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“Yeah, you’re welcome.”
“Excuse me?” he asks.
“Bailey told me about dating your big bro,” I say. “How he’d freak out if he found out you two were an item. I obviously did you a favor back there.”
Drew snorts. “Some favor.” I just know he’s thinking about that kiss when he says it, and it pisses me right the hell off.
“Kissing me was just a bonus,” I say, poking him in the chest, unable to stop myself from getting up in his face. “No need to thank me for that, either.”
Drew looks down at my finger, still jabbed into the dense muscle of his pecs. When he looks back up at me, the air between us disappears and suddenly I don’t have to guess what he’s thinking anymore.
“Back off.” He says it quietly, slowly. It’s a command, not a request, delivered in a tone I’ve never heard him use before. Every inch of my body responds to the challenge, and as much as I might try to tell myself it’s pride, my thickening cock says otherwise.
“Or what?” I push against his chest just a little bit harder. It’s a dare, and he knows it. We both have to be onstage and presentable, doing our very public-facing jobs in a matter of moments. Drew’s not going to hit me. Maybe I’d have feared that from him back in college—big, thickheaded jock that I thought he was. Not anymore; I know him better now. That’s just not who he is.
I never see him move, but suddenly Drew’s right in my face, leaning into my finger on his chest. He moves slowly, never taking his eyes off me, his hand coming up to wrap around mine. I hate him for the way it makes me shake. God, do I hate him.
“Or else.”
I’ve lost my place in the conversation, but it’s too late to back down now. I couldn’t pull myself away if I tried.
It was the same with Bailey at the bar yesterday. Like she belonged in my hands.
Fucking Drew Hicks.
He sees something in my face, I guess, and it sets him off. The hand wrapped around mine closes tightly, yanking me forward even as Drew steps and twists, so I stumble past him into that small, mostly empty storage closet, bracing myself against the wall under the weird blue-green light as Drew pulls the door shut behind him.
“What the hell are you doing?” I ask, humiliated beyond belief when my voice cracks.
“Making sure nobody can see us. What do you think I’m doing?”
Drew steps closer, crowding my space. I pull back hard, pressing my hands to the wall behind me.
Unbelievably, I hear him laughing softly and my temper hits the red zone.
“You don’t actually think that I’m going to hit you,” he says, sounding supremely confident. The dim light casts shadows across his face, letting me see that the humor I hear in his voice hasn’t reached his eyes.
“Wouldn’t put it past you.” The words come out solid this time, thank Christ.
“Hmm,” Drew murmurs, stepping still closer. Another fraction of an inch and we’ll be touching. “I bet you wouldn’t. But I’m not going to make it that easy for you.”
“Easy?” I splutter.
“That’s right.” Drew’s hand comes up, circling my throat, and my heart stops beating altogether. He doesn’t squeeze, doesn’t exert any pressure whatsoever, but he pins me in place with his grip all the same.
“It’d be easier if I took a swing right now, I bet,” he murmurs, his eyes on his claim over my throat. “Give you a real reason to fight back for once. I must just frustrate the hell out of you, Cooper.”
“Fuck off, Hicks,” I say. There’s no way he can miss how hard I’m trembling, but hell with him if he thinks I’m going to admit it.
“Close enough,” says Drew. His fingers tighten ever so slightly around my neck as he plants his other hand on the wall over my head, bends down, and kisses me.
For the second time in ten minutes, I lose my goddamn mind.
No shocked passive participation this time, Drew teases my mouth open, drawing me out with his tongue. At the first touch of that tongue on mine, a choked moan—it might have been mine, but I’ll never admit it—has him pulling back to look me in the eyes. Whatever he sees there makes his breath catch, and in the next second his body is tight against mine, pressing me back into the wall.
My hands come up to slide under the back of his shirt before I can stop them, my fingers tracing the groove of the muscle there, digging in when Drew wraps his lips around my tongue and sucks. I pull away just far enough to catch my breath.
“We can’t—” Don’t ask me what the hell I was going to say; I don’t have a damn clue. Right now there’s nothing in the world I can’t do, so long as he keeps touching me. But Drew gets it.
