My brain stumbles over an idea I shouldn’t even think.
Should I offer lessons?
No. Shut it down, dude. That’s a line you don’t cross.
“Okay,” she says, half to herself, half to me, her brain clearly racing. “So I get him to notice me. Then what? He finds out I’m not what I pretended to be. Isn’t that… bait and switch?” She shakes her head and stares into her coffee. “I show him one thing, give him another.”
I lean back, studying her. “I don’t know. There’s nothing wrong with being serious, Row. If he can’t see how amazing you are as?—”
“Maybe I don’t want to be serious anymore.”
That stops me cold.
Her eyes lift, slow and deliberate, locking on mine. There’s curiosity there. A spark. And something a little dangerous. “Just for a little while,” she adds softly.
My pulse trips. “You… want to have fun?” I ask, swallowing hard. I’m not entirely sure where this is going, or maybe I am, and that’s what’s dangerous.
“I do.” Her voice is steady this time. Sure of itself.
I blink, trying to make sense of it. “That’s why you want hot coffee shop guy’s attention, right? To have fun, not be serious?”
“Yes, but…” She groans and drops her head into her hand. “Ugh, I hate that I’m even admitting this, Jaxon.”
“You can tell me anything,” I say gently. “Whatever it is, it stays between us.” I squeeze her hand again, my thumb brushing over her knuckles before I can stop myself. “You have my word. Just like I can trust you.”
She hesitates, chewing her lip, and the silence stretches between us, thick and heavy.
“You’re embarrassed,” I murmur.
Her eyes flick up to mine, searching. “Yes,” she says finally, her voice barely above a whisper. “I don’t exactly want to humiliate myself in front of hot coffee guy.” She presses her lips together, shaking her head. “I think I’m going in circles here.”
“It’s okay,” I tell her, even though my chest feels tight watching her beat herself up.
She straightens, like she’s giving herself a pep talk. “Okay, let me lay it out. I want to get with hot coffee guy and just… have fun. The problem? I don’t know how to not be serious. And even if he could get past that, he’s not going to love how inexperienced I am in bed.” She winces, the color climbing her neck. “Jaxon, I’ve never even…you know… given a guy a blow job.”
My brain flatlines. “Um. Okay.”
There are about seventeen wrong ways to react to that, and I’m pretty sure I just hit fifteen of them internally. Because, great, now my traitorous mind is picturing her—nope. Not going there. Not now. I shift in my seat, trying to breathe like a normal human being as my traitorous dick rises up, suddenly very interested in this conversation.
“When we kissed the other night,” I manage, my voice rougher than I’d like. “It didn’t exactly scream inexperienced.”
Smooth. Real smooth, dude.
She quirks an eyebrow, a teasing smile pulling at her lips. “That’s because it was you.”
“Me?”
“You’re easy.”
“Oh jeez, easy, huh?” I grin to hide the fact that her words landed somewhere deep and inconvenient. “Tell me how you really feel.”
She laughs and swats my arm. “You know what I mean.”
“I think I do,” I say slowly. “You mean I’m easy to be around. Because I’m like a brother or something.”
“Brother? Oh God, no.”
My heart trips. “No?”