Total pages in book: 151
Estimated words: 145823 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145823 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
“I’ve counted four so far,” Mia added.
“The only guy taking you home is me.” My gut twisted at the thought of any other possibility.
“Really? Claire didn’t seem like the kind of woman who’d be up for sharing. You should probably ask her first.” Her smirk lit a fire in my belly.
What had she said about the “old” version of her having a sharp tongue?
I smothered my temper, counted to three, then gripped her hips and hauled her from the bar to the stool polo-shirt boy had vacated.
“Oomph!” she grunted, bouncing slightly as she landed. “Who made you the resident party pooper?” She tilted her head back and looked up at me with glazed eyes.
“Sam was worried. And apparently for good reason. You’re hammered.” The harsh tone was at odds with the gentle touch as I tucked her hair behind her ears.
“Sam?” Morgan’s eyes widened, and her head swiveled to see her friend on the other side of the stool.
“Girl, you need to go home, alone, and you weren’t listening, so I called in reinforcements.” She shrugged unapologetically.
Morgan’s finger rose slowly, pointing at Sam. “You, of all people, called a boy to get me off a bar?”
“Man,” I corrected.
Sam rolled her eyes. “This is not the same.”
“Traitor. At least you had Will to blame for calling Jagger and Grayson on you.”
Holy shit, she’d dropped his name in a casual conversation. Was that progress or alcohol talking?
Morgan reached for the rest of her martini, but I beat her to it.
“And that’s enough of that.” I gave the glass back to the bartender.
“For the love of God, could y’all untwist your panties? I can have a drink. I’m legal and everything. Wanna see my ID?”
“You’re also mixing alcohol with your meds,” I said quietly, leaning down so only she could hear me. “One amplifies the other. It’s why you feel so drunk.”
“Darlin’, maybe I should have done this a long time ago,” she retorted, turning her face so our lips were an inch apart, if that. “It’s a miraculous painkiller.”
“It’ll hurt plenty in the morning,” I promised.
“What would you care? No doubt you’ll be cuddled up with your ex.” She arched a brow at me and leaned in but lost her balance.
Enough.
“Morgan, I’m not with Claire. She showed up the same night we went to the lighthouse. I had no clue she was coming, and I meant it when I said that it changes nothing between us because I. Want. You.” I steadied her waist as she gripped my search and rescue tee. Fuck, her skin was so incredibly soft under my fingers.
A wicked grin spread across her face, and she skimmed my jaw with her lips. “Do you, now?”
Every muscle in my body tightened, but I found the strength to pull back. “In every way possible. When you’re sober.”
She huffed and nodded loosely at the crowd of college kids. “That guy didn’t care if I was sober.”
Ouch.
“That guy is an asshole,” I ground out, reminding myself to thank Sam for calling me. Morgan would have beaten the shit out of herself for going home with a stranger, and then I probably would have beaten the shit out of the stranger for taking advantage of her.
“I just wanted to be numb for a minute,” she drawled softly.
“Yeah, I can imagine you did.” I sure as hell didn’t blame her. I would have been drunk every day of my life if I’d been through what she had. “Why don’t you let me take you home, Kitty? Any decisions you make when you’re this wasted will be the kind you regret in the morning.”
She blinked away a slight sheen of tears, dropping her gaze to her hands as she smoothed them over my chest. “We’re too complicated. It’s just one thing after another with you. I can’t get my feet under me before you knock them out.”
“I’m the only complicated one in this relationship?”
Her gaze flew back to mine, but she didn’t debate my choice of terminology.
“I have a dead quasi-boyfriend who I loved way more than he ever liked me. You have a helicopter that’s just waiting to kill you and an inhumanly beautiful baby mama who’s so desperate to mark her territory that I half expected her to pee on you this afternoon.”
I stifled the laugh that tried to escape and cradled her face with one hand. “I have a helicopter that I’m damned good at flying and a heart-stoppingly gorgeous Morgan who I would really like to put to bed.”
“But not take to bed. I seem to have that effect on the guys I actually like.” She leaned into my palm.
What the hell had her quasi-ex put her through to make her think that?
I lowered my forehead to hers. “Don’t get me wrong, Kitty. I want to take you to bed. I would fucking kill to take you to bed. I’ve fantasized about getting my hands on you since the moment we met, but the first time you scream my name, the only thing in your system will be me. I’m not about to be one of your regrets when I have the option to be your choice. Get it? I’m not trading the possibility of an entire future with you for a couple orgasms on a single night—no matter how fucking edible you look right now.”