Page 27

That way there be dragons.

Chapter Twenty-One

Avery

Theo glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, waiting on her response, and she wondered if he felt as dizzy as she did. Avery felt her head had been spinning ever since Theo announced he was going to kiss her back at Grace’s, and every moment between them since then had done nothing to slow the carousel. If anything, it was spinning faster than ever. And now she knew, without a doubt, that Theo was an incredible kisser, and he was offering—more. A chance to be friends-with-benefits in addition to pretending to date.

And she was seriously considering it, because, well, just about every time she was alone with Theo now—and even sometimes when she wasn’t—she felt lightning crackling between them. It was hard to reconcile that with everything else she knew about him. Or maybe it wasn’t hard, and she’d always sort of suspected it, and that was what made it so damn hard to process.

“Okay,” she said, and when he waited for her to clarify, she went on. “Let’s do it. Friends-with-benefits, and no hard feelings when it’s done.”

Theo swallowed hard. “We’ll be done when we go back to college,” he suggested.

That meant they didn’t have much time, honestly. Barely three days, and that gave her an odd sense of loss, but she wasn’t about to explore that feeling when the clock was ticking. Avery studied Theo’s profile, working overtime to integrate all the new information she had about him. Very good kisser, likes to hold my face while doing so, chest feels good against mine. Her stomach felt fluttery, which she’d felt in regard to Theo only once before. But now, those butterflies had taken up permanent residence.

The parking lot was empty, but exposed. Every few minutes a car would trundle past, and carefully—slowly, so she could tell him to stop, she knew—Theo started the car and started driving, heading out of town. She knew immediately where he was going, since she had been there before with Cameron, although she wasn’t about to say so out loud. There was a pullout near Crow Lake, just far enough off Highway 5 that, with the lights off, they couldn’t be seen from the road. It was perfect: secluded and a lot prettier than an empty parking lot.

Avery was aware that, if she said no, or even just shook her head, Theo would drive her straight home. He’d never mention what had happened between them again, unless she brought it up. This was, in short, her chance to end things before they really began. But when she thought about it, they were already in it. They had been dancing toward this ever since he kissed her back at Grace’s, since tonight at Tommy’s, and since that moment last year, the one they were steadfastly not discussing.

“Is this okay?” he asked.

The flurries had stopped, and the trees around them were laden with soft, fluffy snow, and the gap between the trees showed the smooth, unbroken expanse of Crow Lake, frozen and reflecting the faint glow of the streetlights, that were in turn reflecting off the low, leaden clouds.

“It’s perfect,” she said, because Avery was suddenly addicted to playing with fire.

He killed the engine and turned toward her. “Are you—”

Avery didn’t wait for him to say sure, because she was. She practically lunged across the center console to kiss him, half wondering if he’d change his mind and push her away. That would be mortifying, possibly mortally so. But instead, Theo just grabbed her face in his big, warm hands and pulled her closer, dropping one arm down to shove his seat back as far as it could go. It was awkward, clambering over onto his lap, but the moment her lips found his Avery completely stopped thinking.

She’d always gone a little blank during hookups, her innate drives taking over for her usually nonstop conscious thoughts. It was why she had been so close to kissing Cameron anyway, even though it was a bad idea, but even still, something felt different about this. It wasn’t just that Theo’s kisses felt good—they did, God they did—it was something deeper, more primal.

She leaned back as he reclined his seat the whole way, tossing her jacket over to the passenger side. Instinctively, she glanced behind her, out the windshield, looking for telltale headlights swooping around the corner. “Cops only check after two in the morning,” Theo said, sounding as breathless as he felt.

Avery wanted to ask how he knew that, and then abruptly didn’t, because she knew. Izzy. He’d hooked up with Izzy here, or maybe that girl from Mille Lacs that he dated that one summer. Something dark and possessive took control of her and she leaned back down, kissing him hard enough that she felt dizzy. Theo was stealing the breath from her lungs and the thoughts from her head, his fingertips playing with the back of her shirt, like he was asking permission.

In answer to his question, she dragged her lips down the side of his jaw, feeling the faint stubble already growing there. His hand spanned her lower back and then eased around, going slowly enough that she could tell him to stop. Part of her knew she should, but that part was completely deprived of oxygen.

Theo slipped his hand up and palmed her breast through the lacy bra she’d put on that morning because it was both clean and made her tits look great. She made a soft noise into his mouth, half moan, half whimper, and Theo cuffed his other hand around her neck and tugged her closer, like even the spare half inch of space between them was too much.

She ground her hips down into his lap, sucking in sharply when she realized he was hard as a rock beneath her. Theo tugged the cup of her bra down under her shirt, just far enough for his thumb to sweep across her nipple. “Fuck, Theo,” she groaned.

“Is that a good thing or bad thing?” he mumbled against the curve of her neck.

“Just—fuck,” she said, and he chuckled. Slowly—too slowly, honestly—he eased his hand down to her waistband, waiting for her nod to pop the button on her jeans. The second his fingers parted her folds she inhaled, rising off his lap and pressing her hand into the roof of the car, needing to brace herself. Theo was looking at her, so intently she felt like her skin was too small for her body, like she might burst at the slightest pressure. He eased one finger inside of her, watching her reactions, and then added a second.

She bit her lip and squeezed her eyes shut, not able to bear the way he was looking at her right then, his eyes so soft and full of awe that it physically hurt. There was something else there too, something she wasn’t capable of examining, and then his thumb fell on her clit and she stopped thinking entirely. She was reduced to mere sensations, a thousand nerve endings turned into live wires, her body shaking and trembling as Theo—fuck, Theo—drove her closer and closer to the edge of a cliff.

“Avery,” he said, his voice low and raspy, and when she opened her eyes the shock of how he was looking at her, coupled with the perfect pressure on her clit, had her coming undone with a force that surprised her.

Slowly, he eased her through it, and she sank down with a sigh, his hands steadying her waist as she leaned forward to kiss him, a laugh escaping her lips. “Shit, Theo,” she said, suddenly desperate to release the rest of the tension between them, the words she wanted to say but couldn’t.

A buzz from his phone had him sighing too, but in frustration as he checked it. “Mom wants me to let her know when I’m home,” he said, scrubbing his hand across his face. Avery knew Tiffany asking When will you be home? was really her way of saying I know you don’t have a curfew, but please get back here.

Avery forced a smile onto her face, doing her best to keep things light. That’s what this is supposed to be, right? There was no reason for her to feel crestfallen that Theo needed to leave, other than the fact that it had been shaping up to be a very, very fun Thanksgiving night.

“We should get going then,” she said, as cheerfully as possible, and climbed back into the passenger seat, like this was something she did with Theo all the time, and not something that had maybe permanently changed her entire world.

Theo uncharacteristically walked her to her door rather than just waiting in his car and waving once she unlocked it, like he usually did. Avery figured this was part of the whole fake-dating charade, although given that it was well after midnight, she wasn’t sure who the charade was for, unless some neighbors happened to be peering out their windows. But it felt nice, she had to admit.