Wicked Sexy Liar

  He holds my hand as he drives, we listen to quiet music, and an easy sleepiness takes over the space between us.

  Upstairs, we brush our teeth side by side. Luke brought a toothbrush with him, and when I see him pull it from a small duffel bag, I tell him the story of finding Ashley’s at Justin’s house. His reply is to spit, rinse and wipe his mouth, and press a wordless, lingering kiss to my temple.

  “What a bag of dicks,” he says when he’s pulled away.

  “I’m going to rinse off really quick,” I say. And I do mean quick. I get in the shower before it’s all that warm, soap and shampoo at the speed of light, and practically sprint to my room in a towel.

  And Lord. Nothing looks better than Luke naked in my bed.

  He’s between the sheets already, his clothes in a neat pile on my desk chair. With unblinking eyes, he watches me drop my towel and tie my damp hair into a bun on top of my head. His eyes move down my neck, stalling on my breasts.

  “Do you sleep naked?” he asks.

  “With you I do.”

  He nods, rapt, and I pull back the sheets, climbing over him.

  He’s mine now.

  I sit up over him, and feel like we’re swimming in a tiny pool of light from the small lamp on the bedside table. His face is just barely in the shadow, but my entire torso is illuminated, and he reaches up, hands cupping my breasts. Between my spread legs, I feel him start to harden more.

  “Logan?” he says quietly.

  “Yeah?”

  His thumbs slide slowly toward my nipples. “Are you my girlfriend?”

  I nod, and he catches his lower lip between his teeth as he watches his thumbs draw slowly expanding circles around the tight peaks. Warmth floods my body, longing, and I bend down, kissing him once.

  “Did you miss having a girlfriend?”

  His brows pull down as he considers my question and he cups my breasts again, gently squeezing. “Not in the way you mean. I like being in a relationship, but I wouldn’t have wanted to be with anyone before you.”

  The question seems to come out of nowhere: “Do you ever miss Mia?”

  He looks momentarily confused.

  “I mean, do you ever—”

  His eyes clear in understanding and he interrupts me: “Do you miss Justin?”

  I laugh. “It isn’t the same. He cheated.”

  “People get over each other for different reasons,” he says patiently. “Just because Mia didn’t cheat on me doesn’t mean I still love her the way I love you.”

  I watch my fingers run over the smooth skin of his chest. “I know.”

  And I do. But it helps to hear him say it.

  “I’ll fuck up sometimes, I know I will,” he says with a tiny, flirty smile. “I’ll forget important dates and buy the wrong brand of tampons when you send me to the store and eat the wrong number of Pop-Tarts and most likely say unintentionally sexist things you’ll need to point out, but I won’t—I promise—ever be unfaithful.” His hands slide up my hips to my waist. “I’m not built that way.”

  I kiss him for that, straightening over him again and running my hand down his bare chest. And then I feel my brain hitting the brakes, slowing further as I watch my fingers follow the map of muscle on his body. My fingertips explore the dips and swells, the long lines of his ribs wrapping around his sides.

  He’s mine now.

  No one else will touch this bare chest.

  No one else will enjoy this transition from chest to stomach, from stomach to hips.

  No one else will feel the soft trail of hair just here.

  He twitches in my hand as I grip him, whispering my name, sitting up beneath me and sucking at my neck.

  No one else will touch his cock.

  No one else will make him come.

  No one else will hear him say I love you.

  Luke’s lips move up my neck to my jaw and he lets out a helpless sound as I stroke up, and down, bending to nibble on his bottom lip.

  A quiet groan rumbles down his chest. “What are you thinking about? You’re being so quiet all of a sudden.”

  “I’m thinking that you’re mine,” I whisper.

  He pulls back, looks between our bodies, at my hand fisted around him. “Fucking all yours.”

  We watch what I’m doing for a few more beats of silence.

  “What are you going to do with me?” he asks, looking back up at my face.

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “Touch me, kiss me.” He lies back down and shrugs a little against the pillow. “I don’t know. I want to do it all.”

  My stomach tightens from the way he watches with wide, intense eyes.

  I shift closer, feeling his cock slide over me and he hums, smiling. “This works. You could get yourself off like this and let me watch you come.” His grin widens. “I sure do like to watch you come, Miss London.”

  I smile down at him, tracing the line of his collarbone with my fingertip. “You’re my favorite.”

  His eyes widen playfully. “Your favorite of anyone?”

  Something fills my chest, climbs up my throat. I nod, unable to agree out loud because it’s true. He is my favorite person in the world. “You’re so sweet to me.”

  “Well, I would hope so. I love you.” He smiles again when he says it, and the way his eyes turn down a little at the corners just as his mouth turns up makes my heart trip over itself.

  “I know you do. I feel it.” I bend, kissing him. My heart peeks over the ledge and sees nothing but wide-open air. “I love you, too.”

  He stops breathing, his thighs tense beneath me. “You don’t have—”

  I cut him off. “I’m not just saying it because you did. You know I wouldn’t say that if I didn’t mean it.”

  It hurts and it soothes just watching Luke struggle with this much emotion. His eyes are tight; he swallows a few times.

  “Yeah?” he manages, finally, but his voice still comes out a little strangled.

  I nod. “I love you.”

  I know without a doubt I never felt this sort of bone-deep comfort with Justin, and even his widest smile never made me melt the way a single, flirty glance from Luke can.

  His eyes search mine for a few, jagged breaths. “London?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Will you move to Berkeley with me?”

  My blood turns to smoke, muscles dissolve. I knew this was coming, at least the inevitable choice of moving together or navigating the distance.

  He’s watching my mouth, not for my answer but because I’m smiling. I can tell he doesn’t know what it means, though, and his eyes grow anxious.

  I lean in, kissing him.

  “No, babe, stop.” He holds me back with one hand curled around my shoulder and my heart trips. He called me babe. Not the intentional teasing of Logan or Dimples, but something instinctive, something that rolled reflexively off his tongue.

  “Be real with me right now,” he continues. “The idea of being up there if you’re down here . . . I can still choose UCSD.”

  I meet his eyes and they’re not smiling, but they’re clear. I see for the first time that his left eye is a little lighter than his right, and it occurs to me that I will never forget this detail about him. Every time we are together, we are collecting these things that make up this amazing Us, and this one makes my throat grow tight with suppressed tears.

  He called me babe.

  His eyes are two different colors.

  He wants me to move with him to Berkeley.

  “I’ll move.”

  His eyes flash wide. “What?”

  “I’ll move to Berkeley with you,” I tell him. “I want you to go to your first choice. I don’t want to be apart.”

  “You’ll live with me?”

  My chest flips at this enormous detail. “Yeah. I mean, assuming that’s the situation you meant. We can get separate places instead.”

  “No,” he blurts, quickly shaking his head. “That’s what I meant. Living together.” H
is head jerks back in sudden skepticism. “Wait. Seriously? You’re serious?”

  I bite back a giddy laugh. “Yes, I’m serious.”

  “You love me and you’re moving with me?”

  I can barely handle his adorable mania. Bending, I slide my lips over his. “I love you and I’m moving with you.”

  Speaking against my mouth, he mumbles, “Holy fuck. Now we’re going to have sex for the first time in this bed. How am I going to last long enough to make sure you come first?”

  I laugh harder, and he shakes his head, rolling on top of me, settling between my legs. “I’m serious. I’ve never been so excited,” he babbles. His cock presses against my clit and I can barely focus on what he’s saying; he’s so warm, so rigid. “My heart is about to explode. I’m inarticulate. And my penis is too happy to adequately satisfy you right now. I get live-in London. I get shared-bed London. I get to—”

  I stretch to cover his mouth with mine, arching my hips, and his cock is there, just there, and when I shift, the tip moves inside. His surprised inhale is jagged as he slides into me so easily, and without any more negotiation he’s moving, curling his hips over me, demanding and greedy. I feel him there—I feel him everywhere—and the intensity of our decision, the idea of having a bed that is ours, a routine that is ours, a love that is ours makes my body hypersensitive, my skin feel tight and too hot. I push up into him, working my body on his, wanting him deeper and faster, harder, too. Last night was all about slow: he kissed me everywhere, made love to me in nearly every position I could imagine, but tonight we are fast, immediately sealing the deal we’ve just made.

  He rises up over me, cupping my bent knees and spreading my legs wider, opening me completely to him. Nothing is more intimate than how he watches, how he stares at where he disappears inside me over and over and over. I reach down, touching him, touching myself, feeling it all: wet and heat, hard driving into soft.

  I raise my eyes to his face and realize he’s looking right at me, gauging my reaction to all of this, and I know now what’s more intimate than the way he watched himself moving in me, it’s this: Luke studying my face while he makes love to me. His eyes are glued to mine as the pleasure starts small and then grows, and grows, until I feel it hooking me, dragging me to that point of no return and I’m unable to look away, and nothing—nothing—is more exposed than staring right into his eyes as I let myself fall to pieces. Luke’s lips part in awe and he nods in encouragement as pleasure takes over my senses and I beg him quietly, senselessly—

  I’m

  Luke, it’s

  it’s so

  close oh, fuck, I’m close

  —his eyes narrowed nearly in pain as he concentrates on getting me there. But my orgasm fully crashes into me and each of my sharp sounds of relief causes a tiny bit of his brow to relax until he’s smiling, grinning so wide, nearly laughing at how I clutch at him, at how wild I am. A million tiny explosions pulse between my legs, up my back, in my throat as I’m crying out, a garbled mess of words.

  I stare up at him, going limp, and his mouth opens wider, like he wants to say something, but instead he just bends, kissing me—messy and bobbing as he moves with renewed intent—and that elated smile straightens into focus.

  Hands tightening on my knees, he spreads my legs even wider, hips pumping. I lift from the bed, squeezing him, wanting to wring every bit of this out of him. He’s so hard, fucking me so wild, I feel it somewhere deep and tender every time he stabs forward but if I could get him deeper inside me, I would. I reach for his hips, urging him into me, and Luke throws his head back as he comes, calling out a disbelieving, “Holy—holy fu—oh, holy fuck,” and then he stills, jerking above me.

  He stops, chest heaving as he looks down at me in wonder. Slowly, he releases his hold on my knees and plants his hands on the mattress on either side of my waist. I feel the silence crash down, realizing how vocal we’d both been, how completely lost in the act.

  My legs are sore from being spread so wide, and I carefully wrap them around him, using them to pull him down against me. His forehead rests on mine, eyes closed as we catch our breath.

  “Holy shit,” he says on a gasping exhale. “Goddamn, woman.”

  “Luke?”

  Eyes still closed, he smiles a little. “Logan?”

  My hands come up his neck, cupping his jaw. “In case I didn’t make it clear earlier, I’m crazy in love with you.”

  His eyes open, meet mine, and his smile grows. “Finally.”

  Epilogue

  Luke

  THREE THINGS FEEL fucking amazing about this moment.

  One, I’m drinking a really great beer.

  Two, my entire family is together—with London—and Mom is making my favorite baked ziti for our going-away dinner.

  Because three: last week, London and I signed a lease on a house up in Berkeley.

  I glance across the room to where London stands at the kitchen sink, wearing one of Mom’s aprons over a jersey dress that shows off her perfect ass. She’s talking to Grams, rinsing a colander full of strawberries, looking like she’s been in this house a million times before.

  I want to roar. Three months into our relationship and I am so fucking gone for this girl, I can barely shut up about it.

  I propose nearly every day and she just laughs at me, and then distracts me with sex.

  Grams’s high, shaky voice jerks me out of my moment: “When Luke was a boy he used to wake up in the morning and say his penis was strong.”

  I choke on a sip of beer, gaping across the room at her. Everyone else has stopped moving, too.

  Margot barks out a laugh. “I’ve been waiting for this moment.”

  Grams smiles proudly. “He was talking about having an erection, of course.”

  London blinks, looking over her shoulder at Grams and then me, coughing quietly. “I’m sorry?”

  I rub my hand over my face. “Grams.”

  Grams shoos me away with a hand. “I’ve been waiting twenty years to share that one—don’t you dare ruin this moment for me. Do you know how long I’ve held on to these gems?”

  I wave my hand, giving her the all-clear.

  “He had a favorite blankie he would shove down his pants while he watched Barney,” Margot adds helpfully.

  “Margot,” Mom chides quietly from the stove, but she’s laughing, too.

  I take another sip of my beer. “Please, do your best. I make a fool of myself for this woman daily. There’s nothing you can say to quell her adoration of me.”

  I can see every member of my family straighten with this challenge, and then they watch London put the colander down on the counter and walk over, sliding her arm around my waist. “He called me by the wrong name about fifty times the first night we were together.”

  Silence surrounds us for a single heartbeat and then my family bursts into laughter. With this, London has just joined their ranks and endeared herself to them forever.

  I stare down at her, giving her a playfully reprimanding look while she rests her chin on my chest and her blue eyes twinkle with mischief. “I love you,” she mouths.

  “You’re lucky I love you, too.”

  Her eyes widen as if she’s just remembering. “We’re moving tomorrow.”

  I lift my hand and gently sweep her bangs to the side. “First stop, Six Flags,” I whisper.

  “Then surfing in Santa Barbara.”

  “Then more roller coasters at Great America.”

  “Then . . . our new place,” she says, smile slowly straightening. “And no more bartending.” I know she’s scared. I know this is huge for her. But she has jobs lined up for months, and her work really is brilliant.

  “And then I start school.” I bend, kissing her nose.

  London searches my eyes, seeking that reassurance I know she won’t ask for aloud anymore.

  We will be okay.

  I am yours.

  You are mine.

  We’re doing this together.

 
“And then you marry me?” I say.

  I expect her to laugh. I expect her hand to cup my cheek and for her to kiss me in her gentle refusal but instead she blinks slowly up to my face. “They have a roller coaster in Las Vegas, you know.”

  Acknowledgments

  THE FUNNIEST THING about this book was our sense at the end that we could have stayed a lot longer with Luke and London. This book came so easily, and their story was so fun and fluffy for us, that by the end we were both surprised that it was over. And that we loved it just the way it was.

  Of course, it’s pretty nice that, after having to rewrite Dark Wild Night, the subsequent book was an easier process, but it just shows us time and again that sometimes it’s smooth, and sometimes it’s rocky, but it’s always worth putting in the effort. So, there’s a little bit of advice to you aspiring writers out there: we still struggle, and it’s always kind of a shock when it’s easy. So get that story down on the page no matter how much it feels like you’re trying to get blood out of a rock. It’s worth it.

  Thank you to every single person out there who reads our books or tweets at us, and who blogs about, reviews, or shares our stuff with their friends. Without you, we have no books. We are eternally grateful!

  We love working with our editor, Adam Wilson, so much—not only because he’s just really fabulous with punctuation, grammar, and pasting the perfect YouTube clips in our margin notes, but also because he is able to see outside his own life and experiences so well that he can make each character of ours stronger through his basic human intuition. To be able to find the pieces of a character that work and the ones that don’t and help guide us in the right direction is pretty amazing. We love writing these books with you, dude.

  Holly Root is a rare, encyclopedic human. We have a question—she has an answer. We have an idea—she has some history and context to help guide us. Thank you for every single thing you do—from the tiny email to the long phone calls. You’re better than the mathematical equivalent of (cupcakes x unicorns)4.

  Our Simon and Schuster Gallery family is as wonderful as ever: Louise Burke, Jen Bergstrom, Carolyn Reidy, the ever-magical Kristin Dwyer, Theresa Dooley, Melissa Bendixen, Jen Robinson, Liz Psaltis, Diana Velasquez, John Vairo, Lisa Litwack, Jean Anne Rose, Steph DeLuca, Ed Schlesinger, and Abby Zidle. Working with each of you makes us feel like we’ve just consumed about seven liters of bubbly stardust. Now we can fly!