His mouth dropped as she spilled the story of her sexual evolution, and it remained open as he stared at her in silence. Since it didn’t look like he had anything to add, she said in a gentler tone, “I loved being with you back then.” She wrapped her arms around her midsection, as if she could hug the memories close. “You made me feel special. And I loved making you…” Oh, now she wasreallyblushing. Because she’d adored making him come back in the day, adored watching him lose himself in her hands and her mouth and her body.
Leo’s burning gaze pinned her in place as he stepped closer. “So you had better sex with people after me?”
“Define better,” she said with a weak laugh. “Actually, no. Not having this conversation with you. I don’t owe you any explanations.”
“But it sounds like I owe you orgasms.” He was standing even closer to her now, and she could see his chest rise and fall with his accelerated breaths, could inhale his spicy, woodsy smell. Hair gel maybe? Some kind of manly body wash? Whatever it was made it impossible for her to think straight.
“You don’t owe me anything.” God, it was hot in her room. She should shut her window to keep the humid summer air out, but that would require stepping away from him, and she didn’t have the strength.
“But you did come the other night?” he demanded.
“Y-yes.”
He opened his mouth as if he wanted to ask more questions, but she put a hand on his chest before he could. And then she made the mistake of glancing down.
If she hadn’t known the shape of Leo’s cock before, she would now. Because he was in gray sweatpants. In her bedroom. In his hot adult body. And he was definitely,definitelyinto this conversation.
His gaze slid down, then back up, and he raised his brows but didn’t make a move to touch her. In fact, the only person touching anybody here was her, her wayward fingers curling into the neckline of his shirt to brush against his skin.
With a start, she pulled her hand away and stepped back, right against the footboard of her bed. She sat down abruptly, her attempt to put some distance between them actually landing her in the worst possible place to ramp down the tension.
His eyes traveled over her shoulder, and his tongue swept across his lower lip. “Is that the same bed?” His tone was light, but a universe of meaning simmered under that simple question, and she sucked in a breath before answering.
“Same bed,” she said. “Where the—”
“—magic happens. I remember.”
She struggled to draw breath into her lungs as his eyes traced the cream-colored velvet headboard and tulle canopy overhead. This was where they’d had sex for the first time—the first time with each other and the first time ever for either of them—and he’d given her everything she’d dreamed of with her first love.
Of course now that she was an adult, she knew exactly what she needed in bed, just like she knew adult Leo could give it to her. And just like with those damn sweatpants, it was all she could think of.
Almost without meaning to, she leaned back on the mattress and propped her hands behind her, arching her back and popping her breasts. She was in a tank top and shorts, nothing sexy, but the hitch in Leo’s breathing told her that he didn’t care about that.
He bent forward and planted one hand on either side of her body, his fingers tense against the pink comforter. Leaning close, he whispered in her ear. “Are your parents home?”
She laughed, a little delighted and a little horrified by this game they were playing. She tilted her head so her cheek brushed his jaw, igniting a million sparks along her skin. “They’re in California,” she murmured. “We’re all alone.”
His hands moved from the mattress to her hips, and he trailed the pads of his fingers roughly down the outsides of her thighs, making her shiver. Hot intentions twisted behind his eyes, and she saw it, saw clearly the plans he was making for them. Ways he’d make her come. Ways he’d makethemcome. And oh, she wanted that. Wanted him to act out every dirty thought with her in this bed.
When his gaze locked on hers, they both froze. Because this wasn’t anonymous. There was no way Leo could tell himself that this interaction was happening with a stranger, no way he could treat her like some nameless partner. Their hookup in the storage closet had been hot, but this time she wanted him to acknowledge that it washerhe was touching.
And it worked. Until it didn’t.
Awareness came back into his eyes first, the knowledge that there were a million reasons for them not to fall into bed together. Their history for one thing. Their present work situation for another. But still Leo didn’t move. In the end she was the one who gently pushed him away. He complied immediately, straightening and clasping his hands behind his back. As he did, his eyes traveled around the room, and his disbelieving laugh snapped the tension.
“Good Lord, Dutch, nothing’s changed.”
A little thrill moved through her at the realization that he’d been too focused on her until now to pay attention to his surroundings.
“I guess my parents never bothered redecorating after I moved out.”
Leo drifted to her wall of bookshelves, stuffed with her childhood books, knickknacks, and awards. He ran a finger over her mini T-Rex skeleton from a school trip to the Field Museum they’d gone on together, and he leaned close to look at her old high school speech trophies in the same place of pride after all these years. The main difference from twelve years ago was the absence of pictures of him. She’d shredded those immediately after their breakup when she’d been too incensed to think straight.
Her room wasn’t entirely free of his ghost though. He paused in front of her vanity where she’d placed the little glass serving bowl with the Dairy Bar logo etched on it. She’d overlooked it in her purge of Leo memorabilia and forgot all about it until she’d moved back in last month. She was using it to hold her jewelry now, perversely enjoying the bittersweet zing it gave her each time she touched it.
He picked it up and cradled it in his hands, and as he did, the weight of their history hit her all of a sudden. If she squinted she could almost see teenage Leo standing alongside today’s version, holding the small box carefully wrapped in shiny red paper. The last gift he’d ever given her.
Today wasn’t the first time he’d crawled through her window, and to pretend that they didn’t share all those memories was ludicrous. She was hit with a sharp desire to stop fighting with him every time they were together.
