“So how do you know him again?” she asks.
The dampness covering my skin evaporates into my cool, air-conditioned surroundings, but damn if my nether regions aren’t all hot and tingly at the thought of Delilah Rosewood actually seeking me out.
Because let’s face it, she fucking wants me.
She came here pretending like she just randomly decided to bring me cookies, but I know what this is. Delilah’s not the first and she probably won’t be the last. All she needed was an excuse to step into my world for a minute, and the second I round this corner, she’s going to expect me to take the lead. To make a move. To be all over her like white on rice.
I know exactly how this is going to go. We’ll chat. Flirt. Eye fuck.
And then she’ll trace her fingers along her neck, trailing down between those two perfectly round tits of hers, and then she’ll give me a reluctant smile, grazing her tongue along her bottom lip as she waits for me to go in for the kill.
Too bad for her it’s not going to happen.
Not that I don’t want it to.
But it’s going to be fun as hell watching her squirm and try and act like she hates me when every part of her is lit like a cherry bomb on the Fourth of July every time we’re in the same general vicinity.
I see it in the way her eyes glint when they meet mine. I see it in the way her thighs clench. The way her hands tremble when I step into her space like I own it.
She can say anything she wants, but her body language wastes no time showing her cards.
“Oh, so you’ve known him quite a while then?” I hear Delilah’s voice once again. She must be on the phone.
I check my reflection in a hall mirror, finger-combing my hair into just the right position before checking my breath on the back of my hand and strutting toward the living room like a man who gives no fucks.
And then I stop. Dead in my tracks. Frozen.
Because Delilah is not on the phone.
She’s sitting across from my goddamned stalker, interview style, chit-chatting away like a couple of prattling finches.
I glance at the psychotic hot mess that is Carissa and brace myself for the familiar gut-check that follows.
“What’s wrong, Zane?” Carissa laughs like we’re a couple of old friends, lifting one of Delilah’s cookies to her lips and taking a nibble. “You look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”
My lips form a hard line as I look between the two of them.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” I say. “You know that, Carissa.”
She shrugs, turning to Delilah. “I was in the neighborhood visiting my grandparents, and I happened to drive past and see my favorite man taking a pretty lady into his house. I thought I’d stop by and say hello. Just being cordial. That’s what you wanted, right Zane? For us to be cordial?”
Carissa stalked me for three straight years, showing up at every public and far too many private events for me to count. The first time I met her, she was posing as a sportscaster and waiting outside my locker room after a big game. Complete with a press pass and tape recorder, she looked the part, and she was sexy as fuck.
When she pulled me away from the team and led me down a hallway and into a private conference room under the guise of conducting a quick interview, nothing seemed off until she locked the door, fell to her knees, and wasted little time taking my cock between that pretty red mouth of hers.
The arrogant twenty-four-year-old me thought it was pretty fucking hot. I blew a load in between her cherry lips, and she drank every last drop. Delicately composing herself afterwards, she rose to her feet and slipped me a note with her phone number before disappearing.
But I never called her because girls like her are a dime a fucking dozen, and I don’t feel bad saying that because they do it to themselves. They throw themselves at us and cheapen their looks and soften their values and spread their legs because their only goals in life are to be baller wives.
Show me a girl who hates football and is crazy into me anyway, and I’ll marry her on the spot. I’ve yet to meet anyone like that. Haven’t even come close.
Not to mention, it’s impossible to respect a woman who has zero respect for herself.
“Carissa, you need to leave.” I fold my arms across my chest, jaw clenched.
“Is he serious?” Delilah points at me and laughs.
Carissa rises, moving my way and slipping her hand along my shoulder. “Always so dramatic, this one. It’s why I love him soooo much.”
Her declaration of love makes molten vomit rise in my throat, and her touch lingers intentionally.
“Go.” My command is a harsh growl. “Now.”
“Don’t be rude, Zane.” Delilah waves for Carissa to come back, and then she pats the seat beside her. “She can stay. Or better yet, I can leave so you two can catch up. Carissa said you two used to be close but you fell out of touch?”
I laugh under my breath. Leave it to Carissa to paint a picture that doesn’t make her look seven kinds of psychotic.
With a stern hand, I guide Carissa toward the door and walk her to the front steps, seeing to it, personally, that she’s on the outside of my fortress.
“Don’t ever pull that shit again,” I say when I pull the door closed.
Carissa pouts, her giant olive-green eyes framed by shiny jet-black hair. The woman is beautiful, no question, but all that crazy inside of her cancels out every last bit of it.
“Who is she, Zane?” There’s a wistfulness in her tone that doesn’t belong there, and she stares at me like I’m the best thing in the world. Her fixation with me is mind-boggling, but I stopped trying to understand it years ago. Nothing about Carissa has ever made much sense.