“Abort mission!” she yelped and ripped the poster out of his hands. Yep, she’d totally forgotten she used to make out with his poster.
Mortified, she started wadding up the poster, but he pulled it from her destructive grasp and shook his head. “Hell no, you don’t. We’re hanging this up.” He sauntered out the door, shoulders shaking with his laughter as he smoothed the wrinkles from the edges. “Where’s your tape.”
“I’m not hanging that.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m really embarrassed now! Can we please just throw it away and pretend this never happened?” She lunged for the damning poster, but Aaron blurred it out of the way and held it too high for her to reach. Son of a mother-fluffin’ biscuit-eater.
She bounced around like an irate bunny, but she only successfully jiggled her boobs around and got a mere three inches off the carpet. Finally giving up, she crossed her arms and tried to look severe. “We’re not okay, Aaron.”
He smirked, spun on his heel, and started digging through her kitchen drawers. And damn it all, he found the tape in the second one. He probably smelled it with his super-sensitive bear schnoz, and now she couldn’t meet his eyes because he really was plastering the poster of himself onto the living room wall. Alana wanted to crawl under a rock and hide forever and ever.
Aaron stood back and admired his handy work. He was still laughing, the brute. “It wouldn’t have worked out with us, you know? I was a little shit when I was fourteen. Plus, I would’ve been prejudiced against your slobby ways.”
“Well, I’m prejudiced against all of your tattoos, Aaron Keller. I mean, did you have to cover up all your damned skin with…what are those? Skulls?” She strode off murmuring under her breath, “If my daddy knew I was hanging out with a tatted-up bad boy, he would have steam blowing out of his ears.”
“Oh, I’m a bad boy now?”
“Yes! And I’m a good girl.”
“No, you aren’t.”
She went to furiously scrubbing an already clean dish in the sink just to have something to do other than shoot mind lasers at Aaron. “Yes, I am. I read books, pay all my bills on time, and pick up my nieces from school on Fridays so Lissa can get a date night with Todd. I eat well, have a consistent and early bed time, say please and thank you—”
“Who says I don’t do that stuff?”
“You ride a bike that everyone hears when you coast down the street.” She jammed her finger at the faint holes in his ears. “Piercings for everyone to see, tattoos everywhere, a haircut that makes you look like a hellion, and eyes that glow like the freaking sun and let everyone know you have a monster grizzly bear just waiting to rip out of you. You’re a bad boy if I’ve ever seen one. Dangerous. Probably slept with a hundred groupies.”
“You’re so fuckin’ cute when you’re mad.”
Alana dropped the ceramic plate in the sink and spun around. “And you cuss.”
Aaron snorted. “You like when I cuss, and you like everything else. I can smell your arousal. Every time I touch you, you smell like pheromones. And if you’re such a good girl, if you’re so perfect, why does your room look like a tornado hit it?”
“Because I was trying on clothes for you!” With a gasp, she clapped her hands over her mouth and wished with everything she had she could gulp those words back down.
It was too late, though. They were out there, dangling between her and Aaron, and now his lips thinned into a straight line. He cast his attention to the open door of her bedroom, and when he looked back at her, his eyes were a muddy gold. “Explain.”
She swallowed hard and let her hands fall away from her face. This was where he would run, and there was no escaping his question.
“Alana,” Aaron said, angling his head in warning. “Just say it.”
“You ruined everything.”
Aaron locked his arms against the small kitchen table that stood between them, his triceps bulging as he trapped her in that inhuman gaze of his. He froze there, like a predator about to pounce on an unsuspecting prey, and chills blasted up her arms.
Be brave. Don’t let him see you weak.
“I had a plan, and I was excited about letting the lease to my coffee shop and apartment go. I promised Lissa I would try a few more dates with guys in the area, just so she would feel like I tried my hardest, and then she was willing to let me move wherever I wanted, no complaints, just support. And that’s a really big deal to me. Trey was my last date, and then I could’ve moved on guilt-free. But the whole damned time, I was comparing him to you and staring at the firehouse, hoping I would see a glimpse of you. I was more excited about you stopping by for coffee this morning than I have been about anything in a really long time. I mean, I couldn’t sleep last night. I think you almost kissed me, and I kept replaying that moment over and over. My chest wouldn’t stop fluttering, and I couldn’t get comfortable. So I woke up early, before my alarm, and wanted to pick out something cute to wear today. For you.” Alana wrapped her arms around her middle to ward off some of the vulnerability she felt under his disconcerting gaze. “I know it’s stupid because we just met, but you have to remember…” Alana gestured to the poster on the wall. “I kind of watched you grow up. And then I got to meet you, and you’re better than I imagined. And I don’t hate your tattoos and piercings. I actually really, really like them. Not on anyone else, but on you, they’re so…perfect.”