Page 18 of Heartbeat Highway

“Are you okay?” I ask quietly.

“I’m fantastic.” She stretches, catlike. “This has weirdly been the best day.”

“Agreed.” Our gazes lock for another moment before there’s yet another angry knock on the door.

“Is everything all right in there?” An alto-soprano voice calls from the hallway. The waitress.

“We’re fine,” I call. I remove the condom and find a trashcan, discreetly wrapping it in a cocktail napkin. We were relativelyquiet, but these people are not fools. There’s only one reason someone locks a door to a private room, and it isn’t because they want to try to hit the high notes in “Defying Gravity.”

I tuck myself back into my pants, and turn to see Lily. Her sundress is back in place—shame, that, I would love to see her with it around her waist, rucked up from below as she rides me and the top pulled down to expose the soft roundness of her curves—and she stoops to pick up her panties from the floor. She examines them for a long moment, as if deciding what to do with them.

I approach her and hold out my hand. “I’ll take care of those.”

“Really?” Her expression promises all sorts of dirty things, if only we had a little more privacy. “What are you going to do with them?”

I take the panties from her and kneel at her feet. As I stare up at her, I help her put her panties back on, sliding them up her full, soft thighs until I release the elastic and squeeze a handful of her perfect, round ass.

She giggles and lets me wrap my arms around her waist. Objectively, I know this should be awkward, and it was at first. A moment of surprise when she first kissed me—Lily’s kissing me, what do I do—but then two years of pent up want took over. Then it was all instinct, pure and unabashed and fucking thrilling.

I kiss her nose. “We should let them in.”

She frowns, her mouth a cute pout. “I suppose we should.”

“We can talk after, though? In the car.” There’s so much I want to discuss. Was this a one time thing? Does she feel even a hint of what I do? Is this all too soon and frightening? I mean, I’ve waited two years. I can wait longer, if it means we can be together like this again.

Okay, not forever. That was fucking amazing and I’m already having difficulty standing, picturing all the things I want to do with her.

The knock comes again, more insistent this time, and there’s heavy murmuring behind the door.

Fine. I roll my eyes, walk over, and pull open the door.

Behind me, Lily gasps. I get it.

I didn’t think Dan and Maxim and—oh, hells to the no—K would be standing there, either.

CHAPTER 11

Lily

My stomach plummets.Foolish me, thinking this could last. Thinking I could live a bit longer in the afterglow.

K heads straight for me. My spine stiffens and my arms cross over my chest, my breasts rubbed raw from Bo’s beard. “Lily!” he says. “Thank God you’re all right.”

Maxim snorts from the corner. There’s a chill from Bo that wraps around me and makes me wish we could rewind ten minutes into the past. I try to catch his gaze but he slouches toward Dan and Maxim at the door.

K goes for the hug, but I stop him with a palm to his chest. “I don’t want to talk to you.”

“Lily, come on. It’s a misunderstanding.” His wheedling tone grates like nails on a chalkboard. “She needed a place for the night, that’s all.” He goes again to touch me, and I step out of his path.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” My tone rises and I don’t care. “What are you even doing here?”

“We stopped to pick you up for the concert,” Dan says by the door. His voice is deceptively calm, but I can tell from the way he’s clenching his tablet that the band is way behind schedule, and he’s barely holding in his panic. “Is the car fixed?”

“Oh,” Bo says, his voice dull. He walks past me, not making eye contact—that hurts more than anything else—and picks up his phone to check his messages. “No messages yet from the mechanic.” He gestures at the food on the table. “Are you guys hungry?”

“Starving.” Maxim pushes past Dan and beelines for a pulled pork slider.

Apparently, K takes my distraction watching his bandmates as an invitation to put his hand on my lower back. I swat at his arm and step further away, toward the wall. “Lily, don’t be like this.”

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