Once Is Never Enough by Mira Lyn Kelly
Lie. Simple. Just lie now and everything would be fine.
Except she could already feel his gaze following the hot path of her heated skin over her cheeks, down her neck...lower.
Clearing her throat, she dug in the front pocket of her jeans, pulling out a couple of quarters. “We were talking about pool. Sticks. Cues.”
The corner of his mouth twitched and his eyes flashed back to hers. “Shafts and butts?”
“Technical terms.”
Garrett stepped closer, resting his hand at her waist as he bowed his head toward her ear, close enough so she could smell the clean masculine scent of him. Soap and skin and the barest hint of lingering sawdust. Close enough so fingers of warmth from his body could reach out and touch hers. Close enough to send her senses reeling as his breath washed over her ear, carrying his gruff, taunting words. “Yeah? Why don’t you tell me about it?”
Nichole’s eyes flew wide with her mouth. “No—nothing,” she managed, stumbling back only to be steadied by Garrett’s strong hand.
“Liar, liar, pants on fire,” he laughed in challenge. Then, with a conspiratorial wink, added, “Red.”
And with a word she was back to that night.
To the flirtation, the slow pulling need, the fast-rising hunger. Dim hallways and dark shadows. His mouth, his hands, his body...his name.
Garrett.
Her eyes pinched shut as she cleared her mind and drew a cleansing breath. “What are you doing here?”
“Jesse.” He nodded toward the table across the bar where she and Maeve had been sitting with the guys before starting their game of pool. “I didn’t expect to see you.”
And, though he hadn’t tried to avoid her, it was pretty clear if he had known, he wouldn’t have come. She got it. That was how one-nighters went. One night.
“I didn’t know you were coming either.” If she had she might have glanced at her hair before she left home. Gone for the cherry ChapStick instead of the original. She might have worn a skirt.
And not with the expectation that those big hands would find their way under it. No!
She cleared her head with a stern shake.
“It was a last-minute thing. Deciding to come out. But...” His jaw cocked to one side as his gaze slid over the second-floor bar before returning to search her eyes. “I don’t have to stay if this is uncomfortable for you.”
Nichole was already shaking her head when a tall glass of what was probably rum and Coke cut between them, followed by Maeve’s disgusted voice. “Didn’t I tell you to get over yourself? Nikki couldn’t care less about you showing up here.”
Not exactly true, but at least it was Maeve saying it instead of her. And, judging from the glint of amusement in Garrett’s eyes, his little sister’s biting words didn’t faze him.
His focus shifted to Maeve. “How’d that job in Denver work out?”
“Same ol’, same ol’.” Maeve shrugged, snaking an arm around her brother’s waist for a quick hug. “I’m scheduled to go back next week.”
Nichole watched the two fall into the conversation she knew one side of by heart, and wondered how it was possible she hadn’t recognized Garrett for who he was.
Only on some level she had. She’d seen his face at least a hundred times in photos in Maeve’s old albums. And, though most of those pictures were of a kid rather than a man, some of them had been recent. Which had to be the reason for that sense of connection. The immediate click.
Watching them together now, though, there was one thing she couldn’t miss. Being around Garrett wasn’t going to be a problem in any sense. His focus on Maeve was utterly complete.
There wasn’t any lingering tension—at least not from his side. He’d showed up, said hello when he saw her, been friendly and then moved on as though nothing had happened between them at all.
Maeve had been right about her brother being the expert in keeping relationships simple. And lucky Nichole to have the Panty Whisperer for her mentor.
* * *
Garrett stood with his back to the bar, his eyes focused on the pool table across the room where Nichole was lining up her shot, his tongue lodged somewhere halfway down his throat.
She moved from one spot to another, bending at the waist, bracing her weight with a hand on the table, widening her stance until—
Until every damn guy in the bar was leering as she took her shot. Just like him. The only thing setting him apart from the rest of the hounds panting after her was he knew just exactly what he was missing. He knew what it felt like to kneel between those legs. He knew what it felt like to spread his palm over the flat of her belly. To run his tongue the length of her.
Which meant, right then, he envied them. At least they could tell themselves it probably wouldn’t be as good as their imagination was making it.
Nichole let out a whoop, high-fiving Maeve as two guys he didn’t know took losing with dopey grins and an offer of more drinks.
Garrett’s eyes narrowed as he started sizing them up. They looked harmless, but guys put on a lot of façades.
His gaze shot over to his sister, who seemed to be handling the attention fine, passing on the drinks—good girl—and whatever else the guys were offering. Same as Nichole. Only there was something different about the way the two women handled it. Maeve leaned into the conversation, taking the flattery with grace even as she rejected it, while Nichole simply didn’t seem to register it at all. She was smiling freely at the guys, but without any kind of sexual recognition whatsoever.
Even when one of the guys reached for her hand, trying to angle in for some eye contact, she just wrapped her free hand around his fingers and basically handed them back to him...with a smile.
She was friendly.
Like he’d never seen “friendly” done before. Some girls played at it. Used it like a kind of game of push-and-pull. But Nichole...she was completely open and available only in one clearly identifiable way that said “not a chance” without ever having to say it at all.
“What’s up, man?”
Garrett shot a look over his shoulder to where Jesse was moving in beside him, his brother Sam a step behind.
“Just wondering how in the hell I ever got past that,” he answered with a nod in Nichole’s direction.
Jesse’s hands came up with the corners of his mouth. “Don’t look at me. I thought about asking her out back before I left, but she ‘friended’ me so fast there was no point in even trying.”
Jesse was one of the few friends Garrett had maintained regular interaction with over the years. He’d been a mellow, genuine guy from as far back as Garrett could remember. And through those first years after losing his dad, when it had seemed like the world was going to collapse around his shoulders and there was no way he’d be able to be everything he needed to be for everyone who needed it, Jesse had unrelentingly been there for him, refusing to let Garrett be alone no matter that the life he’d been a part of—the one with sports and chicks and hanging out—was gone. He’d been the guy to get his twenty-four-year-old sister to babysit once a month so Garrett could go out for a couple hours. The one who hadn’t crowed about cheap conquests. The one who’d understood. Maybe his artist’s mentality gave him more insight than the other meatheads. Whatever. He was a good friend—one of the only ones he truly felt comfortable confiding in.
An hour later Garrett was having to put significantly more effort into not feeling like a stalker than he generally cared to. But, honest to God, he just couldn’t keep his eyes from working their way back to that auburn tumble of hair and contagious laugh.
“She like this with everyone?” he asked Sam, watching as she yucked it up with yet another group of what he’d bet good money had been strangers until just that night. It seemed like she could talk to anyone about anything.
“What do you me
There was an edge in those last words that had Garrett’s head cranking around to where Sam was watching him, a matter-of-fact look in his eyes. “You talking about me?”
Jesse covered his mouth with his hand, but a low laugh escaped regardless.
There was no way Jesse’s little brother was warning him off of Nichole? But, sure enough, he was.
“Relax, man. I’m not going anywhere near her.”
“You’ve already been near her. And the way you’ve been watching her all night....”
Garrett was about to tell Sam he was nuts when that same sort of gravitational pull had him turning around again...and locking eyes with Nichole. Who’d been watching him.
Her lips parted, and from across the room he could actually feel the catch of her breath in his chest.
And then there it was—that blaze of heat working up her neck and cheeks. The one that made him wonder if he would feel the change it brought against his lips if they were positioned in just the right spot.
The corner of his mouth edged up as he tapped his cheek, mouthing the word red to the woman he was suddenly alone with across the expanse of this crowded bar.
Her answering smile was too many kinds of different to count from what she’d been giving to every other guy there tonight, and it hit him like a pile-driver to the gut, effectively knocking the wind out of him as he turned back to his closest friend and shook his head in genuine bewilderment.
Jesse let out a low chuckle. “I’m starting to wonder if the real question isn’t how you got past her, but how she got past you.”
SEVEN
“You again?” Nichole cocked a brow at Garrett as he slid into an empty seat across the narrow table running the length of the trendy downtown gastropub. Not that she was surprised. After three weeks of bumping into the guy most every time she went out, these rendezvous were becoming the rule rather than the exception.
At first they’d both been surprised. Accepting. Maybe even amused.
When it had become obvious that the crossing of their paths wasn’t simply a fluke but a consequence of the overlap of their friends, they’d found a few minutes to talk away from everyone else, both wanting to ensure the other was comfortable.
And they were. Mostly.
The conversation always came easily. Naturally. So much so that by the end of an evening more often than not she and Garrett would discover they’d been so caught up in their own interaction they’d lost the rest of the group along the way. Which was when things became the littlest bit less comfortable.
The laughter would die down between them, the break between one topic and the next filling with an awareness of the things they didn’t want. They’d look around for another conversation to dive into, but they’d be alone. Which would lead to the moment when her focus would drop to his mouth, the open collar of his shirt, a button or two even lower...
And then she’d realize how late it was. Or he’d remember the early call he had to get up for. Or they’d both catch sight of someone and quickly return to the group, going on as they had before, figuring it would get easier along the way.
Eventually.
Only as Garrett’s long legs brushed hers beneath the polished benchtop, and her breath sucked in with the unwilling image of their legs caught together in a tangle of heat and skin, she realized eventually couldn’t happen soon enough.
“Red,” came the gruff observation from across the table. Quiet enough the rest of the group, chatting in their usual animated fashion, didn’t seem to catch it.
But if anyone had bothered to look up as she had, no one would have missed the heat in Garrett’s eyes.
“It’ll go away,” she murmured, flipping her menu open in the hopes of shielding herself to some degree.
Only then the contact that had been inadvertent just the moment before was back. This time blatant and intentional. The press of his leg along hers, holding until she met his eyes.
“I’m starting to wonder.”
* * *
Garrett glared into the men’s room mirror after trying to stop the low simmer running through his veins with a cold splash of water. It wasn’t working.
So much for thinking this coffee shop concert would keep him out of trouble just because they wouldn’t be able to talk. He’d seen her. Seen when her eyes met his. And he didn’t need words because already he knew too much about her. And every damn time he went out...whether Nichole was actually there are or not...he found out more.
And, God help him, he liked it all.
She was cool and funny and clever and thoughtful and generous and loyal...and, damn it, he knew just exactly how good she tasted on his tongue.
And he couldn’t have her. Because he didn’t want her. And she didn’t want him.
They’d talked about it. More than once. Probably more than they needed to. Except for some reason it was one of those topics that seemed to require excessive amounts of reinforcement. He was starting to think maybe this girly splash of cold water wasn’t the way to go. He needed the reason hammered into his head.
Handy that he owned his own construction company. He ought to be able to find someone to do it for him.
With a hard shake of his head, he stalked out of the men’s room into the back hallway and came up short at the sight of Nichole at the far end.
This was the problem. The pull. With words or without, it was like there was some kind of force drawing them together...and it wouldn’t stop until they were as close as two bodies could be.
Yeah.
Echoes of the classical guitar they’d come to the coffee house to hear filled the otherwise deserted space as he closed the distance between them. Watched with the kind of satisfaction that should have made him ashamed as Nichole’s eyes went wide with understanding and she looked for a means of escape. Only in the end they both knew she didn’t want to get away any more than he wanted her to.
And then he had her. He hooked a finger through the belt loop of her jeans, giving himself mad props for refraining from sliding that finger between the denim and the bare skin of her belly the way he wanted to.
Tugging gently, he pulled her down the hall, away from where the intimate concert was being held toward a flight of stairs that led to a second floor.
“What’s up there?” Nichole asked, craning a bit to try and see around the bend as Garrett led the way.
“No idea. But we need to talk.”
A quick shake of her head. “I just came to say goodbye. I’ve— I think— I need to take off early tonight.”
Because the tension between them was growing thicker with every encounter. Every exchange. Every accidental or even not so accidental brush.
And she’d wised up.
Only too late.
“You can’t just—just corral me like this, Garrett,” she laughed nervously, working her way up the steps backward even when she had to know the only escape was from the other direction.
Of course he could. And unless she actually used the magic word no, he would. “That first night, Nichole...why did you let me take you home?”
* * *
Nichole stopped, caught in the dark pull of eyes she never should have looked into.
They’d talked about this. To a degree. But neither of them had been able to move past it. Get free of what had happened and the lingering connection that
“Because when I met you it was the first time in as long as I could remember I wanted more than friendship.” Another backward step and she nearly tripped on the stair. But Garrett was there, his hand at her elbow, steadying her even as he crowded her back.
What was he doing? Being this close, asking her about that night...it was a mistake. They couldn’t go on like this. At first it had been all fun and games. The lingering tension and chemistry between them almost a joke. A dirty secret they shared. Something amusing. A challenge to overcome.
But as the weeks moved past, as the tension and temptations grew, having to say no to something she wanted with more urgency every time they met had ceased being funny.
Nichole wanted this man.
So much more than she should.
“I brought you home with me because I thought it would be safe. There wouldn’t be any risk of getting involved, of things getting too complicated, of me—” She swallowed, closed her eyes and forced herself to say the rest of it. “Of me getting ahead of myself. Because I didn’t even know your name.”
She’d been so wrong. Because now not only did she know just exactly who she’d been with and precisely how to find him...she had to see him all the time.
“So, about that....” His fingers curved around her waist, ending her retreat where she stood, balanced on the third stair from the top of the landing in a space she had no right occupying.
Garrett took the next step, closing the distance between them until his chest brushed against hers and their breath mingled warm and wet together.
Her lashes fluttered as better judgment warred against want. “What are you doing?”
“Reminiscing. It was very hot.”
She shouldn’t have liked the sound of that so much. Not when there was no place to go with it. But the part of her that had never been entirely confident in the sexual arena...the part that even after years remained just the littlest bit bruised over the way her last relationship had ended...needed to know. Needed to hear. “My not wanting to know your name was hot?”