Page 46 of Make Me Sin (Bad Habit 2)
I’m aware of everything, from the way the material of his jeans feels against the backs of my bare legs, to the way his warm breath stirs the hair on the nape of my neck. I feel my pulse in my throat. I feel his breathing, his chest rising and falling against my shoulder blades, the heat and solidity of his body, flush against mine.
I feel his erection, straining against his zipper, digging hard into my bottom.
But he makes no move to do anything other than lie with me, and breathe me in. After a while, I get past the sheer shock of the situation, and begin to relax.
His lips moving against my skin, A.J. says, “Good.”
I want to ask questions. I want to grill him about why he’s here, what he wants from me, and what the hell happened between us at his home, but I don’t. I understand instinctively that we’re on his timetable. This is his game, and, if I want it to go further, I have to play by his rules.
The Spanish Inquisition isn’t in those rules.
The arm he’s thrown over my body is heavy, but the weight is pleasant. Though the bedroom light isn’t on, there’s a bit of illumination from the living room, and I can see the tattoos on his forearm and knuckles. Hesitantly, I touch his hand. When he doesn’t react, I slowly trace the outline of a small tattoo with the tip of my finger.
It’s a flower. On one of the petals is the letter A.
“What’s your mother’s name?”
My finger freezes. He’s asking about my mother? “Elizabeth.”
He doesn’t wait a nanosecond to ask his next question. “Your father?”
“Thomas.”
“You have a middle name?”
“Anne. With an e.”
“And your brother is Jamie.”
“Yes. James.” I know A.J. saw him at my shop, but he was never introduced as my brother. Or introduced at all, for that matter.
“Any other siblings?”
“No.”
“Grandparents living?”
“Two. My mom’s mom. She’s a British countess. Countess Chloe Harris of Wakefield, West Yorkshire. I was named after her.”
He pauses. “That explains a lot, Princess. The other one?”
“My dad’s dad, Walter.” I tell him the luau pig story about why I don’t eat meat. There’s an even longer pause.
“I’m a vegetarian, too.”
There are no words to convey my astonishment. While I’m busy putting my eyes back into my head, he adds thoughtfully, “I read Diet for a New America by the Baskin-Robbins ice cream heir when I was seventeen. I’ll never forget the stories about how slaughterhouses treat the animals. How they die. I never touched meat again. I couldn’t bear to think of being part of all that suffering.”
My heart dissolves around the edges. But A.J. isn’t done with giving me the third degree.
“How long have you owned the flower shop?”
I clear my throat, still recovering from what he’s just told me. “Three years.”
“You want to be a florist since you were little?”
“I always wanted to do something creative. And I knew I wanted to work for myself. I started working at Fleuret during high school and fell in love with it. When I graduated college, I bought the store. It’s hella hard work but I wouldn’t give it up for the world. It’s just . . . mine. It’s all mine. And no one can take it away from me. If it fails, it’s because I didn’t work hard enough, or smart enough. I can never be fired. That’s important to me: to stand on my own two feet. To make my own way. To never be at someone else’s mercy.”
My unplanned confession seems to satisfy him in some profound way, because he nods, and makes a masculine sound deep in his throat. After a moment of silence, the questions resume.
