Chapter Eight
150 days left
The last of the Sunday church crowd had been gone for a good half hour. This was the time they not so affectionately called the Dead Zone. Since the majority of their customers were senior citizens, once they all went home for the day, the bakery typically had an hour or so before closing when customers were few and far between, if any.
Sophie and Kristin had a standing “date” on Sundays to chat and catch up. They grabbed their caffeine of choice and headed out to one of the small round tables in the front with Sophie pausing to swipe a grape sucker first.
“Ohhhhhh yeah,” Kristin sighed as she sat. “Billy is so giving me a back rub tonight. I think I tweaked a hammy lifting the bag of flour this morning.”
Sophie pulled the wrapper off her sucker and put the candy in her mouth. “Your hamstring is the muscle on the back of your thigh.”
“It is?” Reaching up she pulled out the decorative sticks holding her hair in place and shook her head until her cascade of blond-to-pink fell freely around her shoulders. “Well, whatever it’s called back there, I’m getting Mr. Magic Fingers to fix it.”
“This is one of those rare moments when I’m envious of your relationship. I wouldn’t mind having a Mr. Magic Fingers once in a while.”
“Last I checked, you have one of those for at least another five months.”
“I told you, it’s not like that. We agreed that adding sex to the equation would only complicate the situation.” Sophie pulled her sucker out with one hand and lifted her coffee cup with the other. She took a long sip then stuck the candy back in. “We’re like college roommates more than anything. We’re friends and we have a good time hanging out, but it doesn’t need to go beyond that.”
Kristin’s perfect brows drew together and one side of her upper lip curled. It looked like she couldn’t decide if she was baffled or disgusted. “First, that’s a terrible analogy because any boy-girl roommate situation in the history of college ended up screwing at least once. And B—”
“Second.”
“What?”
“You can’t say ‘B.’ You have to say ‘second’ because you started with ‘first.’”
“Soph, don’t make me bitch slap you.”
“Okay, sorry, what’s B?”
“And second”—Sophie rolled her eyes—“how can you be living under the same roof as that British mega stud for a month and not be banging his brains out? The sexual tension between you two is so palpable that after Xander leaves, I have to call Billy for some release el telephono so I don’t explode all over the damn truffles.”
Sophie’s eyes opened wide. “Oh my God, KP. That’s why you’ve been calling Billy so much lately?” She thought back over the last couple weeks and realized her friend had always returned from her office with a healthy pink flush in her cheeks. “Ew! In the office?”
“Don’t change the subject,” she said, pointing an accusatory finger at Sophie. “Why aren’t you taking advantage of your situation? I know damn well it isn’t his choice. That boy wants to pounce on you like a damn jungle cat.”
Speaking of flushing cheeks. Kristin’s choice of metaphors echoed what Sophie had told Xander the day he took her to TLP2. And now her cheeks weren’t the only part of her feeling heated. Clearing her throat, she pretended to pick lint from her jeans and hoped like hell her body would calm the fuck down.
Living with Xander hadn’t been nearly as easy as she tried to make it sound. The part about it feeling like they were roommates living together due to circumstance was true. But there was nothing easy and companionable about their time together. Sure they laughed and had fun—it was impossible not to with Xander. He was funny and animated and charming…
She sighed inwardly.
…and thoughtful and a great cook and sweet and ripped and sex on a stick…
Kristin was right. No matter what they were doing or talking about, there was a constant undercurrent of sexual tension. So far, he hadn’t made any overt moves to start anything, which was refreshing…and maybe a tad disappointing. But mostly refreshing.
Liar.
Shut up.
Manning up, Sophie looked her friend in the eyes and removed her sucker. “I don’t want to confuse the already crazy situation we’re in. Sex changes things. If we start having sex, then we’re bound to develop feelings for each other even if we don’t mean to, and then when this is all over, one or both of us are going to get hurt.”
“Or what if you have sex, develop feelings for each other, and decide to start dating for real after you get divorced?”
They both paused and stared at each other before bursting out into easy laughter.
“Leave it up to me to do things the opposite of what normal society expects.”
“Hey,” Kristin scolded, “there’s nothing normal about you, sugar, and that’s just the way I like it, so don’t you go acting like it’s a bad thing. As for what I said, I’m serious, Soph. You can’t honestly think that the two of you are going to last another five months skirting around each other without hittin’ it. You’ll end up with a broken vaj that can’t get excited for anything without batteries and Xander’s right arm and hand will end up grossly overworked and virtually unusable, costing him his MMA career.”
Sophie stared in wide-eyed wonder at her best friend. “Dramatic much?”
Drama Queen sat back and draped an arm over the back of her chair with a smug look on her face. “Better to be dramatic than chickenshit.”
“Excuse me? Whose side are you on?”
“Yours, Soph. You need to let go of the past and stop thinking every guy out there is like Jared. They’re not.”
Sophie’s body automatically tensed at her ex’s name. Kristin reached across the table and placed her hand over Sophie’s. Her friend didn’t often get mushy-philosophical, but when she did, the woman had an annoying tendency to lay down some wise shit.
The bell above the door jingled and a middle-aged man walked through the door. Sophie removed her sucker with a sigh and stuck it to the plastic cover on her coffee. At least she was getting out of the conversation.
“I’ll get it,” Kristin said and headed for the counter. The reprieve lasted just long enough for her to take the man’s order, pour him a coffee, and show him right back out the door when he tried to linger. Sophie groaned. The guy, all dark and skulking, wasn’t a regular. Not that he’d want to be after that glowing display of customer service. She didn’t even try to sell him the special batch of quadruple chocolate truffles Sophie had whipped up that morning.
“Xander is not like that other asshole,” her friend said, slipping back into her seat and picking up right where she left off. “This man barged into your office and pretended to be your fiancé because he couldn’t stand the way Richard spoke to you. And let’s not forget that he fake-real married you to help you save your Grams’s legacy. He could have said ‘Damn, that sucks’ and continued on his merry way, but instead, he did the unthinkable.”
Sophie massaged the bridge of her nose. “I know he’s not a deceitful snake like Jared was, but he’s definitely not a choirboy, either. He’s been around the block a time or ten, and I know women still text him. Two even thought showing up without an invitation was a good idea.” She scoffed. “Who just shows up at people’s houses like that anymore? They’re lucky I even answered the door.”
Kristin’s eyebrows flew up. “They showed up together?”
Rolling her eyes, she said, “No, two separate occasions.”
“Okay, so the guy has a healthy libido. You can’t judge how he acts as a single man and assume he’d be just as much of a manwhore while in a relationship. What does he do when these chicks call and show up like that?”
Sophie bit her lip. “I don’t know what he does when I’m not around, but when I am, he declines the calls and then blocks the numbers. And with both visitors, he came up and put his arm around me, informed them he was happily married, and wished them all the best before closing the door.”
Kristin grabbed her napkin and fanned herself as she sat back in her chair. “Sophie, if you don’t start having sex with that man, I’ll breakup with you and quit the bakery.”
“Ha ha.”
“I’m not kidding. It’s for your own good, little girl. That man is a goddamn unicorn and you know it. If you don’t grab him by that big, beautiful horn, then someone else will. Grab it, Soph. Grab it and hold on tight, because I guarantee he’ll give you one hell of a ride. And who knows,” she said, a wicked grin curling her lips, “in five months we might just be planning a wedding we’ll all remember.”
Sophie stood up at the sound of the door jingle announcing another customer. “Now you’re talking crazy. There is no way that will ever happen.”
She popped her sucker back in her mouth and turned to go take up her post behind the counter, but promptly ran into a hard wall of muscles. Raising her eyes, her stomach dropped. Xander smiled wide. “What won’t ever happen?”
Sophie made a desperate squeak in the back of her throat, and someone hit pause on her brain because she couldn’t think of a coherent thing to say for the life of her.
Kristin came up behind her and gave her shoulders a quick squeeze. “Oh, we were just talking about how poor Sophie never gets to have any fun. It’s always work, work, work.”
“What?” She gave Kristin a questioning glance. “No we—”
“I’ve noticed that as well,” Xander said. “In fact, my reason for stopping over was to see if you might get the afternoon off to go have some fun with me.”
“Fun?” Damn it, why did she keep sounding like a squeaky mouse? Sophie cleared her throat. “I’m not sure that our ideas of fun match up.”
“I’m willing to bet they do.” He held a hand out, palm up. “What do you say? You up for a little adventure, Soph?” The words “or are you too chicken” didn’t follow, but the twinkle in his eye and smirk on his lips basically said it for him.
Maybe KP was right. She should let go and see what happened between them. It would be nice to indulge in Xander while she had him. Lord knew she’d never have such a fine specimen at her disposal ever again. Everything about him—the way he moved with utter confidence, the way he could pin her with nothing more than a look, the way he made her wet when he got too close for more than a second—screamed sexual pleasure. And there was no mistaking he still wanted her.
Fuck it.
She placed her hand in his and said, “You know what? I think a little adventure is exactly what I need.”
…
Xander couldn’t be more pleased that Sophie had agreed to come with him, especially when he refused to tell her where. She’d hesitated for a long while, though, as if she’d been working something over in her mind. When a resolve settled over her features and she placed her slim hand in his much larger one, he wanted to grab her up and spin her around, but he’d managed—just barely—to keep his cool. It felt like something had shifted between them, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on what yet.
“Holy shit!” Sophie sat forward in her seat, bracing her hands on the dashboard as she got her first glimpse of the carnival up ahead. “It’s the Cinco de Mayo carnival!”
He glanced at her with a raise of his eyebrow. “Yeah. Reid told me about it. Said he and Lucie checked it out yesterday. You’ve been before?”
“Once as a kid—probably nine or so—and then a bunch of times from the time I was a sophomore in high school until a few years ago when I took over the bakery and all my free time ceased to exist.”
“Fantastic,” he said, pulling into a parking space. “Then I’ll expect you to know how to beat all these silly games and win me a gigantic teddy bear.”
“Tell you what.” She turned in her seat and gave him a smile that promised mischief and a whole lot of fun. “We can both play the games, and whoever wins more or wins said gigantic teddy bear first, wins.”
He rubbed his jawline thoughtfully and contemplated her ulterior motive. “Wins what, exactly?”
She blinked her eyes rapidly, feigning innocence. “Isn’t it enough to know you’ve won the challenge?”
“Competing is more fun when each party has something on the line. Makes things more exciting and gets the heart pumping. I like knowing I’ll be rewarded if I win. And, Sophie…” Resting his forearm on the center console, Xander leaned over until he invaded her space. Not completely, but enough to set her on edge. Right where he liked her. “I always win.”
The perfect arch of her brow over steady eyes conveyed that he didn’t worry her in the least. He had to admit, she was damn good at masking her true feelings when it suited her. But Xander had been doing little else than study her every minute they spent within sight of each other. Wasn’t much different than studying an opponent’s fights to learn his habits, tells, strengths, and weaknesses. And Sophie wasn’t as confident as she appeared.
Sophie crossed her arms to support her attempt at bravado. “Considering I have the advantage in this particular competition, I think you might be a tad too sure of yourself.”
“Then there’s no harm in adding some stakes to make it more interesting.”
“Okay, fine. You want interesting? Then let’s keep the stakes a secret until the end.” She reached into her purse sitting between her feet and rummaged around until she found pens and a small notebook. “We’ll each write down what we get if we win. Then we’ll fold them up and keep them in our pockets. Afterward, the loser will read the winner’s note that will reveal what they’ve won.”
“What are the limits?”
She shrugged. “Use common sense. It’s a friendly competition, not a championship fight. To make it simple let’s say it has to be something that can be done in our three places: apartment, gym, bakery.”
He narrowed his eyes. He needed to see where her limits were. “What if I want a full-body rub down after a hard day of training?” Her back straightened like someone slid a metal pole up the length of her spine. She was teetering on the fence. He needed her to fall over to his side. “Not that I have much of a chance at winning, as you pointed out, but I’m just curious.”
Ripping out a piece of paper, she handed it to him along with a pen. “That’s fair.”
She bent her head and poised her pen above the notebook. He waited for her to start writing then asked, “What if I want you to cook me dinner?”
Glancing up, she chuckled. “It’s your funeral,” she said, returning to her paper.
“Wearing only knickers and an apron?”
He bit down hard on the inside of his lower lip so the pain eclipsed the urge to laugh. It took her a good ten seconds before she slowly raised her head to meet his challenging gaze.
Shallow breaths and a quickened pulse were obvious signs of her arousal. But she also did this thing where she absently stroked the hollow of her throat, and it took every ounce of his control to hold her gaze and not watch her fingernails lightly score her clavicle.
“I think you’re counting your chicks before they hatch, Mr. James, but go ahead. I’ll give free rein because I’m not worried about losing.”
Everything he’d imagined over the last few months fired behind his eyes like a dirty strobe show. Ignoring the discomfort of his zipper imprinting itself on his cock, Xander leaned the rest of the way in and spoke against the shell of her ear. “Careful now, Sophie. I can think of a lot of things I want when it comes to you. Things that require you to wear a lot less than my cooking fantasy.” He grazed his nose along her smooth jawline as he pulled back, indulging in her sweet scent that made his mouth water and his balls ache.
She could pretend he didn’t affect her all day long, but she couldn’t prevent the way her pupils grew with desire or how hard her nipples pebbled beneath her shirt. Her body’s response to him wreaked bloody havoc on his ever-depleting control. “You still sure about that free rein?”
“I think you should be more concerned with what I’m going to write down.” Using only her forefinger, she pushed on his chest until he sat back and gave her some space. “I have a ton of laundry and no desire to do it.”
Xander finally unleashed the wolfish grin he’d been holding back. “Let the games begin.”
For the next three hours they alternated between games and rides. Sophie was more than a bit of a thrill seeker, dragging him onto every blooming thing that spun, swerved, dipped, and dropped. Since he wasn’t on the best terms with heights, he generally held on to whatever miserably crafted contraption held him in while the wild child next to him stretched her arms overhead and scream-laughed with absolute glee. The fact that he probably wouldn’t be able to hold food down for at least a week was totally worth seeing her like that.
After riding the Zipper, Octopus, Kamikaze (seriously, who names those things?), and a few others, Xander was certain carnival rides were created for the devil’s amusement. One of them had broken down while he and Sophie were suspended in the air. She’d beamed a reassuring smile at him while swinging her dangling legs. When a couple men of questionable hygiene, whom Sophie called “carnies,” started banging on the engine with a gigantic monkey wrench, Xander actually felt all the blood drain from his face.
Her smile fell and her brows drew together. “Are you feeling okay? You look a little pale.”
Telling himself to get it together, he dragged his hands over his face and took a deep breath before answering. “Sure, why wouldn’t I be? We’re only at the top of a gigantic death trap made up of bolted metal pieces and more electrical wires than I have hairs on my balls and is put together and taken apart dozens of times every year by people who aren’t likely to have finished primary school much less get paid enough to care whether we live or die.” He barely contained his wince with a clenched jaw when more pounding vibrated through the metal guts of the ride and traveled through their seat. “Yep, perfectly fine.”
Sophie drew in a shocked gasp. “Oh my God, this whole time… You’re afraid of heights, aren’t you?” It was a rhetorical question; she’d already ferreted out the problem. “Aw, baaabe.”
“Babe, is it?” She’d drawn out the endearment with sincere sympathy and like she’d called him that at least a thousand times. “I rather like the sound of that coming from you.”
A slight flush rose in her cheeks and she glanced down between them as if embarrassed by her slip. But it only lasted a moment and then her tough-girl mask slid back into place. “Don’t get excited. I call everyone ‘babe.’” She placed a gentle hand on his that had the bar in front of them in a white-knuckle grip. It went a long way in easing his nerves. Unfortunately, there were still several “long ways” of nerves still left. “Why didn’t you tell me you’re afraid of heights?”
“I’m not afraid of them.” Way to sound like a cranky five-year-old, mate. “I simply don’t like them. It’s completely different.”
“Oh I see,” she said, nodding and biting her lip, probably to keep from laughing.
Jesus Christ, this was perfect. The last thing that would help him turn this woman on was to show any sort of weakness. She needed someone just as strong and capable as her. Hell, she deserved a man like that. Anything less and she’d chew them up and spit them out. He should have worked it so they stuck to the games and junk food, but he hadn’t thought he’d react so poorly. And he hadn’t until the bloody ride broke down.
CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!
Xander whipped his head over the side where the man with the wrench stood directly below him. “Oi! That’s obviously not working, is it, mate? Maybe you should try getting someone who knows what the fuck they’re doing!”
The man answered with a combo middle-finger salute and ball grab. Classy. Since the anger seemed to divert some of his nervous energy away from his stomach, Xander was prepared to go all five verbal rounds with the wanker when he heard Sophie call his name with insistence.
“Xander.”
“What, Soph?”
His tone held irritation that had been meant for the asshole on the ground. He intended to apologize and explain, but apparently she didn’t need either, because as soon as he turned his head, she grabbed his face and kissed him like she owned his arse.
It only took a millisecond to recover from shock. He’d been primed and ready to kiss this gorgeous mouth for weeks and hell would freeze over before he let the opportunity slip through his fingers.
Groaning deep in his chest, he thrust his right hand into the heavy fall of her jade-green hair and held her to him as his left palmed her hip to pull her in flush.
He licked the underside of her top lip and she opened without further provocation. But his Sophie was no meek little mouse. She didn’t wait for him to sweep in and lead the dance. Rather, her studded tongue met his in a clash of silky heat.
God, had any woman ever tasted so good, felt so perfect, so soft and strong and absofuckinglutely amazing? No way. At least none that he’d had. Sophie Caldwell left them so far in her dust that new rating systems would have to be invented. One through ten was a joke.
She nipped at his lip and the sharp sting sent pleasure zipping straight to his balls. His hand slid down her neck, over her collar bone, and palmed her right breast—
CLANG!
A metallic whine followed by a jarring shake broke their kiss. He peered over the side to determine whether they would fall to their deaths in the next few seconds. The ride started to inch forward a little at a time until finally it picked up a normal speed. People clapped and cheered, but Xander stuck with releasing a controlled breath and mentally vowing never to board anything that left the surface of the earth ever again.
Now that he knew his teammates wouldn’t be scraping his boneless body off the ground, he returned his focus to where he left off with Sophie, but she just smiled at him as she removed his hand from her breast and placed it back on the bar.
“When we get off this thing let’s grab something to eat and drink. I’m craving blue raspberry cotton candy and fresh-squeezed lemonade.”
From passionate snogging to casual conversation in the blink of an eye. Was he missing something?
Mr. Fix-It released them from their caged seat with a scowl. One Xander gladly returned as he rose to his full height. Seeing he was grossly outmanned, the carnie dropped his gaze and moved on to the next car.
“Come on, He-Man. You’ve got Skeletor shaking in his boots, so now it’s time to hit a food truck.” Sophie intertwined her fingers with his and pulled him off the platform. “The Princess of Power—that would be me—needs to indulge her sweet tooth, and it is your job to indulge me.”
He choked back a groan from the images that flashed through his mind of him indulging her in ways that had nothing to do with her sweet tooth and everything to do with his. Allowing her to lead him through the grounds, he shut down his body’s reaction and focused on studying her, hoping to get some sort of clue as to what was going on in that pretty head of hers. Then again, sometimes it was easier just to suck it up and ask. “Soph.” She looked over with a questioning glance. “What were you about up there?”
With a shrug and a grin, she said, “You looked like you could use a distraction.”
A distraction? Oh, right, from his fear—his extreme dislike—of heights. “I’ll be damned,” he said. He couldn’t hide his smile or stop the laughter if he’d wanted to. Just when he expected a right hook, she threw him a left uppercut. Completely unpredictable, his Sophie was, and damn if he didn’t love that about her. “Let’s get you some cotton candy and lemonade. Then after that, we’re heading to the ring toss bench to break this bloody tie.”
“Eager to get as far away from carnival rides as possible?” she quipped as they took their place in line at a food vendor.
Xander thought about what he’d written on his piece of paper. He could almost feel it burning through his back pocket, the words branding him as sure as her body would if they came to pass. “Not at all.” He waited until she looked up at him, then held her gaze as he raised their joined hands and placed an openmouthed kiss to the sensitive skin on the underside of her wrist. “I’m eager to claim my victory…and my prize.”
…
Sophie pulled another blue tuft out of the plastic bag and placed it in her mouth. The spun sugar hit her tongue and dissolved, the sweet flavor rushing over her taste buds.
A muttered curse came from the other side of the picnic table they’d found under some shade on the outskirts of the carnival. “That stuff should be illegal for any girl out of primary school to eat in public.”
“Why is that?” Closing her lips around her finger, she sucked the sticky crystals off as she dragged it back out to repeat the process on her thumb.
His narrowed his eyes. “You know exactly why, you vixen.”
She shrugged innocently. If the way she ate cotton candy was perceived as slightly sexual in nature by her faux husband, she couldn’t be blamed. It was the only way to eat the stuff. Mostly.
Xander smiled and shook his head, then lifted a bottle of water to his lips. Time slowed as he drank the ice-cold liquid, his Adam’s apple bobbing with each swallow.
Once he’d completely drained the bottle, he crushed it in his hand, twisted the cap back on, and set it on the table. Then he cracked open a second bottle, took a healthy drink, and capped it again.
She raised her eyebrow in question.
“The first was just to quench my thirst. This one’s to enjoy and keep me hydrated.” He nodded at her large cup of fresh-squeezed lemonade as she drank from the straw. “That stuff is nothing but sugar and will only make you more thirsty in the end.”
She moaned in dramatic appreciation as she took a few more sips. “But it tastes so good.”
He rested his forearms on the table, leaning another six inches in her direction. Practically nothing by normal standards, and yet it felt like he’d breached her personal space, causing a frisson of tingles to race down her spine.
The sensual baritone of his voice vibrated the air between them. “O’course it tastes good. The more sinful something is, the better it tastes.”
She knew they were no longer discussing lemonade, and the image of him tasting her—not only her mouth, but her— Oh God.
Clearing her throat, she switched to a safer topic as she methodically marred her cup’s lid with her thumbnail, creating a web of white scars in the plastic. “This was a lot of fun, Xander. Thanks for bringing me. It’s been a long time since I’ve thought about this place.”
“Tell me something about your grandmother.”
The plastic cup of lemonade was covered in cool condensation, and she wrapped both hands around it. Reaching across the table, Xander covered the backs of her hands with his and she dropped her gaze to watch his thumbs caress her in tiny strokes, the rough pads lightly rasping.
A nostalgic smile spread over her face. “I loved the stories she used to tell me about her and Gramps. They were total opposites, but they loved each other with a fierceness that defied reason.”
His smile matched hers. “What’s your favorite story she told you?”
“That’s easy. It was how she and Gramps met.”
“Tell me.”
“She lived in Columbia, South Carolina at the time, which was always swarmed with army recruits because of the nearby Fort Jackson. Grams said she and her friends knew better than to fall for the ‘scamps in uniform’ and practically made a game out of shooting down them and their persistent advances when they went out.” Xander chuckled with her as she thought of the way Grams’s eyes would dance as she remembered those days. “One Saturday night, Grams was in the local bar with her girlfriends and Gramps walked in with a group of his fellow privates. She said he stopped dead in his tracks when their eyes met from across the room.”
She sighed. “Neither of them could look away from each other. She described it as feeling like an outside force linked them together in that moment. She watched as Gramps walked over to her and asked if she wanted to dance with him. She said, ‘There’s no music.’ Then he smiled at her as he tilted his head slightly and said, ‘Maybe none that my ears can hear, but my heart hears it just fine. Doesn’t yours?’ Grams said she was a goner for him from that moment on. They slow danced right there in the middle of everyone, with no music playing, and the rest is, as they say, history.”
“Wow,” Xander said with obvious reverence. “That’s an amazing story, Soph. I can see why it’s your favorite. I bet it’s something else to hear her tell it.”
She nodded. “It was,” she said, at once agreeing with him and correcting his statement to put it in past tense. Grams hadn’t told her that story for years. She likely didn’t even remember it. Sophie’s chest tightened, squeezing her heart until taking a breath became difficult.
Rising from the bench, Xander rounded the picnic table and pulled her to stand in front of him. Cupping the sides of her face, he lowered his lips to hers. His kiss was gentle and thorough, not overtly sexual, but one that communicated a level of caring and understanding in the most basic of ways. With only a kiss he managed to express things without putting them into words.
I understand…thank you for sharing this part of yourself with me…I’m here for you.
Sophie snaked her arms around the back of his neck. Since she’d chosen to wear her black Chucks when he told her “casual and comfortable”, she didn’t have the extra inches in heels that helped align their bodies in just the right way. But she didn’t have to worry, because as soon as she opened and encouraged him to take the kiss deeper, he wrapped his arms around her waist and lifted her until she balanced on the balls of her feet and the apex of her thighs fit over the ridge of his cock.
“Fuck, how do you do this to me?” he rasped as he kissed and nipped his way down her jaw.
She tilted her head back and barely held back a moan when he pushed his hips against hers. “I don’t have the slightest idea what you’re talking about.”
“The hell you don’t, you saucy wench.”
He gave her a smack on her ass that her thin shorty-shorts did nothing to buffer. She gasped at the unexpected sting and he chuckled as he set her back from his hard body that, from the looks of things, was getting harder by the second.
“Come on.” Xander grabbed her hand and pulled her toward the throng of carnival goers. “As of now, we’re tied. We’ll play one more to break it. Then once I win, we’re going back home so I can enjoy my spoils.”
“Ha! You wish. But don’t worry, I won’t drag it out or embarrass you. I’ll make your defeat quick and I promise not to gloat until we get in the car.”