Total pages in book: 108
Estimated words: 101736 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 509(@200wpm)___ 407(@250wpm)___ 339(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 101736 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 509(@200wpm)___ 407(@250wpm)___ 339(@300wpm)
So, he said nothing. He marched to the fridge, pulled out a can of soda, and then couldn’t seem to get out of the kitchen quick enough.
As soon as he was gone, a thrilled look overtook Preston’s face. He’d enjoyed making my dad uncomfortable almost as much as I had.
“If he doesn’t like me in his kitchen,” his tone was full of corruption, “imagine how much he’ll hate it when you take me upstairs to your bedroom.”
Oh, my god. Heat pooled inside my body at his devilish smile. He was going to give me my next lesson here? It was so wrong and bad.
Fuck, I couldn’t wait to do it.
When we’d finished our dinner, I attempted to clear the table, but Preston launched to his feet. “The rule at my house is whoever makes the food doesn’t have to do the dishes.”
While I appreciated the gesture, I convinced him it’d be faster if we did it together, so we half-assed our way through them, and then he followed me up the stairs. I was sure my dad knew I was headed to my bedroom, and that I wasn’t going alone, either.
The stairs creaked under our feet as we ascended them.
Anxiety made my breath go shallow when we entered my room. Not because I was nervous about what was going to happen. It was because Preston Lowe was in my bedroom.
It felt so private. Intimate. He was seeing the place where my crush for him had grown. The location of so many of my fantasies. And the bed where I slept every night, where I sometimes got off while thinking about him.
I was so distracted by my thoughts I didn’t notice what he was doing until my bedroom door clicked shut.
No, a loud, angry voice boomed in my head, making me jolt.
It had sounded exactly like my father, and the memory came flooding back. I was in eighth grade when Colin had a girl over for the first time. They’d gone into his bedroom, and when my father had discovered the door shut, he’d yelled the word so forcefully, my mother and I had come running to see what was wrong.
I grabbed the doorknob, twisted, and pulled. “No, it has to stay open.”
His lips parted, and for a moment, he looked too stunned to speak. Then irritation lifted his eyebrows. “Seriously? That’s fucking ridiculous.” He asked it even when he knew the answer. “Aren’t you twenty years old?”
“Yes.” I gave him the same reasoning I’d given to anyone else I’d brought up here. “But it’s their house. I have to follow their rules.”
His gaze swept over the space, taking in the room that was just large enough to contain a full-sized bed, an end table and dresser, and a closet that was so packed with clothes, I hadn’t been able to shut the sliding door for years.
I’d tried to tidy up my bedroom before he came over, but even with the bed made and the never-ending laundry from work put away, it still looked messy. His focus went back to the door that stood wide open.
“Maybe we should go back to my place,” he offered.
I sucked in a breath. On the one hand, I wanted to be alone with him, where no one would interrupt us. But on the other . . . “Are you worried about us getting caught?”
My question caught him off guard. “Aren’t you?”
“Yeah, but,” my voice was hushed, “is it weird if I find the idea kind of exciting?”
Messing around with any boy in my room was dangerous, but with him? It would be flirting with disaster. When my parents caught Colin having sex, they’d kicked him out of the house.
So, the stakes were high, and yet I longed to do it. I wanted it almost as badly as I wanted Preston, and nervous, eager energy fluttered inside me.
I’d told him I thought the danger was exciting, and his grin was slow and sexy. “Oh, you do?”
The heat radiating from him was so strong, all I could do was nod.
He surveyed the room with fresh eyes and seemed to change his mind about leaving when his focus zeroed in on the full-length mirror by the closet. It was a cheap one I’d bought for my dorm room that came home with me each summer. So, it wasn’t mounted to anything right now. Instead, it leaned against the corner of the open closet door, giving us an angle of the far side of the bed.
He strolled toward it, only to slow when his attention snagged on the pinboard hanging above the dresser. What was he looking at? One side of the board was dry-erase, and I’d scribbled some menu ideas on it. The other side had random items pinned in a haphazard fashion. A ‘save the date’ card for my cousin’s wedding. An old pamphlet I’d gotten from the Culinary Institute of America. A picture of me with Colin last year at his graduation ceremony—