Once outside the theater I gulped in the fresh, cool air of the summer night and turned to stare at Logan as he joined me. I didn’t know what to say.

“Let me walk you home.”

Since we were both going that way, it seemed childish and petty to deny him.

For a while we walked in silence, the tension crackling between us.

“You could have left,” Logan suddenly said.

He was right. At any time I could have stood up and walked out of that theater. “Apparently, I’m a masochist.”

He grunted at that. “I’m quite sure that was an insult.”

“Logan…” I sighed wearily. “Let’s not talk.”

“I’d prefer not to. Right now I’d prefer to be kissing that fucking sweet mouth of yours.”

I flushed and stared at him, wide-eyed. “You can’t speak to me like that.” I glanced around, making sure there were no bystanders to his flirtation.

“Babe.”

“Don’t ‘babe’ me. In fact, quit with the ‘babe’ thing completely.”

“Fine. I’ll quit with it if you can tell me you didn’t feel that inside the theater. Tell me while I was getting hard just sitting next to you, breathing you in, that you weren’t thinking about what it’s like to have me inside of you. Tell me you weren’t thinking about me fucking you. Because I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I want to fuck you and then I want to make love to you…” He drew closer to me as I kept walking, trying to walk away from the words that were making my heart rate speed out of control. “And I want to repeat it over and over for the rest of our lives.”

My breath stuttered, but I kept walking.

Until suddenly I wasn’t.

I blinked at the abrupt movement as I was jerked sideways down the alley between two boutiques. Logan loomed over me, pressing me against the cold, shaded brick wall. “Tell me.”

My lips parted to deny him, but I couldn’t.

He kissed me, crushing my mouth beneath his in an angry, desperate kiss that curled my toes in my shoes. I hated that the scratch of the bristle of his short beard sent goose bumps of arousal up all over my body. I hated that my breasts swelled with need, pushing up into his chest, pleading despite everything for his touch. I hated that my skin flushed and I tingled between my thighs.

I hated that I kissed him back just as desperately.

At the press of his erection against my stomach and the simultaneous brush of his thumb against the side of my breast, the jolt of lust that moved through me had the effect of reminding me of where I was and whom I was doing this with.

I gave Logan a gentle shove, and he immediately let me go.

His chest heaved as he stared down at me, more than a glimmer of triumph in his eyes.

I huffed and pushed past him, darting back out onto the safety of the street.

He caught up with me, and I felt his question without him having to voice it.

“So there’s attraction between us,” I said quietly, feeling vulnerable and, for some strange reason, lonely. “It doesn’t mean a thing.”

“Oh, it means something,” he disagreed, and I could hear that damned determination in his voice, along with not a small hint of cockiness. “You told me yourself, babe. You don’t light up for just anyone… and you become a blaze whenever I put my hands on you.”

“I really don’t like you right now.”

Logan grinned. “That’s okay. As long as you love me, nothing else matters.”

“You are so arrogant,” I huffed. “Have you always been this arrogant?”

“Don’t confuse arrogance with confidence.”

I made a face and stomped ahead, grumbling under my breath at the way his long legs easily caught up with me.

I didn’t shake him the whole way back to our building, and as I put my key in the lock of my flat, he pressed his chest into my back, his lips whispering across my ear. “I’m looking forward to repeating the best sex I’ve ever had.”

My breath caught at his confession, my body screaming to give in to him. Instead I turned the key and shoved inside my flat, slamming the door behind me so I didn’t have to look him in the eye and show him how much I still wanted him.

CHAPTER 20

“You really should think about giving me a key.”

I stared balefully at Maia as she stood on my doorstep the next morning. “I don’t give keys to traitors.”

She grinned sheepishly. “Can you blame me for helping a guy out?”

“Yes. Yes, I can.”

Rolling her eyes at me, Maia disregarded my glare and swept past me into my flat. “Do you have any cereal? Dad and I have run out.”

“I’m making scrambled eggs if you want some,” I grumbled, shutting the door and following in her wake.

She glanced up from the now-open fridge door as I wandered into the kitchen. “Did you say something about eggs?”

“I’m making them. Do you want any?”

“See, you can’t stay mad at me for long.”

“Oh, I’m still mad – just not mad enough to see you go without breakfast.”

“Then that’s not really that mad.” She shuffled up onto one of my kitchen stools. “You look kind of tired.”

I looked a fright. I’d barely gotten any sleep. Again! I’d managed to fall asleep at around five o’clock in the morning out of sheer exhaustion, and then Maia had banged on my door four hours later. “It’s Saturday. Shouldn’t you be sleeping in, like every other teenager in the country?”