I blush—I can’t seem to control it around him—and it’s both from memories of lust and anger. “So you’re just fulfilling a high school fantasy?”
Thomas closes his eyes for a second. “Despite what you seem to think about me and my family, I’m not completely callous.”
I freeze, and wish I could take it back. “You’re saying I should give you a chance?”
“When I win I’ll have my chance.”
I line up my shot. “You wish.”
I make the shot, but not with enough power. The ball stops just short of the pocket, and I inwardly groan. He’s going to take full advantage.
Grinning, Thomas finishes the last of his beer and steps up to the table. “I think we’ve been dancing around the end of this game. Care to end it?”
“Feel free to miss and I’ll finish up.”
He laughs, but doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t miss. Not the first shot, the second one, the third one. Now he’s only got the eight ball left and I suddenly think he’s been holding back this whole time. Toying with me. “Eight ball, corner pocket.”
The ball falls into the pocket with ease, and I know my mouth is open in shock.
It honestly never occurred to me that I might not win. I haven’t lost a game of pool in years. Suddenly I’m conflicted, because I’ve lost. I’ve lost. That means that my dad is still in trouble, but I’m having trouble focusing on that because my mind is focused on images of Thomas and me together in the dark. Part of me expects him to say that he was kidding, that since he won everything goes back to the way it was before. But he doesn’t.
“Good game,” he says, with a faint smile, coming close. So close now that I can feel the heat from his body even though we’re not touching, and it feels like I’m on a tightrope. I’m aware of every sensation, every movement, and I’m about to fall.
“You were serious?” I ask.
“I was.” And then his hand is tangled in my hair and his lips are on mine and I’m so shocked that I don’t even have time to take a breath. The kiss is fierce and deep and it touches every part of me. It’s achingly familiar, and yet like nothing I’ve experienced before. His tongue tastes like beer, but not whiskey. Had he been playing me all along? I think he really did dump his shots the way I had to make me think he was drunk. Now that I think of it, I don’t remember actually watching him take a shot.
Right now I don’t care that I’ve been played. All I care about is his tongue against mine, our lips pressed together. My body responds to him the way it never has to anyone. It blossoms and loosens, and I can feel myself getting wetter. From just a kiss. Damn it. I know I shouldn’t want this. I swore never to trust a Logan again. And I want to keep that promise, but I also want this more than I even thought I could.
He pulls back and I’m lightheaded, almost dizzy. “Tonight, you’re mine,” he says.
I don’t have any words to argue with him.
He puts his cue back, and takes mine. Shrugging on his jacket, he takes my hand and pulls me through the bar. I manage to grab my bag, distracted and dazed by the feeling of his skin on mine.
Thomas leads me out to his car and opens the door for me, and then we’re driving. The silence isn’t uncomfortable, I’m just still shocked. I’m going home with him. Those fleeting and fevered images of him and me in the dark are about to be a reality. I shouldn’t be doing this.
Then his hand is on my knee and all other thoughts and doubts disappear. His fingers leave a trail of warmth from my knee to my thigh. My legs automatically spread for him and he’s rubbing me through my jeans.
My head falls back against the headrest and I’m looking up at the stars through the open sunroof of his car. I let out a moan as he presses harder against that delicate spot. My back arches and I wish my jeans weren’t acting as a barrier to his hand right now. I’m past the point of caring about loans and enemies and pacts. All I want is for my naked body to be pressed up against his.
Maybe fifteen minutes of pure pleasure go by when we pull into the garage of a high-rise on the edge of town. His hand is suddenly gone and I can finally catch my breath. He shuts off the engine and now that my head has cleared, I’m suddenly nervous.
“Rose,” he says.
“Yeah?”
He clears his throat, and I see those signs of discomfort again. He turns toward me. “This afternoon, before you realized who I was, and why I was there…I felt something between us. If we had no history, nothing that was putting us on opposite sides of the table like this, and I had asked you out, would you have said yes?”