Page 80 of Road Trip with a Vampire
“Yes,” I said. “You have fun, I win. You don’t have fun, I lose.” I leaned in closer. “But we both know I’m going to win.”
That earned me a reluctant smile. “What if Shoe Guy realizes I am, in fact, the person he thought I was?”
I looked back at the counter. Another employee had joined Jonathan, and they were both staring at his phone with rapt attention.
“I think he’s forgotten about us.” An idea struck me. “But let’s act extra couple-y while we’re here. Just in case.”
Peter stared at me. “Extra couple-y?”
I hesitated. Had I crossed a line with this ruse? Yes, we’d spent the prior evening engaged in sex acts that would make a sailor blush, but maybe posing as a couple was too much for him.
We hadn’t talked about what last night had meant. Maybe it hadn’t meant as much to him as it had to me.
“Is it okay that I lied about being your girlfriend?” I asked, suddenly unsure. “I know it’s a lot, but telling that guy we were dating threw him off the trail.”
“It’s fine,” Peter said, his voice strange. “You’re my girlfriend. Got it. And I’ll pretend to be your…”
“Boyfriend.
A beat. “Boyfriend,” he repeated, as if it were the first time he’d ever said the word aloud. He looked down at my hand and, after a moment, took it in his. “So if we’re…um,pretendingto be a couple, should we do things like this?”
Before I could say anything, Peter brought my hand to his mouth and pressed a lingering kiss to my palm. His lips were so soft, his breath preternaturally cool as he kissed my hand again and then again. I’d been kissed countless times over the years in countless different ways. I’d had platonic kisses, intimate kisses on parts of my body I didn’t have names for, and everything in between. These simple kisses from Peter in this dingy bowling alley, though, were enough to make my heart skip a beat.
“Or this?” Peter’s eyes never left my face as he gently scraped his front teeth against the fleshy place where my thumb met my palm. He didn’t use his vampire canines; had he done that, I’d have burst into flames then and there. Even still, the world contracted to the heated, possessive way he was looking at me and the place where his mouth touched my skin.
Slowly Peter lowered our linked hands until they rested on his upper thigh. “How am I doing?” His voice was as rough as sandpaper.
Distantly I heard the crash of pins and loud cheering from the birthday party a few lanes away. I couldn’t have been paid to care.
“How…how are you doing?” I breathed, confused.
“At pretending to be yourboyfriend,” he clarified.
Oh.
“You’re doing a bang-up job,” I assured him.
The asshole had the audacity to smirk. “Good,” he said. Then he leaned in and pressed a kiss so featherlight to the corner of my mouth, it took all my restraint not to tug him to me by the collar and kiss him properly.
“You’re being a tease,” I complained.
“I’m not,” he said. “If you leave with me right now, I’ll pick up again where we left off as soon as we get to the car.”
I swallowed, unable to look at anything but him. “But…our bet.”
He sighed. “Fuck the bet. This place is disgusting. The music is giving me heart palpitations.”
I rolled my eyes. “Your heart doesn’t beat.”
“Doesn’t matter.”
And I’d thought Reggie was a drama queen. “Do youreallynot want to risk losing the bet? Are you that worried you’ll have to get up on a chair and announce how brilliant I am?”
“It’s not that,” he said. “I’m happy to tell theworldthat you are the smartest, bravest, sexiest person I know.” His throat worked. “Because it’s true. And I’mnot evenyour real boyfriend. If getting up on that barstool is your price for leaving now, I’ll pay it.”
It was the most impassioned speech I’d ever heard him give. And I didn’t think I’d imagined the hint of bitterness in his voice when he’d saidnot even your real boyfriend. My stomach was awash in butterflies, my interest in showing off all the skills I’d picked up as the four-time reigning champion of the 1950s ladies’ bowling circuit forgotten.
“You’d really humiliate yourself in front of a bunch of strangers just to get me into bed?” I asked.
