Page 14 of The Last Kind of Kiss
When I stop without warning, Bristol nearly collides right into me, his cheeks saturated in a pink, embarrassed blush.
“You know, most guys buy me dinner before they get this up close and personal with my ass,” I jest, watching in delight as that oh-so-delicious blush deepens down his neck and renders him uncharacteristically flustered.
Bristol loosens his tie, clearing his throat in an attempt to maintain some semblance of composure. “I’d offer to buy you dinner if I didn’t think you’d poison my food,” he volleys back.
“You truly have to be obsessed with yourself if you think I’d go to the lengths of poisoning you. Wouldn’t waste that kind of effort,” I say indifferently. “Just following in theexpert’sfootsteps.”
He flinches at the jab, stripped of whatever witty comeback he had poised on the tip of his tongue, and when I go to move past him, he refuses to grant me passage.
From the time I spent getting to know Bristol, he’s a pretty passive guy. He rarely ever loses his cool. He’s not necessarily cold or unemotional, but he’s reserved, and there always seemed to be a part of him locked away—a part I never had access to when we were together.
But right now, glaring at him through my lashes, I see the briefest flash of that part I always craved—a vulnerability that’s been dormant for years. Though as quick as it appears, it’s gone in the same instant, tailed by a darkening of his eyes that shouldn’t look nearly as sexy as it does. I know it’s only been a year since he ended things, but he’s different. More hardened, if that makes any sense. Finally worn down by all the shit life’s thrown at him, and I have half a mind to wonder if it’s because of me.
“You really want to play this game?” he threatens, though there’s no true malice behind his words.
It’s almost worse that way. It makes me want to scream,Yes, I want to play this game!And not in a fuck-you tone but a fuck-metone. My stupid, nutrient-deprived body isthisclose to mauling his face off like some sort of horny, rabid dog. I want his lips on mine, I want his hard body underneath my soft one, I want his tongue so far in my cunt that I forget why I’m even mad at him in the first place.
“Are you scared you might lose?” I purr, cranking up the tension a few notches as I run my manicured nails over hisbicep. When his muscles jump, white-hot satisfaction spools low in my belly.
Bristol hesitates, gulping, and the quake in his voice betrays him. “I don’t lose.”
“You will this time. You have no idea what I’m capable of, Bristol. I can make this campaign a living hell for you.”
“Lila, getting partnered with you for this campaign was already hell enough. Nothing you can say or do will change the fact that I’m the idiot who’s still head-over-heels obsessed with you.”
Something sadistic coils inside me, spits its venom, and trills out a warning call like one angry rattlesnake. “Unrequited love hurts, doesn’t it?”
I expect Bristol to stand down and use that seemingly empty brain of his to make a wise decision for once, but as always, idiocy inflates that big head of his to preposterous heights. He steps into my space, crowding me with his imposing body, our noses mere inches apart from one another. One wrong move and we could be skin to skin, and I hate that some sex-starved part of me isn’t repulsed by that outcome.
His half-lidded eyes list over me, making a detour to my lips and then back up to my eyes, where he pretends like he didn’t just insinuate we go for a round of tonsil hockey in front of an entire room of people. This pleasure-pain ache brews between my legs, my cunt squeezing in anticipation against the thin gusset of my panties. In this moment, he’s entirely too perceptive, and he tabs the strain of my breath, my clenched jaw, my gaze that refuses to settle.
Bristol leans in next to my ear. “Don’t think it’s as unrequited as you think,” he whispers, his voice smoke-cured, irresistibly rich as it curls around me in tendrils.
I need to get out of here before I do something I regret. Or worse, before I give Bristol the impression that I’m no longermad at him. My body’s already doing that for me—it’s practically waving a large, blinking ENTER HERE casino sign right above my hoo-ha.
My arsenal of insults abandons me in my time of need, and I fumble for a retort, trying to rifle through the cobwebs in my brain. I’ve exceeded ten seconds too long in response time, which means I’ve now entered “she doesn’t know what the hell she’s talking about” territory, and that territory is infamously known for crushing women’s dignities.
When a waiter passes us with a tray of wine glasses, Bristol snags one and offers it as some weird peace treaty.
“Wine might help with that blush on your face.”
I snort, though embarrassment acts as a thorn in my side. “Not a big wine fan.”
“No?”
“Not that it’s any of your business, but I’m more of a booze girl. Wine’s too sweet.”
“Then you haven’t had the right kind of wine yet,” he insists, his gaze tiptoeing down to my lips—where I somehow taste the phantom residue of wine on softened collagen.
“O-kay, Mister Romance. I’ll make sure to consider that when I take my expensive limo down to Wine Country and waste the day away taste-testing wines.”
The more I engage in this not-so-harmless flirting, the more chances I give Bristol to squeeze his way back into my good graces. And that willneverhappen. Not even over my dead body.
So with what brain cells are still functioning, I figure that my best course of action is to walk away as soon as humanly possible. I hold my head up high, push my very revealing chest out, and mince off to the other side of the ballroom where Bristol’s silhouette thankfully gets swallowed up by the dance floor. He doesn’t chase after me—no surprise there. But even if he did, he wouldn’t make it two steps without running into an exhaustedcaterer or a horde of men so old they were probably around when the first railroad was built.
I have no idea where I’m headed, but when I breach a lapse in the crowd, I find myself by the stupid buffet table. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but would it really be so wrong of me to crawl under the table and wait out the rest of the gala? Bristol’s going to be sniffing after me like a bloodhound, the press is everywhere I turn, and I’m pretty sure they’re going to start asking questions soon—questions I have no desire to answer.
There’s only one other person scouring the hors d'oeuvres, and I try my best to squeeze past him and take a peek at what this glorified prom is offering.
