She had a sunflower soul with a heart of gold, a hankerin’ for adventure, and a thirst for knowledge. She was raw and earthy, mellow and cataclysmic, sexy and lovin’.
She was the epitome of everythin’ I loved in this world.
And it was gettin’ hard to remind myself why I shouldn’t make her mine.
Then I remembered it was Dane’s fuckin’ birthday, and I was standin’ there with a hardenin’ cock pervin’ on his little sister.
Lila stopped in front of me, hand to the flare of her hip, one leg kicked out and bronze in the descending light, all sass and flare. “I don’t think I’ve seen you scowl so much in your life as I have the last two months.”
’Cause you’re drivin’ me fuckin’ crazy, I almost said.
Instead, I took a last drag of my cig and flipped it to the concrete where I stamped it out with an aggressive twist of my heavy boot.
Lila’s sassy expression faltered as she stepped closer and reached up to gently take down my sunglasses.
“Can’t ever read your expression if I can’t see those velvet eyes,” she murmured, touchin’ the skin beside left eye, smoothin’ out the creases there. “Always smiling, even when you have nothing to smile about.”
I snagged her wrist, makin’ her jump, but I only pressed my thumb to her pulse as it took off in a sprint, rubbin’ the tender skin over it. “Not much worth smilin’ about today.”
“No,” she agreed softly then hesitated, shiftin’ from foot to foot in a little shimmy that shouldn’t have been hot but was. When she finally looked back up at me, her eyes were more green than brown, glowin’ like unearthed emeralds. “I know we’re trying to put the past behind us, so…can I hug you?”
Fuck me, but she was sweet.
I felt my mouth curl in a small, genuine smile as I opened my arms and waggled my brows. “Come get it, babe.”
She laughed softly then lunged forward to wrap her arms around my neck, press her lush body to mine and hold tight.
She smelled good, like crushed berries and jasmine, earthy and sweet, and she felt even better, like a piece slotted back into place. I put my nose in the glossy sheets of her hair and clutched her hard to me.
“Missed ya,” I murmured, ’cause at the end of the day, she was my best friend.
“Missed you,” she admitted. “Even though you’re a pain in my ass.”
“That’s what she said,” I countered.
She shoved me away, but she was laughin’, hair tossed back, eyes alight ’cause I’d set fire to them.
Another of her beauties: she made everyone feel like their best self ’cause she always saw the best in people.
“So you got the ritual. Where we headin’?”
Lila stopped laughin’, but her smile stayed, growing warm and sly. “The Wet Lotus strip club.”
* * *
* * *
The Lotus was Fallen owned and operated, so I was no stranger to the velvet booths, blue lights, and mirrored bar, but sittin’ there with Lila was a far cry different than lounging around with my brothers and flirtin’ with the dancers and bar staff.
Mostly ’cause Lila had insisted we go back to the apartment so she could change and I could drop the bike. We were drinkin’ to excess, apparently, so we caught a ride with Axe-Man to The Lotus, and we’d cabs after that. But it was her outfit that set me on edge more than the naked women on stage.
She was wearin’ purple.
She’d always favoured the colour, or maybe I had. Either way, along the line it’d become our favourite, and I was used to seein’ her in it.
But I’d never seen anythin’ like that dress.
All dark lace from the short hem ticklin’ her smooth upper thighs to the edge of the flowy sleeves that still revealed her colourful tats through the fabric. It plunged to a point just above her belly button, the lush swell of her breasts shinin’, half-exposed in the neon lights, the long spill of her dark hair glowin’ black and blue.
When she stood, I could even make out the thin string of her black thong dissectin’ the blooms of her hips and ridin’ high on her ass.
It was a dress designed explicitly to kill a man’s resolve to behave himself.
My fingers twitched on the bar as I watched her watch the dancers, as she shimmied her shoulders to the music.
Feelin’ my gaze, she looked over at me and laughed. “You look angry for a guy in a strip club.”
Angry? No.
Fuckin’ pissed ’cause here I was, tryin’ to be an honorable guy for the first time in my fuckin’ life, and the personification of temptation was sittin’ across from me, completely unaware I’d been half-hard since she emerged from the bathroom at the apartment with big, wavy sex hair and spiked metal high heels.