Velvet Kisses(8)

I don’t wait for the conversation to continue. Instead, I steer Marley toward the parking lot before we both freeze to death. My dress shirt can only handle so many inches of snow.

The douche jumps in front of us with a defiant stance. His knee bounces. His jaw is tight with rage.

“I got a place off Vermont,” he rattles it off like anyone cares. “I’m at Briggs now. I couldn’t stand to be apart from you, Mars.” His voice softens.

He transferred? Game changer.

Marley’s curious eyes needle into mine as if asking what’s a girl to do? I shake my head just enough.

“Once a cheater always a cheater,” she spits it right out at him.

That a girl. That’s one truth that never gets old.

“I’m all about you.” He holds up his hand as if he’s suddenly under oath. “I worked those other girls out of my system, swear to God. Ask my sister, I bought an engagement ring I was going to give you at Christmas, just before I fucked it all up.”

Marley tenses against my arm. He’s getting to her. An engagement ring, huh. He’s not fighting fair. She’ll need a lot of resolve to push through this diamond-studded lure.

Marley takes a quivering breath. Her gaze is set dead ahead as if she can see her wedding day dissolving right before her eyes.

“We’ve got to go.” Marley slips her hand around mine and treks toward the parking lot at a quickened pace. She’s soft, cold and strong as steel—just the way I like my women.

“Go where?” he shouts into the night like only a desperate man can. “You going to fuck that old dude? Is that what you’re going to do?” He brays out a laugh.

Who the hell is he talking about? I’m not even close to old. I should go over there and school his punk ass. He looks exactly like the type of idiot I’d beat up in junior high for looking at me funny.

“That’s right! I am.” Marley stops dead in her tracks and spins around. “We’re going to fuck until we pass out! And then we’re going to fuck some more!”

Geez. These kids and their vulgarities.

“Cat Alice was right—you’re nothing but a slut!” he shoots back.

Marley takes in a never-ending breath as if that were the final straw.

“You can tell Cat Alice that it takes one to know one!”

Who or what the hell is a Cat Alice, and why should her opinion matter?

“I will tell her!” he thunders back. “While I’m burying myself inside her later on tonight.”

So juvenile.

“That’s it!” She drops to her knees. Her fingers spastically fiddle with my belt. Before I know it my boxers are exposed to the elements. “My next article is titled how to give your man a blow job in a snow storm! Want to watch?” Her voice curdles to a scream.

The douche lets out a riotous roar of his own, extending his arms to the sky as if he’s just been electrocuted.

“All right, sweetheart. Time to take you home.” I scoop her into my arms and make a break for my car before my pants hit the ground. “The bedpost awaits.” I look back just in time to see the idiot’s jaw drop. “Don’t think I’m opposed to using my belt.” In truth that last part was meant for the two of them—each their own meaning.

Marley lets out an approving squeal as I land her in the passenger’s seat. The snow settles over her hair, and she holds a fairy princess appeal.

Her eyes widen. Her lips part as she pulls me to her mouth by the back of the neck.

Marley presses her lips over mine, lingering, smearing me with an angry affection that can only come after a good fight before pushing me away with a violent gasp.

“What was that for?” I pant into her.

“That was a thank you.” Her eyes ride down my chest then right back up again. “First one of the night.”



* * *



“So where’s home?” I ask wheeling out of the parking lot a little quicker than anticipated, my back tires sliding from behind like we’ve just knocked over a bank.

“Wherever you want it to be.” She pulls a southern drawl from out of nowhere.

“Kentucky?”

“Nope, Georgia. I try to hide it most times but on a night like tonight”—she shudders in my suit jacket—“after what I’ve just been through, it’s all hands on deck. Whatever helps the pain, my sister says.” She clucks her tongue. “Not that I’m in pain. I’m actually relieved. William Ashley Richie is just a stain on my past.”

Ashley? That explains a lot.

Once the heater kicks in, I turn it up—turn her seat heater on without bothering to ask. As much as her accent sounds adorable as hell, she shivered her way through it.