Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 94579 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 473(@200wpm)___ 378(@250wpm)___ 315(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94579 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 473(@200wpm)___ 378(@250wpm)___ 315(@300wpm)
I make a humming sound, unconvinced. Girls like the ones she came here with? They don’t give up easy, and they don’t play fair. Prime example: Scarlett being marooned on the porch, alone, despite the fact that it was by design.
“You want something to drink?” I walk the few feet to the cooler I had Keats place by the door so we’d have refreshments on the off chance she came back. Unhook the latch with my foot like a Neanderthal. Reach down and produce a bottle. “Beer? Water?”
“You brought me water?”
“Well, I didn’t want us—you—to die from thirst. Not on my watch.”
“That was really—”
I point a finger at her. “Don’t you fucking dare say nice, and don’t get used to it. I’m not running a home for stray cats here.”
Her eyes widen. “Stray cats?”
Shit. Damn Keats and his crap analogies. “Uh…never mind.”
I grab a water for myself, twisting the tops off two bottles and handing one to Scarlett. She swipes it in her mitten-clad paw, sucking the first drops eagerly.
“Ugh, it tastes so good.” Beneath the dim light of the porch, she offers me a smile, biting down on her lower lip. “I didn’t know I needed this.”
I take a long drag of my own to occupy myself, chugging down half the bottle in one gulp. Wipe my mouth, leaning against the house, letting the silence fill the space.
“So.” I smack my lips.
“So.” She smacks hers.
“Do you think this is boring?” I muse after a few long seconds of silence. “We’ve only been out here twenty minutes.”
“We could play a game if you want.” Scarlett studies me, mimicking my pose as she takes a position against the porch balustrade. Crosses her legs at the ankles, ass balanced on the rails. “Want to play Never Have I Ever?”
“Isn’t that a drinking game?”
“I think so?”
“But we’re not drinking.”
“Do you want to play the game or sit here, bored out of your mind?”
“Fine, but you start.”
“You have to take a drink if you have done the thing, even though we’re not drinking alcohol.”
“Thanks, wise ass—I know how to play Never Have I Ever. Can I just point out one fatal flaw with this whole thing? Pretty soon you’re going to have to take a piss, and it’ll have to be in the yard.”
She nibbles her bottom lip, squinting down at the overgrown bushes. “Damn, good point. I guess if I have to pee, I’ll deal with it.” She cranes her neck, staring off into the dark. “It’s not like I’ve never had to pee outside before.”
“Suit yourself.”
“I’ve seen guys peeing off this very porch, so it wouldn’t be a big deal.”
I get the party started. “Never have I ever peed outside.”
We both sip from our bottles.
She clears her throat. “Never have I ever gone skinny dipping.”
Neither of us drink.
“Really?” Scarlett is clearly astonished by this revelation. “You’ve never gone in the water buck naked? Why does that surprise me?”
The answer seems obvious, but I enlighten her anyway. “Not a fan of public shrinkage.”
Her laugh fills the yard, head tipped back, mouth smiling. “Fair enough.”
I stare at her dimple, long and hard, before blowing a puff of air into the night sky. “Never have I ever made out with a stranger.”
I take a drink. Scarlett does not. “You’ve never kissed a stranger? Not even drunk-at-the-bar making out? I thought everyone has done that.”
“Negative ghost rider.” She thinks for a few seconds. “Never have I ever wet the bed.”
I groan out loud.
Take a chug of my water bottle as my stomach growls.
Scarlett laughs, the sound echoing in the cold night air. “Do not tell me you were a bed wetter.”
“No! Jesus, keep your voice down!” I glance around to make sure the few stragglers aren’t listening. “I mean, I might have had a few accidents as a kid.”
“Just as a kid?”
“Fine.” My lips purses. “I may or may not have gotten too hammered once or twice and pissed myself in recent years, but that’s hardly the same thing.”
She laughs again, hitting her head against the support beam holding up the porch with a wince.
“Ouch!” She giggles, rubbing the spot through her hat with a few fingers.
“You okay?” I stop myself from reaching out…touching her leg.
“Yeah, I’m fine.” Her mouth is still grinning. “Your turn.”
“Hmm,” I hum. “Never have I ever…” I tap on the floorboard. “Never have I ever gone commando.”
Surprisingly, we both drink.
Huh. “Now you’re telling me you walk around with no underwear on?”
Her shoulders rise and fall within her jacket. “Sure, all the time.”
That’s a fun tidbit of information I latch onto, filing it away in my spank bank under Cute Shit Scarlett Does.
“Never have I ever caught my parents having sex.”
We both laugh, drinking, and Scarlett cringes at a thought, musing. “I don’t even want to visualize it. I was twelve, and I had friends over and everyone heard them doing it. Can you imagine the horror? It was so loud and so terrible, hearing my father grunting—like, couldn’t they have waited?” She physically shudders. “My friend Nicole still brings it up to this day.”