Adorkable(38)

It was amazing how statements like that said by beautiful girls like Roxy could slice right through a person. I didn’t even like the girl, and I still felt gutted.

“You’re right,” Becks said, bringing a hand to my cheek. My head snapped up in reflex. “She’s not pretty.”

He was speaking to her but looking at me. Though his words were insulting, the heat in his eyes made me flush and not from humiliation. How could he look at me like that in front of someone like Roxy? It defied logic.

“She’s so much more than pretty,” he breathed, running his thumb along my cheekbone before giving me another below-the-ear kiss.

I was vaguely aware of Roxy stomping away but wasn’t sure of anything at the moment. Becks had done it again. His words were engraved in my mind. I would never forget what he said.

He was just acting, I reminded myself.

But he’d sounded sincere, my heart insisted. And that kiss…

Yeah, my brain responded, but it wasn’t real.

But it felt real.

Yeah, but it wasn’t.

This back and forth between heart and mind was so jarring; I felt completely off kilter.

“Why do you do that?” My voice was little more than a whisper.

He seemed to understand I was referring to the kiss.

“Because I can tell you like it.” He paused, an odd look to his face, while I held my breath. “And you have a birthmark—” He brushed the place with the tip of his finger. “—right here.”

Eyes wide, my hand flew up without my telling it to. “I do?”

He nodded. “You didn’t know?”

I shook my head.

My heart was set to burst when he grinned and added, “Plus, girls have told me it’s one of their favorite places to be kissed.”

I let out a shaky breath. Naturally, Becks had kissed other girls that way before. I was stupid to have thought it was something special, something he did just for me.

Stepping back to put a little space between us, I said, “Well, it’s very effective.”

“You okay, Sal?”

I forced myself to look him in the eye, burying my emotions down deep. “‘Course I am.”

He studied me a moment. “Alright then,” he said. “I’ll see you same time this Saturday?”

“What for?” I asked.

“Lesson two,” he smiled.

I gulped. “What’s lesson two?”

“It’s the next step in your training, Sally-san.” Becks laughed. “Just be there, okay?”

I wanted to tell him there was no need. We’d already won everyone over, but instead I nodded incapable of speech. Oh Lord, I wasn’t sure I was ready for lesson two. In fact, I knew I wasn’t, but as Becks sauntered down the hall, I also knew I’d do just about anything for another one of those kisses.

I was a total schmuck.





CHAPTER 9





“What’d you call this again?” I gasped.

Becks lifted his head from my neck only an instant to mumble, “Nuzzling,” and then was back on the attack.

“Oh.”

If lesson one was hot, lesson two was freaking explosive. From this day forward I’d have to list nuzzling as one of my favorite pastimes. I was ready to burn up as Becks worked me over. His lips were hitting all the right spots, and whenever he found a particularly sensitive patch of skin, he’d mount a full-scale assault, kissing, nibbling, and stroking until I was a mushy heap of girl flesh at his mercy.

I think he knew it, too, because every time I gasped or stifled a moan, he’d double his efforts to make it happen again.

This was insane. I was insane for coming up with the F.B.F. idea, and Becks was insane for agreeing. It was impossible to separate my true emotions from the current situation. With every pass of his mouth, I became a little more his. Becks was already a part of me, but the reality of him was more than I’d ever hoped for. When a month’s time was up, I wasn’t sure I could go back to being just friends. I loved him so fiercely, had loved him before this, would continue to love him after. And all he’d ever feel for me was friendship.

This one, I thought sadly as Becks drew another gasp from my lips. This one could only end badly, and when it did, it was going to hurt.

A lot.

“How’s it going up—Oh my!”

Becks froze like a stone, arms anchored to my waist and back, lips attached to my throat, while I tried (and failed) to will myself invisible.

When I finally got the courage to glance up, Mrs. Kent was immobile, straddling the threshold of Becks’s room, one foot in one out, eyes staring at us on her son’s bed, mouth gaping in pure, unadulterated shock.

We were pieces on a chessboard, each waiting for someone to make the first move.