Page 47 of The Arrogant One

My favorite is the flavor that I smell on you.

Sadie

How do you make everything sound so perfect?

Me

I’m just being honest.

Sadie

So, you don’t have a favorite, and you don’t like lemon. Does that mean if I brought pineapple cupcakes, you’d eat them?

Me

The fuck?

Sadie

Ha!

Me

Is that your favorite?

Sadie

I’m a chocolate girlie, but I’m really open to everything. I wouldn’t turn down a pineapple cupcake. I’d taste it. I’d taste anything.

Me

Then bring me what you want to taste, and you can lick it off me.

I held my phone in my hand, staring at Sadie’s texts, my thumbs hovering over the screen. I never invited women to my house. The last thing I needed was every one-night stand knowing where I lived and how to get through my gate.

I didn’t enjoy chaos, and that would be a direct invitation.

But when it came to her, things had been different from the start. I didn’t know why, I didn’t know how. I just knew I wanted more.

I typed my address and hit Send, hoping tonight was only the beginning of that.

The beginning of us getting to know each other more.

The beginning of us starting something more.

And the beginning of us exploring each other’s body even more.

Within a few seconds, her response came in.

Sadie

Ohhh, you live in the Hills. Fancy. See you soon.

With Beck’s name on the screen, I held the phone to my ear and said, “I have about ten minutes to talk,” as I answered his call. “You good, brother?”

“I’m sitting on our team’s plane, waiting to take off.”

I skipped the dramatics of making an old-fashioned andpoured myself a scotch, holding the tumbler not far from my mouth as I sat in my living room. “I would have thought you’d already be in New York for tomorrow’s game.”