Kiss the Girl (Naughty Princess Club 3)

Giddy excitement rushes through me, and if I weren’t in public where someone might witness me looking like an asshole, I would be jumping up and down, clapping my hands together and squealing. Like a peppy cheerleader. Like a girl.

Eric brought me to a flea market. I know, I know . . . I just mentioned romantic shit, and flea markets do not really scream hearts and romance, but this is me we’re talking about here. I don’t need love poems or candlelit dinners or a dozen roses. If you want to woo me, bring me to the largest pop-up flea market in twenty counties, with the biggest collection of antiques you’ve ever seen, which only comes around once every three years.

“When I was grabbing a coffee this morning before work I saw a flyer for this thing on their bulletin board. It sounded like something you might like,” he tells me.

“Might like? This is the kind of thing that will get you laid.”

I can already feel my neck getting red and hot and itchy as soon as the words leave my mouth. Sure, we’ve been making out pretty hot and heavy lately, but it’s never moved beyond that, and we obviously haven’t talked about it like normal adults because that’s just stupid. I don’t know how this shit works. Am I supposed to ask for it? Am I supposed to initiate it? I know I’m all about being a strong, independent woman, but sometimes, you just need the guy to take the fucking lead and read your mind so you aren’t questioning everything.

While I’m waiting for a hole to open up in the parking lot and suck me down into the pits of hell to put me out of my misery, Eric slides his arm around my waist and pulls me against him. He changed out of his business suit while I was showering earlier, throwing on a pair of well-worn jeans and a fitted grey raglan T-shirt with red three-quarter length sleeves. He paired it with a red baseball cap that he put on backwards, and as I stare up at him, with my body pressed tightly to his, the soft and mushy feeling in my chest catches on fire. But not in a bad way. In an “I want to fuck you like a porn star” way.

“Is this your way of telling me flea markets make you horny?” Eric asks, smiling down at me, the hand pressed against my lower back starting to inch closer and closer to my ass.

This is my way of telling you that YOU make me horny.

“Obviously. The smell of pottery, the sound of a ticking grandfather clock, the feel of a porcelain vase in my hands . . . makes me want to hump the table they’re sitting on.”

See? Look at how adult I’m being.

Eric chuckles, removing his arm from around my waist, and all my hope of having sex in the parking lot is gone. I mean, not that I would do that or anything. Allegedly.

Grabbing my hand, he laces his fingers through mine and tugs me towards the huge field beyond the parking lot, where row after row of tents and tables have been set up.

“I still can’t believe you brought me here. This is my favorite place in the entire world. Well, all flea markets pretty much are, but this is the queen of all flea markets. I usually have a countdown on my phone telling me when the next one will be, but I guess I forgot about it this year,” I tell him, slipping my purse strap over my shoulder as we stop right at the edge of the grass to take in all the tents.

Fuck, why am I lying to him?

Cindy and Belle told me I needed to get deeper with him. Open up and talk to him. Keeping everything locked up inside of me isn’t the way to do that. I’m quickly realizing that I don’t want whatever this is between us to just be on the surface. I want more. I want to trust him, and I want him to trust me. It scares the holy hell out of me, but I can’t keep living in the past, just waiting for him to break me like Sebastian did.

“That was a lie. I totally knew this was happening today, I just didn’t want to think about it. Especially since I got an email last night that all my stuff is going to auction this weekend and there isn’t a damn thing I can do about it,” I tell him in a rush.

“Shit. I’m an asshole. We can leave. This was a really stupid idea. I just knew you loved antiques, and I hate that you had to leave everything behind, and I thought this might make you happy. I had no idea the auction was already happening.”