Page 55 of A Wreck, You Make Me (Bad Boys of Bardstown #3)

This is also something he knows because he always asks.

If some guy bothered me or said something to me.

And I always tell him I’m fine. That I’m having fun.

I don’t have very many friends because I’m not really good at making them—Callie and our girl gang is an exception—but the more I go to school, the more excited I get.

I don’t know what my future holds or if I want to be a professional dancer or not but for once, I want to live in the moment and not worry about anything else.

“Any reporters fucking with you?” he asks then.

At this, I shake my head too. “No.”

“Not after the last guy.”

“No one.”

So apparently, there’s a thing called Redhead Watch on one of the sports’ websites.

The first one that broke the news of Thornes’ stepsisters.

They keep posting my photos for some reason.

Coming and going out of school, my job, around town.

I don’t even know why. But thankfully Snow isn’t in any of those photos but it’s enraging enough that the team is planning to sue the website for invading my privacy.

On Shepard’s insistence. Because he absolutely fucking hates it.

Hates. That people are posting my photos everywhere and that my privacy is being invaded.

As much as I hate taking further financial and legal help from the Thornes—although the team is footing the bill—I think it’s a good idea.

Because it’s creepy and scary. It makes me afraid of what they might find if they keep up this obsession with me.

And if what they find can hurt him and his career.

Speaking of, I ask, “Are you… feeling okay? About the season, I mean.”

Ever since Stellan and Isadora’s engagement, the articles about their supposed love triangle have grown.

And thereby speculations about his performance and the upcoming season.

I’ve tried to cheer him up as much as I can, but I really don’t know how he’s doing.

I don’t know how his game is going or where his head is at.

And I wish he would just tell me. So I could help.

“If I said no, would you give me what I want to make me feel better?”

My heart starts racing and I open my mouth to say something, anything. I don’t know what and I don’t get to find out when he says, “You don’t need that.”

“What?”

He jerks his chin toward my hand. “That.”

I glance down and see I still have the lipstick tube clutched in my hand. “Lipstick?”

“Yeah.”

I blink, confused. “Um, I don’t?—”

“You do it to hide your freckles, yeah?”?

I suck in my belly. “How do you know that?”

“Because you were talking about it with the girls a couple of days ago,” he says. “Actually, the precise term was your ‘stupid freckles.’”

A couple of nights ago, Tempest, Callie and Meadow had come over for a visit.

We already knew about the party, so we were discussing clothes, make-up tips and all the girly stuff that we usually do, and drinking pina coladas that I’d made at the dining table.

I was telling them about my trick with the red lipstick.

Although they all said I don’t need to hide my freckles at all because they’re pretty.

At which point, I remembered that he had said something similar—actually, he’d said he was going to count all my freckles—but I shut that down and moved on.

“You heard that?” I ask. “But you were with the boys.”

And Snow. Because somehow Snow has taken to all the Thorne men and their friends.

I guess all she needed was a safe space to get out of her shell, and I’m so happy that she has that now.

That night, she was with them—Ledger, Reed and Riot, because they generally go where their other halves go—and of course him, playing that video game she likes.

And from what I could hear she was winning, and I don’t think it was only because they were letting her.

She’s become quite good over the past week.

Snow , I tell myself. Remember her? She’s your sister. She’s a part of this family now. She loves them. She loves him . You can’t do anything to jeopardize that. You can’t bring your feelings into the mix and complicate things. You have to do the right thing.

“I did,” he rasps, breaking my thoughts.

“How?”

“Because I always hear you.” Then, “I always smell you too.”

“Because you steal my perfume.”

“Guilty,” he says without any guilt whatsoever and it makes my heart race.

Licking my lips, which causes his jaw to clench, I say, “It’s just… They’re countless and I just?—”

“Of course they’re countless,” he says. “Like the stars in the sky.”

“I—”

“But that’s not the point,” he cuts me off.

I shift on my feet, my cheeks blushing and blushing. “What’s the point?”

“The point is,” he says, his eyes flicking down to my mouth for a second, “you don’t want to make your mouth even more irresistible and juicy than it already is.”

“What?”

He glances down at my mouth again and I have to part it. Not to draw attention to it, but because I need to breathe. And when he’s looking at me like that, like he’s so hungry, I can’t get enough air in.

“It does a shit job of hiding anything on your face,” he says after a while, looking up, his eyes burning.

“Your freckles still sparkle like a sprinkle of cinnamon on my favorite coffee. But it makes things worse for your mouth. I already fight a hard-on, a fight that I lose, by the way, every time I see your strawberry lips. So trust me when I say, you don’t wanna paint them red and put ideas into my head as to which part of my body I’d like that lipstick to end up on. ”

My eyes are wide. “W-which part?”

He watches me for a beat, a slight hint of amusement passing over his features. “It starts with a D and ends with a K.”

I blink and keep blinking, confused.

And his amusement only rises to the point where his lips twitch and he helps me out.

“It’s a four-letter word, baby. It has a tendency to get hard when turned on.

People are obsessed with its size and say the bigger the better.

Mine is always hard around you, and it’s pretty much the biggest you’ll ever come across. ”

By the time he finishes giving me all the hints, I’m blushing.

Although I’m not sure which is the bigger factor here, all the facts that he listed about his dick or that he just called me baby.

After days and days of not calling me anything.

After calling me Jupiter that night when he never calls me that.

Or the fact that he just implied he’d want my lipstick on his hard and big dick.

I still lift my chin and glare at him. “Thank you for explaining it to me. But it’s your fault I didn’t get it in the first place.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes. If you hadn’t barged in here while I’m changing, my mind wouldn’t be mush.”

His lips twitch again, and he throws a casual, cocky shrug. “Your mind is pretty much mush as soon as I enter the picture.”

I breathe out sharply, even though he’s right. “And you’re pretty confident about the size of your…” I wave my hand in the general area of where his dick is.

That makes him chuckle. “Only because it’s a fact.”

I keep glaring at him and he keeps staring back at me with a very slight smirk. I feel like I’ll come out of my skin and he looks cool as cucumber. I press my hand back on the tiled wall to cool myself down and he leans back against the door, as if he’s enjoying this.

Then, swallowing, “Shepard?”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t think we should talk about this,” I say with as much gravity as I can.

“No?”

“No.”

He loses his amusement a bit. “Because you want a fresh start.”

“Yeah.”

“And you don’t want any more secrets and lying.”

“No.”

“And because you want to focus on your sister and give her a stable home.”

I swallow thickly. “Yes.”

Although I’ve been thinking about it. Especially ever since the night he didn’t come home or rather came home very late.

I heard the door open and sprung out of my bed, ready to go to him.

But then stopped myself. Because what if me going to him made things worse?

He pretty much told me—has told me multiple times—what he wanted from me and I told him I couldn’t.

So there wasn’t really any point in going there and potentially agitating him further?

But there has to be a way, right? That I could do both. Protect this new fragile family I’ve built, not stress Snow out and also be with him.

“All noble causes,” he murmurs.

“I’m—”

“ Good causes,” he keeps going. “But then again, you’re such a good girl, aren’t you?”

Holy shit. He should not have said that. He should not have called me a good girl because it’s like a flip has been switched. My heart is racing. My palms are sweating. And it’s hard to stand up straight.

In a flash, he’s across the space and on me. Not that this space was very large to begin with. But still, it takes my breath away that he moves so fast. He moves like an animal, a predator with sharp teeth pouncing, and suddenly his fingers are around my neck.

Like they used to be. Before .

And then I have no chance of an escape because it’s an even bigger trigger.

I instantly go both alert and soft. My back arches.

My pussy clenches and I gasp both with the threat of his touch and anticipation of what he’ll do with it.

Before I can speak, he goes, “But I can turn you into a bad girl, if I want, can’t I? ”

I nod, or try to, but he doesn’t let up his grip. “Y-yes.”

“Yeah, I can.” Satisfaction flickers through his features. “I can turn you from my sweet Little Strawberry to my good Little Whore.”

I jerk, my muscles spasming. God, it’s been so long.

So, so long since he called me that. Since I’ve felt this.

This deep sense of belonging, surrender.

This deep, deep sense of rightness. That he’ll take care of me no matter what.

It’s been so long since I’ve felt safe all because he chose to wrap his fingers around my neck and give me a choking necklace.