Page 65 of Drive

“Yes,” I said, grabbing his balls. “You get that in my mouth, I take this off.”

He dropped the soap, grabbed my hand, and slid it up and around his ready dick. “How about we work on gettingthisin your mouth?”

“Nope, sorry.”

“If you’re not any good at it, I understand,” he chided with a shrug.

“How about you kiss my ass? Blowjobs are a privilege you have toearn. These lips are pure gold, baby. Completely innocent. I’m saving that act for a worthy man.”

“Oh, shit,” he said with a sly grin, “challenge accepted.”

“Don’t get your hopes ups. My high school boyfriend still has blue balls.”

“Really?” Reid said as he brushed my lips with his fingers. “And your virginity wasn’t sacred?”

I sighed. “It was supposed to be. Gave it to the wrong guy. I know that’s a shitty second, but it’s all I have.”

“Damn, this is going to make me a pervert. Now it’ll be all I think about.”

“It’s not that big of a deal,” I said as he lathered me up from my toes then turned his back after he handed me the washcloth.

“The hell it’s not,” he said with sincerity that had me laughing. “I’m taking this very seriously, Estella Rosa Maria Emerson.”

“Well, calling me by my full name is definitelynotgoing to get you there. My mother did it daily to remind me how serious she was. And now I can’t even look at you naked,” I said, shielding my face from him. “It’s echoing in my head like a broken record now.Great.”

Reid chuckled and leaned into the shitty excuse for a showerhead, his lips on my ear, and rubbed himself across my back as he slid his hand down my stomach. I lost my breath. My heart pounded as he reminded me exactly who I was in the shower with. “Reid,” I said breathlessly as I leaned into his seductive touch.

“Yeah?”

“Reid,” I gasped.

“What, Stella?” he whispered as his middle finger danced along my clit before he dipped it low.

“She’s going to forgive us, right?” He pulled away from me and I turned to face him.

He looked gorgeous, his dark hair pushed back from his face, soaked and inked, his defined muscles shedding water. “I don’t know.”

“Sorry, I . . . sorry,” I said, my eyes watering. “But what if she doesn’t forgive you?”

He pressed me into the stall, his hands at work, and doing their job well. “You can keep asking, Stella, but I don’t know the answer.”

“Fine. I’m sorry. I’ll shut up.”

“’Bout time,” he said as he cut off my retort with his hungry tongue.

CHAPTER TWENTY

“Down with the Sickness”

Disturbed

Addiction sneaks up on you. It’s a subtle thing. You get a taste, you revel in the buzz, and then you begin to crave another hit. You know the high is temporary, but the craving is a bitch.

And I was beginning to crave Reid Crowne.

He was the perfect drug. And I never knew when the next hit was coming. Curled up on the shitty red couch in The Garage, I watched him with growing thirst. And it wasn’t just Reid, though he was enough. It was the need for his music. I’d never been so close to the process, and it was fascinating to watch. The birth of a new song, of something different and distinctly the Dead Sergeants. Sometimes they just jammed until they recognized a niche. And though some of the time they acted like clowns—especially Ben and Rye, who seemed to have a bad case of the stooges—they took their music seriously. And when it worked, my scalp prickled with awareness, my arms filled with goose bumps.

I knew, without a doubt, the band had a huge future, and I could feel it happening between them. Reid only reacted to Ben when he played. He would glance up at him when prompted but mostly just lost himself, and I loved it. After a few hours in the overheated shit hole they rented, the shirts came off. Reid tucked his in the back pocket of his jeans as he beat his drums mercilessly. I couldn’t help but to get a little bothered by the display of hungry, raw men in front of me.