“Boy, you’re really fucked, aren’t you?”
“I’m not just fucked, Brooke. I’m fucked up the ass at fifty miles per hour without lube.”
She winces. “Why don’t you just take Zeke?”
“Because I’d rather be fucked up the ass at fifty miles per hour without lube.”
“I could take you like that if you really wanted.”
I turn in my seat. Zeke is standing right behind me, his hands gripping the back of my chair. The grin stretched across his face is his trademark, lopsided one, and his bright eyes are twinkling in amusement.
My pussy clenches.
Um.
What the hell, pussy? Put your claws away. We don’t like this guy, you little whore.
“Cain does this all the time,” Brooke says. “Pops up when he’s not wanted. It’s kind of annoying, actually.”
I groan and slump forward on the table without speaking to him. “Great. I have my own personal rash.”
“You should go and see somebody about that.” Zeke slips into the chair next to Brooke, ignoring her sideways glare.
“I would,” I reply slowly, “But I don’t know any witch doctors.”
“Ouch.” He smirks. “That’s some rash.”
“Oh, it is. It’s six-foot-three inches tall and goes through women faster than Leonardo Di Caprio.”
“Ah, if only the women looked like his.”
I give him a flat stare. One I hope that Brooke easily misconstrues as disgust and not disgust mixed with mild offense.
I’m no watercolor painting—at least according to my reflection in the mirror this morning—but I’m at least a decent pencil sketch.
“I think I’m taking my lunch to go,” Brooke says, looking at her phone. “One, I have make a call, and two…Well, I’m getting a little turned on by this tension.”
Zeke coughs into his hand, but the corners of his eyes are crinkling the way they always do when he laughs.
Wait. Why do I know that?
“You’re gross.” I watch as she stands and grabs her purse. “Do you have to leave me with him? What if I kill him?”
She pauses, blinking her brown eyes at me. “I’ve got bail money. Don’t worry. We’ll smuggle you into Venezuela.”
“Awesome. That’s so reassuring.”
She smiles and waves. “Bye, guys. Don’t kill each other. Or, you know. Get arrested for indecent exposure,” she adds hurriedly before turning and running to the counter on the other side of the restaurant.
That ‘true friendship’ thing I was thinking a few minutes ago? Yeah. Scrap it.
This is bullshit.
“She has great timing, doesn’t she? And she’s so subtle,” Zeke says dryly.
“Was it the turned on thing or the indecent exposure thing that clued you into the subtlety?” I roll my eyes.
He’s looking over my shoulder as he answers, “The fact she’s made a circle with one hand and is poking her finger through it with raised eyebrows across the restaurant.”
I jerk around so I can see the take-out counter. Brooke drops her hands and shoots me a sweetly innocent grin that reeks of bullshit.
“Awesome,” I mutter, sitting back around.
Zeke narrows his eyes as he slowly brings his gaze to meet mine. “Do you think she knows what happened between us?”
I guess now isn’t the time for a smartass answer that I don’t know either. Shame… “Did you tell anyone?”
He shakes his head.
“Then no, she can’t possibly know. I didn’t tell anyone. Not even my dog.”
He raises an eyebrow. “You talk to your dog?”
“Of course.” I reach for my drink and pull it toward me. “It’s that or myself, and if I talked to myself, people would think I’m crazy.”
“Nah, that’s not the first sign of being crazy. I read that the first sign of craziness is having little white hairs on the palm of your hand.”
Frowning, I turn my hand over and lift it toward my face. I cast my gaze over the lines on my palm.
And through my splayed fingers, catch Zeke’s changing expression. His lips curve into a wide yet thin smile, like he’s biting down on both of his lips to stop himself laughing hard.
“What?” I say slowly, unable to fight my own tiny smile.
“Carly,” he leans forward, his upper arms pushing against the material of his paint-splattered t-shirt. “The second sign of craziness is looking for those hairs.”
My lips turn down as it hits me. That little shit. I can’t believe him.
So, I do the only thing I can think of.
I grab a menu, lean across the table, and whip him in the side of the head with it.
He bursts out laughing. The rich, deep sound catches the attention of a few people around us, so I drop the menu quickly and sit right back.
“You’re such an asshole,” I hiss.
“I told you, you’re so easy to rile, sugartits.”
I jerk my foot out toward his leg beneath the table, but I miss him. Instead, my toes slam into the chair leg.
Zeke grins. That stupid fucking shit-eating grin that makes my clitoris cry.
She’s a whore, too.
“You’re impossible.” I fold my arms across my chest.
“How can I be impossible? I exist.”
“Fine. Putting up with you is impossible.”
“Yet,” he smiles, sitting back, “Here you are, putting up with me.”
“I am this close,” I say, pinching my finger and thumb together, “To throwing my glass of water at you and screaming that you’re a sick, cheating bastard before walking out. Just to embarrass you.”
His smile is lopsided—mischievous. “Then, when everyone stares at me, I’ll shrug and tell them you’re PMSing and it was a dream cheat.”
“Hey, don’t dismiss that. Dream cheating is a very real thing. It’s all subconscious.”
“I don’t think that counts if you’re dreaming that your partner is cheating on you. That just makes you paranoid.”
“You know what else makes a person paranoid?”
“What?”
I stare at him as I lean forward on the table. “The knowledge that I know exactly what size your dick is,” I whisper.
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