
‘Correct!’ she said, dropping a kiss to the head of his dick like a prize.
