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  up to pul her by the elbow onto the sidewalk.

  "You sure you'l be al right?" The chily night air had done a pretty good job of sobering me up, but I wasn't

  reconsidering my rendezvous with Austin. At least not yet.

  Kira nodded. "Fine."

  She didn't look fine, she looked pissed off. I glanced out

  onto the street. Lots of cops. No cabs. I'd only turned

  away for a few seconds, but when I turned back to face

  her, Kira's expression had turned stormy.

  "You asshole!" She took a couple of steps forward, her

  heel catching on a crack in the sidewalk, and stumbled.

  Jack.

  With an inward sigh, I went after her. Jack was with the

  same woman from earlier and he did his best to ignore

  same woman from earlier and he did his best to ignore

  Kira. I saw him give his date a pained glance she

  answered with a shrug, and they started walking.

  "Hey, Jack! Jackass! Don't you walk away from me!"

  "C'mon, Kira, don't." I didn't blame him for ignoring her. I was a little less pleased he was also actively ignoring me,

  even though I knew it was realy for the best, al around.

  "He's not worth it!"

  "Fuck you, Jack!" Kira couldn't let it go, apparently.

  Jack grimaced and puled his cap from his back pocket.

  He put it on, but didn't look at her. We hadn't gone more

  than another few steps down the sidewalk when Kira

  launched herself at his back.

  Jack stumbled forward as she slammed into him, her legs

  and arms flying. She didn't actualy manage to hit him more

  than once or twice, but the spectators leaped out of the

  way of her drunken tornado performance. She was

  shrieking insults, mostly stupid and incoherent ones.

  Jack gave me an angry look that pissed me off. It wasn't

  like I'd told Kira he and I had hooked up or anything. Her

  issues with him were his own problem and had nothing to

  issues with him were his own problem and had nothing to

  do with me. He pushed her off him firmly and grabbed her

  arm at the same time so she wouldn't fal. She kept trying

  to hit him and missing.

  "Stop it," Jack told her and gave her arm a little shake

  before letting her go. When she flew at him again she

  managed to knock his cap off. I stepped forward, wishing

  I'd gone with Austin and left Kira to her theatrics alone.

  This was a scene I realy didn't want to see.

  "I hope your Prince Albert fucking rips out and you have

  to piss through three holes!" Kira screamed.

  "Kira, c'mon." I reached for her.

  Kira alowed herself to be led away, stil shouting insults.

  By the time we got to the parking garage the crowd had

  thinned and we had a better shot at hailing a cab. I rubbed

  my bare arms and shivered, but Kira had anger as her

  cloak and she danced back and forth on the nubbly

  pavement, waving her hands and muttering curses.

  "He's not worth it," I repeated. "Jesus, Kira. What's wrong with you?"

  "He's a jackass," she said sulenly. Her makeup had

  smeared, her hair tangled. She needed to be in bed.

  Fuck. I wanted to be in bed, and not alone. Yet here I

  was, instead, babysitting her while she had a tantrum about

  some guy she'd had a crush on a milion years ago but had

  never even dated.

  I didn't correct her, even though I didn't agree. "You're

  drunk. Cal Tony. Go home."

  She sniffed and crossed her arms. "Oh, you don't care!

  You're going to screw Austin. What difference does it

  make to you if my heart is broken?"

  I laughed and knew I'd made a mistake by the way her

  brows puled low over her smeared eyes. "Your heart's

  not broken. You didn't even go out with him. He doesn't

  even have the Prince Albert anymore."

  She glared at me. I thought suddenly she was maybe way

  less wasted than I'd thought. "Did you fuck Jack?"

  "It was ages ago."

  "You fucked Jack?" Kira's fist clenched at her sides, then

  "You fucked Jack?" Kira's fist clenched at her sides, then opened as her shoulders slumped. "I thought you were my

  friend!"

  "Kira, it was years ago, and you weren't—"

  "That doesn't matter!" she cried, and I knew she was right.

  "You knew how I felt about him! I loved him!"

  I'd never loved him. At least there was that. "I'm sorry."

  Kira whipped her phone from her purse and stabbed the

  buttons with her fingernail. She turned her back to me. I

  should've counted myself lucky she didn't try to punch me

  in the face the way she'd done Jack. As it was, I was cold

  and my stomach had begun to churn.

  "Your sorry is shit." Kira spoke into the phone next. "It's me. Come pick me up. Yeah, I know what time it is. I'l be

  waiting at Tom's Diner on Second Street. Harrisburg, you

  'tard."

  She hung up and stalked off down the sidewalk without

  looking back.

  "Kira!" She flipped me the bird without even pausing.

  There was no way I was going to run after her, not in my

  There was no way I was going to run after her, not in my

  four-inch fuck-me pumps. I managed a hobble, though.

  "Kira, c'mon. Wait."

  "You're supposed to be my friend," she said, and the quiet affront in her tone was worse than an insult or a punch.

  "God, Paige. Just because you can doesn't always mean

  you should, you know? This isn't high school anymore."

  I stopped trying to folow her. "No shit, realy? And caling

  out some dude on the street when he's with another girl,

  that's not straight out of high school?"

  "That's different!"

  "How is it different?"

  "You knew how I felt about Jack!" Kira shouted.

  We'd have attracted more attention if it wasn't Friday night

  just after the bars al closed, but as it was we were just

  two more drunk sluts fighting over a guy. In high school I'd

  have shouted back at her, maybe even done a little hair

  puling.

  But as we'd already established, we weren't in high school

  But as we'd already established, we weren't in high school

  anymore.

  I trapped my tongue between my teeth to stop myself from

  shouting back, but even then my voice came out clipped

  and sharp. "I said I was sorry. You weren't with him. You

  never even dated him. And you weren't even speaking to

  me at the time."

  She faltered for a moment, her lashes batting and her

  mouth working as though she meant to say something

  realy awful but could only come up with "…Yeah, wel.

  You shouldn't have."

  I didn't point out the number of boys I'd liked that Kira

  had fucked, or tried to fuck, or lied about fucking just to

  needle me. I said nothing, just stared, and she at last had

  the grace to cut her gaze from mine. She shrugged instead

  of speaking.

  If you're lucky, the friends you make when you're sixteen

  stay with you for the rest of your life. If you're smart, you

  know when it's time to let them go. I stopped walking. I

  watched her walk toward the diner, where drunk and

  hungry people would order eggs and stiff the waitress
and

  steal the silverware. I let her go there, even though she'd

  been drinking and she needed a ride home and I couldn't

  be sure the person she'd caled would come to get her.

  Yeah. Some friend.

  Chapter 04

  "I'm realy glad you came," Austin said this as soon as he opened the door.

  I said nothing.

  He closed it behind me as I moved past him and into his

  living room. I recognized the chair and the couch. It had

  been mine, once. The chair had been his and he'd been

  welcome to it, but I'd paid for that couch.

  The couch didn't matter.

  "You want something to drink?"

  I turned to look at him, this boy grown into a man. "No. I

  didn't come here to drink."

  Austin smiled. "So, what did you come here for?"

  I puled him forward by his belt. Two steps. He didn't

  stumble, but he did put his hands on my upper arms. I

  must have caught him by surprise. I looked up, up into his

  face. But when he bent to kiss me, I turned my head.

  "Let me guess," he said into my ear. "You didn't come here for kissing?"

  "You can kiss me." I took his hand off my arm and put it

  between my legs. "Here."

  I looked at him, then, and his expression gratified me

  immensely. His fingers curled experimentaly against me

  and pushed at the soft cloth of my skirt.

  Austin blinked, slowly. His smile didn't fade so much as

  leak away. "Paige?"

  "We both know what I came here for." I curled my fingers

  around his wrist and moved his hand down to the hem of

  my skirt, then up again to replace his palm against my

  panties. "Let's not pretend anything else."

  I thought, for one brief, strange second, he was going to

  turn me down. The heat of his hand seeped through my

  panties, but the flash of ice in his eyes left me cold.

  Suddenly I had no trouble remembering why I'd left him.

  He didn't let me pul away. "Fine. I'm not pretending."

  "Good."

  "Good."

  "Good," he said. His fingers slipped inside my panties and found me already wet. Again, his gaze flickered. "Fuck,

  Paige."

  "Yes, please," I said.

  He'd always been bigger than me, but in the years since

  we'd broken up he'd gone from a bulky footbal player's

  build to the harder, leaner muscled frame of a man who

  made his living working with tools. He might have quit the

  construction job with his dad's company, but whatever he

  was doing kept him in tight, hard shape.

  At first I thought he might not kiss me. We'd done it

  before, fucked without kissing each other on the mouth.

  We'd fucked angry, rough. We'd done it tender-soft, too,

  and sweet.

  So when Austin puled me closer and brushed his lips

  across mine, I was already tense and waiting. He kissed

  me softly and puled away. He looked into my eyes.

  "I was sure you'd bail on me."

  I frowned, not wanting to talk, and when I opened my

  mouth he took my words away with another kiss and the

  restless stroking of his hands. I'm not ashamed to admit I

  stretched under his touch, so familiar no matter how long it

  had been. We kissed for a long time, al the way up the

  stairs and down the hal to his bedroom. I kissed him with

  my eyes closed, trusting him to lead me so I wouldn't

  stumble. We kissed the way we always had, but it was

  different, too. We stopped just inside his bedroom door

  and puled apart, both of us breathing fast and hard. I

  couldn't remember how long it had been since anyone had

  seen me the way he did.

  I was made of feathers when he lifted me, but I became

  flesh when he laid me down.

  It was a new bed, new sheets. The smel of fabric softener

  was the same, and my heart seized, going stil before it

  lurched to life again. His mouth ate my gasp. He

  swalowed my breath.

  I'd worn clothes he could ruin without me caring, but

  Austin didn't tear or rip anything from me. Kneeling

  between my legs, staring at me on his pilow, he only put

  his hand on my bely. The muscles jumped.

  his hand on my bely. The muscles jumped.

  When he smiled I almost couldn't remember what it had

  been like not to love him, but I forced myself to. This was

  not going to be anything but what I'd intended it to be. I

  spread my legs a little as I inched the skirt up over my

  thighs.

  Austin put his hands to the hem of my shirt and lifted it to

  run his fingers over the swel of my breasts. He looked me

  over as if he'd never seen me before, like he hadn't once

  spent long hours cataloging every inch of my skin.

  I liked the way it felt when he looked at me.

  When his gaze met mine, we both smiled, which was a

  relief. There had been a moment at first when I thought this

  might turn awkward. Either sentimental or angry. We'd

  fucked a few times after I left him, and it hadn't always

  been a good choice.

  It probably wasn't a good choice now, but when he ran his

  hands up the insides of my thighs, and a finger underneath

  the elastic of my panties, I stopped worrying about it. I

  arched into his touch, my eyes closing in anticipation. He

  slid a finger along my clit, then another down to press

  gently at my opening. That's when he stopped.

  gently at my opening. That's when he stopped.

  I looked at him. "Austin?"

  He opened his pretty mouth, but al that came out was a

  hiss of air as he pushed inside me. I groaned as he

  crooked his finger against my sweet spot. He used his

  thumb on my clitoris at the same time, the familiar double

  whammy that had always worked for me.

  "You like that?"

  "Yes," I told him. "I like that."

  He hooked his other hand into my silk panties and eased

  them down one side at a time as he kept up the in-out

  stroking. His eyes left my face to watch the motion of his

  hand, and I was glad. I didn't want to watch him watching

  me.

  He stopped only for a few seconds, long enough to pul his

  shirt over his head. I used the time to pul down the side

  zip of my skirt, and he helped me off with that, too. My

  shirt went next. We moved together, coordinated, until I

  lay naked on his bed.

  "Take off your pants."

  I returned his hard stare. We'd never spoken much during

  sex. Now we were practicaly reciting the Declaration of

  Independence. I toyed with my nipples, teasing him as he

  unbuttoned and unzipped. He wasn't wearing the loose

  boxer shorts I'd expected, but tight boy shorts cut high on

  his thigh.

  "Nice underwear," I told him.

  The old Austin smirk came back, and he stripped them off

  quickly before getting back on his knees again. His cock

  stirred, half-hard but rising, on his thigh. "Thanks."

  "Did you put those on just for me?" I got up on my elbows

  to look at him.

  Austin just raised a brow. "What if I did?"

  It wasn't the smart-ass answer I expected, and

  c
onsequently, I had no answer.

  "Paige." His hand went stroke, stroke, stroke, and I was

  hypnotized. "Open your legs."

  I did, because I wanted him there. I thought he'd use his

  hand, but Austin got on his bely on the bed, instead. He

  wriggled up between my legs before I knew it, his breath

  hot on my inner thighs and finaly, at last, my cunt.

  I cried out when he kissed me there, but stifled it with my

  fist. When he licked me, I drew in a breath that tasted of

  my own skin. It had been a long time since a man had

  gone down on me…since the last time I'd been with him,

  as a matter of fact.

  His lips worked my rigid clit as he pushed a finger, then

  two, then three, inside me. Rough but not harsh. He found

  my G-spot and I convulsed around his fingers. Pleasure

  took my voice away.

  I pushed my hips upward in lieu of command, and he

  fucked me with his mouth and hands until I gasped and

  trembled. Shaking, I looked down at him, nestled between

  my legs. Passion had hazed my vision, but everything

  became crystaline when he paused to look up at me.

  "Don't come yet." Austin's voice had grown impossibly

  deeper over the years. Now it went lower stil. His breath

  drifted over my hot, wet flesh and the motion of his lips

  tantalized me mercilessly.

  He moved up my body and captured my wrists with his

  hands as he pushed mine over my head. My fingers curled

  around the wooden spindles as I stared him in the eyes. I

  wasn't the same girl he hadn't taken to the prom, and I

  wasn't the same girl he'd married. I was a different woman

  now. But I held the headboard anyway, watching him as

  he fumbled in his nightstand for the package of condoms

  and slid one on.

  When he moved back over me, one hand on his cock to

  guide it inside me, I tensed. My eyes closed as he filed

  me. When he moved, I moved with him. It was easy to

  remember how.

  He fucked into me slowly, then faster. He pushed up onto

  his hands to drive his cock deeper, and I took the pain of

  his thrusts and turned it into pleasure. My hands gripped

  the wood. His eyes never left mine, not even when he slid

  a hand between us to stroke my clit in time to his thrusts.

  "Now," he grunted from between clenched teeth, "you can come."

  I hadn't been waiting for his permission, but my body took

  I hadn't been waiting for his permission, but my body took

  it anyway.

  "Say my name." His fingers left me and he pushed his face