Fakers (Licking Thicket 1)

I slunk down the hall like I was a kid again, afraid of being caught, and I snuck glances at the backyard out the window to make sure my mother and Ava weren’t coming… which was how I nearly ran into a person standing in the hall by the kitchen.

“Oh my God!” I said, grabbing the person—a man, definitely a man, though much less bulky than me—by the shoulders. “I’m so sorry. I was, ah… distracted.”

And if I hadn’t been before, I certainly was once I got a look at him. Holy shit.

“No, sorry, my bad,” the guy said. He straightened his black T-shirt and brushed an unruly mop of wavy, brown-gold hair away from his magnetic blue eyes. “I was distracted too.”

He motioned toward the pictures on the hallway wall—a collection of bovine-inspired artwork my mother had begun before I was born—and shook his head wordlessly. I felt my face heat.

“Ah. Yeah, it’s quite a theme, isn’t it?” I said. “Cows in flower crowns?”

“I can’t tell if it’s horrible, or wonderful, or both.”

“Both,” I decided. “Most things are.”

He turned to give me a quick, startled smile, and I realized belatedly that while he’d been staring at the wall, I’d been staring at him.

Honestly, there was a lot to look at. Besides the sexy, untamed hair, the man had sharp, intelligent eyes that looked like they missed nothing, high, rounded cheekbones, a scruffy jaw, and plush, pink lips, like a master sculptor had perfectly softened all his other features to balance the intensity of his eyes. His body was lithe, leanly muscled, and delightfully warm. He had a little silver hoop in his left ear, a freckle in the hollow of his throat, and a stack of bracelets up one wrist. He could’ve been anywhere from fifteen to thirty years old. I felt a pulse of awareness in my gut.

Please don’t be fifteen, please don’t be fifteen.

“Are you okay?” he asked, frowning at me in concern.

Damn it all, I was still staring.

“Yeah, no, totally. Just, um.” I cleared my throat. My mother’s art display was the last place on earth I’d expected to meet someone as striking as this. Why did this have to happen while I was a giant, sweaty mess? “Making sure you are.”

“Oh.” His expression cleared, and his lips twitched. Apparently, I was still staring at his lips. “I’m fine. Except that I stepped out of the bathroom down here and this cow started staring into my soul.”

I had to force myself to look away from him and focus on the cow painting, but when I did…

I laughed out loud. “It really is. That cow knows exactly what you’re thinking right now.”

The man gasped, and the sound went straight to my balls. “You think? In that case, that cow needs to mind her fucking business before she gets corrupted.” He looked me up and down, from my messy, sweaty hair to my sneakers, and I’d swear the smile he gave me was pure flirtation.

The smile I gave him in return sure as hell was.

This kind of thing never happened to me. Ever.

“Have you ever seen a real cow?” I asked, because I was the fucking king of suave conversation.

Jesus Christ, how had I ever managed to have sex with anyone?

“A real cow? Obviously,” the guy said, folding his arms over his chest. I couldn’t help but notice the defined muscles in his chest and arms. He was shorter than I was but definitely not scrawny. Fuck he was sexy. He smirked. “Don’t I look like a country boy?”

I laughed, feeling all the stress from the day start to fall away.

The guy was wearing black boots, black jeans so tight they showed every delicious bulge, a black T-shirt, and those bracelets, which were not the kind you swapped at a Boy Scout Jamboree. He was the hottest thing I’d ever seen, and my stomach was suddenly swooping a little… make that a lot.

Maybe Mama had been right about there being all kinds of new things in the Thicket if this was the kind of guy I could find here now.

“About as much as I do,” I said, forgetting for a moment that I was decked out like a Dairy Association billboard. The guy didn’t seem to mind.

Keep him talking. Keep talking forever. Come on, Brooks! Talking is your specialty. Making people like you is what you do.

But of course, my mind flatlined when I needed it most, and I had the sudden, terrible fear that panic might cause me to break into the Partridge Pit song and dance like I’d done the other day.

Fortunately, one of us still had a functioning brain.

“So, what brings you here to Thicky Ticky?” he asked archly.

I snorted. “Licking Thicket,” I corrected. “Show a little respect, if you please.”

He grinned up at me—thank you, sweet baby angels—and I felt that grin flip my stomach back the right way round… and then burn lower.