Wicked Games (Games #1)(15)
Author: Jessica Clare

I didn’t care—I grinned and took a bite of the pizza and gave a moan of delight at the taste. If I never ate again, I’d still die happy.

Dean glanced over at me and smiled, a boyish look. To my surprise, he reached over and grabbed my left hand as I reached for a beer and examined it with great curiosity, his emphasis on my fingers. Then, he looked over at me, relieved. “Not married?”

He’d been looking for a wedding band. My heart skidded to a stop. “No,” I whispered.

“Boyfriend?” He asked, trying to keep his voice light as he released my hand and reached for another beer. He didn’t look me in the eyes.

“No boyfriend,” I said in a small voice. The world crashed down around me, a little. Okay, a lot. “You?”

His mouth quirked. “No, no boyfriend.”

I threw my napkin at him. “You know what I mean.” Oh god, I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think—I couldn’t see his hand behind that beer bottle—

“Nothing,” he said, shaking his head. “Currently between ex-girlfriends.”

My breath whooshed out of me in a relieved gulp and I choked, coughing on the food in my mouth. Dean thumped me on the back. “You okay?”

When I regained my breath, I gave him a horrified look. “Dean, I just realized… we don’t know each other.” I knew that, and I still wanted to run into the other room with him and throw him down on the bed. How horrible was that? How wrong?

“I know you,” he said, shaking his head. “You make a mean fire, you can’t paint for shit, and you taste like peanut butter.” Dean winked at me, and the mix of playfulness and lust on his face sent a bolt of desire straight through me again. “I know all about you.”

“But you don’t know me… really know me.” My voice raised in a slight panic.

He handed me another beer, twisting the cap off and placing it in my hand as if I were helpless. Then he thought for a moment and clinked the neck of his beer against my own. “Then we get to know each other tonight.” He smiled slowly. “And tomorrow. And the day after. And all the time we have left on this island. Baby, you and me have nothing but time.”

The low, sexy way he said it made me blush, and I took another sip of beer, trying to quell my nervousness. Some women jumped into bed with strange men, lived life as a series of one-night stands. I did not. For me, sex didn’t come without emotional attachments. Stay calm, I told myself. Drink more beer. Everything’s better with beer.

“Why don’t you ask me something, and I’ll ask you something,” Dean offered, munching on pretzels. We’d finished eating the majority of our meal—I imagined that his stomach hurt as much as mine with all the food we’d hastily crammed into it—but there was still the incessant need to snack, to stockpile carbs for when they disappeared again.

I grabbed a celery stick and swirled it in the dip, then bit down. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-eight. You?”

Not a bad age. “Twenty-six.”

“Ever been married?”

“No, never,” I said.

“Me either,” Dean said, reaching for a celery stick of his own. “Came close once.”

“Want to talk about it?”

He laughed. “Not tonight. Wouldn’t do good to talk about my ex-girlfriend in front of my current one.”

So I was his girlfriend? A silly thrill shot through me at that, and I gave him a dopey smile. “I’m from DC. So where are you from?”

“Houston,” he said, cocking his head to the side as he regarded me. “You sounded Southern, I thought.”

“I am,” I amended. “I’m working in DC but I grew up in Amarillo.”

“Texas, too?” Dean grinned. “But not my part of Texas. Next you’ll be telling me that you’re a Cowboys fan.”

I shook my celery stick at him. “They are ‘America’s Team,’ you know.” At his snort of outrage, I laughed and reached for another beer.

Football seemed to break the awkward dam between us, and we launched questions at each other that we’d been too self-absorbed to ask up to this point. Personal questions—like how many sisters Dean had (three), and how many pets I had (a cat). We moved to not-so-personal stuff like sports and karaoke. We both loved the former and hated the latter. Both of us liked the same music, and we’d even hung out at the same bars in Austin during our college years.

At some point, we’d eaten a few bites of everything and had drunk nearly all the beer. As we’d moved down the table, tasting food and chatting about random stuff—none of it game-related—our seating pillows slid closer and closer together until at some point I was leaning on Dean’s corded arm as he fed me another pretzel stick. Or tried to, but I was yawning too hard.

“Sleepy?” he asked, shifting me to an upright position.

I nodded and tried to hide another yawn. “It’s the beer. Always does that.” I was sleepy and more than slightly woozy with the alcohol running through my starved system. How many beers had I drunk? Five? Six? Dean had easily downed as many as me, though he seemed to be handling the effects well. I peered at him. “Does this mean we’re going to get drunk and go make out again, now?”

Dean chuckled, getting to his feet and extending his hands to help me up. “I think one of us is already drunk.”

I slid against him, my legs boneless, and laughed as he reached to catch me, dragging my body against his. His bare chest felt so hot and nice against my own flesh, and I immediately slid my hands from his neck and down his shoulders. Dean had to be the best looking man I’d ever slept with, with the broadest shoulders and the nicest tan, and that sly grin that did crazy things to my knees. I focused on his mouth and realized he was grinning even now, which probably explained why I was having difficulty standing. “Hi,” I said breathlessly.

“Let’s get you to bed,” he said, looping his hand around my waist and making sure that my arm was anchored over his shoulders. I let him lead the way as he half-walked, half-dragged me to the bedroom as the room spun around me.

My stomach heaved uncomfortably.

“You okay?” Dean whispered. “You just got really pale.”

“I don’t feel so well,” I said in a light voice, trying to push away from him.

To my surprise, Dean picked me up in his arms and carried me to the bathroom, setting me on the floor next to the toilet. My stomach spun and churned, and I moaned and sank to the floor next to it, laying my cheek against the cool white porcelain.

“Too much beer and too much weird food,” Dean said, stroking my hair back as it fell in my face. “Are you going to be sick?”

I closed my eyes, as if that would help my stomach. “Don’t know yet.”

He walked away, and that simple act made my stomach churn a little more. The thought of me being sick made him ill.

I couldn’t blame him. We’d just gotten clean after two weeks of filth. Still, it embarrassed me that I’d repulsed him and I closed my eyes, laying still and praying for the vomit to stay down.

It did not.

Someone moved a minute or two later, and I opened my eyes to see Dean back at my side, offering me a slice of bread and a glass of water. Surprised, I stared up at him as he held the bread out. “You need to eat and drink this.” I groaned at the sight, but he insisted. “Hangover prevention food—trust me.”

And he pushed the slice into my hand and didn’t budge until I began to take small bites of the bread. When I was done with that, he handed me the glass of water and watched until I finished it as well.

“Thank you,” I said in a small voice. I didn’t know what to make of his thoughtful return. He could have left me on the floor and gone to sleep and I wouldn’t have thought any worse of him, but this was… startling. And nice. “I feel better,” I added.

“You’ll be fine after you sleep it off,” he told me, and helped me to my feet again. This time, we moved more slowly, with greater caution so as not to upset my stomach once more.

We moved back to the small bedroom, and I glanced at the two twin beds. A thin blanket covered each one, and the white pillows seemed inviting. I sat down on the edge of the closest one, and Dean helped me into the bed, pulling the covers over me. I tilted my head up to look at him and he gave me a quick kiss on the forehead, then moved to his bed.

Bed—for the first time in two weeks. So pleasant.

It turned out to be impossible to sleep in. The covers got hot within minutes, sticking to my skin and feeling smothering. The tiny bed was almost too soft, and I flailed back and forth in bed, miserable. It was like I was missing something, and it grated on me so much that it was physically impossible to sleep.

After I turned over for the hundredth time, Dean rolled over in his bed. “Can’t sleep?”

“No,” I said in a miserable voice. “There’s something wrong with my bed.”

“Too comfortable?”

I gave him a miserable laugh. “Maybe. Who would have thought?”

“You can come sleep with me.” In the darkness, I heard him pat his bed. “Just like back at camp. Actually, the camp bed is probably smaller.”

He had a point. I hesitated for a moment, wondering if he’d think I was too forward if I leapt back into bed with him and then decided that I didn’t care. I slipped out of my bed and over to his, where he held the covers open for me. Turning my back to him, I slid into bed next to Dean so we could spoon as we always did on the island.

My backside nestled against his, and his arm went around my waist as always, and he pulled the covers over me. “See, plenty of room.”

Strangely enough, it did feel roomy compared to our little shelter, and I snuggled down next to him, my body fitting against his comfortable, familiar molding. “Thank you, Dean.” And though it was hot under the covers within moments, his skin warm against my own, neither one of us moved, and I fell asleep within moments, his hand splayed low on my stomach.

Chapter Nine

Holy crap. I totally did not mean for that to happen. But at the same time… I don’t regret it. Not in the slightest.—Dean Woodall, Day 16

I woke up to the delicious feeling of a broad chest against my back, an arm locked around my waist, and a pillow under my head. In fact, it felt so wonderful I didn’t want to open my eyes.

“I can tell you’re awake,” Dean whispered against the back of my head. “You’re twitching.”

With a groan, I flipped over and burrowed against his chest, trying to hide from the sunny, too-bright world. “If I wake up, that means we have to go back.”

He laughed at that, and I felt the rumbles in his chest through my own body. Dean’s hand had slid to my hip where my sarong had bunched up high on my legs. He was rubbing the exposed skin there with slow, smooth circles, as if he couldn’t resist touching me. My face grew hot as I recalled—whoever had left us the sarongs had not left us matching underwear.

But I didn’t feel the urge to move, or to push Dean’s hands away. I remembered the shower last night and our explosive, frantic sex. That had been the most singularly awesome sexual experience I’d ever had, but I wasn’t sure how to initiate it again. My eyes slid open and all I could see was the lean, darkly tanned muscles of Dean’s torso. He’d lost so much weight in two weeks that his six-pack was etched and defined, and some of the bulk of his body was gone. Not that it made him unattractive—not by a long shot.