He dragged his fingers through the condensation on his glass. “You haven’t called in a while.”
“I wasn’t sure you wanted me to,” she said, avoiding his eyes.
He scooted closer to her, his knees knocking against hers. He shouldn’t want her to call. Calandria Cole had lived next door to his family his whole life. When she and Liv were kids, Noah was the one who helped them braid their hair for dance recitals and made chocolate chip pancakes when they were sad. She was little Callie Cole. But suddenly, she didn’t seem so little anymore. While he’d been off getting his doctorate and becoming a college professor, she’d grown up. He was having a hard time remembering that he wasn’t supposed to kiss her.
He took a sip of his beer, as though his heart wasn’t pounding. “I like when you call.”
She blushed. He wondered how else he could make her blush.
By their eighth call, he’d been so hard when he hung up that he’d jacked off right there on the couch in his living room, unable to wait even a moment to ease his desire for her. By the eleventh, he’d stroked himself to the sound of her throaty laughter, and thanked every god known to man when she gasped on the other end of the phone and came on her own fingers, pretending they were his.
His eyes swept over the edge of her dress again, this time catching on the name tag stuck to the bodice of her Halloween-store gown.Hello, My name is: Bernadette Farthingworth.He ran his fingers over the tag, her breath hitching when his knuckles grazed the top of her breast in the process.
“Who’s Bernadette Farthingworth?”
Her cheeks flamed, a pretty pink that traveled down her throat. “She’s the heroine in my favorite romance novel,” she said. He arched an eyebrow, let his knuckles trail over the swell of her bust as his hand fell away. “Marrying the Secret Duke,” she explained. “Noah?”
“Yeah, Calico?” His voice was rough, darker than it should be when speaking to his little sister’s best friend. It was the voice he used on their phone calls now, the one he would have used if he were going to kiss her.
“I’m glad you came tonight.”
“Me too.”
He sipped his beer and thought about leaving it at that. Noah wasn’t this guy—he was the guy who would show a woman a good time and then call her a cab. He was the guy who didn’t take a woman’s phone number because they both knew he’d never use it. He’d never had a girlfriend, never even spent more than one night with the same woman.
He was not the guy who spent three weeks looking forward to the phone calls of a woman eight years younger than him and pretending he wasn’t hard as hell just at the sound of her voice.
He was not the guy who thought about breaking his own rules and maybe, just this once, trying the whole relationship thing.
“Callie!” Liv appeared beside them, dropping her head onto her best friend’s shoulder. “Come dance with me,” she said, pouting.
“You’re drunk,” Callie laughed.
“So are you!”
“True.”
Callie’s eyes darted to Noah’s, her bottom lip drawn between her teeth. He tilted his head toward the dance floor, encouraging her to go dance with his sister, and returned his attention to his beer.
He was not the guy who was disappointed when a woman he’d known his whole life went off to dance with her friends.
“You ready to go?” Liam asked, appearing at his side.
Noah took another sip of his beer, and watched as Callie pressed a cold glass to her overheated face as she danced. “I’m gonna stay a while longer. Make sure Livi gets back to her hotel okay.”
Liam followed Noah’s line of sight to where Callie danced with Liv and their friends, her hips swinging, her hair swaying, and her laughter floating across the room even over the music and the noise.
“You’re gonna stay for Livi, huh?” Liam said, his eyebrow arched and lips pressed together like he was holding back a laugh. Liam pointed to his mouth, baring his teeth. “Watch out for the braces.”
“Fuck you,” Noah said, but there was no heat in it, the corner of his lips turning up. “She hasn’t had braces for years.”
“I’ll see you back at your place?” Liam asked, backing away. “Or not? I have an early train back to Boston, so if you’re not back by morning, I’ll assume you decided to risk the jail time.”
“She’s twenty-one, asshole,” Noah called.
“Just don’t wait all night to make your move, old man!” Liam called back.
Around midnight, Noah made his way across the room. Liv was already saying her goodbyes. “How are you getting home?” he asked his sister.
