“I wasn’t sure at first, so I searched through my email and after a few hours, I managed to find it,” Garrett said as he opened her door and reached for her. “I spent the past week reading it and comparing it to the book you published.”
“And what did you find?” Kristen asked as he pulled her into his arms, making her swallow hard as the move brought their faces inches apart. She watched his gaze flicker to her lips as she was slowly lowered to the ground.
“You rewrote Tristan’s character, turning him into a brooding asshole that was once Emily’s entire world until he betrayed her,” Garrett said softly as he reached up and ran his fingertips along her jaw before he dropped his hand away.
“To match the man that he was based on,” Kristen said, watching the way that Garrett’s lips twitched as he took her hand in his and entwined their fingers together.
“And you changed the ending, instead of Emily telling Tristan that she was in love with him, she told him to go to hell,” Garrett said, absently caressing the back of her hand with his thumb, the move sending goosebumps racing up her arm.
“The same words that you said to me,” Kristen drawled as he gave her hand a gentle tug that had her following him as he made his way down his driveway towards the road.
“The very same,” Garrett murmured absently, sounding lost in thought. “You were trying to tell me that you loved me, but instead, I thought you were making sure that I knew just how much you hated me,” he said, making her frown as she racked her brain, trying to figure out what he was talking about.
She opened her mouth to ask him what the hell he was talking about only...
“Oh, my God,” Kristen said hollowly as the realization slammed into her.
“You thought you were Greg,” she said hollowly as what that really meant finally hit after all these years.
“And you hate Greg,” Garrett said as they crossed the street.
“More than anything,” Kristen said, wondering why she didn’t see this before.
“Who’s Greg?” Garrett asked, glancing at her as they made their way to her front door.
“Everyone, Kelly, her gofers, the boys at school, my mother and stepfather, everyone who went out of their way to make my life a living hell, which brings up an interesting question,” Kristen said, pulling her hand away when they reached her front step so that she could look at him as she asked, “Why did you think that you were Greg?”
“Besides the fact that you wrote him as your best friend?” Garrett said, reaching up to push a strand of her hair back behind her ear. “Because he was in love with you.”
“Writing 101, make the bad guy the character that readers least suspect so that they never see it coming,” Kristen said, swallowing hard as his fingertips brushed against her skin. “I still don’t trust you.”
“I know,” Garrett said as he leaned down and kissed her forehead.
“I’ve thought about kissing you a thousand times,” Garrett said softly against her skin as he gently cupped her face in his hands.
“What are you doing?” Kristen asked, watching as he pulled back just far enough so that he could look into her eyes.
“Finding out what it’s like to kiss you,” he whispered as he pressed his forehead against hers and-
“What if I don’t want to be kissed?” Kristen asked, reaching up and placed her hands over his as she slowly took a step back, taking him with her as the move caused her to move onto the first step.
“Then, I go back to wondering,” Garrett said, following her as she moved onto the next step.
“Maybe that’s for the best,” Kristen whispered as she thought of all those times that she’d imagined what it would be like to kiss him. She’d thought about it so many times, imagined it in a thousand different ways, and narrowed it down to the perfect first kiss.
It was the one and only thing that she didn’t write about, the one thing that she didn’t want to share with her readers, and the one thing that she wouldn’t be able to resist finding out what it would be like to be kissed by the only man that she’d ever loved.
“Maybe it is,” Garrett said softly, his fingertips caressing her jaw as he turned his head and-
Tore a soft moan from her when the move caused his lips to brush over hers in a barely-there caress. The next brush of his lips had her breath catching in her throat and the third...
It had her lips parting, allowing him to deepen the kiss as he dropped his hands away so that he could wrap his arms around her. He pulled her closer as he took his time, alternating between brushing his lips against hers and moving his lips against hers as she reached up and cupped his face in her hands.
The incredibly sexy groan that he released when she did that had her parting her lips again and-
Moaned softly when his tongue found hers as he pulled her tightly against him.
She lost herself in that kiss, forgetting about the past six years, their deal, everything, as she kissed him back. She’d never been kissed like this before, like he was savoring every brushof their lips, teasing of their tongues, leaving her desperate for more.
