This One is Too

Chapter Seven

Hudson

The condensation from the glass bottle in my hand drips onto my jeans. I've been nursing one beer all night. I don't want to be drunk. I want to be coherent. Calculated.

Everyone else, though, is drinking the night away.

Amelia has finally let loose, and is currently playing a very serious game of rummy with a couple guys in the band.

Josie is on her third shot. I've counted. I want to know how drunk she intends on letting herself get on a bus full of people she barely knows.

The lights still swirl around us in a slow pattern, illuminating different parts of the room at different times.

When the light isn't on me, and is on Josie, I look that way.

Her hair is shorter than I remember, and lighter. It makes the rich chocolate of her eyes pop, even in the dim light.

She's in a tank top and tight jeans, sitting with her next drink in hand and one leg crossed over the other.

I rake my gaze across her body. My eyes almost pop out of my head when I notice something I hadn't earlier, because she'd been wearing a sweater in the cold arena most of the day.

A tattoo.

Right above the bend of her elbow on her left arm.

It's words that I can't make out from here, but I suddenly itch to know what it says.

I used to tease her about getting a tattoo. I didn't think she ever would.

Then, the thought occurs to me that she might have more.

I hate the way lust surges through me, because want for her is the last thing I should feel.

Still, the idea of roaming her body and finding every new secret she might have under her clothes makes me hard. Josie might be cold-hearted, but she's just as sexy as she was two years ago. If not more.

Fuller curves, clothes that accentuate what she has, versus hide it. She's learned how to use that body, and I can't help but wonder how that would translate in the bed.

Jake obstructs my view of her, walking to in front of her and leaning down to speak into her ear.

I wish the music weren't thumping so loudly so I could hear what he's saying.

Whatever it is, she laughs at it. A genuine laugh. Not the fake one she used to give when she didn't like someone.

I grip the glass bottle tightly, wondering how hard I have to squeeze until it breaks.

"I won." Amelia plops back down on the couch beside me, planting a kiss on my cheek. "I think you owe me fifty bucks."

I'd bet her fifty dollars that Dave would beat her.

"Fine, but you got lucky."

I force my eyes from Jake and Josie, and focus on Amelia.

She and I have never had a talk about what we are, if anything.

We're sure as hell not dating, but I can't say we aren't something.

I feel bad that I invited Josie on here tonight just to make her watch us.

But it seems pointless, anyway. She's not paying me any attention. She's not broken her eye contact with Jake.

"All right, new game!" Matt calls, simultaneously turning down the music. "Spin the bottle."