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I think I’ve been gone too long, and everyone seems to have forgotten that I’m a royal prick.
“If I win, he has to buy me this appetizer that I saw on the menu. One of the waitresses dropped it off for us when I was reading—”
“Why didn’t you just tell me? I would’ve bought you—”
“You’ve bought me enough,” she retorts sweetly, lightly touching my arm but removing it just as quickly. “Besides, that’s what a bet is for, right? I couldn’t think of anything else.”
So, no kisses. No hidden rendezvous. And why does she keep touching me and then immediately removing her hand like my skin is poisonous?
“Why do you keep doing that?”
Her face lifts. “Doing what?”
“Touching me, then recoiling.”
Hollyn frowns, and I feel as though I keep digging myself a deeper hole with this one. I can’t seem to say anything right without her thinking it’s personal.
“Well, I…” She stops herself and I try to erase some of the annoyance from my face. “You just don’t seem like the kind of man that…”
“That what?”
“Likes being touched.”
Touché.
Hollyn nailed it on the head. My normal fixation on being left alone and playing hockey has pegged me as a loner asshole with no love life and a house that currently sits on too many acres and no one to share it with. My idea of a good night is a medium steak, a beer, and ESPN.
I’m far from being invited to a gathering that involves people I don’t know. The boys pick and choose, knowing that I’m not someone that’ll be the life of the party and I like it that way.
I just don’t like the way Hollyn said it into existence. As if she either feels sorry for me or the thought of touching is repulsive in itself. It might be for a lot of the population out there, but not with her.
“You can touch me,” I grumble out, exhaling a sigh because I should have never gotten off that stool. I should have waited for Sullivan to fuck up.
Now, I need an exit plan, and I don’t have one.
“Well, I don’t want to if—” My index finger shoots up to silence her retorts, and Hollyn listens again.
Stop ordering this woman around, dickhead.
“I’m good,” I confirm gently, dropping my hand. “I promise.”
She bows her head with finality. “Okay.”
“Go ahead and win your appetizer. I’ll buy you one if you lose.” Hollyn smiles at me and begins to pivot before another thought clobbers me upside the head. “Shorty, what did he want?”
Her blues slice back up to me, and a small smirk forms along her lips. I’m not sure yet if I should love it or hate it. “Well, that’s the thing…” My face skews in another wave of I’m about to get pissed off. “I’m supposed to tell you that you suck.”
“I suck?” She nods, proud that she agreed to do it without any reservation of how I would react. “And you swallow?”
A heated blush forms on her cheeks and makes her skin glow a bit. “I did say that, didn’t I?”
“You tryin’ to take it back?” Hollyn hesitates for a second before she slowly rocks her head back and forth. “You’re gonna make one man very lucky one day, Shorty.” I shove my hands into the pockets of my jeans. “I’m just hoping it’s not Weston you invite me to a wedding for.”
Hollyn steps away and presses her lips together before saying, “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, eh?”
Right.
Because he won’t be asking her on a date.
