Unforgivable Read online

  “So,” she said in a low voice. She hadn’t moved. One hand still curled loosely around a wineglass that was now almost empty.

  Mick smiled. “So.”

  They stared again for a moment or so until her chin lifted. She took a long, slow sip of wine, finishing the glass. He watched her throat work as she swallowed, and his own went dry.

  “You could get me another drink,” Alice told him. “If you wanted to.”

  Yeah. He wanted to. “White?”

  “Yeah. I’ll come in with you. It’s a little chilly out here.” She handed him her empty glass and rubbed at her arms with a little shiver but a smile that heated him up. She brushed past him in a way that only a jackass would have thought was accidental. A glance over her shoulder had his eyes making those little hearts like in the cartoons.

  He followed her inside.

  They weren’t alone in there, which wasn’t as nice as it had been out there on the deck, but his mood had improved immensely. Mick put his empty bottle in the bin and poured Alice a fresh glass of wine. Her fingers brushed his when she took it. Her eyes—and they were indeed pale gray, as he’d guessed, held his. She smiled and sipped, and there was nobody else in the room. Not for him.

  Somehow after that the inside jokes didn’t bother him. Not that he felt like he had to be the life of the party or anything—it was enough to sit next to Alice on the couch and feel the heat of her hip on his, the occasional brush of her shoulder. The drift of her fingers on his knee every so often when she reached to put down or pick up her glass. The group had moved conversation to a rowdy game of Bullshit, so cards were flying and people were shouting and laughing. It was easy enough to let her touch him like it was an accident, though every now and then the way her gaze snagged his convinced him that it was anything but.

  The hours crept past midnight before he knew it. At nearly one in the morning, someone new arrived to a chorus of friendly catcalls and admonishments—Paul, his name was. Jay had invited him the same way he’d invited Mick. Or not quite the same, Mick thought as he watched Jay embrace the other man. They didn’t kiss or anything, but there was more to that greeting than casual friendship.

  Alice saw it, too, and she murmured, “Finally.”

  Mick looked at her. She shrugged, the two of them still sitting on the couch while everyone else had moved to take empty plates and glasses to the kitchen, or to say hello to Paul. It would be obvious in a few seconds that she ought to move away from him now that there was more room on the couch, but for the moment, they still pressed thigh to thigh. She half turned toward him with a small smile.

  “It’s late,” Alice said. “Probably bedtime, huh?”

  If it was an invitation, he lacked just enough confidence to act on it. She squeezed his shoulder as she got up, but it could’ve been meaningless. Mick watched her say hello to Paul and get a kiss and hug from Jay, he watched her say good night without looking his way or sending any other signals, and when she’d disappeared down the hallway, he finally found the incentive to get off the couch himself.

  In his basement room, Mick fell asleep thinking of Alice’s laughter, but he fell asleep alone.

  Chapter 18

  A full day at the lake, followed by dinner and a bonfire, with S’mores, campfire songs, and hilarity . . . it would’ve been enough to send anyone off into slumberland. Yet Alice hummed with the unreleased tension of the hours and hours of not-quite flirting she and Mick had been doing since last night on the deck. It was making her crazy.

  She hadn’t meant anything the night before, heading outside where he’d been brooding with a beer. She’d only meant to get some air and say hi to Jay’s friend. Okay, so the new guy was easy on the eyes, nothing wrong with that, right? But it wasn’t the thick dark hair falling over those crystalline eyes or the quirk of his smile or the broad shoulders or amazing forearms that had gotten her so tangled up inside. At least it wasn’t only those things. It had been the simple way he made sure she always had a fresh drink. The almost sly way he’d let his eyes slip to hers when someone told a joke, as though he’d been waiting for her reaction alone, as though nobody else’s mattered.

  She’d been snared.

  No other way to describe it. The question was, would she do something about it? Watching him now from across the fire, Alice thought she would.

  She’d never been the kind of girl to sit back and let the world come to her. She went after scholarships and relationships and whatever else she wanted, usually with a practiced determination and practicality that had served her well enough through the years. Sure, she’d been disappointed in her pursuits a few times, but that was part of going after what you wanted—you had to be prepared to lose.

  Somehow, Alice didn’t think she was going to lose. Not with the way Mick’s gaze kept slipping back to capture hers, no matter where she stood, or how he made sure to somehow be wherever she was. Not in an obvious way, nothing anyone else might see, because while Mick was pursuing Alice, she was making it extremely easy for him to do it.

  When the fire had burned to coals and there were more yawns than laughs going around the circle, Alice gathered up as much trash as she could and paused next to Mick. “Hey. Help me carry this up to the house?”

  Jay and Paul had both disappeared an hour before. Bernie and Cookie were snuggled together, and Tanya had fallen asleep in a lawn chair. Alice, with Mick a step or two behind, carried the garbage to the oversized can at the base of the deck steps and dumped it in. It was darker up here, the light from the fire an orange haze at the bottom of the garden and the house itself lit only dimly from a few lights in the living room. Under the deck, sliding glass doors led into the finished basement . . . and the room where Mick was sleeping.

  “Wanna play some pool?” Alice asked.

  Mick laughed softly. “Are you any good?”

  “Terrible. But that’s what makes it so much fun.”

  There was a beat or two of silence, in which she was sure he’d reach for her. He had to, didn’t he? After eyefucking her all night long, surely he’d move a little closer. Lean in. Put his hands on her hips.

  Instead, Mick backed away. “Sure. I’ll play.”

  Alice followed him inside, calculating how many steps between the sliding doors and the hallway to his bedroom. Imagining herself stripping out of her dress and letting it fall to the floor, walking in just her bra and panties to his room with no more than a glance over her shoulder and a crook of her finger. He’d follow, she was sure of that. Yet something stopped her. . . . Anticipation was delicious, after all.

  “You can rack,” she told him, and went to the glass-front fridge Bernie had salvaged from a convenience store being remodeled. “You want a soda?”

  “I’ll be up all night.” Mick grinned.

  Alice smiled back and lifted her brow. “And?”

  “Sure. I’ll have one.” Mick grabbed two cues from the wall rack and handed her one, taking the can of cola from her. “You want stripes or solids?”

  “Stripes.” Alice took a drink and set the can down, then put some chalk on her cue. She was truly terrible at pool, that part hadn’t been a lie. But bending over the table and shaking her ass to keep him distracted? That she was good at.

  They played for about five minutes before the sound of shouts from upstairs made her pause. Mick hadn’t heard them; he was in the middle of a joke when she held up her hand to hush him. To give him credit, he did at once, looking concerned.

  “You okay?”

  “I heard something.” She went to the bottom of the front staircase, head tilted to listen. “I thought it sounded like Jay.”

  Mick put his cue down and stood beside her. “I don’t hear anything.”

  She didn’t either, now, just the huff of their breathing. The heat of him brushed her bare arm. When she turned her face, his mouth was there. The kiss felt like an accident, or at least like something they could pretend wasn’t on purpose. His lips urged hers to open. He pushed her back against the