And most important of all for someone like me who has zero interest, ever, in pursuing long-term relationships but loves to enjoy a short-term fling here and there, the woman at the bar was right.
He has very long thumbs.
And everything you’d assume that goes with long thumbs.
Bonus?
He doesn’t take his equipment for granted, and he doesn’t let its size do all the work.
Java have mercy.
I did not deserve what that man did to my body last night, and I’ll be feeling it for days.
“Ah, you’re doing the sneak-out-before-he-wakes-up thing,” he murmurs from the edge of the bed entirely too close to my ear.
I shriek and fall back on my ass.
Dammit.
I was breathing too loud.
“No, no. I was going for ice.” I am such a liar.
Until yesterday, I was merely a gossip. But for the past ten hours or so, anytime I’ve looked at Duke, the only thing I can do is stretch the truth.
The thing about studying humankind and their relationships and weaknesses and vulnerabilities your entire life, about learning every secret you can learn and realizing the implications of those secrets, is that you learn when to divulge things and when to keep your truth close to the vest.
I need to leave this room.
I need him to not follow me.
And that’s for both of our sakes.
I don’t think he’d stalk me all the way to the airport and board my plane with me, but I do think he’s this close to wearing me down and getting my phone number, and I need to leave before I break and give in.
Of all the things I thought I’d find last night, a friend was not one of them.
“I can get ice,” he says. “Come back to bed.”
“I’m already half dressed. Call it my first good deed of today.”
“If my time-telling skills are correct, you already did me two good deeds since midnight.”
Heat courses through my body and makes my cheeks flush. “I enjoyed those good deeds more than you did, so they don’t count.”
“Doubt it.”
“Completely positive.”
“How about we each take one then, and we’ve both done a good deed for the day.”
This is exactly the problem.
He’s fascinating and charismatic mixed with the slightest hint of awkward that makes him so real, and the combination makes him a million times more tempting than he should be. I can think of four people back home I’d introduce him to if they didn’t care that I’d slept with him first.
Except for the first time in years, the idea of introducing a guy that I had a short fling with to a friend actually makes me ragey.
I need to go.
This hot Hawaiian one-night stand with a nice guy after a bad day is screwing with my emotions. “Deal,” I say, rather than arguing as I keep scrounging for my boot.
“You’re not ghosting me, are you?” he says.
“I’m getting ice.” I’m ghosting him. But the longer I search for my boot, the more likely he is to figure that out. I can go barefoot to the ice machine near the elevator. “If you want to get up though, you should run a bath. My life won’t be complete if I don’t see what you can do in that bathtub before I go home.”
And once again, the reward for becoming a liar should not have been the best sex of my life.
Guilt gathers so hot and heavy around me, it’s a wonder it doesn’t take physical shape and beat me with my missing boot.
“Go home?” I see the outline of his head lift in the dim light of the moon peeking in from around the curtains. “You go home today?”
“Yep.” Finally. Something that’s the truth.
“To Jawbone?”
“Yes.” Oops. Lies again. “Jawbone.”
So original, Sabrina. Why didn’t I tell him I was from Springfield? There are Springfields in practically every state. But there’s only one Snaggletooth Creek, or one Tooth, as we locals tend to call it, and the Tooth isn’t big.
Jawbone was the first thing that popped into my brain.
“Where you’ve completely forgotten that your Aunt Applebee and your Uncle Five Guys are secretly having an open marriage because they can’t stand each other or their dear child Little McDonald?”
I wince.
Regretful Sabrina is talkative Sabrina.
I don’t live with regrets often, which is my only excuse for not realizing once I started downloading all of my gossip on him, I wouldn’t stop.
He knows about stolen mail. He knows about awkward blind dates. He knows about secret babies. He knows about family feuds.