A Shattered Moment (Fractured Lives 1)

“You’re trying to kill me,” he muttered.

“Why?”

“Seriously? Forget about the fact that we’ve been interrupted twice now, but Wonder Woman underwear?”

“Panties,” I corrected.

“What?”

“They’re panties,” I teased.

“Whatever, they’re still Wonder Woman,” he said, helping me into his pair of sweats. His hands gently cupped my bad leg. I shivered as his fingers moved over my scars. Thankfully, he didn’t say anything. I might have embarrassed myself by bawling or something. Besides my doctors and my parents, he was the only one who had seen my scars.

“And that’s a good thing?” I asked, bringing my thoughts back to his fascination with my panties.

“Wonder Woman is like a top-of-the-list fantasy chick, so you wearing those seriously adds to the whole image.” He pulled the sweats over my hips and into place, ending the game.

I had to laugh at his reasoning. They were just panties, but in light of what had almost happened, I guess it made sense. In spite of him seeing my leg, I was still aching for more than I cared to admit.

“I’m coming out,” Chad yelled, officially ending the mood.

“He’s like a damn toddler. Now I get why my mom always joked that kids would one day ruin my sex life.” He rolled up the leg of the sweats so he could look at my knees.

“Wait. Your mom would tell you that?” I thought I’d misheard him.

“What took so long?” Chad grumbled, sitting next to me on the couch. He grimaced when he spotted my knees, which looked as bad as they felt. Thanks to Bentley’s momentary distraction, I’d forgotten about the throbbing abrasions.

“Yeah,” Bentley said, answering my question. “My mom was pretty forward about that stuff. I think she was trying to scare me into practicing safe sex. This will feel cool,” he added, dabbing at my knees with some kind of antibacterial cleaner.

I flinched but remained quiet while he continued to wipe away the dried blood. “You’re lucky,” I said. “My parents’ stance was just don’t do it.”

“Trust me. I would have preferred that over my mom’s openness. S

he felt it was her job to lecture my friends, too.”

“True story,” Chad interrupted. “Remember when she found out I was dating Olivia Bakersfield?”

Bentley winked at me, chuckling.

“What did she do?”

“She handed me a box of condoms in front of the guys and made me practice rolling the condom onto a banana.”

“No she didn’t,” I gasped, covering my mouth.

“I shit you not,” Chad grumbled.

“You’re neglecting to tell her the whole story,” Bentley pointed out. “Like, for whatever dumb-ass reason you said you couldn’t wait to ‘tap that’ when you were talking about Olivia?”

“You said that in front of his mom?”

“That’s right.” Chad chuckled. “I did say that, didn’t I? Still, I should have bet money on it because it happened.”

“Like anyone would have taken that sucker bet. Who didn’t have a shot at Olivia? All you had to do was ask,” Bentley joked, bandaging my right knee before turning to the other one.

“Ha, ain’t that the truth.” Chad agreed as they high-fived, proud of themselves until my disgusted look brought them back to reality.

“So, did you ask?” I asked Bentley, who had suddenly felt the need to concentrate on bandaging my other leg.