She felt herself finally start to relax as time went on and alcohol went down. Kirby was cheerful and funny and just fun to be around. Amelia was quieter but threw a zinger into the mix every so often that had everybody laughing. The bar got louder, and Sabrina got closer as the crowd grew, and pretty soon, she was pressed up against Adley’s back, and Adley wasn’t mad about it. At all.
“Is this okay?” Sabrina breathed near her ear, and Adley could only assume she meant her proximity. “It’s a little tight in here.”
She nodded and looked into Sabrina’s blue eyes. “It’s the only time we’re the same height,” she said with a grin.
“True.” And Sabrina smiled back. “It’s nice.”
“It is.”
There was a moment and it was charged. Definitely electric, like a current ran between the two of them. A heat. And instead of being completely freaked out by it, Adley felt oddly comforted.
The evening went on, laughter and cocktails, and Sabrina never left her spot. Adley could feel her even when she wasn’t looking and couldn’t actually see her. Amelia was telling a story about a client of her dog walking business, and the whole time Adley was looking at Amelia, listening to her words, she could feel Sabrina behind her. And the best word she could come up with in her head to describe the feeling wasperfect.
“Gotta hit the ladies’ room,” Sabrina said in her ear. “Feel free to follow me.” Then she winked and walked away, and Adley had to consciously force herself to stay sitting. Because Sabrina was just teasing. Right?
“So,” Kirby said as she leaned in. “You two together?”
Adley blinked at her. “Who? Me and Sabrina? No.” She shook her head, probably too vehemently.
“No?” Kirby actually looked disappointed. “That’s too bad. You’ve got off-the-charts chemistry.”
“You think so?”
“Please.” That was Amelia, sitting two stools away. “I can feel it all the way over here. You’re getting it on me.” She made a show of brushing some invisible substance off her arms.
“And me.” The bartender, a tall brunette with tons of hair gave her a grin as she pulled a tap to pour a beer.
“Seriously,” Kirby said as her eyes found Sabrina heading in their direction, and she lowered her voice. “You should see the way she looks at you.”
And before she could process those words, Sabrina was back and in the exact same spot that had become so cold when she’d left. Adley could feel the warmth again up against her back. Welcome. Wanted. Desired.
Jesus. This was bad.
But so very, very good.
They stayed later than Adley had intended, and it was nearingeleven o’clock by the time they were in Sabrina’s car and headed back to the Scoop parking lot for Adley’s car. They’d both switched to water a while back, and that pleasant buzz that Adley had been headed toward was gone now. Still, though, sitting in the car mere inches away from Sabrina, their attraction was palpable. Comfortable and not, both at the same time.
“You’re okay to drive?” Sabrina asked as she guided her car into the spot next to Adley’s.
“Oh yeah. Totally okay.” The interior of the car was dark, and her hand was on the door handle, but she made no move to get out.
“Kind of a bummer. Drunk Adley is fun.”
“Drunk Adley is reckless,” she said with a laugh. “She makes bad decisions.”
“And does lots of kissing.”
“Exactly.” And even though it was dark, their gazes held, and Adley could feel the intensity of Sabrina’s. God, it would be so easy to kiss her now. Just a slight lean toward her was all it would take. Time ticked by. A second or a minute or an hour, Adley wasn’t sure. But finally—finally—she managed to pull on the door handle. The overhead light was rude, bright. They both blinked several times. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Sabrina,” Adley said softly.
“Good night, Adley.” Sabrina’s smile was tender, and Adley could feel her watching as she got out of the car and into her own. She stayed there until Sabrina pulled out of her spot and headed home, then followed her until her turn came and watched as her taillights disappeared.
Lying in bed a little while later, she replayed the night in her head. Hell, she replayed the week. Scottie had warned her about this very thing. About the attraction showing up again. And honestly, she’d known it was a possibility—she and Sabrina had too much of Kirby’s aforementioned chemistry for it not to pop up again—but she hadn’t expected it to happen so fast. It was only the first week!
She lay there in the dark, her mind spinning, her body buzzing. Sleep seemed far away, and she could think of only one good way to release the tension and push herself toward rest. Eyes closed, she slipped a hand into her panties and found herself unsurprisingly wet, as she had been for pretty much the entire time that Sabrina’s bodywas pressed up against hers in the bar. Her mind tossed her images of Sabrina in various states of undress as her fingers moved through her own wetness.
She came in less than three minutes.
Chapter Twenty-four
