Page 36 of Stay Scared

Cade stays where he is. The table traps one side of me while the booth closes the other. His skull mask is inches from my face, and my body remembers the old arrangement before I want it to: his left hand at my waist, his thumb beneath my jaw, his mouth waiting when I tipped my chin toward him.

“Move out of my way.”

“You’re looking at the exit again.”

“I told you to move.”

He stays there, and anger climbs fast.

I spit through the opening near the mask’s mouth. Most of it strikes the painted teeth.

Cade goes still. Gray eyes brighten behind the mask.

“Now that feels familiar.”

He wipes the painted jaw with his thumb.

“You built all this for a woman you seem furious with.”

“I can be pissed at you and still want you.”

His hand starts toward my jaw.

For one treacherous second, I lean into the motion I remember before catching myself.

“Do not touch me.”

Cade stops before his glove reaches my skin and lowers his hand. He wants to touch me. The flex of his fingers gives him away, but he leaves the wanting where it is.

I don’t.

I seize the front straps of his vest and drag him down. The skull clips my forehead before he turns, and my mouth catches the exposed edge beneath the painted jaw, awkward until Cade lifts his chin and gives me better access.

I kiss him harder. Whiskey still clings to his tongue, but his hands stay at his sides.

I tighten my grip on his vest until the edge of the skull presses into my cheek. The mask turns the kiss rougher, stranger, and far too easy to want. Cade makes a low sound against my mouth as my teeth catch his lower lip, and his body surges forward until the booth presses into my back.

His hands remain curled beside his thighs, his shoulders locked with the effort of keeping them there.

I bite down.

Copper reaches my tongue, and Cade jerks once beneath my grip. For one reckless second, I almost put his hands where I remember them.

Instead, I release his vest and step back.

Blood gathers along the split in his lip.

“Fuck, I missed that,” he says.

“You need better hobbies.”

“Bite me again.”

“I made my point.”

“Since when do you stop at one?”

His mouth is still wet from mine.