My mom owns a tiny sandwich shop she inherited from

her dad when I was in high school. I'd worked in that shop

almost my entire life, running errands as a kid then

graduating to making subs and running the cash register.

Now I only helped if she had a big order to fil and deliver,

or a party to cater.

"She stil has it. She was working for Hershey but got laid

off."

Austin nodded. "I'm working for McClaron and Sons."

I had no idea who or what McClaron and Sons was, but

the fact he was working for someone other than his dad

surprised me into a reply. "What about your dad?"

Austin shrugged, then grimaced, and only because I'd once

known him so wel it had been like knowing myself did I

catch his hesitation. "It was time I got out of that job."

"But you're doing the same thing, right? Construction?"

Kira popped into the conversation and drew both our

attentions.

"Yeah, and some other stuff," Austin said, but didn't

elaborate.

Interesting. Austin had worked for his dad's business the

way I'd worked for my mom's—summers and after school

since he'd been old enough to carry a hammer. It had

always been the assumption that he'd take over the

business when his dad retired, and become a ful partner

business when his dad retired, and become a ful partner

some time before that. I'd figured he already was.

"What about you?" Kira sipped her drink, eyes on Ethan.

For someone with a boyfriend, she certainly seemed

interested in him, but then Kira was just one of those girls.

You know. The slutty ones.

"I'm a mechanic," he said. "For Hershey."

"Oh, that's a good job!" Kira sidled in between Austin and Ethan.

"It is a good job," Ethan agreed and drank from his cup

while his eyes wandered everywhere on Kira's body but

her face.

It was so easy, realy. They wanted to seduce us. We

wanted to be seduced, for a few hours anyway. I knew

what we looked like to them. Two girls in slinky outfits,

sucking back drink after drink and letting the crowd push

us closer and closer. There's no such thing as social

distance in bars. The music makes conversation impossible

unless you lean across to shout in someone's ear. The

crush of people means you have to fight for your own

smal space, and sharing it doesn't seem so bad after a

smal space, and sharing it doesn't seem so bad after a

drink or four.

When Austin's hand ended up on my ass, I didn't even

blink. It felt good there. Heavy, warm. He had strong

fingers to go along with those biceps. He smeled good.

Drakkar Noir. Despite myself and everything that had

happened with us before, I'd missed him.

Austin said into my ear, "Wanna dance?"

Our bodies had always worked just right together,

whether we were dancing or fucking. I was ready for both.

Leaving Ethan and Kira, he took my hand and puled me

up the stairs to the third floor, where the songs ran into one

another without stopping and al sounded the same. We

found a spot in the middle and started dancing.

The booze had made me soft and melty, but the music

wasn't. I wanted to slow dance. Austin wanted to grind.

We compromised with a little hip action that brought us

groin to groin, but when he tried to flip me around and get

up on me in the back end, I pushed away with a smile.

"You don't answer my messages," Austin said.

It was easy to pretend I didn't hear him with the music so

loud. I smiled and shook my head. He took me by the

arm, up high in the soft part that bruises easily. His fingers

closed al the way around it.

He moved in to brush his lips against my ear. "I've realy

missed you."

I inched away from him, but Austin grabbed my wrist just

as a bazilion watts of supernova bright light lit the entire

dance floor. Austin stil looked good. I must not have

looked like Frankenstein, because he reached to brush my

hair from my forehead. He smiled again as the lights went

down and the beat of the music started its rapid thump-

thumping, the same as my heart.

It was different when he kissed me. I felt different. His

mouth opened and I let him inside me. His tongue stroked

mine as his hand came up to curl in my hair. He didn't pul

it, though my body tensed in anticipation.

Austin nuzzled at my earlobe. "You stil taste the same."

Fortunately, I remembered the reasons I'd broken off our

relationship. Unfortunately, I stil remembered al the

reasons we'd ever hooked up. When Austin ran a fingertip

reasons we'd ever hooked up. When Austin ran a fingertip

down my bare arm along the sensitive inside flesh to press

his fingertip just over the pulse at my wrist, I knew he felt

the way my heart sped up at his touch. Time hadn't

changed that. Maybe it never would.

Maybe that was okay.

"Come home with me," Austin said.

"It's too far." Forty minutes I'd have driven in a heartbeat back in the day, just to get in his pants. It wasn't too far.

Just too long.

"Paige," Austin said with a grin like a shark. "I moved to Lemoyne."

Just across the river. Fifteen minutes, tops, if you drove

realy slow or got stuck in traffic. The world fel out from

under my fuck-me pumps, but Austin was there to catch

me. The crowd moved and danced around us, but we

stayed stil. I looked deep into his blue, blue eyes, made

bluer by the strobe lights.

"What the fuck," I said evenly, "did you do that for?"

"New job," he reminded. "Remember?"

"New job," he reminded. "Remember?"

I tried to recal if he'd said where McClaron and Sons

was, and couldn't. He should've told me, I thought, and

hated myself for being irrationaly angry. I tugged my arm

from his grip. "I have to go check on Kira."

"She's fine. She's with Ethan."

I tried to level him with a glare, but I'd never been able to

level Austin. He'd laid me out cold a thousand times with a

look, but though I'd practiced and perfected my steely-

eyed look of cold disdain, it slid off him like oil. I bit my

lower lip and lifted my chin.

"If he's anything like you, I'd better make sure she's okay."

"Paige." Austin's hand snagged my wrist. Puled me close.

"If she's anything like you, she can handle him."

The night it ended between us, we'd fucked up against the

wal of our shitty, third-floor apartment on Cumberland

Street in Lebanon. The red-blue lights of a cop car outside

on the street had painted the ceiling and wal over our

heads. He'd torn away my panties, tossed them to the

side, used his body to pin mine to the wal while his hands

side, used his body to pin mine to the wal while his hands

held my ass.

I bore the marks of that last encounter on my back for a

few weeks where a nail from a falen picture had gouged

me. I hadn't noticed the pain or the blood while we were

going at it. I never had found my panties.

It had ended but wasn't over. The plain truth is, with a few

drinks in me there was little chance of my resisting Austin.

Not drunk. Not sober, either. Why else had I moved so

far away?

"Hel, no," Kira said when I found her downstairs and

brought up the subject. She shook her head and looked

over my shoulder to where I was sure Austin was

watching. "You told me to never, never, never let you fuck

him again!"

I made myself stare at her, not look back at him. "I know.

But that was before."

"Before what?" Kira's lip curled.

"Before you thought it would be fun to invite him out with

us. I haven't talked to him in months. Since before I moved

here. But now here he is."

here. But now here he is."

"And looking utterly fuckable." Kira didn't lose the sneer, but her gaze flickered back and forth to my face and over

my shoulder. "You know, Paige, I've known him as long

as you have. He moved up here, wanted to know where

the good places to go were. I told him we were coming

here. I didn't know you were going to go home with him. I

thought you were over him."

"I am over him!" I looked over my shoulder and caught his

gaze, then turned away with hot cheeks and fast-beating

heart.

"Whatever."

"I'l give you my key." I looked back at Austin, now bent

in conversation with Ethan.

"Fuck, no. I'l get Tony to come pick me up!" Kira shook

her head and stumbled a little bit.

I reached to steady her and she clutched at my hand. "Wil

he come for you?"

"He wil if I fucking tel him to." Kira straightened, then

"He wil if I fucking tel him to." Kira straightened, then

swiped at her hair.

"I'l wait with you until he comes."

"Don't do me any favors," Kira said, then slung her arm

around my shoulder. "Paige. Don't forget what happened."

As if I ever could. "I'l be fine!"

"Don't let your pussy get you into trouble," she continued, warning me off what she'd falen prey to many times

herself. "He made you cry."

"Yeah." I let Austin's gaze catch mine when it turned

toward me and didn't look away. "Wel, he won't make