Page 5 of Sweeter

She gives me a strange look. “You don’t sound excited yours did.”

“I was. I am.” I force myself to smile. “Seriously.”

Marley doesn’t laugh, doesn’t look away. “You don’t like Hellfire, do you?”

I swallow; feel my smile slide away like non-stick paper. “I don’t like anything.” Fuuuuck, that melancholy bullshit should have been stopped at the mouth border. “Forget I said that. What do you do for work?”

“I have an artist’s residency at the Blue Lodge.” Marley squints at me like I’m a skin sample under a microscope. Jesus, could my chances with this girl get any worse?

The heaviness that took over in LA settles on my chest like a dead cat. It’s only now it’s back that I realise the weight lifted when I first saw Marley. A nice vacation, but now it’s business as usual. I clear my throat. “What do you make?”

“Ceramics and jewelry.”

“Are you any good?”

“I’m great.”

I laugh, impressed she can say it. I believe her. She’s got the confidence of someone who knows what they’re doing. I used to think I was like that, but I was just cocky. I gesture to her heavy red and gold beaded necklace. “Did you make that?”

Marley doesn’t answer. She’s still studying me like my face holds the secrets of the universe. “You’re saying it sarcastically.”

“Pardon?”

“’What a time to be alive.’ You mean it like a joke, don’t you?”

“Uh, yeah? How do you mean it?”

Her hazel eyes narrow. “Why did you move to Bozeman?”

I stare at the manager’s door, half-wishing I’d stayed with the sugar babies. They were angry about something I hadn’t done, but that’s better than being interested in something I have to hide. Marley moves closer, the bow of her lips slightly parted.

Kiss me, I think.Forget what you’re thinking. Just kiss me.

But she doesn’t climb onto the sticky leather chair and press her gorgeous lips to mine; instead she traces the air in front of my face.

“I try to make things that reflect people,” she says. “If I made a cup for you, it would be tall and even, peacock blue with a bright gold drip down the side.”

I smile. “Sounds nice.”

“Then I’d blow charcoal dust over it. Dull the blue, turn the gold to brown.” Her gaze clicks into mine, surer than any stranger’s has a right to be. “Do youwantto like things again?”

The air in the room is too thin. Where did this girl come from? Felix’s catfish can’t have brought us together, that’s too stupid. It feels like fate or something equally impossible. I stare into her hazel irises and my heart starts pulsing like I’m at the top of a double black slope, about to push into the future. I get to my feet. As technique goes, this is the worst approach I’ve fronted since middle school, but I need to be closer to her.

Marley doesn’t step away. Instead, she looks up at me, her hair and lips and eyes shining like an angel. “You didn’t answer my question,” she says, but her voice is husky. I don’t think either of us care about the question right now.

I slide a hand around her side. She trembles and it’s a relief to know I’m not alone in this insane attraction. “I want to kiss you.”

“To get out of answering my question?”

“Because I want to kiss you.”

“So, kiss me.” She closes her eyes, waiting.

The hairs on my arms stand on end and I’m hard beneath my jeans. I haven’t been this turned on by the idea of a kiss since…ever. I cup the back of her neck, her curls are soft and smell like roses. It’s a gentle scent for someone who saw through me so mercilessly, but I think that might be Marley—bright and piercing, like a diamond. I lean forward, feeling her breath on my lips, and a bang sends us stumbling apart.

“Hurry up, Hat Boy!” the brunette yells. “Come face the music!”

Marley giggles and my dick wilts. Nothing like a girl laughing at you to punch your sexual killswitch.

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