She twirled a strand of her hair around her slender fingers. “Oh, a little while ago.”
“Who is he?” I asked.
“Lucas.”
“Lucas,” I repeated for the sake of my memory. I would have to deal with him. “This is your third engagement. Do you have commitment issues, Rosalie?”
She couldn’t deny it. “Yes.”
“How old is he?”
“Late twenties.” She swallowed.
Keeping my mouth shut was the biggest challenge of them all. Rosalie thrived on having the last word. The only problem with that was I did too. I constantly struggled to find the right words when communicating with her, grappling with the challenge of responding to her remarks, all while keeping my smart mouth out of her reach.
It was useless to even try.
“And you haven’t sworn off him yet?”
“Don’t sound so surprised,” she said, tilting her chin up.
“You’re right. You’re not exactly hard to get.” It tumbled out before I could stop it.
A lie.
“Didn’t your mother teach you how to talk to someone with manners?” Her hand moved, the ring on her finger catching the light for a brief, unwelcome moment.
“She tried,” I countered. I shoved my hands into the pockets of my baggy jeans to keep them off her. “Instead I got my father’s smart mouth.”
“Figures,” she scoffed, rolling her eyes.
My eyes narrowed on the ring. “How many carats?” I asked.
“Three,” she said hesitantly.
“Three?That’s insulting.”
“Not everyone cares about carats.”
“You do,” I said, looking her up and down. “You’re an expensive woman, remember? Can a man like Lucas even afford a woman like you?”
A part of her wanted to laugh—I could tell by the curve of her lips as they lifted. “I hope so.”
I chuckled, picking the rag up off the hood of the car. I continued to wipe down the tools before putting them back into the box Sean had cluttered. “He makes you happy?” I wondered.
She looked up at me, her smile faltering for a moment. Her lashes, thick and dark, fluttered with each blink. “Yes,” she said.
She was such a goddamn liar. Made me feel better about being one myself.
“Come on,” I said, tossing the rag down. “I know you’re gullible, but you’re not easy.”
“You know nothing about me,” she gritted.
She was a walking temptation I constantly wanted to act upon. My insidious desires burned in my gut, fixated on just one thing. That one thing was the woman sitting directly in front of me, on the hood of my car, with eyes that spoke a novel’s worth of words that remained unsaid.
“I know a few things,” I started, a smirk twisting my lips. “Like how you kiss.”
“I kissed you once. That doesn’t make you special, Max. I kiss lots of men.”
