Just a Number(51)

“Never,” is all he has to say, and I’m instantly reassured. “He just…he worries, Amelia. I get that.”

“Fine,” I agree. “I get it, too. But if you were out there boning some hard-bodied twenty-year-old—”

Owen laughs, distracting me for a minute before he adds, “Which I am, remember.”

Unable to keep the stupid smile from my face, I roll my eyes. “Okay, fine…but if he knew that—without knowing who she was—you’d be a fucking hero. What the hell kind of logic is that?”

“Guy logic. Dad logic.”

“It’s stupid.”

Owen steps closer, so close I can feel his warmth and smell his cologne. I want him to pull me into his arms and make this all go away. But we can’t…can we? I reach out for his hand, and he takes it without a second thought.

“I realize it doesn’t make any sense, sweetheart.” His thumb moves back and forth over the back of my hand in its usual soothing way. “But we’ll do whatever we can to make him understand. Okay?”

I nod, stepping closer to him without thinking, and I place my other hand on his hip. I know I shouldn’t, and something in my brain tells me to back away, but I just can’t. I need to be near him right now as much as I need air to breathe.

At least, that’s how it feels.

Owen must feel the same way, because his free hand comes up and cradles my jaw tenderly, his long fingers teasing the short hairs at the nape of my neck as he leans down to brush his lips over mine.

“I know we shouldn’t,” he whispers, his warm breath tickling my skin, “but I just can’t help myself.”

“Good,” I tell him, pressing my mouth to his firmly before either one of us comes to our senses.

It doesn’t take long before we’re completely lost to each other again. Owen’s tongue slides along my lower lip, and I sigh, giving him just enough room to slip past them. I can taste the scotch on his tongue as it sweeps over mine, his fingers curling behind my neck to hold me close. The booze has emboldened him, and I’m too hurt to know any better. I just want to forget what happened upstairs and lose myself in him.

Warmth flows through my veins like a wild fire as I loop my fingers into the waist of his pants, pulling him forward to deepen our kiss and fully welcome him into my embrace. He doesn’t try to pull away; in fact, he goes with the momentum until he’s got me pressed hard up against the washer.

Something in the recesses of my brain screams at me to end this before it gets out of hand. I choose not to hear it, my desperation to be reassured of Owen’s intentions winning out and making it sound like no more than a whisper that eventually fades into nothingness.

It’s clear he’s just as anxious to show me how he really feels as his hands move to my ass and he lifts me onto the washer, pushing himself between my legs. My skin blazes like it’s on fire as his hands move down my thighs to the hemline of my dress, and I tremble when they slip beneath the soft fabric and begin to push it up toward my hips.

The second his fingers hook into the sides of my panties and tug—too light to remove them, but hard enough to make the pulse between my legs intensify—I throw my head back and moan. “Oh, god. Owen…”

He kisses his way down the column of my throat and along my collarbone. Waves of warmth wash over my skin with every pass of his lips, and my heartbeat grows louder and louder.

Thump thump thump.

Growling, he pulls me forward again, forcing me closer to his body until I can feel his erection pressing against me.

Thump thump thump.

I’m about to beg him to keep going when I realize the pulse in my veins doesn’t match the one I’m hearing in my ears, but when he tugs on my panties again, I forget all about it.

Right up until I hear, “What the hell is going on down here?”





16. You Found Me



When we’d first arrived, I didn’t foresee any of this happening. Sure, I knew that Amelia and I would have more than our fair share of difficulty covering our relationship up, but we were both confident that we would succeed. Did I expect the topic of conversation to focus on the woman I’d been seeing? No, I can honestly say I didn’t. I mean, I suppose I expected someone to say something, but to have it brought up while surrounded by everyone was a bit unexpected. And uncomfortable.

What I expected even less was for Amelia to be blind-sided about our relationship.

Julia bringing it up hadn’t been a malicious act; I think she was genuinely curious and happy for Amelia. At least, this is what I hope, because I’d like for my younger sister to approve of our fast-growing relationship.