The Marked Men Series Books 1–6: Rule, Jet, Rome, Nash, Rowdy, Asa. Jay Crownover
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eyebrow that had the double silver bars in it and leaned forward so that he was resting his elbows on his knees and staring directly into my eyes. There were interesting shadows dancing and flashing in the silver depths of his eyes that I didn’t know what to make of, but he had never looked more enticing than he did in that moment.
“Come on. You really think things can go down like they did and we just pretend like it never happened?”
“Why not? It’s what we’ve been doing and it seems to be working just fine.”
“Shaw.” He sounded exasperated. “We are not going to have seriously awesome sex—especially since it was your first time—and not talk about it. First off, I want to know what you were doing with Remy for all those years if you weren’t sleeping together. That just doesn’t make any sense. I also want to know why you took off the next morning; you didn’t even give me a chance to try to talk to you.”
I set the coffee down and pushed some of my hair out of my face. I leaned toward him so that I was almost in the same position he was. We were so close I could see each of his eyelashes as they brushed against his cheek when he blinked.
“I told you guys until I was blue in the face that Remy and I were just friends. We never, ever had any kind of romantic relationship. Our friendship was deep. It was powerful and intimate in a way Neanderthal males fail to understand, but it was never physical, and I can’t believe you thought I would stick around afterward just to have you rush me out the door the next morning. I’ve seen you in action more times than I care to admit Rule; I wasn’t going to be another one of your morning-after headaches. I have more pride than that.”
“But you were going to hold on to your virginity for twenty years and then just give it up to me for no apparent reason?” He sounded slightly put out, which made me grin.
“I had my reasons, Rule.”
“And those would be?”
“For me to know. Look, I didn’t ask you for anything after, I don’t expect anything from you, so can’t we just get over it?”
“No, we can’t.”
I reeled back a little bit and frowned at him. “What? Why not? We’ve known each other forever; this is just a thing that happened.” I flipped my wrist in a way I hoped was dismissive and went stock-still as he grabbed my hand in his much larger one. I stared, fascinated, as the tattooed digits linked with my own.
“See, this thing that happened”—his voice dropped a few octaves and I was suddenly acutely aware that the coffee shop was full, and that for whatever reason, we had garnered enough interest from the fellow patrons who were watching our interaction with rapt attention—“it wasn’t just some insignificant event that we can just ignore; believe me I tried. I went out Friday and met a smoking-hot redhead.”
I felt my face fold into a scowl as I tried to pull away from him. He smiled at me and used my trapped hand to pull me even closer. “Sadly, it took maybe five minutes to realize that I was trying to use one girl to get another off my mind, so I thought Saturday I would try for a blonde or maybe a brunette—hell, maybe both—because my head was all twisted up by a chick it shouldn’t be.”
I tugged on my hand but he just pulled me even closer, so that he was practically whispering in my ear, and I was almost sitting on his lap. I had to use my free hand to brace myself on his hard thigh. It was way too intimate, way too familiar, to touch him this way when I was trying to put distance between us. “So Nash and I went out, and there were redheads and there were brunettes and there was even a superhot chick who looked kinda like Pink, but you think any of them did it for me? No, Shaw, not one, because they fucking weren’t you. Ever since you walked out on Sunday all I’ve been thinking of is you. Now why is that?”
His words made me shiver from the inside out. “Because it was new, because we have history, and it makes it harder for you to keep me faceless and nameless. I don’t know, Rule.”
He lifted a hand and ran his thumb across the rise of my cheek. It made my breath catch and my heart start to trip over itself.
“Whatever the reason, it matters, Shaw. It matters a lot.”
“What are you trying to say, Rule?”
“I don’t know. All I know is other girls aren’t you and that isn’t cutting it for me. I think we need to figure out what’s going on between us.”
I shook my head a little and a silver flare lit up his pale gaze. “I’m not going to be one of many. Like I said, I had my reasons for letting things happen the way they did, but if you think I’m signing up to be a bed filler because no one else is fitting the bill right now, you are sadly mistaken. I know you, Rule; I’ve known you since you first figured out girls were more complicated than boys, and you’ve never wanted to put the work in.”
The feather-light sweep of that thumb across my cheek almost had me melting into a puddle at his booted feet. “So this time I will. We’ll hang out, do shit together. I mean, we’ve known each other forever but I honestly don’t really know anything about you. Come on, Shaw, what do you really have to lose?”
Not my heart, because he already had it even though he didn’t know it. “So you want to, like, date?”
He laughed. “I’m not really the dating type, but I swear that while we’re trying to figure out what’s going on I’ll keep it in my pants. No screwing around, no other girls. I owe it to you and to me to see what’s here or if it was just a fluke.” He sounded so sincere; he looked serious and determined to make me believe what he was saying.
I cleared my throat and bit my bottom lip a little. Sure it was what I had dreamed of—Rule suddenly realizing I was a girl and wanting to be with me. Granted, in my fantasy, it always came with his profession of undying love and devotion. In reality, his curiosity and promise to at least feel things out was probably as good as I was ever going to get. I didn’t know how much I trusted him, but I had always, always wanted him, and it just wasn’t in me to turn that down when it was being offered up on a silver platter.
“If we do this—hang out, spend time together—your parents, my parents, Rome, none of them are going to like it very much.”
“Who cares?”
I guess I did, but I always was the only one to worry about that stuff.
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
I breathed out a soft breath and as it whispered across his mouth he briefly closed his eyes, so I did the only thing that was left to do. I leaned forward and pressed my lips to his. It wasn’t with the same desperation as it had been the last time; there was no panic that he would change his mind, no years upon years of pent-up desire and frustration, no regret that it was only going to be a one-night thing—just the sweet press of my lips against his and the soft bite of his lip ring into my lower lip.
Kissing Rule would always be uniquely different from kissing anyone else. There was just something about it that put it in a class all its own. I felt his lips turn into a grin as audible sighs from several of the tables around us were heard. He pulled back and tapped a finger on the tip of my nose.
I sat back in my chair and cleared my throat. “Well, then.”
He barked out a laugh. “Yeah, at least that part of it seems to be a no-brainer.”
I shifted in my seat and motioned absently to the work still sprawled across the table between us. “As nice as this little visit was, I have to finish this presentation.”
A quick flash of disappointment blazed across his eyes but he hid it behind his easy grin. “When do you work this weekend?”
“I work all weekend, but I’m first out on Saturday night. I just have to be in by ten on Sunday morning.”
“Busy girl.”
“You don’t know the half of it.”
“So,