Addicted to You (22 page)

“By the way,” she said, “can I have my
purse?”

“Oh, of course,” he said with an embarrassed
edge to his smile. He handed it across the table. Leah carefully
avoided making skin contact as she took it. She wanted to keep a
clear head.

Not that she was some animal who couldn’t
control her hormones after making contact with a desirable mate.
But you know. Might as well play it safe and proceed with
caution.

“So you stopped by my parents’ house,” she
said. “Did you meet them without me? This relationship is going out
of order, I think.”

Will gave her a smile she grudgingly
conceded was adorable. “No, they weren’t there. But I did get to
see Elijah again. He’s a good wean. And he shared your cupcakes
with me.”

“Wean?”

“Child. Sorry, I forget myself
sometimes.”

“It’s okay,” she said. “I like learning how
you say things.”

After their main courses arrived, they spoke
a bit more about Elijah and her unusual family circumstances, and
she didn’t freak out about the fact they were talking, yet again,
about her feelings. How did this keep happening?

Eventually, the conversation segued into
Will’s family and his lack of desire to return to Scotland, despite
that he loved his country quite a bit.

“It’d be cool to go there someday,” she
said. And then realized what she had just implied and blushed. “I
mean … you know. Alone. Or not.” She rubbed her forehead. “I don’t
know what I’m saying.”

He grinned. “I’ll take you someday.”

It was presumptuous of him, but she didn’t
correct him. It could happen. She hoped it would.

“So,” he said, leaning over the ice cream
dessert they had agreed to split. “Since we’re taking this slow,
how many dates should I take you on before I’m allowed to kiss
you?”

She felt her face grow warm again and
resisted the urge to say, ‘Just this one.’ “We can play it by
ear.”

“And since you’re worried about sex—”

“I am
not
worried about sex,” she said,
interrupting him. “I’m just concerned that …”

“Yes?” Will prompted, oblivious to the
obscene way he was sucking on their dessert cherry topper.

“I am just
concerned—
stop sucking
that
—I am just concerned that we’ll do it
and then I’ll get bored.”

“Bored with me?” he asked, brows raised in
surprise.

“Yes.”

He smirked. “Not possible.”

“That’s an arrogant thing to—”

“I mean it,” he said, laughing quietly.
“People get bewildered, confused, aroused, amused, and irate with
me. But never bored. I promise I’ll keep you interested.”

She contemplated the way
his tongue flicked out to lick the ice scream on his lower lip.
“It’s true that since we met, you’ve pretended to be a sex addict,
jumped me in a dark theater, let me jump
you
in a dark pub, and blackmailed
me with my own purse.”

Nearby, an old lady dropped her fork in
horror.

“I can’t take credit for all of that, but
aye, exactly,” he said, grinning.

Ten minutes later, they were asked to leave
for having an ‘unsuitable’ conversation in a family restaurant.

“See?” Will said as they stood on the
sidewalk, debating what to do with themselves. “Interesting.”

He beamed, and Leah laughed at the absurdity
of it.

Since neither of them seemed to want to end
the night early, Leah nodded in the direction of the small
playground just a block down the street.

“Let’s walk,” she said, and they fell into
step alongside each other. They were close enough that her shoulder
brushed his arm. She wanted to turn her palm and take his hand. She
didn’t.

He did though. His long fingers laced
through hers and lightly squeezed.

“Thank you,” he said, “for seeing me
again.”

She rubbed her thumb along the side of his
palm. “Like you said, the addiction thing was the only lie. And … I
don’t know. I’ve had time to think about everything. For some
reason, I trust you.”

“I’m glad. And I’ll be sure to give you
plenty of reasons.”

She smiled down at their feet, watching the
sidewalk with its cracks and holes pass underneath. A minute later,
Will pulled her off toward the empty playground. A set of swings
and a complicated jungle gym with three types of slides sat in the
middle of a wood-chipped area. Just outside the wood chips, a steel
bench was parked for parents to observe their children.

They sat at the bench, Will pulling her
close enough that their sides touched. She thought of that couple
at the library and smiled again as she shifted even closer,
pressing into his side. He put his arm around her shoulder,
enveloping her in warmth and the earthy scent of his soap.

“Will,” she said. Her cheek rested against
the side of his neck, and she turned her face, closing her eyes
against his skin. “I feel like I should warn you I’m not very good
at relationships.”

His arm tightened around her. “Guess that
makes two of us. But I’m optimistic we can learn.”

“But I mean …” She drew back just far enough
so she could see his face. The tender way he smiled down at her
made her chest ache. “I can’t promise that I won’t freak out on you
again later on.” She looked away. She had to make him understand
what he was getting into. “And I can’t promise that any of this
will last, or that my feelings won’t change, or—”

“Leah.” His thumb skimmed her bottom lip,
and her tongue tripped on her words. Her throat went dry. “I’m not
asking you for any of that. You’ve intrigued me from the moment we
met, and all I want is for us to give this a chance.”

“Why?”

He gave her a lopsided smile. “Why do I want
to give this a chance? Well, there’s the issue of me being
completely infatuated with you, and—”

“No, that’s not …” She lowered her head back
against his shoulder with a small smile. Her cheeks were beginning
to hurt from all the smiling. She’d have to get used to this. Or
just slap herself a couple times. “Why did I intrigue you?”

“Because you were a contradiction. And
beautiful. And because you called me disgusting.”

She laughed. It was such a weird feeling to
know this guy, this stunning, sexy-as-hell and
too-sweet-for-his-own-good guy, wanted her. And that she wanted
him. Wanted to keep him. Right here, by her side, for as long as
she could.

“Don’t think about where we might be in a
month or two months or a year,” he said, his voice a low, lilting
vibration against her temple. “Because right now, you’re the only
person I want to be with. And I don’t expect that to change any
time soon.”

They sat in silence for a
few seconds. Then she whispered, “I think I’m falling for
you.”
I think I’ve already fallen for
you.

He smoothed his thumb along her cheek.
“Another thing we have in common then.”

Will’s fingers trailed down her jaw, her
neck, her collarbones. The warmth between them flared into a fire,
sending sparks down her side and settling low in her stomach. She
wanted to turn and climb onto the bench. To straddle him right
there beneath the moonlight and the dim yellow glow of a nearby
streetlamp.

Will grew tense beside her. “Finn and some
of the guys are at a bar a couple streets down. Want to join
them?”

I’d rather have you to
myself,
she thought, and then promptly
wanted to punch herself in the crotch. This might all be new to
her, but she wasn’t going to turn into a simpering pile of
hormone-charged emotions.

As if he’d read her mind, he said, “I
wouldn’t mind keeping it just the two of us, but it might be better
to have more company. I could introduce you to my friends.”

They left the playground and walked the five
minutes down the street to the bar while Will told her about
Glasgow. She was content to listen to him speak. Hell, he could be
reading the dictionary and she wouldn’t mind as long as he did it
in that accent. But she liked the opportunity to learn more about
where he came from.

Once they passed the second block, he pulled
her up to a bar with the front door propped open. Inside, the smoky
air stung her eyes, and the dim lighting didn’t help much either.
She recognized Finn immediately with his dirty blond hair sticking
up at all angles. He was an attractive guy. Downright hot, in fact.
And he seemed decent, despite his questionable hijacking of Will’s
email, so she couldn’t work out what Kat had against him, other
than the fact he’d taken the lead role away from an actual drama
student. Leah supposed that would piss her off too, but despite the
supposed enmity, it had been immediately obvious to her that Kat
was attracted to him. She’d been hiding it beneath hostility, but
the girl had undoubtedly wanted to tear Finn’s clothes off (Finn
probably mistook it for Kat wanting to tear his head off). Leah
knew sexual attraction when she saw it.

Finn spotted them and lifted a hand to get
Will’s attention. Then his eyes—and his smile—grew wide when he saw
Leah.

“Did you two love birds kiss and make up?”
he asked, throwing his arms around the both of them.

Will pushed him off and said, “I don’t kiss
and tell.”

“Hey, Scotty, introduce us!” One of Will’s
other friends shoved forward to thrust his hand out at Leah.

She gave his proffered hand and his
liquor-tainted breath a flat look. Then, declining to touch him,
she looked at Will and asked, “Scotty?”

“You know, because I’m Scottish. Sorry,
forgive him. He’s an idiot. What was I thinking wanting you to meet
my friends?” Will said, laughing.

“I’m Andy,” Will’s friend said, still
smiling. His glazed look meant he was well on his way to getting
drunk despite that it was a Monday night. He slapped a hand on
Will’s shoulder. “We haven’t seen this guy in weeks, and now I know
why. He’s been holding out on us.” A couple guys behind him shouted
something unintelligible that made Will laugh.

“Just so you know,” Finn said, “if you’ve
got any questions about him, I’m your guy. Did you know he keeps
the stuffed hippo he had as a kid in the back of his closet?”

While Andy and the other guys roared with
laughter, Will gave a low chuckle and said, “How do you even know
that?”

“I’m observant,” Finn said. “Plus, I was
snooping.” He looked at Leah and added, “I don’t normally do that.
He’s just special.”

Leah smiled. This whole ‘meeting his
friends’ thing was kind of fun. She’d never cared to know much
about the guys she slept with. In fact, the less she knew the
better (except in the case of her burglar). Guys in her past had
only mentioned introducing her to friends or family members a few
times—those were usually the guys who didn’t realize they were
having a one night stand and wanted to get her number in the
morning. She always cleared things up for them pretty quickly.

But everything was different and new with
Will, and she knew that, eventually, she would learn to stop being
afraid of that.

And hey, she was actually in a bar,
voluntarily socializing (sort of) with strangers for no other
reason than to hang out. She couldn’t wait to tell Helena later.
Helena would flip. Neither of them were big on barhopping. Helena
had shared the party scene with Leah their freshman year. Unlike
Leah, however, Helena had kept her priorities straight. Seeing how
deep Leah was getting into the party lifestyle, she had taken Leah
aside and slapped the sense back into her. Now, they preferred to
have their alcohol while comfortably situated in their living room.
Less mess and much more convenient for passing out.

“Come on,” Will said with a low laugh.
“Let’s get out of here before Finn starts telling you what color my
pants are.”

“They’re dark gray,” Finn said, and then
snickered when Will shoved him.

Leah glanced down at his jeans. They were
dark blue, not gray. She was missing something here.

“He means his underwear,” Andy said loudly.
Some nearby college students looked over at them, expressions
curious. One of them even scoped out the boys’ waists to look for
peeking underwear. “Took me a while to figure that one out
too.”

The corner of Leah’s mouth quirked into a
crooked smile. Maybe she and Finn would have a talk one of these
days.

“Is your underwear a common topic?” she
asked Will. This didn’t bother her in the least.

“I wish it weren’t.”

“Where’d you two meet anyway?” Andy asked,
leaning too close to Leah again and wavering unsteadily. Finn gave
him a none-too-gentle shove. It didn’t seem to faze him. “You go to
REU?”

“Save the questions for when you’re sober so
I won’t have to tell you everything twice,” Will said with a small
laugh. He nudged Andy toward their other friends. “Who’s DD? Make
sure you get his keys from him.”

“You got it, Scotty,” one of them said
before Andy muttered something about having to piss. They dragged
him off toward the bathroom.

With a hand at Leah’s elbow and an
apologetic look for his friends, Will guided her to an empty stool
at the bar.

“They’re lucky Scotty was awesome,” she
said. She shook her head when the bartender asked if she wanted
anything. Will ordered soda, which hopefully meant he was no longer
nervous.

“You’ve watched Star Trek?”

“Just the movies. I’m
surprised
you’ve
watched Star Trek.”

“Finn is a fan.” Will gave a small shrug and
then paused in such a way that Leah knew he was thinking about how
to ask something. “When you left my apartment that night, you said
you couldn’t believe you had put up with the therapy for me. But
you’d been attending the meetings for a long while before I showed
up.”