I’m such a sucker.

The last time I had my car worked on, it cost me nearly two-thousand dollars. When it started making its latest round of noises, I didn’t know what to do. The bill for the nursing home is already taking up the majority of my paycheck from Billy’s, and all the money I’d gotten from selling our house is gone. So I just had to suck it up and let Silas look at my car.

All that shit about him not being capable? I knew he was capable. More than that. He had oil running through his veins, just like his dad. The difference was, he wasn’t a fan of working on cars. In fact, he hated it. He only really loved being on the field.

But it’s easy to fall into a comfortable groove with Silas, arguing about everything. If I’d just agreed to let him look at my car so easily, it wouldn’t have felt right.

Call it our competitive nature, but it doesn’t feel like winning unless there’s a fight. I can’t help thinking of one of our many fights, so long ago.

It felt like I’d been there forever. I’d been waiting outside his locker room, for him to finish practice, but coach had never kept them this late before. I finished my geometry and my vocabulary homework while I was waiting, and before I knew it, the rest of the team was filtering out, freshly showered. They barely looked at me, and one of them stepped on my homework as he swept by me in the hall. I stood up, packing up my things, expecting that Silas would be next, all freshly showered and smelling of soap. When I checked my phone, I realized it was late. After five. My mother would be screaming mad at me.

But Silas didn’t come out.

When another football player came out, I asked him if he’d seen Silas. He told me that he was still out on the field.

So I wandered out there, expecting to see him doing extra practice. The boy was nothing if not 100 percent devoted to the game. Instead, I saw a bunch of cheerleaders at the edge of the field. They were all clapping and whistling. They weren’t wearing their uniforms, but it was September, so they were wearing their tight shorts and half-shirts that displayed as much of themselves as possible, their long, shiny hair in high ponytails.

As I walked forward, I saw who they were clapping for. Silas, doing a series of flips across the sidelines. I lost count at ten. He was like a jumping bean, too much energy for one body. After school, or our study sessions, or any place where he had to sit still for any length of time, he’d always go to the nearest lawn and flip.

He bowed for his audience, as they wolf-whistled, and it occurred to me just how much he loved the spotlight. How it adored him, too. How destined he was for greater things than this town could give him. When his eyes trailed to me, he broke into a run toward me, but I’d already turned back to the school.

“Go back to your audience,” I said when I felt him at my feet.

“You jealous? I didn’t do anything with them, Genevieve. I was just showing them some moves.”

“I’m sure those aren’t the only moves you’d like to show them,” I said, stomping even faster now through the rutted grass toward the school.

“What?”

Okay, that wasn’t fair. I knew it as soon as I said it. He’d look at other girls, for sure, but he’d never actually acted on it. Not that I knew of, anyway.

I stopped short and he nearly slammed into my shoulder blades. I whirled on him and said, “I waited for you. Now my parents are going to be angry at me.”

“Okay. Okay.” He held out a hand. “Chill. I won’t take a shower. Let me get my keys and I’ll drive you home.”

I looked at him. He was covered in sweat, his hair matted to his face, and there was grass and dirt embedded in his skin. “Take a shower,” I snapped at him. “I’ll walk.”

“No, wait—”

Before he could say anymore, I’d taken my full backpack and walloped him with it, so hard that he stumbled backward. Then, hefting it onto my back, I took off at a run.

God, I constantly got violent with him, it was a wonder he put up with me. Too much of a gentleman to hit a girl, he usually just put up his hands and took it. Even if he could be a bit of a scoundrel, he always did what he could to help me. So I agree to help clean out his apartment while he takes a look at my car. I start in the kitchen, cleaning the counters and floor, and by the time I’m done with that, it’s nearly dark. I climb down the rickety staircase and find him on a crawler under my Bug, with just his legs sticking out. “Does it need a whole new transmission?” I ask him, dreading the answer.

He wheels himself out from under the car. The sun is nearly down, the temperature has plummeted, and the fucker still doesn’t have a shirt on. “Nah. You’re in luck. Just a new—”

“Don’t.” I hold up my hand. This is where he starts to make me feel inferior with his use of complex automotive terms. “I won’t know what the hell you’re talking about, anyway. Just tell me, how much will it cost to get it to stop making that whump-whump-whump noise?”

He wipes his hands on a rag and crosses his arms. “So, you can dazzle me with your big vocabulary, but I can’t use mine?” he asks. “Hardly seems fair. But yes, that whump noise should be history. No charge.”

“Seriously?” I smile, thinking I could kiss him. “Great. Thanks. Your kitchen is almost habitable.”

“What about the bedroom?” he asks without skipping a beat.

I groan. “Don’t get any ideas.”

“Excuse me?” he asks.

I stare at him, confused. “What?”

“Don’t get any ideas, who?” He seems like he’s expecting more.

I glower at him when I realize what he wants. “I’m sorry. Don’t get any ideas, Master Mechanic.”

He grins. “Where do you want to go to dinner?”

I shrug. Other than the McDonald’s and Billy’s, there isn’t much of a choice. He knows that. And I still smell like an onion ring. “I saw you had spaghetti upstairs. I can make us some.”

It sure beats answering a million questions from Billy and Abby as to why Silas and I are “together”. Since we’re not.

He catches on right away. “You afraid to be seen with me? Or you just want me all to yourself?”

“No, I’m not afraid. And I’m not with you, anyway,” I tell him. “And yes, we may have had a history. But that’s over. I’m really just doing this as a favor to another human being. It doesn’t mean anything.”

He laughs. “Nothing? So you don’t want to take me upstairs and get in my pants?”

“Far from it. I mean, you know I’d do anything to help you if you needed it,” I say, crossing my arms. “Because you’re right. I still care about you, and you still have a place in my heart. You will always have that place. But I don’t know if I trust you not to hurt me anymore.”

He throws the rag against the wall and glares at me. “What? And why would I do that?”

“Well, you’ve seen a lot of the world since we broke up, Silas,” I say, thinking of all the women he must have had, starting with one Erica Lindley. I can’t not think of them. “And I know I ended things badly, so you have every reason to want to get back at me.”

“Get back at you?” He lets out a short laugh. “When have I ever been bent on revenge toward you?”

“Fine,” I sigh, throwing up my hands. My whole body is trembling, because I’m angry as hell. I know exactly where we’re heading, because we’ve done it so many times before. It usually ends in an explosion. I try to calm my breathing before I speak again. “Why are you even back here? It’s clear you’re much too good for us.”

He turns away, clearly so incensed he can’t bear to look at me. He’s trembling, too, and I can see the veins popping from his forehead. In high school, it would quickly escalate to us throwing things, and then become a hot, heavy make-out session.

I can’t let it go there. Because after experiencing that last kiss, I’m not sure I can trust myself to stop with making out.

He whirls quickly, comes up close to me and wags a finger in my face. “You’re fucking unbelievable. You’re the one who pranced around high school with her nose so high in the air we couldn’t see your eyes.”

My eyes widen. “Oh, I did, did I? You never seemed to mind that very much, before,” I mutter. “Considering we went out for over a year before you decided you were too big for this town.”

“If you could call that going out,” he throws back.

“What does that mean?”

“I call it more like torture. Does this sound familiar?” He grins sadistically, pretends to have a conversation with me, affecting both of our voices. “Please? No. Please? No. Please? No.”

I glare at him. “I’m sorry if I’m not the kind of woman you’re used to, who fucks as soon as you pick them up on the side of the road!”

He twists his mouth in different shapes, the beginnings of a thousand different retorts, but nothing comes out. He storms up close to me like he’s going to grab me and shake some sense into me, but stops with mere inches between us when I flinch.

His face softens, his muscles relax. His breathing is ragged and strained. His eyes scrape over me, as if discovering me for the first time. When his eyes lower to my chest, I am sure he can see my heart bursting out of it.

I cross my arms over myself. I need to stop this. I need to walk away and never come back. We ended things for a reason. A good reason. Erica Lindley. And now, there’s Ella Vanderville. I repeat those names, over and over, trying to force it into the front of my mind. I need to remember that, and stay firm.

Even though, when he reaches out and easily swipes a lock of hair away from my shoulder, I can’t remember my own damn name.

And then he lifts his finger and lightly grazes my cheek. He wants me.

Fire radiates through my body. Desire pulses between us, so strong I can feel it. I tell myself to stand firm, beg myself to do it, but find myself wavering on my feet nonetheless, my knees wobbling like they’re composed of jelly. I draw in a heavy breath, hardly able to hold it for a second before I gasp it out. My body crackles with electricity, crying out for more. “What about Ella?” I say, thinking, Fuck Ella.

He must be able to see inside my mind, because he shoos the thought away like an annoying nuisance and says, “Fuck Ella.” His finger trails lazily down my neck, stopping at the seam of my sweatshirt. He flirts with the fabric, his eyes never leaving mine. “Tell me to stop,” he breathes.

I try to nod, but our eyes are locked, those dreamily blue endless depths drawing me in. His breath, warm and sweet, flowers between us, making me woozy. It’s almost exactly like four years ago, when he was new to me, but now, the doubt is gone. All those worries of being too young . . . they’re gone. Instead, there are fears about never feeling the same way with anyone else, the way I feel right now. I’d like to think I never believed this moment would happen, but maybe I had, deep down. Because now that it’s here, I know I want this.

“Maybe I’m tired of saying that,” I murmur.

Before I can protest any more, he drops his mouth upon mine, making every last bit of breath I have die inside me. His mouth consumes mine feverishly, his tongue claiming me as if he’s owned me all this time. He’d never lacked confidence, and I surrender control immediately. His tongue explores my mouth wildly and unstoppable, and his hands are on my body, up my sweatshirt, molding my breasts.

“Fuck it,” he growls into my mouth, tweaking my nipple through the thin fabric of my camisole. “You know how long I waited for this? Genevieve, you feel so good.”

“I love it when you call me that,” I whisper, because it’s true. As much as I argued against it, nothing has ever made me come alive as much as when he’s said my name.

He lifts my sweatshirt, and I pull it off, over my head, casting it to the side. “I know.”

His tongue trails down my jawline, and his fingers play on the strap of my camisole, lowering it below my ribs so that my breasts spring free. He cups them in his hands and drags his face down my center, planting devouring kisses on my breastbone. I arch my head back and cry out as he pushes me against the wall, his tongue licking its way across the sensitive nub of each breast. “Oh,” I moan, unable to believe the feeling of this new sensation. It’s more than I ever thought possible. “Oh, god, Silas.”

I’ve never had anyone kiss my breasts before. The furthest we’d gone is hands under the shirt. But now I’m wondering why the hell I waited so long. I press my back against the wall, my back arching toward his body. I tangle my fingers in his thick hair, pressing his open mouth harder on my skin, wanting more, and it’s clear he has no intention of stopping. A warm, aching sensation is building between my thighs, almost too much to bear.

He breaks from my skin, and I’m suddenly cold where his mouth has been. Eyes heavy-lidded and full of explosive energy, he looks around the garage.

“Come on,” he says gruffly, taking my hand and guiding me to the office. It’s more enclosed in here, so we’re not on display in the windowed garage. He looks around the cramped room but there isn’t anything other than the tiny metal desk and a defunct soda machine. He leads me to the desk and pushes aside the dusty blotter. Then he guides me against it so that I’m sitting at its edge and plants himself in front of me, then covers my mouth with his.

I run my hands down to his waist and I’m finally able to appraise his gorgeous body, unabashedly. He’s gotten a tattoo of 12—his jersey number—on his collarbone and there is just a little more dark hair over his pectorals. Oh good Lord, he’s so indescribably perfect, I feel faint.

“You okay?” he asks, gazing into my eyes as I grip the edges of the desk to steady myself.

I nod, still dazed. I need him. I need this. I’m like a kid in a candy store, unsure where to go first. All I know is, I want to try it all.

His hands move around my waist, lifting the camisole over my head. Before, we’d made out and fumbled around under our clothing, but except for five minutes during our last make-out session together, that was as far as it went. I’d always been self-conscious about my body, too, so I usually pushed his hands away and put a stop to things. But now, I can’t stop. I don’t want to stop. I’ve been thinking of this for four years. And maybe I am getting more mature because at this point, I don’t care. I want to feel his skin against mine.

He casts aside my camisole and gazes at me hungrily. I suck in a breath, feeling an unsure pang of nervousness, but before it can fully materialize, he cups my breast in his hand and brings the nipple to his mouth, sucking it, his tongue working circles on it. I toss my head back and gasp.

He gently nudges me back on the desk. “You’re so fucking sweet, Genevieve,” he murmurs into my skin, reaching for the button of my jeans as he trails kisses down to my abdomen. His fingers find it and expertly work the button, and I feel the fabric loosening. “I need to taste all of you.”

My breath comes out all uneven. The thought of him tasting me has my body trembling all over with desire and . . . fear. The two emotions are doing a dance inside of me, each vying for top position. This is huge. I think of how long I’ve imagined and wanted this, wanted Silas above me, fucking me, and without warning, fear pulls the upper hand.

“Silas. Wait,” I whisper in his ear.

“I’ve waited for this for four years. I don’t think I can wait anymore,” he murmurs, intent, dragging his open mouth down to the waist of my jeans so I can feel his inviting warm breath on my skin there.

It takes all my willpower to summon the energy to lift myself up and nudge him away. “But I’ve never done that.”

He stops suddenly and looks at me. “What do you mean?”

“Like I said,” I say, blushing now. I don’t think now is the time to tell him that I’ve never even kissed another man, besides him. My eyes trail to the dirty linoleum floor. “I’ve never done it. And you said it yourself. This is temporary.”

His eyes are wide. “Magee?”

I shake my head. “Chuckie is nice. But he isn’t . . .” I stop. Take a deep breath. Am I really going to say this out loud? “He isn’t you. And maybe you spoiled me for everyone else.”

His expression changes, hardening. He rakes his hands through his hair. “Fuck that. That’s not true. What’s so special about me?”

He suddenly stands up and turns away, quickly putting all those glorious muscles off-limits. It’s physical pain. I straighten on the desk and find my sweatshirt, then slink into it, embarrassed. The truth is, in four years, I never even had a close call. Never even wanted one. It’s like, the day I left Silas, that part of me turned off. Chuckie sure as hell couldn’t take his place, and neither could anyone else in the town. Sure, as a waitress at Billy’s, I meet all kinds of guys, but I never even felt one-tenth of what I felt in this room, right now. Was I comparing every single guy in this town to Silas St. Clair? I’d like to say no, but . . .

Yes. Undoubtedly . . . yes, yes, yes.

The moment I realize that, the moment I wonder why it is that I stopped him.

Then I remember what had driven us apart before. He’s Silas St. Clair, god of football, and I’m just the loser he left behind. It. Can’t. Work.

He retrieves the keys of my car from the pockets of his jeans, and it isn’t hard to see his raging erection poking through his jeans. He lays the keys beside me on the desk. “It’s late. You should go home.”

“Don’t you need help . . . upstairs?” I ask him.

He shakes his head, a tortured smile appearing on his face. “If I bring you upstairs, I won’t be wanting you to clean for me.”

I start to blush. “What?”

He shrugs. “Genevieve,” he says, “you can’t not know how much I want you. Naked, and on me. I wanted it then, and for fuck’s sake, I want it now, more than ever.”

I shake my head. “But you’re going away, Silas. Our lives are so different. I mean, aren’t you dating that girl Ella Vanderville? You know it would mean too much to me, and I can’t have you doing that and then blowing town--”

“Stop,” he says, his voice hard. “I know, I get it. You should go home.”

He doesn’t make another sound as he takes my keys and pulls the car out of the garage bay. He simply shuts the garage door as I sit in the front seat and, not looking back as I pull away, starts to climb the stairs. I can’t help thinking of what he’d said. If I bring you upstairs, I won’t be wanting you to clean for me. I want you naked, and on me.

I imagine being naked, my skin flush against his, and I let out a shuddering breath.

It isn’t until I pull up in front of the Peking Dragon that I realize my car has stopped making that noise.