Lauren’s head spun.
It was that smile that had hooked her the first time they’d met. They’d been paired together in a proteins class before Brad had switched to pastry. During a session on identifying which beef cuts came from which part of the cow, Brad had started cracking jokes and Lindsay had laughed.
“That sirloin thing is untrue,” he’d said at one point. “I mean, they say Henry VIII loved the steak so much he knighted it Sir Loin, but that’s not true. ‘Sir’ comes from the French, meaning ‘over.’ It’s the top part of the loin.”
“How nerdy of you to know that.”
And then he’d grinned. There was something silly and self-satisfied in that smile, but it lit up his whole face and made something in her melt. She spent that whole semester with a stupid, overwhelming crush on him. When he finally asked her out at the end of the semester, she couldn’t say no.
She’d never been happier.
He shot that grin at her now, and she wanted to kiss it off his face.
But that was not what they were here for.
Yet she could still feel the thrum in her body whenever he was near. He was gorgeous, no question. He looked a bit more reputable now, with shorter hair and a clean-shaven face. He had the sort of presence that filled a room. When they’d dated, Lindsay had found that warm and comforting, but now she found it a little intimidating. His eyes sparkled, his muscles stood out on his arms, and he even smelled good. If shedidn’twant him, she’d wonder about her own mental health.
And now he was being sweet and sensible and not like the villain she wanted him to be. She could walk away from a villain. She wasn’t sure she could walk away from Brad.
“What are you thinking?” he asked.
“I hate that you’re so…you, sometimes.”
“What does that mean?”
“You’re…you know. Handsome and charming.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Oh, really?”
“Like you didn’t already know that.”
“You’re beautiful but also quite prickly. But I guess you have some charms.”
“Some charms?”
He threw his head back and laughed. “See? This is what I miss. We used to just sit around for hours, talking about food and making each other laugh. And I knew you were the One when you laughed at my dumb jokes.”
Lindsay balked. The One?
He shrugged, as if to say,you heard me.
Lindsay lunged at him. Later, she’d wonder exactly what had made her do it, but something about him smiling and laughing and making her feel the way he used to robbed her of all reason and good sense. She kissed him hard. He put out his hands, probably in self-defense, and rested them on her waist.
Lindsay resigned herself to her fate. Something in her still cared about him, still wanted him, and even though she knew it was stupid and she’d regret it later, she went for it anyway.
She expected Brad to protest, but he went with it, letting her push him down on the sofa until they were both horizontal and she was straddling his waist. They each had a foot on the floor, and this position was not ideal, but she knew if she stopped, the bubble would pop.
He groaned and bucked his hips up against hers before thrusting his fingers into her hair and snaking his tongue into her mouth.
When one of his hands ran down the side of her face, down her neck, to cup her breast, she suddenly had second thoughts.
She pulled black slightly.
“My friends keep saying I should get you out of my system.”
“Uh-huh. How do you propose to do that?”
“You don’t think us having sex is a bad idea?”
