Page 38 of The Secret Experimentation
“We could leave. We could leave right now. Go to my place,” I tell him. I need to clear my head, but I want Mel with me.
“We should get back,” Mel says, infuriatingly casual. “The guys are waiting for us. Oh, fuck what are we going to tell them? We disappeared together for half an hour.” I can see his brain thinking hard about a fake story.
I want to sayfuck it, let’s tell them the truth.But what is the truth? What Mel and I are sharing doesn’t feel like simple experimentation anymore. It feels like more. I’m so damn confused.
I bite down on my tongue, hard enough to taste blood.
“Let’s tell them that I felt sick and you helped me. Yeah. They won’t suspect anything, since I can’t hold my liquor,” he says hurriedly, unaware of my inner battle.
“But you’re coming home with me later,” I state while buttoning up my shirt.
“It will be late.”
“Do you need to do something tomorrow?” I ask, ready to find a solution. He is going to come home with me tonight. I need him. I mean, I need to talk to him.
Mel’s eyes widen. “No. But I’ve never spent the night…with you. Not since we started this.”
“Really?” I pretend not to know, when I’m well aware of that. I tried to keep things casual and take it slow, but we’ve seen each other almost every day for two weeks. And I want more of him. So the next step seems obvious to me. Or maybe it’s just the post-orgasmic haze talking.
“I guess it’d be fine.” I can see he’s trying to act free and easy, but he can barely stop the smile from taking over his face. I feel myself smile back as I watch him turn to the doorknob.
When we go back to our friends, Daniel and Pete are on the dance floor—eating each other’s faces. Sam is talking to Asher and Jordan at the bar. So, we walk toward them. But Kaiden appears out of nowhere in front of us.
“Welcome back,” he smirks at us so smugly. “You look…flushed.” He snorts, flicking his eyes between me and Mel. He knows what happened in the bathroom. But the uncomfortable feeling I’m expecting being discovered doesn’t come. My focus turns to Mel.
“And you look like an idiot as usual. What’s your point?” he replies, yanking Kaiden’s drink from his hands and gulping it down.
“Do you really want to insult me, knowing that I know?” he retorts.
“I don’t know what you think I know that you know.” Mel doesn’t lose a bit. I’ve witnessed their bickering a couple of times and they are always quite entertaining. Mel turns into a sassy wildcat. And damn if my satisfied dick doesn’t slightly rise at that.
“Oh, I think you know what I think you know that I know.” Kaiden’s challenging look is edging on comical.
“Please. What I know is that what you think I know that you know it’s not what I think you know that you know.” Mel sticks his tongue out and now we have landed into ridiculous town.
Kaiden makes a show of rolling his eyes. “But I know…”
“Okay.” I stop their nonsense, holding my palms up.
“But I was about to win,” Kaiden huffs brattily.
Before I have the chance to ask him what the hell he was going on about, a very familiar, small, manicured hand lands on my forearm.
I look up and Vanessa, my ex, is smiling at me.WTF?My old blank mask falls into place. But I’m so surprised to see her that I don’t stop her from curling her small body around mine in a too-long, too-intimate hug. Her lemony perfume surrounds me and her big breasts press against my chest—oddly they don’t do anything for me, and I know it’s not just because of the mind-shattering blow job I just received. Still, memories from my time with Vanessa hit me hard and all the light, easy sensations I’ve been feeling up until now evaporate. I take a step back, untangling our bodies, but her hand trails down my bicep and grips it.
“Baby, I finally found you.” Her red-painted lips and light blond hair look fake and too…tidy. I almost snort at my own thought. When is anything ever too tidy for me?Since you started seeing a messy, lively little pixie who turned your world upside down.
“Found me?” I ask, but it looks like she didn’t hear me
“Scotty’s place looks great,” she says, looking around.Scotty?I’d pay to see the horrified look on his face hearing the nickname. I nod, wondering what the hell is she doing here. And how does she know about my brother’s bar? But my eyes fall on Mel. He’s fidgeting, staring at my arm. More precisely at her hand on my arm, which suddenly feels like a lick of flame burning my skin. I quickly grab her wrist and pull her fingers off from around my shirt.
She sneers at me. “Right, wrinkles are the enemy.” I can hear the contempt in her voice. She’s always hated my OCD tendencies. And the old feeling of inadequacy shows his shy face, making me grind my teeth.
Mel narrows his eyes at her. “An enemy yournatural,smooth face seems to avoid.” Kaiden barely stifles a laugh, while Vanessa keeps going imperturbably.
“Oh. Are these new colleagues of yours, Russel?” She gives Mel her quick, fake smile and then her eyes linger a little too long on Kaiden. Was she always this…obnoxious?
“No. They’re Mel and Kaiden, my…friends.” As soon as the wordfriendsleaves my lips I know I’ve fucked up. Mel slightly flinches back like I physically hurt him.
