“I’m king of the world!” She threw her arms wide, breasts arching toward the ceiling and the strangest sensation of lightheartedness swept through him.
Logan laughed. Zach whipped around at the sound, but he ignored him. Her pose hinted at the red panties beneath her black dress. Panties that matched the red paint on her toes.
Archly, she stared at him. “Truth or dare.”
She hopped down from the chair, accepting Zach’s hand. She leaned into him, still grinning from the dare to play out her favorite movie part.
Logan met the snapping fire in her black eyes. They were the color of midnight, the velvety, sweet spot of night. Oh, what the hell…. “Dare.”
Still leaning against his friend, she clapped her hands together. The playfulness stretched the scars around Logan’s heart.
“I dare you to kiss me.” Her throaty whisper hitched just the barest moment on the last word. His gut jerked at the challenge. He hadn’t kissed a woman, not even Rochelle, since before the accident. She’d always seemed repulsed by the muscle atrophy that turned the left side of his face into a permanent frown, the pity in her expression whenever she turned at the last moment to kiss his right cheek, never his left.
Jasmine however, reflected only anticipation, humor and breathless wonder. Did the night free her to such abandon? Is she always like this? He found himself hoping—actually hoping—that the answer combined the two.
Zach’s hand grazed along the gentle swell of her hip and Logan’s gaze wandered over her curves before he lifted his right hand and beckoned her with a finger. If she wanted a kiss, she had to come and get it.
A challenge.
A gauntlet.
Damned if she didn’t circle around Zach toward him. She planted one hand near his plate and the other feathered down to touch his left shoulder. Anticipation twisted through his gut, nobody touched his scars, but the heat of it pushed right through the fabric, digging deep into the scar tissue to spread warmth tumbling against the strange squeeze around his heart.
He lifted his chin a fraction in invitation. Her sinful, pink tongue flicked out to moisten her lips. A perfect cupid’s bow. A year ago, he would have urged it down to his cock. Hell, he was considering that now.
Her warm breath teased his face. He smelled the sweetness of her perfume, some flowery combination that reminded him of sultry, hot Texas nights. It seemed eons passed between the dip of her head until the moment her lips caressed the corner of his mouth.
The left corner.
The damaged and permanently scarred corner.
A jolt speared him as her tongue stroked over the scar tissue. She kissed him slowly, a symphony of light, erotic sensations. He opened for her and sucked the flavor inside. The cold, practical part of his mind snorted at the clack of teeth. Hardly the kiss of an expert, but when he dared explore deeper, a shiver of awareness rippled over his skin, awakening long dormant needs.
Warm, wet heat flooded his joints, but his cock remained ever quiet, unmoved. He gave into the temptation to cup her face with his hands, fingers stroking the smoothness of her cheek. She didn’t pull away and the kiss ended as slowly as it began, with nuzzling sweetness along his scars. Her gentle retreat brushed her nose against his and he steeled himself for the revulsion—or worse, the pity—he would see in her, but her heavy-lidded black eyes offered no hint of condolence.
“Wow,” she murmured, and dropped a warm kiss near the corner of his eye. “Can I dare you again?”
The rusty sound of laughter wheezed out of his chest. “No, you have to wait.”
Just beyond her head, Zach gave him two thumbs up. Thumbs that he immediately tucked back into his pockets as she straightened, giving Logan an eyeful of her breasts. The twin globes strained above the plunging neckline, swelling like two ripe apples, flushed to pink with need.
Logan wanted to run his fingers down the sweet V, caress the heat of her skin and roll the weight of the pert, round nipples tenting the silk fabric with his fingers. But he leashed that desire. “You need to dare Zach.”
Fortunately for all of them, she dared Zach to sing. The dirty and faintly insulting lyrics of Rodney Carrington’s Put Your Clothes Back On and country twang sent her into gales of laughter.
Zach dared her next to eat from his fingers.
Logan never imagined that watching another man feed a woman could be so erotic. Every time she took a bite or licked the juice from Zach’s fingers, Logan’s skin tightened. The next dare stripped Zach of his shirt and forced a pectoral dance. Not Logan’s favorite activity to watch, but her unabashed reaction created a cocktail of sexy humor.
He’d been content with the game until the kiss. A kiss he considered daring her to repeat, only straddling his quiet lap the second time around. But his cock wasn’t interested and hadn’t been in a long time. The nerve damage combined with fire and trauma seemed to have permanently emasculated him. Yet the daring promise in her midnight gaze beckoned him to try. He’d passed previously.