Abby smiled wider. “You’re cute when you blush.”
“I-I just didn’t realize anyone was looking. It’s good. See?” I took a spoonful, and I pushed it up to Abby’s lips. She made a surprised noise, opening her mouth, and she gave me charged eye contact as I fed her the mousse. My breath came short, and I tried to tell myself I wasn’t picturing Jade in front of me instead.
“Okay, kind of sexy,” she said once I took the spoon back. “But I see what you mean, it is really good.”
Was it? I hadn’t tasted it. I could feel Jade’s eyes on me still, practically trying to bore a hole through me, and I couldn’t help myself. “Can I try some of your tiramisu?”
Abby smiled wider, and she took a spoonful of tiramisu, holding it up to my lips. “Open wide,” she said, her voice low, and I risked flicking my gaze over to see Jade’s white-knucklegrip on her fork. It made my stomach drop just looking at it, and I opened my mouth with a low noise of satisfaction. Distantly, I registered something flaring up in Abby’s eyes when I did, and I should have felt guilty, but she was the one who told me to stop thinkingshouldandshouldn’t.
“That’s so good,” I murmured. Abby swiped a thumb over my lower lip.
“Sweet tooth, huh?”
“I know what I like.”
She grinned. “I like that.”
Jade made a low noise—I think it was involuntary, a quiet growl in the back of her throat, and I lost my breath. Wondering if she might make a noise like that with me.
Jesus, I was losing my mind. I had to get out of here. Had to go now, before I did something I regretted.
I pushed my chair back, standing up, and I didn’t really even realize I was doing it until I was standing up, all eyes on me. I pursed my lips, blushing furiously. “Sorry,” I said. “Just one second. I need to go to the bathroom.”
That didn’t come out convincingly at all. That wasfine.People could talk about how desperately I was lusting over Abby. Anything to distract people from what I was actually thinking. I turned and pushed away from the table, and I raced past the speaker system, around the corner, past the bathrooms, and down to the grassy area at the bottom of the terrace, shielded from view of everybody, and I leaned back against the wooden boards of the deck, breathing hard, staring up at the night sky above me.
The sound from the speakers just above me swallowed out anything else, and I tried to lose myself in it, just following the beat, thinking about the music—about anything other than Jade and the vivid fantasies that still coursed through me—but all itmeant was that I jumped in surprise when a voice came from next to me.
“Don’t see a bathroom here.”
Jade’s voice. I whipped on her with my heart in my mouth, and I felt a heady sense of panic when I turned to see her coming around the corner, leaning against the wall next to me. “Oh…” I managed after a second. “Jade.”
“What do you think you’re doing, exactly?” she said, her voice a low growl, and it stirred something deep inside me. I couldn’t do this. She and Daniela were perfect together. I’d promised Daniela. Jade had been all over her.
“Shouldn’t you be off on your dance routine with Daniela?” I said, forcing myself to look away, focusing on the thick trees beyond the edge of the property. She cut in, pushing off from the wall and moving in front of me, and my stomach dropped at the sudden positioning—Jade right in front of me, my back against the wall.
“If you’re going to fuck Abby, go ahead,” she said, her eyes locked on mine, “but you should be focusing on her if you’re doing that.”
Oh, Jesus. She was jealous. My stomach fluttered, heart hammering like I was in free-fall. I’d been trying to make her jealous—I had been all this time I’d been talking to Abby, I was only now realizing—even though I knew I wasn’t supposed to. I ducked my head, looking at her through my lashes. “I don’t know what you mean,” I said, and something flared in her eyes.
“Alyssa…”
“Do you think I should get together with her?” I needed to stop. I’d never been able to shut up once my mouth got ideas.
“Do what you like,” she said, her voice clenched and tight. She wouldn’t look right at me.
“That’s not an answer. Do you think I should? She’d probably let me kiss her.”
She growled, and my stomach fluttered when she stepped closer. My knees quivered at the sensation, backed up against the wall, Jade close enough I could smell the woodsy scent on her clothes. “You’re doing this to me on purpose,” she said.
“Is that a no? You don’t think I should?”
She put a hand on my arm. The touch was electric, her fingers on my bare skin, and I forgot briefly how to breathe. “Alyssa,” she said, her voice a warning.
“Yes, Jade?”
Her eyes dragged down, looking over my body, and I couldn’t believe the way my mind ignited—how I wanted her to look at any thing she wanted to, do whatever she wanted. Jesus, I needed her so badly, it was like I was gasping for air and she was the only relief. “I don’t want you to evenlookat Abby,” she growled, her eyes locking on mine. “I swear to god, if you touch her like that one more time—fuckinglookingat me the whole time—I’m going to pull you away from her.”
“And then?” I said breathlessly, and I let my hand fall on her shoulder, fingertips teasing her collar through her shirt. “What would you do after that?”
