Page 63 of Touch Me

“Yeah, that’s me. I’m a Scooter Uber.”

“That’s hilarious.” I laugh again. Everything is so funny tonight.

“No. No way.” Jess shakes her head. “Look at her. She can’t get on that thing.”

“Sure she can.” He swings his leg over the back and grabs a helmet out of a basket thingy. “I have a helmet, and it’s not that far. She’ll be fine.”

“Yeah, I’ll be fine.” I aim to slap Jess on the shoulder, and suddenly everyone I know is gone.

Huh? Where am I?

Someone grabs my shoulders and turns me back around. “Oh, there you are! Where’d you go?”

Ella looks me up and down, head cocked, and turns to Jess. “Jesus, how much did she drink?”

Jess shrugs, hands on her hips. “I don’t know. Maybe she was doing shots behind our back.”

“I did not do that.” I shake my head. “I was fine until that pretty girl gave me candy in the baffroom. After that I went numb. Juss like I wanted. Yep.”

“Candy?” Ella asks.

“In the bathroom?” Jess sighs and shakes her head.

“Yep. Gum bears.” Wait, that’s wrong. “Gummy bears.” I feel like dancing some more, so I continue my sidewalk dance from earlier. “So good.”

“Edibles,” Jess and Ella say in unison.

“Shit.” Jess pulls out her phone. “Let me call Jace to warn him.”

My hand flies to clutch my chest in an attempt to stop my heart from somersaulting in my chest at the mention of his name. In actuality, when I look down, I’m just holding my boobs. “No Jace. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t even want me there. I’m a stranger, juss like always. Henry likes me, though.” I take my hands off my boobs and smash my cheeks together. “With his smushy face. I like Henry.”

“Look, I don’t have all night. Let’s go,” Pushy Uber Scoober guy.

As the girls whisper fight with what to do with me, I tiptoe past them with my newfound ninja skills, finger to my lips to signal to Scoober guy to be quiet, and before they know what happened, the helmet is strapped to my head with one eyed covered with my hair and he’s guiding my leg over the back of the scooter.

“You ready to go, doll?” Looking over his shoulder, he winks and smiles.

“You’re nice.” Running my hand over the buttery soft leather of his jacket, I decide my cheek would appreciate it more and nuzzle the side of my face into his shoulder.. “Yep, let’go.”

He laughs. “Just promise me you’ll hang on.”

I salute. “Yessir.”

Even though he never gets up to full speed as far as I can tell, the lights of the city still blur before my eyes,err eye, in colorful streaks. In what feels like only a minute, we stop outside Jace’s building. He gets off first, takes off my helmet, andoh, I can see again. Grabbing me around the waist, he lifts me off the scooter, setting me on my feet. His hands linger as I fight to balance in my heels.

“Oh, you’re strong. Niceandstrong.” I grip his biceps and squeeze. “Awesome.”

“You like that, doll?”

He pulls me closer, his hands sliding lower on my waist and slowly encroaching on the boundary I would normally have set for strangers. But as I stated earlier, it’s been areallylong time since I had my legs in the air, and he’s handsome and caring and made sure I got home safely.

I dip my chin down and just when I go to attempt the smoldering look through the eyelashes thing, he disappears, and I stumble backward. Landing on my ass with my legs in the air... again. I shake my fist at the sky, cursing whatever God is responsible for that karmic injustice.

“That’s not what I meant when I said I wanted my legs in the air and you know it.”

Andwhat is wrong with these shoes?

When I recalibrate my vision from the dizzying fall, Jace is in front of me, grabbing me around the elbow to help me up.

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