Distraction (Westbrook Series Book 1) (12 page)

The sound of Kyle slamming the front door rudely interrupts my fantasy. Sam appears to be having his own daydream because he is just staring at me with an amused expression on his face.

OMG.
Does he know what I was just thinking about?
I am flooded with embarrassment, but I remind myself that no matter how much it may seem like it, he can't actually read my mind.

"Laila, give me your phone. I'm going to call mine to see if I can find it."

I'm surprised he waited this long to do that.
Isn't that the first thing you're supposed to do when you lose your phone?
I probably would have even suggested it earlier, had I not been so preoccupied with Sam.

"It's in my purse on the table," I say, while nodding my head in that direction. Kyle picks my purse up and hands it to me, as if he would get some sort of disease if he actually reached inside to get my phone out.

"
Really
, Kyle? Is my purse really that scary?" I ask sarcastically.

He shrugs. "I don't like rooting around in women’s purses. You girls have
private
things in there that are none of my business." He looks away, as if he is embarrassed.

"You mean like
Tampons?
" I hold up a Tampon to emphasize just how ridiculous he is being. I immediately regret my dramatic protest when I realize that Sam is probably just as horrified as Kyle. I glance around the room, but Sam has disappeared. I sigh with relief, while shoving my Tampon back safely into my handbag.

"There's
that
and there could be . . .
other
stuff in there. Look, it's just better if I just don't
know
, okay?" Kyle truly looks uncomfortable. He won't even look me in the eye when I hand him my phone.

That's when I realize he is probably talking about condoms.
Does he really think I'm carrying condoms around in my purse? Even worse, does he think I'm having sex? Geez. I know my shirt is sexy, but I don't think that I look like a slut.

Kyle shakes his head, and walks away with my phone.  After about five minutes, he returns, and slides my phone across the counter to me. "There is no way it's here. My ringer is so loud, you'd hear it upstairs if it was ringing."

He's right about that. His ring tone is loud and obnoxious. It plays the
Black Eyed Peas
old hit "Let's Get It Started", which is a song that I used to love,
before
it became my brother's ring tone.

Sam strolls back into the kitchen casually, and pops his head into the refrigerator again. I guess he was so distracted before that he didn't find what he was looking for. Finally, he emerges with a bottle of Blue Moon in his hand. This gives me an idea. I grab an orange out of the bottom drawer in the refrigerator.  I throw it up into the air and catch it, while smiling playfully at him.

"Orange?" I ask, while leaning back against the counter, cradling the orange as if it were a prize.

A smile creeps on his face as he nods. I watch him sit down on the bar stool, making sure his eyes are locked on me, before I turn around. I reach up into the cabinet to grab the knife and cutting board. I am exaggerating my reach on purpose, making sure the flaps on my shirt are opening just enough for him to get a glimpse.

After a few minutes, Kyle comes over and gently shoves me aside. "For crying out loud, Laila. Get a chair or ask for help." He reaches up into the cabinet, and easily retrieves the knife and cutting board for me. He sets them down before heading toward the back door.

"I'm going to run up to the driving range to see if I left my phone there. I'll be back. If anyone calls the home phone, just let them know I can't find my cell.  Just give them your number, okay lil sis?" On his way out, he picks up my cell phone and stuffs it into his pocket.

"Eye-eye, captain." I salute him. I consider bitching about him taking my phone without asking, but decide to let it go.  I'm not really expecting any calls, and I'm not going anywhere tonight anyway. I wonder if he is expecting a call from that girl, Georgia. He must be expecting a call from
somebody,
because I've
never
seen him so worked up about something so stupid as misplacing his phone.

"Are you staying behind?" Kyle asks Sam, before shutting the door completely.

"Yeah. I just opened a beer." He holds it up in the air to show Kyle. "I might as well finish it while it's still cold." Sam sounds indifferent, as if the only reason he isn't going with Kyle is because of the beer.

Yeah, right
. I swear that the second the front door closes, Sam jumps out of his chair. I still have my back turned to him, as I cut the orange into tiny wedges.  I can feel his body inching closer. He wraps his left arm around my waist, spreading his hand across my belly, and pulls me back against his chest. He runs his other hand up my bare arm slowly, making me shiver.

"Cold?" he asks, while burying his nose against my neck. I just shake my head. Apparently, my voice doesn't work when he is this close to me. "Don't mind me. I'm just waiting for my orange," he says with feigned innocence, while kissing my neck.

He is making it increasingly difficult to cut the last couple of pieces. I somehow manage to slice them all without cutting any fingers off. Although, I’m convinced I wouldn't feel any pain even if I did. Sam's like my very own anesthesia. His lips make my whole body tingle, while my head floats away into a lovely fog.

I turn around to face him, holding an orange slice gingerly in my hand. "Where is your beer?" I ask.

"What beer?" he asks in a joking way.

I gently push him back against the counter, and reach into the freezer to get a frosted pint glass out. I squeeze the orange and drop it inside. Sam watches me as I reach around him to snatch his beer off the counter.  I pour it into the frosted cup, the same way I've seen my dad do it a million times.

"Here you go. Orange slice and all." I hand him the glass, but he just sets it on the counter, as if it is the most insignificant thing in the world.

"I thought you stayed behind just so you could drink your beer. You know, so it doesn't get
warm?
" I say playfully, while folding my arms across my chest.

"I can assure you, my conspiracy was
not
about getting my
beer
alone in this house." His arms are wrapped around my waist again. He keeps slipping his thumb inside the slit of my shirt, and is running the pad of it across my bare skin on my lower back. It is driving me absolutely crazy.

I almost didn't catch what he had said. "Conspiracy?" I ask, my voice cracking a little.

Sam shakes his head, and chuckles in that
I know, but I'm not sure if I'm going to tell you because it is so much more fun to hold it over your head
kind of way. I tighten my grip on my arms, and hold them firmly in place across my chest, in order to keep him from getting any closer.

"
Fine
. You win," he says in a defeated tone. He takes his phone out of his pocket and starts waving it in front of me.

"Is this some sort of Morse Code, where if you wave your phone around in a certain way, it's supposed to communicate some sort of
top secret
message?" I ask sarcastically.

When I look a little closer, I notice the outside of the hard-shell case has a St. Louis Cardinals baseball logo on it.
It is the exact same kind of case that Kyle has on his phone.

"Wait a second." I snatch the phone out of his hand. "You hid my brother's phone just so you could be alone with me for a little bit?"

"I know. It's
genius
, right?" He has a smug look on his face and is beaming with pride. "And it won't be just a little bit. It takes
exactly
twenty-five minutes to get to the range, and then another five minutes to the course. Even if he spends no time
at all
looking for it, he will not be back for
at least
another
fifty-five
minutes." He wiggles his eyes suggestively, as he unwraps my arms from across my chest, and pulls me closer to him. "I can think of a lot of things we can do in fifty-five minutes."

I roll my eyes. "Yeah, I
bet
you can." My tone may be sarcastic, but I can't help but smile, knowing that he devised this whole plan just to be alone with me. He isn't even thinking about the fact that they are probably going to be late for their party now.

"How do you know I'll be here for the next fifty-five minutes?" I ask in a teasing way.

"I don't, but I'll take what I can get. Plus, he took your cell phone. Aren't you going to need that tonight?"

I laugh at him and nod. I certainly would, if I were actually going somewhere. "You
do
know that my brother is going to kill you when he finds out you did this, don't you?"

He has a devious little smile on his face that sends chills down my arms. "Why would he kill
moi
when the silly phone was buried in the couch cushions?" Sam grabs the phone back from me. "I think he really needs to get his eyes checked because it was right here, the whole time."

He clicks the switch on the side of the phone, to turn the ringer back on. That's when I realize he had slipped away, right about the same time that Kyle was calling himself on my cell phone.
How very sneaky of him
.

"You must have been shaking in your boots when Kyle called his phone.”

"Yeah, I had to adjust, but when you're
badass
like me, you think pretty quick on your feet. I slipped into the bathroom and turned the ringer off, just in time. I
swear
the
damned
thing buzzed right after I flicked the switch." He pauses for a moment. "It really was a pretty simple plan, though," he says with a satisfied smile on his face.

I laugh to myself because he sounds like the bad guys at the end of an episode of
Scooby Doo. 
They would explain how they
almost
got away with their evil plot, had Scooby and the gang not ruined everything.

"We should probably call him, to let him know we
found
his phone . . . in the couch cushions,” I add sarcastically.  “I would feel bad if he spent the whole night looking for it."

"You're probably right. I didn't expect him to get so upset about losing his
stupid
phone in the first place. I guess he's got it pretty bad for Georgia."

"Yeah, it sounds like he kind of does."

"Hey, can we let him sweat it out just a
little
longer?" he asks.

I am still staring at him, the way a scolding parent would.

"
Please?
" he whines. "I
finally
have you all to myself. Plus, he's probably almost to the range by now. I'll call in about ten minutes, okay?"

I nod reluctantly. I must admit that he's pretty cute when he begs. "Okay fine, but you just assumed that I'd want to make out with you the whole time while he is gone?" I walk back into the family room with my full, unopened drink. I eye my other drink that is probably warm by now.  I'm not even sure I want anything to drink tonight.

An old re-run of
The Facts of Life
is on now. This must be some sort of ’80s sitcom marathon. Sam doesn't follow me at first.  This makes me a little nervous because I was only teasing him.
What if he thinks I am seriously pissed at him?

He takes his time, but he does eventually make his way back into the family room, now carrying his beer. He looks nervous. An uneasy feeling settles into my stomach. I am unsure what to do. I could just tell him I was only joking, but for some reason I don't. I just sit there, completely frozen, as I wait for him to say or do something.

"I went ahead and called Kyle. He was pretty relieved. He wanted to know if Georgia had called." He looks down at the phone. "She called
twice
. I don't really know what's going on between the two of them, but it's definitely
something
."

He is keeping his distance from me, and his voice is a little shaky. This is a completely different side to Sam that I've never seen. His eyes are so big and hopeful that if they could speak, I'm pretty sure they would be apologizing right now.

There is a long, awkward silence before he says anything else. "Look, I didn't expect . . . I mean I don't think you are just going to . . . ." He sighs and blinks hard. "I'm sorry if I gave you the wrong idea. I really
do
just want to spend time with you. We don't have to even make out, if you don't want to. I just want you close to me, Laila."

I smile to let him know that I'm not holding any grudges. "Well, then you better get over here because according to your calculations, he's going to be home in less than twenty-five minutes," I say, pretending to examine the non-existent watch on my wrist.