She shakes her head but cracks a smile, showing off her cheesecake filled teeth.
I wait for her to finish chewing before I apologize. Again. “For the twentieth time, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to ruin your night and get you kicked out. I mean it. I was about two seconds away from peeing my pants.” I hand her a bottle of water to wash down her dessert. “And if it makes you feel any better, I almost peed my pants when I saw his friend, hanging upside down in the dark like some supersized half human bat or some shit.”
Madison spits out a mouthful of water as she erupts in laughter. “Holy crap! You poor thing. If you had peed, I would have stopped being your friend. Just saying. I would’ve had no choice.”
I punch her arm playfully. “Shut up. You’re horrible.”
We both allow for a couple more minutes of just enjoying a good laugh, before she changes the mood and gets all serious. “So tell me.” She sits up straight, preparing herself for a story. I knew she would ask sooner or later. “What did this friend look like? Is he some weirdo, like The Hills Have Eyes looking dude or what? Did he have bubbles and puss coming out of his neck and shit? Is that why he stayed downstairs, probably jerking off in the dark basement? Spill.”
My heart speeds up at just the mention of Royal. The truth is, I haven’t gotten that dark look in his eyes out of my head since that first night, and I can’t deny the fact that the way he almost made my knees buckle still has me shaken to my core. There’s so much I want to ask; to know, but it’s such a weird situation that I wouldn’t even know where to start. He’s my boyfriend’s brother for crying out loud. A part of me wants to go to the bar to get that tattoo and the other part is telling me maybe I should just stay away and pretend we never met.
I clear my throat and stand up from the couch. My mouth suddenly feels dry and I can’t help my raging heartbeat. She’s going to think that I’m either crazy or lying my ass off, but here goes . . .”He’s undeniably gorgeous, Madi. No joke. You think Jax is the sexiest man to walk this earth? Well Royal blows him right out of the water. And yeah, that’s his damn name: Royal. Tell me that isn’t sexy. He seriously stunned me speechless and I couldn’t take my eyes away. Not even for a second. I still feel like a complete fool for the way I stared at him with my mouth gaping open; not to mention that I got stuck with him the other night.”
She jumps up from the couch and stands in front of me, trying to call me out on bullshit. “Whoa, whoa, whoa. Back your ass up a bit. You were with him the other night. I thought you were with Colton’s brother?”
I nod my head and swallow. Here it goes again . . .”I was. Royal is Colton’s brother. Strange, I know.” I take a deep breath. “I was going to tell you but didn’t want you flipping out over Jax. He was there, but I hardly got to talk to him.”
She fixes her ponytail and throws it over her shoulder, clearing her throat. She looks as if she wants to call me out again and jump down my throat, but instead, settles on hearing more. “How is anyone more gorgeous than Jax? I mean look at him. He’s barely human! He can have any girl he wants with just a flash of his smile, and don’t think that I’m not mad that you kept all that from me for three damn days. We’ll talk about that later though.”
Thank fucking goodness . . .
“I have looked at Jax and you’re right; he’s gorgeous. Too gorgeous,” I admit. I reach into the fridge for a water and pull the cap off. “But Royal isn’t just sexy. He’s dark, tempting, and breathtaking. Imagine this: blonde hair, shaved at the sides, but long in the middle, falling to one side, and a thick, long stubble covering smooth, full lips.”
I close my eyes and picture his defined jaw; so perfect and masculine. “His body was like every woman’s wet dream: tall, muscular, sweaty, and covered in ink. Don’t even get me started on those pale gray eyes. I can’t get them out of my head. He’s beautiful, Madi. No lie. Stunning even. Colton doesn’t even hold a candle to his brother. I don’t get how they can be so . . . different.”
We’re both just standing there in silence for a moment, taking it in, before Madison’s phone goes off, scaring us both. She gives me a quick look before walking over to the kitchen, toward her phone. “I need to see this guy to believe it. It makes no sense that a man that sexy would be hiding out. Too bad I’ll probably never get invited back. Jax was freaking out that night.”
She picks up her phone and her snarl turns to a smirk as she starts typing really fast and hard. “I take that back. Jax just invited us to some bar called, Savage & Ink. He said they’re doing tattoos all night and we should hang out. I’m so damn happy that I just went from wanting to slap you, to wanting to kiss you.” She points her phone at me. “So don’t disappoint me again. I’ll forgive you . . . for now.” She smiles.