The thought of sharing an apartment with Megan no longer bothered me the way it had six months before. It was now just a part of my daily life, like seeing her wander around half-naked and having indecent thoughts about her. Still, I had set certain boundaries for myself that I wasn’t going to cross.
Those were still firmly in place, and they weren’t going anywhere.
“Oh yeah? You want me to come over there and tear it off you?” I began unwrapping my hands slowly, still holding eye contact with her. My wicked gaze locked on hers, and I was pleased to see the effect I was having on her. She wriggled on the stool, tightening her thighs together before gulping down her mouthful of toast and blinking rapidly at me.
I had been learning how to read the female body and sense its wants since I was a child.
And, right now, I was sensing her want in a major way.
“Don’t even try it. I can defend myself, as you well know,” she shot back immediately. She’d given up on eating and assumed a ready posture. But I always got what I wanted, and if I wanted my sweater back, I would take it.
“I can put you on your back whenever I want.” I adopted a menacing expression as I stalked toward her with slow, determined steps like a hunter closing in on his prey.
Megan’s eyes opened wide. Sensing the danger, she leaped off the stool.
“Don’t you start!” She began to cackle as she darted around the kitchen island to escape me. She failed miserably, though, because I managed to snatch her easily and shoved her down on our living room couch.
“Fuck, hold still!”
She laughed against me and the sound of it rebounded off the walls around us, her disheveled hair fanned out beneath her. I lifted her arms up over her head, holding her wrists, and settled myself over her slender body, putting my weight on her. I felt her breath catch when my bare chest grazed her nipples. They were hard beneath my sweatshirt, and I knew she was ashamed. I knew she wanted me, though she still refused to admit it. She was in denial because she could not show herself to be vulnerable. She could not let her instincts get the better of her good sense.
“I know you want to fuck me.” I leaned forward until my nose brushed along hers. It wasn’t because I was attracted to her or found myself drawn to her beauty; it was because I was an asshole, and I liked to make her squirm.
I breathed in her pleasant orange blossom scent, the same as it was when we were children sitting out in the yard and she tried to teach me Spanish. To me, she was forever that little girl with the white bow in her hair. It felt simultaneously as though it had been both a blink and a lifetime since that moment.
“And what makes you think that? A little too sure of yourself, I think,” she answered, sounding annoyed. She hated it when I tried to tame her. She was a fighter, a brave warrior who would never let a man dominate her. She wriggled under me, twisting her wrists in an attempt to get out of my iron grip. I smiled smugly as she huffed in frustration.
“Do you think I’m stupid?” I answered lazily. “Do you think I haven’t noticed the way you’ve been looking at me ever since we started living in this apartment together? You can deny it to yourself but not to me,” I breathed against her lips, staring at the tiny mole beside her cupid’s bow. She licked her lips, and her breathing turned heavy, her nipples straining more and more against the white fabric that covered them.
“I don’t—” she began to say, but then we were interrupted by the sounds of someone else’s footsteps in the living room.
Both of our heads snapped to the woman who was watching the scene before her with an expression that was both thoughtful and bewildered. Who knew what was going through her head, finding me in a compromising position with Head Case’s half-naked body spread out underneath me?
“You really do have a type, huh? Blue-eyed brunettes,” Megan noted as I got up, freeing her from my grasp. I stood up, watching the woman in our living room.
She was in her early twenties.
Pale skin with sharp, delicate features. She was undoubtedly hot but very angelic looking.
I scrutinized her more closely, searching for a pair of full, pouty lips that I would not find. My gaze roved over her slim but not upturned nose before delving into her blue eyes.
An ordinary blue like all the others, not the ocean I had been immersed in just a few months before.
Still, she bore aslightresemblance to Tinkerbell the night before.
Now, though, she looked nothing like her.
“I…um…left my number for you in the room,” she stammered, twitchy and timid. They were qualities I deliberately sought out in my women these days, despite the fact that they all turned into fierce lionesses in the sack and made it clear that their alleged shy reserve was just another strategic front.
What was this particular girl’s name? I didn’t even remember.
I usually didn’t, and I had to cover for it with some banal nickname.
Her gaze swept longingly down my body, lingering on my crotch.
“I don’t give a shit where you leave your number, sweetheart. I’m not going to call you anyway,” I said, cold and clear. She winced at my stormy face.
Why did they all make the same mistake?
