Page 18 of Shutout
“Prove what?” I push my hair away from my forehead, which lasts a whole second before the rain pounds it back down.
“That I’m not a dud.” The corner of her lips curls into the mischievous smile that appeared every time she pranked me. “You’re a stranger now, right? So you should be able to kiss me with no problem.”
My skin prickles. Red alarms blare in my mind.
This is dangerous territory. The kind I carefully maneuvered around all through high school. I vowed to myself to never, ever play with Liv like this. She’s always been so much more important than any hookup.
Yet if I back down, she’s going to walk off thinking that Roberts’ words were true all along. And it chafes me raw that she even heard them in the first place because she’s always been outrageously hot.
So, that leaves me with no choice but to kiss her.
Unfortunately, competition is in my damn DNA, and the surest path to victory is just rising to the challenge. I eat the distance between us in one long step. Her eyes flash with surprise as I grab the back of her neck and pull her against me.
I crash my lips on hers.
Apropos, thunder crashes above us and maybe a lightning bolt strikes me too. Except the sparks concentrate right where our lips touch. Liv gasps like she feels it too, and that’s when my brain packs its shit right up and jumps off its socket.
Our mouths separate for a shared breath and I walk her back until she’s up against the brick wall. The rain beats against my back and then her hands grab fistfuls of the back of my T-shirt. With my free hand, I push her hips against me and now we’re close enough. Before she starts thinking I’m through with her, I swoop down again, coercing her mouth open with my lips.
A groan comes from my throat and I all but collapse against the wall. She tastes like rain and like Liv—something strong but sweet just like she is, just like she tries to hide. I need another taste and my tongue strokes hers, languid, deep, savoring the wet brush of our tongues, the gentle pull of mylips around her soft ones. She must have no doubt about what we’re doing here.
Friends who don’t find their friends hot don’t kiss them like this.
I smile against her lips, opening my eyes for a second as I switch to the other side. Her eyes remain closed like she’s given herself fully to every sensation.
I kiss the corner of her lips. Scrape my teeth against her bottom one. She grabs tighter onto my shirt like her legs are giving out.
That vaguely registers in my brain.I’m making Liv’s knees weak. Me.
Then I tilt her head back even more so I can have more access. But while I plunge deeper in her mouth, one of her legs climbs higher against mine and the friction sets me on fire like a match. I shift my hand from her hip and down her thigh, at just the same excruciatingly slow way I’m kissing her. Finding the crook behind her knee, I hitch it higher until our hips are aligned. Until not even the rain can come between us.
Liv moans. If I was getting hot before, I’m pretty sure the rain’s evaporating at the contact with my skin now.
My pea brain finally activates the flight reflex. If we keep going, I’m going to embarrass myself in front of her. Or worse, take her in some alleyway where anyone could see us.
This time our mouths make a loud, wet, sucking sound as I pull away. Her eyes fly open right away and the haze clears from them shockingly quick. Liv snaps her mouth shut, and I have to use all my willpower to not lock my eyes on her bruised lips. Just in case I’m tempted to keep bruising them.
We both breathe like trucks as I carefully lower her leg and step back. And back some more. Liv’s dark eyes lower down to my lips, my chest and lower, before lifting quickly with an unreadable expression.
Since I’m nowhere near as good an actor as she is, I rub my face to try to wipe whatever is on it.
Namely, that I’m toast and I know it.
“Got enough proof, then?” I ask with a raspy, garbled voice that we both know what it means. That kiss turned me on so much that I could probably replace the Olympic torch.
“Yeah, I guess so.”
I splay my fingers wide to peek at her. “Youguessso?” Is she shitting me? That kiss was freaking epic. Lightning in a bottle. Or rather, a volcano in my veins.
Liv has the nerve to shrug. “At least it helped me win the bet.”
I drop my hands. “What bet?”
“Make out with a stranger or buy the week’s groceries.” She tilts her head, eyes hooded as she inspects me again. Her voice is thick as she says, “So, thanks… stranger.”
I stand still as a statue, watching her all the way until she rounds the corner and goes back into the bar.
I wish I could reactivate my legs but they’ve turned into lead. My eyes fall down to my Converse, St. Cloud blue, that are now soaked through. Which is a little bit like how I feel on the inside. Like I was okay a moment ago but now a storm has barreled through me.
