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My fingers wanted to reach out and smooth their way up her thigh so badly that I swear they started to cramp.
I swallowed and balled one hand into a fist as I used the other to lift the bottle back to my lips.
When I lowered the alcohol to my side, Raina reached out and started to play with my hair.
With a groan, I closed my eyes and grumbled, “Not fair. I can’t touch you back.”
“Just lift your hand,” she encouraged. “I’ll take your wrist and touch myself with your fingers. Wherever you want.”
Opening my lashes, I looked into her eyes and swallowed. “Now there’s a dangerous game.”
“And there’s no nurse here to catch us this time.” Raina eased closer, her gaze practically daring me to say what I really wanted. “Just name the place, darlin’.”
I shuddered and took another drink.
Raina eased back as if I’d just rejected her, and I bit down on the back of my teeth in regret, wishing I could explain how hard this was for me, wishing I could somehowshowher all my insecurities and concerns without her thinking I was weak and lacking.
I wished I knew how to be better at this.
Tearing my gaze from hers, I glanced around the room, feeling stupid until I noticed the pair of horseshoes she had tacked over her doorway that led out onto the balcony.
After taking another drink, I motioned toward them. “Why do you have two horseshoes above your doorway?”
Raina glanced over and sighed. “Because I heard two superstitions about them. If you hang one with the prongs pointing down, the good luck is able to pour out and surround that home, protecting it from evil, and if you hang it with the endsup, it will catch all the good luck. I wasn’t sure which was right, so I just put up two to hedge my bets.”
I glanced at her, and my vision blurred, telling me I was fully feeling the effects of the alcohol now. “So you’re superstitious?”
She shrugged. “Not really, but this was horseshoe country, and everyone hangs them in Westport, what with the Stallions being our school mascot and everything. So I thought...” She shrugged again, leaving the sentence unfinished.
I laughed. “Might as well go all out if you were going to go all in, huh?”
Raina nodded and then sighed. “If it actually works, I can’t tell if it’s served me with good luck or bad. I mean, I lost my sister, I’m in a coma, and my soul is currently severed from my body. Then again, I was the only survivor of that accident—so far, anyway—and I get to spend every day with you.”
“Sounds like you got a little of both since you hung them both ways,” I mused, glancing up at the two horseshoes.
“Yeah,” she murmured, seemingly depressed that life had given her a confusing mix of good and bad.
“You know,” I admitted. “I never told anyone this before, but I don’t treat horseshoes like good luck charms. To the Greeks, they were a sign of Omega, the last letter of their alphabet; so for me, horseshoes marked the end of life. And now, whenever I see them above a doorway, I don’t touch them for good luck. I touch them to remember Hayes.”
“I like that,” Raina decided with a soft smile. Glancing up at the horseshoes, she murmured, “Hey, Kins. I miss you.” Then she popped over to the door to slap both horseshoes before popping back onto the bed with me.
Turning to me, she rolled her eyes, even as she grinned. “I feel like she just answered,Pookie. Do the wild, crazy thing. Live life to the fullest. Go for what you want the most.”
I nodded slowly before asking, “And what would you go for right now if you could?”
Sighing dismally, she cocked her head as she studied me from head to toe. Then she said, “That’s easy. I’d go for you.”
My eyebrows lifted with interest. “Me?”
When she nodded, the warmth in her hazel-gray eyes stirred up a crazy heat inside me.
Taking a moment to savor the sensation, I wetted my lips before answering, “Well, if youdiddecide to come after me, I think I might just let you catch me.”
“Really?” Scooting closer, she asked, “I thought you didn’t like sex and dating.”
“But I likeyou,” I countered. “Besides.” With a one-shouldered shrug, I admitted, “I only said that because I never had any luck with any of it.”
“Yeah, right.” She snorted in disbelief. “You never had any luck with sexordating?”
