“So what do you want from me?” she asked quietly, as Will pulled into a parking spot in the middle of tourist central.

He turned off the ignition and faced her, one arm draped over the wheel in a way that was so intensely male that she wanted to take the tiniest nibble out of his bicep.

“I want you to ask me again.”

She didn’t pretend to play dumb. “But you already said yes the other night.”

“Only because I was hard and could see your nipples through that slutty top you were wearing. Ask me again. And I’ll say yes again. But you have to ask while sober. Maybe even begging a little.”

She held his gaze. “You’re playing games with me.”

Will gave her a faint smile. “Sweetie, isn’t that the entire point? To make a big game out of your ‘vacation’ before you go back to real life?”

There it was again. That raw, honest look on his face that was completely unlike the Will Thatcher she’d come to know and hate over the years. He was intentionally messing with her head. He had to be.

And yet…

“William Gregory Thatcher. Will you have a fling with me?”

His tiny smile turned into a full grin and her entire stomach flipped over. Oh dear.

And then he was out of the car before she had a chance to register why something so simple as a smile made her swoon.

“Hey!” she called, scrambling to unbuckle her seat belt. “You said you’d say yes!”

“And I probably will,” he said, putting on his sunglasses and taking in the crowded scene as though he didn’t have a care in the world. “But first you must be tested.”

Brynn resisted the urge to slam her forehead on the hood of the car. “Tested how? We’re in the middle of Seattle Center. What do you want me to do, run through the fountain naked?”

Will gave a mock shudder. “Ain’t nobody wanna see that. And besides, your tattoo can’t get wet yet. No, I’m thinking more…science center.”

It took several seconds to register. “You want to take me to the science center? As in the Pacific Science Center? As in school field trip, nerdy grade school nirvana?”

“Yup.” He was already heading that way.

“But Will,” she said, scampering after him in her high heels. “I’m supposed to be living on the edge. This is even more mundane than my regular life.”

He stopped so suddenly she would have skidded past him had he not grabbed her hand. Brynn assumed he was steadying her, but he kept pulling her closer. Then closer still. Until they were standing chest to chest, hip to hip in the middle of a crowded courtyard.

“Does this feel mundane?” he asked, tilting his hips forward slightly.

“Will!” she hissed at the contact with his erection. “You’re…”

He shifted his hips again to confirm it. “Yup.”

“There are children around.”

“Somehow I don’t think two adults dry-humping is going to outrank cotton candy with the six-year-old set.”

“We are not dry-humping,” Brynn said, her hands going to his chest to push him away. Except she didn’t. Okay, maybe they were kind of dry humping.

He carefully scanned the crowd for gawkers before slowly lowering his head as though to kiss her cheek and then missing, and landing behind her ear, where there were about a thousand nerve endings.

“Is that a yes to the fling?” she asked, hoping he didn’t notice her slightly breathless voice as his tongue flicked across her earlobe.

Will pulled back almost as quickly as he’d moved in. “Mmmm, too soon to tell. I’ll have to see how you perform in the bubble race.”

Brynn stared in exasperation at his back as he strolled toward the admissions gate of the center as though they hadn’t just necked in public.

She chewed her lip.

She hadn’t been lying about it being field trip heaven in there. Every school in the area made an annual trek there. Including hers. And every damn year, her class had been instructed to pick a partner to stick with for the day. But there was always an odd number. And Brynn had always ended up with one of the chaperones.

Which had been fine, really. Because at least the chaperones hadn’t called her names and hidden her lunch box.

“Come on, Princess!”

She took a deep breath. You can do this. You’re an adult.

You’re not that little girl anymore.

“God, I hate you,” she muttered as she set off to follow Will.

It was a sentiment she’d been thinking and saying for years. But for the first time, she wasn’t even remotely sure it was true.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

No sex without love. We’re not savages.

—Brynn Dalton’s Rules for an

Exemplary Life, #24

Admit it, you had fun,” Will said they crossed from his driveway to hers. Over the grass this time. Because rebels did that sort of thing. Still, Brynn might have been just a little careful not to let her heels pierce the lawn.

“The Science Center was fun,” she conceded as she dug her keys out of her purse. “But the Ride the Ducks adventure was a monstrosity.”

“Come on, that’s tourist gold!”

“Perhaps. But it’s local trash.”

Will followed her into her dark foyer without asking permission to come in, and Brynn was surprised that she didn’t have the slightest inclination to ask him to leave, even after an entire day spent in his company. When had spending time with Will gone from miserable to…fun?

It’s just this weird phase you’re in. In a couple weeks you’ll wake up and realize that he’s a schmuck and that you have a tattoo.

Brynn’s eyes went wide at the thought. “My tattoo! I entirely forgot!”

Will gave her a slow, smug smile. “Which was exactly the plan.”

She threw her purse onto the entry table and immediately reached for the waistband of her skirt to finally inspect the new marking on her hip.

But Will moved faster than she did, capturing both her hands in his and bringing them purposefully against his chest. “I’ll do that,” he said in a strained, gruff voice.

She froze. Any girl past puberty knew that tone. It was the one that said, I want you naked. I want you to scream.

Brynn swallowed and forced her eyes up to his. They were dark and smoky, exactly as she’d known they would be.

“Will, I…”

He lifted one hand to her face, unfolding her fingers and planting a hot kiss on her palm, the tip of his tongue just barely making contact with her skin.

And just that one touch was enough to have her moan. This was why she’d picked Will for her fling. The guy knew his way around sex.

Or maybe he just knows his way around you. She pushed the thought out of her mind. No way would she get through this night by thinking.

“I still want to see my tattoo,” she whispered.

Will backed her up slowly until she was against the wall. “Later.”

And then his lips found hers, and he kissed her long and slow and hard.

Brynn forgot all about her tattoo as she let her arms wind around his neck, pulling him closer, not caring that she seemed needy, not caring that they were using each other for sex, or maybe companionship or some other weird, possibly unhealthy connection she didn’t know how to name.

The kiss wasn’t gentle, but it was different from the other kisses they’d stolen from each other. It was purposeful, each giving as much as they took.

Will’s hands were roaming over her back as he deepened the kiss, and Brynn raked her nails lightly over the back of his neck, relishing his guttural low moan.

Brynn had never understood the big deal with kissing. It had only ever been the obligatory first step toward the main event, but kissing Will was an event all its own.

He pressed hotter, deeper, his arms locked so tightly around her that she couldn’t breathe. Didn’t want to breathe. Dimly she became aware that there was a certain desperation to his kiss. As though there was something darker at play than standard male horniness.

When he finally released her mouth, they were both gasping for air as their gazes locked and held for several seconds. Without warning Will dipped his head and ran his tongue along her exposed collarbone before moving his mouth to her neck and sucking.