Say You'll Remember Me(34)

He sat up. “No.”

I laughed. “Good.” I shook my head. “That was a terrible transition by the way.”

“What do you mean?” He smiled.

“Just sliding that question in all nonchalantly.”

“I was just curious…”

“Uh-huh. Would you be jealous if I was talking to my exes?”

Mask.

I gasped. “You would! You’re obsessed with me, Xavier.”

He looked down, humor around his eyes. When he looked back up, his gaze had gone a touch serious. “I like it when you say my name.”

I smiled. “Xavier,” I whispered. “Xavier. Xavi—” He leaned forward and kissed me.

I didn’t expect it. I did, but I didn’t.

It took my breath away.

I was hoping I’d hate kissing him. One last-ditch effort at not falling completely head over heels for a man I could not have. But the second his lips touched mine I was a goner. It was everything.

I don’t know how I fell in so deep already. It didn’t make sense. It was too soon, too impractical, too inconvenient. And my heart simply couldn’t care less.

We could have been kissing by a dumpster in an alley. Making out in a Porta Potty, it wouldn’t have mattered. The kiss was all I was afraid it was going to be. It was perfect.

A hand slipped under my jaw and he shifted and lowered me onto the towel, fingers curling around my ear. He parted my lips and his tongue gently brushed mine and all I could think was that he flew two thousand miles to kiss me. And I liked it. All of it. The effort. The feel of him half on top of me and the lumps of sand under my back. I liked the way he smelled and how strong and gentle he was pressed into me.

Normally my first time kissing someone I’d be nervous, but there was something so calming about him. Steady. Like he was safe. Predictable. Which was funny because I had no idea what he was going to do. It was sort of like a really experienced trainer calming an anxious horse—and I probably needed to think a little more on that. He was a vet, maybe he really did know how to calm anxious horses? But he hooked the back of my knee and wrapped my leg around his waist and I forgot what Google search I was planning.

“Whaaaat are we doing?” I breathed.

“I don’t know…” he whispered into my mouth.

But we kept doing it.





Two hours later I unlocked my apartment while he ravaged the side of my neck from behind and his hands wandered up the bottom of my shirt. The bolt clicked and we spilled inside. I didn’t flick on the light. He spun me and pressed me into the closed door.

“I think some of the things we did on that beach were illegal…” he whispered, peeling my shirt off me.

“I liked doing crimes with you.”

He laughed huskily and reached around and unhooked my bra.

We’d had fun in Santa Monica but nothing that included either of us being naked—and that’s not because I was being the voice of reason, believe me. He didn’t want to put me in a compromising situation. The whole making out in the sand had been one long edging session and I was officially ready to be compromised.

I pulled him to my lips by the cuff of his shirt.

“Xavier…” I whispered.

“Samantha…” he whispered back, smiling against my mouth.

He was right. The name thing was hot.

“Bed,” I managed. I nodded in the general direction and he lifted me against him by my ass and carried me through the apartment. When he set me down, I crawled across the comforter on my hands and knees and he followed, grabbing me by the hips and pressing into me from behind. He dragged my hair over my shoulder and his lips came down on the side of my neck. “This is an air mattress,” he said.

I had to laugh at the matter-of-fact delivery.

“And?” I panted.

“And what if we break it?” He grinded into me.

“Are you going to take my underwear off? Or do you want to talk about the furniture?”

He flipped me over and glided on top of me, still fully dressed, and crushed his lips to mine.

I could make out with this guy forever. He was really good at it.

He was so careful and deliberate. Like every nibble or caress was being measured to see how it made me respond. He made me feel like kissing me wasn’t about him, it was about me. Like he wouldn’t like it if I didn’t like it.

A palm traveled up my chest, over my collarbone, and to my throat. When he had my jaw in his hand, he tipped my head to the side and put his lips to the bare skin of my neck. I could feel his erection through his pants.

“You need to take everything off…” I said. “Now.”

He sat back and started unbuttoning his shirt, looking at me like he was going to eat me.

Pooter appeared. She scaled the side of the bed and did quick zoomies between us while he peeled his shirt off. We both laughed as he tossed his shirt over his shoulder. I was about to wiggle out of my pants—I had my thumbs hooked in my waistband—when I heard the hiss of air leaving what had to be a baseball-sized hole somewhere on my mattress. The bed almost immediately started to deflate.

We rode the rapidly flattening balloon down to the floor.

“You have got to be kidding me…” he breathed, as the bed folded around us.

This had to be sabotage. Tristan probably.