These Thorn Kisses (St. Mary’s Rebels 3)

But I can’t.

She’s my best friend and she’s the person that I’ve betrayed the most here.

I never got to tell her; another thing I didn’t get to do before it was over. And that will always haunt me. The fact that she had the right to know but I still hid things from her.

Maybe I’ll still tell her about it one day. When it won’t hurt too much to think about.

But for now, I’m going to go back to being a good, loyal friend and support her by accepting her invitation.

It will be fine.

It will be like it is at soccer practice. I will keep my head down, stay busy with other people, and soon it will be over.

Only I don’t count on something… bizarre.

Something so totally out of this world.

Her brother hitting on me.

Not the one I’m in love with. But her other brother, Ledger.

Ever since I arrived at the small get-together with Salem and Poe, he’s been staring at me. I didn’t notice it at first because I was busy not noticing things.

As I feared, he is here as well.

Tall and broad, wearing his usual white shirt and navy blue jeans. And since it’s sort of springy weather, he doesn’t have a sweater on and his top two buttons are unbuttoned.

I’m afraid to say that I noticed that right away. I also noticed that his hair has grown out since he last had a haircut. It already was when I was still with him, and when I pointed out that he needed a haircut, he proceeded to stare at me in his usual way before telling me that it was out of courtesy for me. Since I liked touching it, playing with it, fisting it during sexy times — only he didn’t exactly say ‘sexy times,’ he used other colorful words.

“Frankly you’re obsessed with my hair,” he murmured, sitting at the kitchen island.

I threw a piece of bread at him. “What, and you aren’t? Newsflash, Conrad: you’re obsessed with my hair too. You’re beyond obsessed with my hair. You touch it in your sleep. Yeah, I’ve noticed. You touch it when we’re watching TV. You touch it when we’re doing the dishes. You touched it the first time I came here and we were looking at those photos. Don’t think you got away with that. I noticed that too. You touch it all the time.”

By the time I finished, his whole gorgeous face was colored in amusement and his eyes were flashing as he said, “I do. And I am.”

“You’re what?”

“Going to touch it now.”

And then he did. First when he pulled me in for a wet and hungry kiss and then when I got even hungrier and got down on my knees to suck his cock. He touched my hair then as well. He fisted it actually and used it to pull me on and off his thick, tasty dick and…

That was when I stopped noticing.

Things about him at the party, I mean.

And since everyone is here, all of Callie’s brothers, Reed and his sister, Tempest — who’s really kickass and has taken quite a liking to Poe — I got distracted by them.

Until I realized that I was being watched.

By Ledger.

Which came as an epic surprise for a lot of reasons, including the fact that I think I picked up a very strong vibe between him and Tempest.

So when he corners me in the kitchen — where I’ve gone to just take a second to myself before going out to where he is — and asks me out on a date, I’m speechless. I’m even more speechless when after my refusal, he keeps trying to convince me.

“What about her though?” I ask finally.

“What about who?”

I look him in his pretty brown eyes. He’s got great eyes.

I would draw them if I still drew. And if I could draw anyone else’s face.

Other than his.

“Tempest,” I say.

That gets me a reaction. A pretty fierce one.

His brows snap together and his square jaw goes tight. His entire body goes tight as he replies, “What about her?”

“I thought… she was important to you. I mean, the way you were pretending to not stare at her and —”

“Tempest is nothing.”

And that’s my answer.

I know he’s lying. And I know that I was right about the vibe that I picked up. There’s something there, between them, and maybe that’s why he’s asking me out on a date. Because of her.

I smile at him sadly and say, “You know, it would be a great idea to go on a date. But you’re…”

But I trail off because I notice movement behind Ledger’s shoulders.

A flash of dark hair and stricken gray eyes.

Tempest.

She’s standing at the kitchen threshold and from the looks of it, she heard everything. When she spins around and leaves, my heart twists for her, for the disdain and rejection she must’ve heard in Ledger’s voice.