“Bring her in. She has some explaining to do,” she demands, her voice stern.
I gulp, loudly. Lacey only brings out her bossy boots during dire situations. Obviously, she feels this is a dire situation.
Colt draws me away from the water's edge before placing me on my feet. A new type of awareness prickles my skin when every inch of Colt's rock-hard body glides past mine in the process. Normally, his playfulness would have caused the pulse in my body to redirect to my pussy, but today his tease is less effective. Don’t construe my admission the wrong way: my nipples are budded and euphoria has thickened my blood, but his appeal is nowhere near what I felt standing across from Rico in the dungeon-like room five days ago.
“Ms. Blaire Williams, cardigan-wearing, has never said a curse word in her life, kindergarten teacher got a tattoo? I knew there was a rebel hiding in there somewhere,” Colt jests, lazily raking his eyes over my body. “What did you get? A cute little heart? A butterfly?” He locks his lust-filled eyes with mine. “Come on, baby girl. Are you going to show me? Or am I going to go on a treasure hunt?”
Lacey bumps my hip, her eyes wide, her jaw hanging. Even she can't miss Colt’s innuendo-laced flirting. He has no troubles ruffling up any woman's interest; he just smirks, and they all flock to him. But this is different. Normally, our flirting is an acceptable notch over the friendship line. This feels more like a gigantic leap.
After returning Lacey's hip bump, I cross my arms in front of my chest, ensuring my body’s reaction to Colt’s avid gaze remains concealed. Unable to locate any ink on my scarcely covered body, Colt lifts and locks his eyes with me.
“Where did you get it?” The waggling of his brows doesn’t hide the eagerness in his words.
I tighten my arms under my chest, hoisting my moderately sized bosoms higher into the air. “Not in any place you’ll ever see.”
His smirk enlarges to a full-toothed smile, not believing a word I'm saying. He knows as well as I do, if given a chance, I’d climb him like a jungle gym. Well, I would have before Vegas. Now, I’m not so sure.
Colt’s real name is Marshall, but we all call him Colt, because. . . well. . . He’s hung like a horse, that’s why. And from the noises Lacey and I regularly hear bellowing from his apartment, he has no troubles bucking for hours.
Ignoring my flaming red cheeks, I say, “I’m. . .leaving.”After snatching my phone and towel off the chair, I bolt for the exit.
“But the fun is only beginning, baby girl,” Colt jests, his tone low and tempting.
I’ve just hit the pool gate when Lacey catches up with me. “You have a lot of explaining to do, young lady.” She weaves her arm around the crook of my elbow. “But I don’t know where to begin. With the fire-sparking showdown I just witnessed? Or that you got a tattoo on an obviouslyprivateregion of your body that you failed to update your best friend on.”
After guiding me into the elevator, Lacey snags the towel out of my hand and commences drying her light brown hair. The elevator ascends to our apartment in absolute silence. She doesn’t need to speak. Her questioning eyes are more interrogating than her mouth ever could be. If the elevator car wasn’t air-conditioned; I may have melted under her stifling gaze.
Her quiet approach lasts as long as it takes for us to walk into the front door of our modest apartment. “Spill. Now.”
Throwing my house key onto the glass and wrought iron entranceway table, I pad into the living room. My steps are lazy, weighed down by the confusion still muddling my heart. I sit on a red wing-backed chair while Lacey props her backside on a stark white loveseat, not at all concerned her dripping wet two-piece bikini is soaking into the expensive material. She eyeballs me but has reverted to her silent stance, her gaze a unique mix of intrigue and shock.
“I got a tattoo in Vegas.”
She huffs and rolls her eyes. “Duh.”
The arch of her manicured brow increases when I blubber out, “And a husband.”
Her mouth gapes as her eyes bulge. “Wait. What?” The shock of my admission has reduced a woman who can talk under water to one-word sentences.
I gulp, washing away a lump in the back of my throat. “I don’t remember exactly how it transpired. All I remember is waking up with a wedding band on my finger and a man’s name tattooed on my hip.”
“Wow,” She breathes out heavily. She scoots across the double seated sofa to sit closer to me. “No half-baked Vegas experience for you. You went straight for the complete package.”
I throw my hands over my eyes and slump into my chair. “That’s not even the whole story.”
Lacey gives herself a few moments to settle her shock before she sits on the edge of my chair and pries my hands away from my face. “Okay. We can handle this. First thing first: did you use protection? If not, there's a pharmacy half a block over; I can go get—”
“Yes,” I interrupt, my words weak. “Although I have no recollection of the actualdeed,empty condom wrappers were in my room.”
Her lips quirk as a glint of curiosity fires in her expressive eyes. “Wrappers?How many are we talking exactly?”
I munch on my bottom lip before raising three fingers into the air. Her bugged-eyed expression grows, and the corners of her lips twitch, but she respectfully holds in her smile. Lacey knows me well enough to know the finger signal I’m holding in the air is the combined number of times I’ve done thedeedthe past two years, so to achieve that in one night is a record-breaking achievement for me.
“Okay. Good. Protection was used.” Her voice is high with shock and excitement. “Second. Was your husband still present the following morning, or did he do the Las Vegas hightail escape?”
Even in the tenseness of the situation, her statement causes a smile to stretch across my face. Lacey can bring any girl down from the ledge, no matter how dire the situation may seem.
“He was still present.”
