What if I was the sexual equivalent of popcorn? Suitable for light snacking only?

Nash’s lips met mine, and I pushed those fears away. I opened for him, sucking his tongue into my mouth, tasting it. He leaned into me, and we would have fallen onto the cushions if he hadn’t braced his hand against the back of the couch. He shoved my backpack and jacket to the floor, then lowered me gently, slowly. With infuriating patience.

Even drowning in my own doubts, I had no patience.

He settled over me, hips pressing into me, chest heavy on mine, holding himself up on one elbow. His knee slid between mine and I gasped, sucking air from him. Heat rose from the pit of my stomach, tingling all the way up. He tasted so good. Felt so good. And I understood him in a way no human girl ever could.

Surely he knew that…

Nash’s lips trailed down my neck, setting off a series of tingly explosions, adrenaline pumping through my heart. My hand clenched the tail of his shirt, then I pushed it up, trailing my fingers over his stomach.

And in that moment, I became a fan of football, for the simple fact that it had literally shaped him. I couldn’t resist running my hands around to his back as it twisted and bunched beneath my fingers. He was strength personified, and simply touching him made me stronger. Harder. More capable of everything ahead of us.

If I had Nash, I could do it. I could do anything.

The phone rang, and Nash groaned into my ear, his breath a puff of warm frustration fueling my own. “Your dad?”

“Probably.”

He collapsed on me, pinning me to the couch momentarily as the phone rang again, and I didn’t want to move. Didn’t want him to get up. He had to, of course, but he did it slooowly, sliding off me one delicious inch at a time until he sat on the floor beside the couch, one hand flat over my stomach.

I arched one arm over my head and grabbed the phone, moving as little of my body as possible. “Hello?”

“I take it you’re at home?” my father said as metal clanged in the background.

“I answered the phone, didn’t I?” I closed my eyes in regret; my answer had come out harsher than I’d intended, my voice sharpened by irritation at having been interrupted.

My dad sighed, and I heard hurt in his exhalation. “Is Nash there?”

“He walked me home.”

He sighed again and raised his voice. “Nash, go home.”

Nash scowled. “I was…just going.”

“Say hi to your mom,” my father said. Then there was only silence and the clang of more metal over the line, and I realized he was waiting for Nash to leave. Right then.

“Um, I will.” Nash stood and leaned down to kiss my cheek, the most he would do with my father there, even if only in spirit. And in voice. “See you later, Kaylee,” he said,then closed the door on his way out.

“Happy?” I snapped into the phone. I wasn’t sorry that time.

“No, Kaylee. I’m not happy. I’ll be home by seven-thirty with dinner. What do you want from the Chinese place?”

I bit my lip to keep from saying something I’d regret later. Likely much later. “Shrimp fried rice. Want me to call it in?”

“That would be great. Thanks.” He hung up, and I stared at the empty living room, wishing I knew of some way I could get along with my father and save Addy’s soul. But so far, the two seemed to be mutually exclusive. Fortunately, it would all be over in a matter of hours, and my life would go back to normal.

Assuming I survived the night.

15

MY DAD WALKED in the front door at seven twenty-four, carrying a white paper bag and smelling of metal and sweat. He looked awful. Exhausted. I felt bad for him. And really guilty.

After my mother died and I’d been handed over to my aunt and uncle, my father had gone to Ireland to run the pub his parents owned. He’d made a decent living, but most of his extra money went to pay for my incidentals and to fund my college account. So when he came back to the States, he’d brought nothing but a suitcase and enough cash to put down a deposit on a rental house and buy a second used car—I still had the one he’d bought me for my sixteenth birthday.

Now he worked in a factory all day, taking overtime where he could get it, because he thought he should at least try to make as much money as his brother did.

I didn’t care about the money. A little money only made people want more of it. And I liked our used furniture, because if I spilled on it, no one got mad, which meant I could snack in the living room, in front of the television. But my father insisted we eat dinner together every night. Our crappy kitchen card table was the magic wand he kept waving to turn us into a real family. But on some nights, all that magic seemed to do was irritate and frustrate us both.

And still he tried….

“I got some fried wontons.” He set the greasy bag on the card table and draped his jacket over the back of a folding metal chair.

“Thanks.” He knew they were my favorite. He knew all my favorite takeout, because he rarely had time to cook, and I didn’t care if I never ate another bite of homemade health food after living with Aunt Val for thirteen years.

We ate in near silence, except for the occasional intrusion upon my thoughts when he asked if I’d done my homework—yes—and how Nash and Harmony were doing—fine. He never asked about Tod, which was just as well, because if he had, he’d know from my answer that I’d been hanging out with the reaper, too. And that would just make him even angrier, and more worried.