Page 21 of Crazy Rich Cajuns

She swallowed hard.She was going to enjoy this chemistry.That was the only option, really.Because she wasn’t going to be able to say no to it.

“I do know the salad fork from the dinner fork, but beyond that, I might be a little lost.”That wasn’t entirely true.She knew the forks.Salad, dinner, oyster, dessert.But she didn’t really care what Bennett’s family thought of her, and this was her way of warning him that she wasn’t going to be the perfect lady that his hoity-toity mother might be expecting him to bring home.

“I don’t care if you eat with your hands,” he told her.

She narrowed her eyes.“You shouldn’t tell a girl who eats French fries six meals a week something like that.”

His smile was slow.And cocky.“I know who I’m talking to, Kennedy.”

For some reason that made a little tingle go down her spine.

But he didn’t know her.Not really.He knew what she’d showed him, dammit.She had control of that.She’d gotten to be a master at that early on in her life.Dressing up, performing, smiling even when her head was pounding from all the bobby pins stuck into her updo, dancing even when her feet were killing her in the shoes that were a size too small but matched her dress perfectly.That was the other thing about sticking close to Autre.She could be herself here.She could say and do whatever she wanted.They might roll their eyes, but they weren’t giving her a grade.They weren’t lining her up against other girls and deciding who was the best.

Bennett thought he knew her because he’d observed her in her own habitat.Maybe there was something to that.She hadn’t put on any airs with him.But they’d spent a total of, what, twelve hours together if she added all the phone conversations and short visits together?

He probably thought he was really good at reading people or something.

In actuality, he was just seeing what he wanted to see.Or what she wanted him to see.He seemed to like her tattoos and her piercings and the black shorts and skirts she wore, her combat boots, her sassy mouth and the sexual innuendo and banter she turned on for him.Lord knew, she didn’t do that with every guy who walked in.

“Then I guess you know what you’re getting into,” she said, watching his face carefully.

“I really do.”

He really thought he did.

And she was going to let him think that.For now.

Kennedy guessed she was pretty different from the girls he usually brought home.She just might shock his mother…

Oh.

Suddenly it made a lot more sense.She was a little bit of a rebellion.

Or a lot of a rebellion.

Now she got it.

“Okay, I think this is going to be…fun.”She pushed him back and opened the car door—her own door—and got into the car.

Bennett looked like he maybe had something more to say, but instead he nodded and rounded the front of the car.

Kennedy waved at Maddie and Juliet who were still standing on the porch.Juliet looked a little confused.Maddie looked like she was disappointed she wasn’t going to have to have a front row seat to whatever was going to happen this weekend.

That was because Maddie knew Kennedy far better than Juliet did.

4

“So, tell me about your dad.”

Bennett looked over.They hadn’t even pulled onto the highway out of Autre yet and Kennedy already had her boots up on the dash of his rented BMW, her black and blue striped skirt riding high on her thighs.It revealed the creamy smooth skin along with the flowers that trailed up her left leg.The intricate tattoo started with a tiny vine that wrapped around her ankle, then climbed her leg, getting bigger, with flowers in various stages of bloom along the way.It dove under the hem of her skirt, reappearing at her waist above the top edge of her skirt, then continued up her side, slipping under the fitted black top that left her midriff bare.He could see it again where it reappeared from the short sleeve of the shirt and then trailed down her arm to her wrist and then grew narrow, the vine continuing down to wrap around her pinky finger.He wanted badly to trace the entire length.With his eyes.His fingers.His tongue.He wanted to see it in its entirety.He wanted to know the meaning behind it.

She also had piercings that sparkled along the edge of her ears, one at the corner of her right eyebrow and one single tiny stud in her nose.She wore heavy black eye makeup and black nail polish and always had black in her clothing and shoes.Or boots.Today, her long, dark hair was pulled up into a high ponytail, the deep red tips hanging against her shoulder.And she was grinning at him with a grin that said she knew she frustrated him and entertained him at that same time.

He wanted her more every single time he looked at her.

And now she’d kissed him.So he was basically fucked.

He didn’t remember a time when he’d been so into a woman before even kissing her.

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