Page 54 of Make Her Mine

I lean in and say near her ear, “Just so you know, when we get to my truck, I’m going to kiss you.”

She jerks to a stop and looks up at me. “Excuse me?”

I smile down at her, playing the part of adoring boyfriend, having an intimate conversation with the woman he’s madly in love with. I lift my hand and brush her hair back from her cheek. “Zach is out here. So I’m going to kiss you.”

“We don’t have to be kissing and all over each other every time he’s around.”

But I notice that she’s breathing a little faster.

I cup her cheek. “Oh, but we do.”

Suddenly, she gets a sly look in her eye, then flattens her palm on the lapel of my jacket and runs it up and down. From a distance at least it looks like we’re discussing something friendly. “Why is that?”

“Because if you were my girlfriend and your ex was in town and interested in getting you back, I would be doing everything I could to show him that you are very taken.” I slide my hand from her cheek down her neck, then skim it down her back, still loving all the bare skin this dress shows off. When I get to her ass, I cup it and bring her closer.

She takes a quick little breath in.

“Though, if you were my girlfriend, and you were wearing this dress to dinner, I’d be touching you a whole lot anyway.”

“Wow, I was really right about my ass in this dress, wasn’t I?” Her voice is a little breathless.

I love that.

“It’s your ass, your legs, your breasts…” I take a breath. “Your smile, your sense of humor, the way you tease with our friends, the way you take care of our families.”

Her smile fades and her mouth drops open.

I kind of hate that me saying I like all of that shocks her.

She swallows hard. “You think I coddle people and hold them back.”

I take a breath. “I think you love people and…yes, you coddle them.” I don’t want to fight with her. I don’t want to make her feel bad. So I go for light. “That doesn’t change the fact that you have great breasts, and legs to go with that ass.”

She clears her throat. “Careful, that all almost sounded like you might be attracted to me for real.”

Is she fishing here? Is she joking? I don’t care. “Well, let me make that very clear. I find you incredibly gorgeous, and I’ve been itching to run my hands all over you all night. Zach or not. Fake boyfriend or not. That is very real.”

She stares up at me, those words hanging between us.

I wonder if she’s also thinking about how much between us has been very real.

Like all of it.

The “dating” part maybe not, but our conversations, the emotions, the chemistry, even the laughter—and there has been some of that, dammit—has been real.

Finally, she says, “I hope I have garlic breath.”

I chuckle. I would expect nothing less from Harlow.

I kiss her forehead, then turn her toward my truck and continue across the parking lot.

Because of the way the truck is parked, the driver’s side is the side closest to where Zach and his friends are leaning against their cars, casually chatting.

So that’s the side Harlow is getting in on.

“I don’t have anything at your house,” she says to me. There’s no way they can hear us from here, but they can see us.

“I know.”

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