Page 47 of Big & Bossy

She breathed out, a little cloud of fog filling the small gap between us, and before I could react she stretched upward. Her lips met mine, gentle, soft, her red lipstick staining me the instant they touched. She’s drunk. She’s drunk. She’s drunk.

She’s sobering up.

I parted my lips, kissing her eagerly, every part of my body being set on fire, chasing away the chill. She wanted this. Her hands on my neck, my hoodie, she pulled me closer, pressing her body to mine as she let me explore her mouth and the heat that came with it. I could kiss her forever—I wanted to devour her, have her, claim her.

The hand that clutched the front of my hoodie moved, her nails raking down my chest then lower, down to the waistband of my gym shorts. She’s drunk. She’s sober. She’s drunk. She’s drunk. “Fuck,” I grunted as her hand broached the elastic band, dipping behind my boxers. My cock was already hard from kissing her. “Mandy.”

“I want you,” she breathed, her fingers wrapping around my hard shaft. “Please.”

“We can’t,” I bit out. Every part of me screamed to continue, to let this happen, but I wasn’t that guy. If she wanted me, she could have me when she was sober. “You’re still drunk.”

“Yes but it’s okay?—”

She retreated within a second, her eyes going wide, her body freezing up. Her breath came quicker, her chest rising and falling a little too fast, a little too panicked. “Mandy?”

“I’m…”

She breathed in a shaky breath, one foot stepping away, then a second later her arm painfully clutched mine as she spewed every single drop of pancakes down the front of my NYU hoodie.

Chapter 22

Mandy

My head felt like it was going to explode—literally.

I grunted as I rolled over, a pillow clutched between my arms and legs, and squinted my eyes open the moment I felt something warm against my hand. Wherever I was it wasn’t my room. There was a hint of blue light coming from Jackson’s phone as he scrolled aimlessly through social media…

Jack.

Despite the pounding in my head, I suddenly felt wide awake. Where’s my dress? I had on shorts and a big T-shirt. Where am I? Jack’s house. How? He picked me up. Slowly the events from the night before began filtering in, memories assaulting me one after the other. On one hand, I was thankful that I’d never been the type of person to forget anything that happened on a drunken night out, but on the other, I wished I didn’t remember throwing up down the front of his hoodie.

“Oh my God,” I mumbled, burying my face in the pillow beneath my head as I clung to the one in my arms.

Jackson chuckled as he laid his phone facedown against his bare chest. “Good morning, princess. How are we feeling?”

“Morning?” I breathed, peeking out at him over the crest of the sheets. It was so dark I could barely make out the features of his face, could only see the small amount of light in the room reflecting off his eyes. “It’s the middle of the night.”

“It’s eleven in the morning, Mandy,” Jack drawled, his body shifting beneath the covers. “It’s just the blackout blinds.”

I groaned as I rubbed at my eyes, my headache annoyingly localized behind only one of them. It made me want to gouge it out of my skull. “I feel like I want to die.”

“Do you not want me to open the blinds, then?”

I shook my head, the sheets rustling beneath me and filling my ears painfully. “You can open them.”

He rolled to his left, his hand reaching out toward the bedside table. One click of a button and light began to filter in from behind me, his upper body coming into view much clearer than before.

“I’m sorry I threw up on you.” He turned back, every muscle in his chest rippling as he fought to get the covers over him before I saw the tattoo.

But it was too late.

My hand reached out instinctually, stopping him from covering the little bit of ink on his left pectoral. My fingers on his bare skin, his breathing shuddered as I traced the lines, any existing thought evacuating my mind. A tiny panda, fairly simplistic. The view was from the side as it sat on its butt, his face peering down at the little crown in front of him, lying limply on the ground. I couldn’t breathe.

“Please don’t,” he whispered, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed. “It’s nothing.”

It wasn’t nothing. It was something, it was everything.

Gently, he wrapped his fingers around mine, removing my hand. “I’ll run you a bath, okay? We should get you cleaned up.”

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