My mouth popped open. “Do what?”
“Smile like that.”
“I’m not,” I said, smiling wider.
He worked his jaw, fighting his own smile. “We need to talk about what happened tonight.”
My smile fell, and my mouth went dry. Why did I feel like I was in trouble? He was the one who’d started everything. “Okay. Do you want to start off by telling me what made you want to choose me for the rock-star version ofThe Bachelor? If you wanted to kiss me, you didn’t think to do it when Danny wasn’t watching us? Or, you know, maybe ask me if I wanted to be kissed first?”
“I knew Danny wouldn’t see anything. His guitar solo is like meditation to him. He gets in his own world.”
“So, it was planned?”
His head tilted. “Not exactly.”
“Do not tell me you didn’t recognize me because I saw you look at me before you grabbed my face.” I couldn’t stop myself from reimagining it—that first crush of his lips to mine.
“I did you a favor when I kissed you.”
My brows shot up. “A favor?” I dragged out mockingly.
Liam frowned. “That asshole was all over that other girl. I kissed you so that he would fucking feel it. You saw his face, didn’t you?”
I shot up on my elbow, exasperated. “So, that’s why you stuck your tongue down my throat?”
“Aye, if you want to get into specifics, I believe your tongue tasted me first.”
My God, the way he’d said “tasted” made me want to do it all over again.
What? No, I don’t.
“You’re unbelievable,” I said.
“I get that a lot.” Liam smirked at me, and I swatted his stomach.
“You’re telling me, that was all for show? That you didn’t want to kiss me?”
There had been a hunger in him that made my insides melt when he sucked and tugged at my lips. I could still feel it. It was hard for me to believe he hadn’t felt anything…but it was Liam. He must’ve kissed a hundred girls by now for that song, just to get a rise out of the crowd.
His eyes dropped to my mouth, and his smirk disappeared. “That’s right.”
I ran my tongue along my bottom lip, wetting it. Toying with him was fun and might be the only way to get him to admit that he had feelings for me.
“If that’s true, why put on the show? Why make another man jealous if I mean so little to you?” I pressed.
There was a flicker of vulnerability in his eyes before they hardened. But I wasn’t giving up yet.
“You’re a Fox, living under our roof. Family to my best friend. I wasn’t going to let some douche in a button-up at a rock show humiliate one of us. Especially one who’d already broken your heart.”
“Ah, so you were protecting me?”
“Sure.”
“With your mouth?”
“Avery,” he groaned through his teeth as he threw his head back.
“You felt nothing?”
