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  She tries to turn and catch herself, but I'm close enough that she grabs at me for purchase. There's a harsh tug on my sweatpants, and the momentum takes them right down to my ankles, freezing air suddenly whips across my skin. Ava falls all the way to her knees, looking up as I look down. It's cold as hell, but that doesn't stop a blush from rising all the way to her hairline, as she tries to keep her eyes on mine instead of the front of my black boxer briefs.

  “You know, if you wanted an encore of last night you could have just asked,” I say, and it's impossible not to grin.

  “It was an accident,” she mumbles, clearing her throat as if it will hide the heat on her cheeks. The parking lot is practically abandoned, but the idea of someone seeing us is enough for Ava to break her iron grip on my sweatpants and try to find her bearings on the ice again. I bend to yank my pants back up, grateful that the cold is keeping me in check.

  I hold my hand out to help her up. She glares at me, but it only lasts a few seconds before she grabs my hands with both of hers, and I lift her up to her feet. When her shoes scrape on the snow, I put my free hand against her back, sandwiching us with party supplies and pulling her close so she doesn't slip again and escort her to the truck.

  The weather has turned fast, and I want her safely inside the truck. We toss the bags inside, and I help her climb up.

  “There. Safe and sound.” I grin. “If only you'd listened to me in the first place, the fine customers at Shop-N-Save wouldn't have seen me in my underwear.”

  She shrugs. “I don't like being told what to do unless I'm naked.”

  I don't like being told what to do unless I'm naked?

  Eyes widening, I shake my head at her. Damn, she's definitely grown up. I don't remember her ever being this sassy, and fuck, I like it. I shut her door and climb into the driver's seat.

  I start the truck, and clean the windshield, and after I do, I realize Ava is still watching me.

  “Barrett?” she asks, voice soft.

  I know what she's asking. What is this? What's happening between us? But I'm fresh out of answers. This chemical attraction that's building between us is big and electrifying. And fucking terrifying, because there's no way we can act on it.

  My gaze lowers from her eyes to her full, kissable lips, and suddenly all I can think about is kissing her. Taking her plush mouth with mine…Imagining what she'd look like undressed for me. Ass raised up, her hips the perfect height to grip in my hands, pulling her back onto my stiff length, hearing her cry out as I penetrate her fully for the first time.

  I take a deep breath and begin to mentally calculate my billable hours from last month, recite the Latin names for legal concepts I studied in law school, anything to stop myself from doing the one thing I want to do—kissing all that sexual frustration right off her beautiful lips.

  Her gaze falls to my mouth, and the moment it does, it's all I can think about. Goodbye, habeas corpus. Hello, lust.

  Ava wets her lower lip with her tongue and in an instant, I've closed the distance between us, bringing my lips to hers in a searing kiss.

  The moment our mouths meet, she lets out a sound of surprise, but from the way she tilts her head up to meet mine, it's a welcome one. I linger as long as I dare, not wanting to give up her sweet lips, her little breathless sounds just yet. Denying myself that would feel like death.

  “We really shouldn't be doing this,” I murmur with my lips still lingering against hers, because it seems like the right thing to say.

  She kisses me again. It's hot and insistent, her hands grasping at my coat before she answers with a smile. “I know that.”

  I can think of plenty of ways to heat her up a couple more degrees, but unfortunately, we're in her father's truck in the middle of a parking lot. Taking herculean strength, I pull back from her, certain that guilt is written all over my face. I can’t even look her in the eye at this point, all I see are the remnants of my sins reflected on my best friend’s sister’s face. Her splotched cheeks, the lust-filled eyes, the swollen lips, or maybe that’s what I’m seeing in my own reflection. Fuck. “Nice as this is, we should probably get back to the house.”

  She nods, and I pull out onto the road when the full-force of what we've done hits me. I kissed Ava. I kissed her without even thinking about it, after spending years trying to put her out of my mind. Worse, I called it nice. The opportunity was there, and everything in me wanted to take advantage. If she hadn't kissed me back, I would have stopped. But, man, she did kiss me back and it was everything I’d imagined. Hot, soft, sweet.

  “Shit.” Ava startles when I curse, and I resist the urge to reach over and touch her in some small way. “None of this was supposed to happen.”

  “Nothing did happen,” she says back, so casually I can barely believe it. “Which is why we're going to unpack the truck when we get back home and go on with our day.”

  I force a breath into my lungs. At least that means Nick won't have to find out. I couldn't risk my oldest friend in the world hating me because of one stupid mistake.

  I nod, staring straight out the windshield, like there could possibly be anything more interesting outside than the woman next to me.

  With every passing minute, the silence strains into awkwardness, and I reach over to flip the radio on. Ava's hand doesn't brush mine this time, instead staying locked in her lap. A jazzy beat flows from the speakers; it's not my type of music, but this is more about drowning out the silence than hearing the latest top forty.

  When the house comes into view, I hold back a breath of relief, and pull into the driveway without breaking the quiet between us. Nick is outside already, scraping off the front porch with a snow shovel, and the bastard waves as soon as we get out. His wave is like a sucker punch to the gut. If he finds out how close I was to violating his sister, I have a very good feeling that that wave would turn into a right hook.

  “Took you two long enough.” He kicks the last bit of snow off the concrete, then leaves the shovel by the door. “Did you make a detour or something?”

  Neither one of us answers, and when I loop around to grab the bags, Ava stops in front of me.

  For a second, I'm not sure whether to go around, or take a step back and let her by. We stare at each other until Nick raises an eyebrow.

  “What's going on? Do you both want to freeze your asses off out here?”

  “No, he told me to wait insi-” Ava starts.

  “I didn't want her to slip again and-” I interrupt, and she gives me a pleading look.

  Nick rolls his eyes. “Yeah, okay. How about we get inside? It's freezing balls out here.”

  “Fine by me,” I say hastily, passing off the lightest bag to Ava.

  She glances inside it, seeing the paper lanterns, and sighs. “I guess I'll go try to figure out how to assemble these before Mom and Dad get back.”

  She walks past Nick without another word and into the house. I haul everything else up to the porch, turning back to head to the truck and close the door. I pause as Nick taps me on the shoulder.

  “Did Ava say something to piss you off?” Nick asks, sounding none too surprised. “Everything that's happened with Dad has left her kind of moody.”

  Hoisting the bags back into my arms, I give him a look. “No, man, she's fine. It's just weird to catch up after so long.”

  Thankfully, he doesn't even blink at the lie. “Well, at least she's not driving you crazy. I wish she would just give up on this whole factory thing and instead get on with her own life.”

  I thought she did have a life here, but a creak from behind catches my attention. Ava is standing in the doorway with her arms crossed, irritation tight between her brows.

  I can tell by her expression that she heard every bit of that.

  “Thanks for the support, Nick.” Sarcasm cuts through her tone, quick and sharp.

  “Listen, I'm on your side, okay?” He puts his hands up like it'll ward her off. “That scrapheap shouldn't be anyone's business anymore. Even Barre
tt knows it's not worth your time.”

  Ava stares at me, looking surprised and hurt all at once, and I rush to clarify, “That's not what I said. It's your decision, Ava.”

  “But I think a lawyer knows a good deal when he sees one,” Nick insists.

  I shrug. “If Ava says she can handle it, then she can handle it. Your dad put a lot of work into that place.”

  “Yeah, whatever.” Stubborn or not, Nick tends to back down when he's outnumbered.

  “Thank you, Barrett,” Ava says, deliberately emphasizing my name.

  After a quick nod, I move to take the rest of the bags inside. She steps back out of the way, body just inches from mine, and I tell myself to keep on walking.

  But not before one last phrase jettisons into my head out of the depths of my subconscious sins.

  ‘Mens rea.’

  A guilty mind…how fucking appropriate.

  Chapter Six

  Ava

  It’s a wonder my mother lets me help in the kitchen anymore. Her off-script cooking style and my dedicated loyalty to the recipe mix about as well as oil and vinegar—our evening of cookie baking made that clear yet again. With Dad, her usual sous chef, napping off his long morning of doctors’ appointments, she’s stuck with me and my slow but methodical process of slicing peppers in perfectly even slices.

  “It’s all getting mixed up in a salad anyway,” she reminds me. “It doesn’t matter if they’re even or not.”

  I accept the reminder with a smile but keep at my slow, precise work. After all, if I focus all my energy on this, maybe I won’t completely lose my mind over the master chef to my immediate left.

  Barrett, playing the part of the perfect house guest, dices and chops vegetables along with me. Helping even though he's not even staying for dinner tonight. I’m careful to stand a solid foot to his side as not to run the risk of my arm brushing his, afraid of how visibly obvious it would be to Mom that just the brush of this man’s arm would send me into a state of euphoria. A kiss turned me on my head for over an hour. Still, watching his hands at work out of the corner of my eye is enough for me to wish he’d handle me with that kind of skill.

  Something about a man who knows his way around the kitchen turns me on quicker than you can preheat an oven. Or maybe it’s just the way he cradles that cucumber, wrapping his large hand around it one finger at a time. Am I imagining things, or is Barrett holding that cucumber a little lewdly on purpose?

  When I lift my gaze, the smug grin on his face gives me my answer. He runs his hand down the cucumber twice in a slow, stroking motion and my cheeks flush. He’s made a game out of teasing me, and there’s nothing I can do but play along. I roll my eyes in his direction, thankful that it seems to break the awkward tension from earlier today. But the second Mom turns her back to load dishes into the dishwasher, Barrett presses what I hope is a cucumber against my outer thigh and leans in close enough that his breath teases the hair on my neck.

  I stop breathing, fearing if I make a sound that Mom will turn around and catch this, us, whatever this is.

  “Stop staring, Ava,” he murmurs. His bottom lip barely grazes my ear lobe and a rush shoots through me. “We both know you couldn’t handle this.”

  My God, please tell me that it's a cucumber up against my thigh and not his dick. I can’t even bring myself to look down, only straight ahead. I’m pretty much positive it isn’t a cucumber. If I make eye contact with Barrett, I’m going to push everything off this damn counter and beg him for it, cucumber or not.

  A wave of heat continues to pulse through me at the realization of his words. I hate to admit that he just might be right. If what I saw when Barrett stepped out of the shower was any indication, he might split me in half with one thrust. He might be too much for me to take, but why does every inch of him make me want to try?

  “Need any help?”

  The sound of Mom’s voice jolts Barrett back into behaving. Tossing the cucumber back on the cutting board, he resumes dinner prep as if we hadn’t just been teetering on the edge of foreplay in my mother’s kitchen.

  “Don’t worry, Mrs. Saunders. I’ve got everything under control.”

  If by everything he means me, then yes, he absolutely does. To say I’m putty in his hands is an understatement. He’s got a grip on me tighter than the one he just had on that cucumber. At this point, I know there’s no way I can sit through a family dinner without groping Barrett’s dick under the table as he passes me the salad dressing. Because I am shameless and cannot stop thinking about his cucumber. Which he really needs to keep to himself.

  Turning away from my recipe duties, I snag my phone out of my back pocket while Mom and Barrett are discussing the rest of the menu and shoot off an emergency text to my best friend Megan, praying she’s not busy. Luckily, she responds in an instant, asking if she needs to call and fake a death in the family. A snicker escapes the side of my mouth. She's always had my back no matter what.

  “What’s so funny, Ava?” Mom asks as both she and Barrett turn to look at me, a smirk all over his gorgeous face.

  “Oh, nothing. It’s just Megan. She actually needs me to meet her at the mall. It seems kind of urgent, plus I should pick up a present for Dad anyway. Two birds, one stone. Save me a plate?”

  I have one arm in my coat before she even has the time to respond. Barrett shoots me a “I know exactly what you’re doing” look, but I brush it off and breeze out the door without another word. It feels good to be back in the driver's seat of my car, back in a position of control for the first time in the past twenty-four hours.

  When I turn the key in the ignition, the engine sputters and then goes silent. This has got to be a joke. I give it a few more desperate tries, but it does nothing but leave my fingers stiff and cold in my gloves. Shit. I’m going to have to go back in there. Stepping back into the concentrated sexual tension I left unresolved in the kitchen isn’t exactly a safe move for me, but if I grab the keys to Dad’s truck quick enough, I might be able to slip out without notice.

  As quietly as I can muster, I crack open the door and tiptoe toward where all the keys are stored near the back of the kitchen.

  “Back so soon, sweetie?” Mom asks.

  Well, it was worth a shot.

  “Yeah, my car wouldn’t start. I’ll just take Dad’s truck, no worries.”

  Mom crinkles her face in disapproval. “I don’t know if I trust the truck with the roads being this bad, Ava.”

  “I can give you a lift,” Barrett suggests, chopping up the last of the cucumbers. “I was going to head out soon anyway. I told my mom I’d come over for dinner tonight.”

  Mom’s face softens into a pleased smile at Barrett’s offer. “I’d feel much better about that, Ava.”

  “Sure, that’s fine,” I say, not opposed to another opportunity to let my eyes wander Barrett’s sculpted frame without my mother as our audience.

  “I’ll leave the front door unlocked for you tonight, Barrett,” Mom says, giving his forearm a grateful squeeze. “And thank your mom again for sharing you with us. It’s been so nice to have the extra set of hands helping out around the house.”

  God, if only those hands could help me out, too.

  * * *

  Once we're inside the car, Barrett turns up the heat and adjusts the vents to direct some of the warm air toward me.

  “I'm sorry about what you overheard with Nick before. I meant what I said about supporting you in whatever you want to do. If saving the plant is your goal, then that's pretty fucking commendable.”

  “It's honestly fine. Thank you, though.” I shrug him off. It's been no surprise that Nick's against my plan. Ever since his quickie wedding and even faster divorce, he's been in a sour mood. Just because his dreams fell through doesn't mean he can't be happy for the rest of us.

  The mall parking lot is packed to the brim, but I could spot Megan’s bright red hair from a mile away. She’s leaning against a pillar by the front entrance, scanning the parking lot for an
y car that looks familiar. I sent off a warning text on the way to let her know I’d be dropped off in front, but I didn’t mention who would be doing the driving. Too much to try to explain via text without Barrett asking what I was typing so furiously about. I direct him toward Megan and he pulls up the car, shifting it into park.

  “I can pick you up tonight,” he offers.

  “I’m sure Megan can drive me home.” One-on-one car rides with Barrett, plus the cover of darkness? That’s a dangerous combination that I might not be able to resist.

  Outside my window, Megan tilts her head in an effort to identify my mysterious driver. Could she be any less subtle? When I open the door, her eyes light up with recognition as she gets a clear look at my chauffeur.

  “Oh, my—”

  I cut her off with a tight squeeze of her wrist. “Thanks again for the ride,” I call over my shoulder as I tug Megan away from the car and into the warm safety of the mall.

  “I’m sorry, was that or was that not Barrett Wilson?” Her eyes are wide like she just spotted an A-list celebrity, not my high-school heartthrob.

  “The one and only,” I say, a smirk tugging at the sides of my lips.

  “Since when are you guys a thing? God, I didn’t think it was possible, but he’s gotten more gorgeous. Didn’t you have a major crush on him in high school?”

  “We’re not a thing.” I pause, then hand over the gossip I know she so desperately wants. “Although we may have kissed.”

  Saying it out loud leaves my lips warm and buzzing, almost as good as the kiss itself. I haven’t felt like this about a man in such a long time, but of all people, does it really have to be my brother's best friend?

  “You are so lucky the mall is open late,” she says, “because you have a ton of explaining to do.”

  As we weave in and out of stores in search of a fitting retirement gift for my dad, I fill her in on every detail. The shower ordeal, the standoff followed by the pantsing accident, all of it. She cackles at my horrible luck, and I can’t really blame her. The past few days have been nothing short of a parade of embarrassing moments, but I’d take a hundred more slip-ups if it meant Barrett would kiss me like that one more time. I'm clearly insane.