Seducing My Best Friend (Fated #3) (6 page)

He was looking out the front window, but hadn’t started
the car.

“I guess it was good weird,” I said softly.

“Better than good,” he said, turning to look at
me. “Don’t you think?”

I nodded.

“So how about I won’t be weird if you won’t be
weird?”

“Does that work any better than I won’t think
dirty thoughts if you won’t?”

A mischievous glint flashed in his eyes as he
started the car. “Were you thinking saucy thoughts about me while you were
working?”

“Maybe,” I said, looking out the window.

“Tell me something you were thinking about,” he
said, pulling out onto the road.

I shook my head.

“Oh come on,” he said. “Prove you’re not an
unimaginative prude.”

My jaw dropped. “I am not a prude.”

He leaned on his console and fixed his eyes on me.
“Go ahead. Try and shock me. I dare you.”

“No,” I said. “I don’t want to play this game.”

“That’s a shame,” he said, stopping at a red light.
“I think you would’ve really liked to hear what I was thinking about you.”

I swallowed.

“But if you don’t want to know then-”

“No,” I lied. “I don’t.”

He shook his head. “I guess I’ll just have to show
you then.”

Was he crazy? I couldn’t talk like this with him.
He was my friend. It was too awkward, too embarrassing, especially since I had
no idea where his boundaries were.  

I rested my elbow on the center console. “Well,
you better show me that ice cream place first cause I’m getting hangry.”

“Hangry?”

“Yeah, hungry and angry. Hangry. Like Brad and
Angelina. Brangelina."

“Oh,” he said, his brows coming together. “I think
I get that sometimes.”

“You 
think
?”

"I bet the Brangelina's don't get
hangry."

"Probably not. What do they have to be hungry
or angry about?"

“Say no more,” he said, laying his foot on the
gas. “You’ll need energy for what I have in mind anyway.”

I rolled my eyes. “Have you always been this
filthy or are you turning it up a notch now that I let you have your way with
me?”

“I think I’ve always been bad, but being with you certainly
hasn’t mitigated anything.”

I shook my head and smiled out the window. If a
guy as hot as Aiden hit on me in real life, I wouldn’t even be able to make
conversation. Then again, this wasn’t my real life. I didn’t know what it was.
“So where are we headed?”

“I was thinking The Gelateria,” he said.

“But we’ve been there a thousand times.”

“For good reason.”

“You don’t want to try something new?”

“Nope.”

I leaned my head against the seat.

“I’m hankering for their double chocolate. I need
something slightly bitter after all the sweetness I had on Saturday night.”

I felt my cheeks go rosy. “Give it a rest,
loverboy.”

“Careful now, I could get used to that.”

He parked the car at a meter and had already put
some coins in by the time I joined him on the sidewalk.

“What flavor are you going to get?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I said, walking through the ice cream shop’s open
door. “I’m thinking either stracciatella or pistachio, but I’m feeling a bit
torn.”

“Get both.”

“No. That’s madness, and you know it. Neither of those flavors
can share the spotlight.”

“What did you get last time?”

“Lemon.”

He grimaced. “That doesn’t really help.”

I pursed my lips. I rarely made a bad choice, but there was
nothing as dissatisfying as ordering the wrong flavor and wishing it were
something else.

“The stracciatella will probably taste better mixed with my
chocolate.”

“Why would it be mixed with- oh- I see what you did there.”

He smiled, obviously pleased with himself.

“For your information, I won’t be sharing my ice cream with you in
any way so you have nothing to worry about.”

“As if you’ll be able to help yourself.”

We ordered our ice cream and carried our cones to the little
patio out front, taking seats across from each other on the little metal
chairs.

“So, now that you’re not hangry anymore,” Aiden said. “I have
something I need to ask you.”

“Shoot,” I said, crunching a piece of dark chocolate.

“I was wondering if you would be my date for Claire’s wedding?”

I stopped licking my cone. “Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure,” he said, taking a large bite out of the
side of his chocolate ice cream. “And if it makes you feel better, it was
actually her idea.”

“What?”

“Don’t get me wrong, I wish I thought of it myself, but she realized
I didn’t have a date before I did. Anyway, she said she’d love you to come.”

“Wow.”

“In fact, she said you were the only woman in my life that she
actually likes.”

I laughed.

“And she seemed to think I’d behave better if you were there.”

“I don’t know about that.”

“So will you come?”

I filled my mouth with ice cream to buy myself time.

“It would mean a lot to me,” he said.

I would never turn him down, but I relished the semblance of
control that being hesitant seemed to give me.

“Well?”

While the pathetic little girl in me did a cartwheel, I
shrugged. “Sure. If it means that much to you.”

“Thanks, Lucy. It does.”

I licked around the base of my cone and got the weird inkling
that Aiden was transfixed by it. “What?”

“Nothing.”

I lowered my cone and looked around. Everyone else was minding
their own business from the people in suits having ice cream cones as their one
reward all day to the kids hanging out with their skateboards, staring at their
phones while they ate in silence.

“Can I ask you something?” I asked.

“Of course,” Aiden said, sitting up straight with chocolate
lips.

“As a friend.”

“Sure.”

“And I want you to be honest with me, no matter what.”

“Always.”

I sighed. “I’m not some kind of rebound for you, am I?”

“What?”

I shrugged. “I don’t mean to be lame, but the thought crossed my
mind and-”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“No it’s not. It’s a real thing, and I don’t know if you’ve
thought about it, but I just wanted to know if you’re just- I don’t want to say
using me but-”

“That’s a really fucked up thing to ask me, Lucy.”

“I think it’s a fair question.”

“I don’t. Not at all.”

“I’m not trying to offend you or anything. I’m just trying to
figure out if this thing or- that thing we did on Saturday- if that was all just
for fun or if it was-”

“More?”

I nodded.

Aiden sighed. “Have I done anything to make you think it’s not?”

I pursed my lips. “No, but-”

“Lucy, I care about you. I always have. You know that.”

“Of course I know that, but you haven’t always cared about me
the way you-” I swallowed. “Cared about me on Saturday.”

“I know,” he said, licking his lips so the chocolate
disappeared. “But that doesn’t mean my feelings aren’t genuine.”

I took a deep breath.

“I like you a lot,” he said. “And I’m attracted to you.”

I pursed my lips.

“And I’m not done trying to convince you that we’ve got
something here, something we’ve been sitting on for too long.”

“I guess I just want to know why now? After all this time?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. But isn’t it better late than
never?”

“Maybe,” I said. “I just don’t want to lose you as a friend.”

“Don’t look at it as losing a friend,” he said, leaning back in
his chair. “Look at it as gaining a skilled lover.”

I rolled my eyes.

He leaned across the table and lowered his voice. “You do want
to have another night like that, right? Please tell me I’m not sitting here
making a total ass of myself.”

I smiled. “You’re not.”

“Thank god,” he said. “Cause I really need more of that side of
you in my life.”

“Well, if you play your cards right, maybe that can be
arranged.”

“Good,” he said. “I would be devastated if we couldn’t do that
again.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah, Luce. I don’t think you get what you do to me.”

“No,” I said. “I guess I don’t.”

“Well, I’m going to show you as many times as you’ll let me,” he
said. “And don’t even get me started on what I’m going to do to you.”

She couldn’t even look at me.

I hated to make her squirm, but I kinda loved it, too. She
always acted so tough, so controlled. It was fun to see her lose it, and the
shade of pink her cheeks turned filled my mind with all kinds of inappropriate
thoughts.

“You okay?” I asked.

She was entirely focused on her ice cream. “Fine.”

“Does it bother you when I say stuff like that?”

She pushed a piece of hair out of her face. “I wouldn’t say it
bothers me.”

“What would you say?”

She shrugged. “I’m just not used to it. I mean, I suspected you
were a bit full on, being such a conceited jock and all, but-”

“Hey!” I said. “I am not conceited.”

“Maybe that’s not the right word.”

“Cocky, perhaps, but not conceited."

She sighed, getting the joke.

I furrowed my brows. “Sorry. Please continue.”

“It’s just that you just come on all strong with your muscles
and your hair and your eyes and your dimple-”

I smiled and shook my head to the side, as if I had the kind of
flowy hair that could be whipped.

She rolled her eyes. “And then you say all these sexually suggestive
comments and-”

“And what?”

“I’m not used to it.”

“You better get used to it,” I said. “Besides, surely other guys
come on strong when they like you.”

“I guess, but even then I have a hard time taking them
seriously.”

“So how long does it usually take then? For you to take a guy seriously?”

“When he says he likes me?”

I nodded.

“I don’t know yet.”

“What do you mean you don’t know yet?”

“I mean, I don’t think most guys really know what they want so
their flattery doesn’t usually hold much weight with me.”

“I thought everybody knew what guys wanted.”

“Exactly,” she said, taking a bite of her waffle cone. “But most
guys pretend they want more.”

“Whoa whoa whoa.” I raised my hand. “I had no idea you were such
an expert. Please enlighten me.”

“What do you want to know?”

“What is it that guys pretend they want?”

She pursed her lips. “Well, I guess a lot of them- or at least
the ones I’ve met recently- pretend they want someone to snuggle and play house
with, someone they can commit to and build a future with.”

I nodded slowly. “Okay, and what is it that they actually want?”

She looked around and then fixed her eyes on me. “Blow jobs.”

Her comment took me by surprise so much that I almost choked on
my ice cream. When I finally stopped coughing, my eyes were watering, and I
wiped them with the back of my hand. “I see.”

Lucy cocked her head. “Do you disagree?”

I parted my lips to speak-

“You don’t have to answer that. I already know where you stand
on this.”

I raised my eyebrows. “What?! What are you talking about? Where
do I stand?”

She broke a bite off her cone and covered her mouth while she
spoke. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but a woman’s ability to give a good blow job
has probably been your number one dating criteria for the last- I don’t know-
five years? Maybe longer?”

I shook my head. “That is not true.”

She squinted at me. “No?”

I clenched my jaw.

“What else are you looking for then?”

“Someone I can have an intelligent conversation with, someone
who makes me laugh.”

“But you’d settle for someone who gave good blow jobs.”

“No I wouldn’t.”

“So if we continued doing whatever this is-” she pointed back
and forth between us. “But I couldn’t give a blow job to save my life-”

“Anyone could give a blowjob to save their life. Haven’t you
seen those prison documentaries?”

She rolled her eyes. “Seriously, Aiden, maybe I really suck at
giving blow jobs?”

“I hope you do and hard while you’re at it.”

“Come on, I’m trying to have a serious conversation about blow
jobs here.”

“And I’m seriously interested.”

“I guess I just don’t really understand what you see in me when
your last few girlfriends were complete twigs who ate nothing but dick.”

“Wow. You liked ‘em all that much, huh?”

She shrugged. “I mean, they weren’t that bad. I don’t mean to be
unfair. I’m sure they had nice qualities that I failed to recognize, but I
don’t have anything in common with any of them.”

“That’s what I like best about you.”

“The fact that I’m soft all over and won’t suck your dick just
to get access to your credit card?”

“No.”

“What is it then?”

I looked around and leaned forward. “The fact that you’re sexy
as hell and will suck my dick anyway.”

She gasped. “That’s very presumptuous of you.”

I shrugged. “Don’t get me wrong. I don’t want you to do anything
until you’re ready, but I saw your face on Saturday night. It’s only a matter
of time.”

She turned red again and tried to make a face like she was
pouting, but her guilty smile still shone through. “You’ve basically just
proved my point.”

“What point?”

“That that’s all you or any guy is after.”

“I have to disagree with you there. What were the other things
most guys pretend to want?”

“Snuggling, commitment, a future together.”

“Can I be perfectly honest with you?” I asked.

“If you must.”

“I’m not going to pretend that there aren’t things higher on my
list than snuggling.”

“Obviously.”

“But as far as being committed to you and hoping you’ll be a
part of my future, I’m way past wanting those things. If anything, I’d say you
can basically take those things for granted.”

She popped the bottom of her cone in her mouth and crossed her
arms while she chewed.

I rolled my eyes up to the sky but The Gelateria’s awning got in
the way. “In fact, besides my family, there’s no one I’m more committed or tied
to than you.”

She swallowed her last bite and grabbed a paper napkin out of
the dispenser on the table. “I guess we do go way back.”

“Way back,” I said.

“And you think seeing each other like we did on Saturday is
worth risking everything we’ve had up to now?”

I shrugged. “I think it’s too late.”

“And if it weren’t?”

“Wouldn’t you always wonder?”

She rubbed the back of her neck.

“I don’t know about you, but I always wondered what it would be
like to hook up. Ya know, in the back of my mind. Didn’t you?”

“I suppose so.”

I nodded. “Glad you chose the stracciatella?”

“Yeah.”

I smiled. “Want to swing by my place for dessert?”

“What time is it?” she asked, pulling out her phone. Her face
dropped. “I can’t.”

“Why?”

“I promised Fiona I would do her hair for her date tonight.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Isn’t she a stylist? Can’t she do her own hair?”

Lucy shook her head. “Not really. It’s like how dentists don’t
clean their own teeth, ya know?”

I stood up and pushed my chair in. “I guess. Who’s she going out
with?”

“Peter, the children’s hospital guy.”

“Damn. So he’s a keeper?”

“Yeah. Or at least he’s her first Tinder match who isn’t a total
douche bag.”

I sighed.

“Rain check?”

“Sure,” I said, walking over to open the car door for her while
she threw her napkins in the trash.

“You don’t have to open the door for me.”

“And you don’t have to make me so damn hard, but you do anyway.”

“Jesus,” she said, rolling her eyes and taking a seat in the
car.

“Hey,” I said, turning to her when I got in beside her. “Maybe
you could do Claire’s hair for her wedding seeing as how you’re in such high
demand.”

Lucy’s eyes grew wide. “I’m so sorry. I should’ve offered. I
just figured she already had somebody picked out and Nancy approved.”

“If she doesn’t, would you do it?”

“Of course,” she said. “Please tell her I would be happy to, and
not that it matters, but it would save her some money.”

I started the car. “I’m sure she would pay you.”

“Absolutely not. She can pay me in free drinks afterwards.”

“That can definitely be arranged.”

Lucy was quiet on the way home, but warm, too, much like the
summer evening.

I pulled in across from her building. “Shame you don’t have more
time.”

“Next time we’ll skip the ice cream,” she said, batting her
eyelashes.

I reached across the console and rested my palm against her
cheek. “Deal,” I said, leaning in and pressing my lips to hers. I kissed her
softly, letting my sugar coated tongue drift into her mouth for a taste of her
that could hold me over till next time.

When I finally pulled back, her eyes were shiny and she bit her
lip. “Maybe I should forget about Fiona.”

“Oh no you don’t,” I said. “I’ll never hear the end of it.”

She smiled. “Thanks.”

I reached into the backseat. “And don’t forget your flowers.”

She put her hands around the plastic covered bouquet and got out
of the car. Then she waved at me with her fingers as she crossed the street, still
smiling as she looked away.

And I couldn’t believe it.

I hadn’t even gotten lucky, and I still felt like the luckiest
guy in the world.