Page 70 of Wicked Me
Because that was basically what I was doing—orwasn’tdoing. Having Her Number and then not calling was like telling her all over again that I didn’t want her. But I didn’t want her to see it that way since it was the furthest thing from the truth. The truth was her mom was a coward. The truth wasshewas the most important thing—not Sam, not Rick, not whatever piece of information Rose had that Rick needed. Her. And she was missing from my life.
Maybe that was why I’d made Adele’s “Hello” my ringtone and why I couldn’t stop listening to the beautiful, haunting reminder of what I could say to Her. The answers to all my problems seemed like they should be so simple, but my gut rolled with a lifetime of doubts. Her lifetime. She’d turned seven the day before I arrived in D.C.
“I don’t know.” Charlotte leaned her head back, a deepVetched between her eyebrows, while she massaged her right leg. “Maybe I should finally join this decade and look in to the whole crowdfunding thing.”
Nicole, who had her eyes closed on the other side of Charlotte, broke out into the Dr. Who theme song, and I was pretty sure it was against the law somewhere if someone didn’t immediately join in. Good citizen that I was, I did, and loudly. That earned me a fist-bump from Nicole and a quirked lip from Charlotte.
I nudged Charlotte’s good leg with the toe of my sensible flats. “Why don’t you call a doctor?”
“A doctor can’t help me open a bookstore,” she said.
“You’re limping.” Nicole opened one eye long enough to glance at Charlotte. “And barking.”
“I’m sorry, Nic,” Charlotte said and slid the combat boot on her good leg next to Nicole’s black low-heeled pumps. “I’d been trying to get the mold out of that book for days, and then you swept in and took care of it within five minutes. My devil horns sprouted, and I’m sorry, Poison Ivy.”
Nicole lifted her glossy red hair from the back of her neck and grinned. “I prefer mold whisperer. And you can make it up to me tonight with a strawberry daiquiri.”
“Done,” Charlotte said.
“With an umbrella,” she added. “And whatever Paige wants.”
Whatever I wanted. If only I knew.
* * *
“ICAN HEAR THE BACONscreaming, you know,” Sam announced from his perch on the kitchen countertop.
As always, it was just the two of us. Max Cleary was expected to make his official bid for presidency any day now, and Riley worked relentlessly to help make that happen. And as always, I didn’t mind his absence one bit.
I snorted on a laugh from my stance in front of the stove. “If you’re hearing bacon screaming, then we need to take a trip to aspecialplace after dinner.”
“Bacon Anonymous or the Bacon Triple X movie theater? Because I’ve been to both.”
I shook my head and fluffed the rice with a fork. “Child.”
“So does that make you my babysitter?” The tip of his tongue poked from the corner of his mouth while he skimmed his bare foot up the back of my thigh.
I gripped the fork harder as sparks of heat melted through my body. His foot rose to just below my ass, and both his touch and the pressure building inside me pushed me against the stove with a gasp.
Something had changed between us these last few weeks. A daring honesty—except about the topics of Rose and Rick—had fused with our suffocating sexual energy. It took a great deal of willpower not to tell him the truth of my consuming need for him. Or to tackle him onto the island where he’d destroyed my panties the first time. Willpower and extreme hunger. I was starving.
“Wherever you plan on taking that foot of yours might result in a trip to the emergency room.” I nodded to the stove. “I have a pot of boiling gravy up here. Just sayin’.”
“You’re a terrifying cook,” he said, but removed his foot and hopped down from the counter to saunter closer and whisper in my ear, “Just sayin’.”
A delightful shiver ran down my neck, and I bit my lip on a sigh. He could likely sense my relaxed state around him and was daring to cross all the lines he hadn’t yet. Lines I wanted him to cross.
“Unfortunately, you’re not that far from the truth,” I said. “It’s more than a little scary when I try to pretend I’m the Iron Chef.”
“I’m going to build my own bunker with a solar-powered refrigerator during the zombie apocalypse.”
A chuckle tripped out of my mouth at the random direction his thought process took. “Okaaaay. What does that have to do with anything?”
He leaned against the counter, watching as I stirred the gravy. “We’re talking about things that scare us, right? I’m scared of running out of bacon.”
“But you could still run out even with a solar-powered refrigerator.”
He shook his head. “Not if I build the bunker next to a pig farm.”
