The Bad Boy's Heart (Bad Boy Series #2)

Chapter Thirty: I Look Like A Perverse Polly Pocket

Chapter Thirty: I Look Like A Perverse Polly Pocket

Cole and I are playing the most torturous kind of hide and seek. Take an innocent playground game and turn it into something entirely deviant where the stakes are much higher than losing. Because your standard first grader wouldn't want to be caught. They would do everything in their power to win, to be the last man standing. But me? I'm not doing that great of a job.

Exhibit A, Last Night.

The minute we came back from our not so innocent walk from the park I should've rushed up to my apartment, locked the door and pulled up videos to see how abstinence worked. I'd been a virgin, never even kissed till the age of eighteen so how hard could it be to resist one guy?

But there lies my problem, he's just not one guy he is the guy and running away from him is the cruelest form of self torture. He bewitched me into joining him for coffee and as I settled into the plush leather couch, I could see that it'd been kept for one purpose only: to be so comfortable as to not let the sitter want to move, ever.

So I did, I'd made myself comfortable and told myself that I had some amount of self-control which I prided myself over. I wouldn't relent to Cole's seduction until he came clean about his knee. Then and only then would I surrender. But as I watched him give me hot looks from the kitchen, I told myself that just because I couldn't give in, didn't mean that I couldn't enjoy it. Perhaps I'd give him a taste of his own medicine. Whatever sultriness I had I could use it to my advantage and make him fess up. The sooner it was out in the open, the sooner we could come up with a plan. I had everything ready, the paperwork, the figures, a perfect ten year plan if only he'd let me talk to him about it.

And as I'd started imaging that future, I hadn't noticed the steaming cup of coffee on the table in front of me or the steaming hot hunk that had somehow sidled up to me.
"Penny for your thought?"

The smouldering looks, the half smile, the careless way he'd tossed an arm around the back of the couch and angled his body towards me. Oh boy, Cole Stone was giving his full blown seduction treatment. I gulped and took a rather large sip of my coffee which in turn burned my throat. So while I was hacking away, Cole's arm slipped down my back, stroking and comforting.

"Are you back to physically endangering me while you try to woo me? Isn't that so fourth grade?"

"First grade to ninth grade actually but who's counting. Also kindergarten, I had such good game then."

"I would disagree, your playground bullying isn't what I call game."

"But I was memorable to you, isn't that all that matters? How much of Jay can you actually remember through the years?" He smirks and I sigh, annoying irresistible but stubborn jerk.

And he was right, of course he was. All those memories of Jay I had treasured growing up were now lost, not even in some long forgotten corner of my brain, where I had some memories of Nicole. But with Jay, it was almost as if they had never existed and Cole had somehow swept in and erased everything to do with my former crush.

"My throat is still burning, you're diabolical."

"It's coffee, a hot drink that you're supposed to let cool before inhaling. Would you like me to examine your throat though? With my tongue perhaps?"

"Would you like to tell me whatever it is that you're hiding from me?"

His playful expression had hardened and I felt him close off. I had been worried that he would send me my merry way but he hadn't. Instead he'd leaned closer and whispered in my ear.

"I don't like losing Shortcake. I will tell you when I'm ready, if I'm ready but this game? I'm not losing."

"It's not a game Cole, I need to know."