Nuclear Heat (Firework Girls Book 4) Read online

  It feels like there’s a string attached to my heart, and Jack’s got a hold of the other end, and he’s pulling, pulling, pulling. Reeling me in.

  “Um...” he says.

  I roll my eyes. Oh my god, what? I guess when I texted “I’m going out with the girls” I should’ve said “I don’t want to see you tonight.”

  He glances at my shoes and purse on the floor. “You haven’t been drinking again, right?”

  I sigh and look at the ceiling. I think about saying, Yes, but don’t worry. I’ve got my membership to AA all lined up. Instead, I say, “No.”

  He comes in and shuts the door. I watch him as he comes around and sits on the couch. He looks perfectly serious. So do I.

  “Are you going to tell me what last night was about?” he asks.

  I look back to the ceiling and sigh. I barely remember last night. “What do you mean?”

  “You know what I mean. Why’d you drink so much?”

  I shrug. “People do it.”

  “You don’t.”

  “Yeah, well, there’s a first for everything.” Lucky me.

  “Sam,” he says softly, pulling my eyes to him. Our eyes meet and it makes my heart give in, in spite of myself. “Come on, honey,” he says gently. “Tell me what’s bothering you.”

  Here it is again. The heartbreak. This time, it feels like a little ball of concentrated pain, squeezing my heart and throat and making it hard to swallow. Who knew heartbreak came in so many different varieties? As I look at Jack’s face, his genuine concern for me so evident, a hot tear leaks out and skips down my cheek.

  Jack watches it and frowns. “Hey,” he says, scooting to the end of the couch and leaning toward me. He’s not touching me at all, but I feel wrapped up in him like a cloud. He reaches out and wipes the tear with his thumb. His touch hums through my body, from cheek to feet.

  “If I didn’t know better,” he says, giving me a gentle, teasing prod on the shoulder, “I’d think you were crying over some guy.”

  My eyes widen and my reaction comes through on my face before I can stop it. He straightens sharply, blinking in shock.

  Oh god.

  I roll onto my side, away from him, one arm dangling off the table, my face on the edge. Yeah. We just need to stop talking now and he needs to stop looking at me and I need to stop looking at him.

  He’s quiet so long, I wonder if he’s going to leave. Part of me wants him to. Part of me needs him to stay. Because being in love is a special kind of fucked up, I’m discovering.

  I close my eyes. Why did he have to come now? Why did I have to fall in love with him?

  I hear him get off the couch and walk around the table. It sounds like he’s sitting down right in front of me. When I open my eyes, he’s lying on the floor on his back, his body parallel to mine. His head is under mine, so I’m looking right at him.

  There’s no escaping him now.

  He’s wearing a pained expression I can’t interpret. “I’m sorry for teasing you,” he says. “Heartbreak sucks.”

  Hot tears make another appearance, dammit. He reaches up and wipes a tear from my cheek.

  I give up.

  My heart is aching. He’s killing me. I grab his hand, hanging onto it as he cups my cheek and neck.

  “Ah, Sammy,” he says. “I know this is new for you, but it gets better.” He pauses. Again, that expression I can’t read. “Usually.”

  I look at him helplessly. As much as I need and cherish his friendship, how can that ever be enough for me now? How can I pretend?

  I tell myself I need to let go of his hand. But when I loosen my grip, instead of taking my hand away the way I meant to, I slide it down to his forearm and grip again, hanging on to Jack for dear life.

  He follows the movement of my hand and his brows furrow slightly. He looks back to me, a question in his eyes. I’m too worn out and heartbroken to do anything but look back.

  The furrow in his brows deepen. “Who,” he asks slowly, “is this guy?”

  I press my lips together, the tears running fresh again. I can’t look away from him. I can’t hide it. Maybe this is what Ashley knew, and why she said to talk to him about it. I can’t hide this from him anyway.

  A pained look crosses his face: confusion and disbelief. “Sam?” He chokes out my name, his voice a whisper.

  It’s you. It’s you.

  And I’m just one more woman he didn’t mean to make fall in love with him.

  I give a weak shrug and find my voice at last. “Sorry,” I whisper. I didn’t mean to fall in love with Jack. I really didn’t.

  His eyes widen slightly in surprise and dawning realization. Now he knows the truth, surely.

  It’s only inevitable now: his “we’ll always be friends” speech, or “I didn’t mean to give you the wrong idea” speech, or “I’m in love with Emily” speech. Part of me is cringing against the horrible words I know are coming. Part of me is willing to beg. Beg.

  Part of me doesn’t want to go one second past this moment, because there’s not one single thing Jack can do that won’t terrify me.

  He has that deer-caught-in-headlights look. He’s still processing what I’ve revealed and he has no idea what to do next. No good can come from this. God, why did I have to put the both of us in this awkward fucking position?

  This time, I do move, only half an inch, intending to get off the table and away, but his hand suddenly tightens against my face, keeping me here.

  He’s looking at me differently now. Am I just imagining it? Am I reading too much into an expression like those ridiculous love-sick girls are so prone to do? There’s no denying I’m officially a ridiculous love-sick girl myself. But he’s looking at me almost the way he has in my dreams, like he wants me, too. But it’s even more than that. He looks hungry for me. I thought I knew every way Jack’s face could look, but I never could have imagined him looking at me like this.

  My heart is pounding against the table and every inch of my skin is on alert. There’s that string again, drawing me in whether I want it to or not.

  My breathing is sharp and shallow. I now realize, so is his. Oh my god.

  He looks like he wants to come to me and I want him to. I’m beyond terrified, but God help me, I want him to so badly.

  Still holding my cheek, eyes locked on mine, he lifts his head an inch toward me. I match his move. I didn’t mean to. We both freeze.

  He’s not moving or hardly breathing but he’s reeling me in and I’m sunk. I can’t fight this.

  I lean down to him half an inch more, asking. Begging. If he pulls back I know it will tear my heart open, but what’s the difference? I’m already bleeding.

  But he doesn’t pull away. He swoops up, coming to me until our lips press together. My heart does, in fact, break open. I am broken everywhere and completely lost in him.

  Jack. Jack.

  It’s just a kiss, but it consumes me. I smell him. I hear his jagged breathing, matching mine. My lips are on his, but even though a kiss is what I wanted, it is instantly not enough. I part my lips slightly, needing to taste him. He pulls away, just enough to look at me. He may as well have pulled my heart out of my chest too.

  I’m terrified I’ll see regret in his eyes. Or the look of a friend who’s only kissed me out of pity.

  Instead I see that look of longing. I’ve seen it a hundred times on the faces of a hundred different men. It feels so different coming from Jack.

  He takes my face into both hands then and kisses me firmly, pressing hard against my mouth. A whimper escapes me. I tighten my grip on his arm, kissing him hard back. Our mouths open eagerly, our tongues desperately tasting each other.

  Oh god, oh my god.

  He suddenly hooks his arm around my back and slides me off the table on top of him. Our mouths and tongues work together with a kind of desperation I’ve never experienced. Our arms close around each other like a vise. I’m lightheaded. My heart feels ready to burst, unable to hold this thing in me that is so big
and terrible and divine. Oh god. I give a little whimper. Then another.

  He moans and grips the back of my head with his hand, pulling me even harder against his mouth. My heart is pounding fiercely and I’m literally dizzy. He rolls us over so he’s pressed on top of me and I’m so drunk with him I can only hang on.

  Our kissing grows more impassioned and my hands are all over him. All I know are his kisses and his body and everything in me reaching for him.

  I can’t get him close enough to me. I want him inside me. I mean, I want his entire body inside my entire body and I never knew it was possible to want such a thing. To want a person this way. To want him. All of him. Jack.

  I feel his desire for me hard against my inner thigh. My body responds instantly. Suddenly I’m on fire everywhere, my crotch aching for him. This is more familiar territory, to be sure, and I feel slightly more sure-footed for a brief moment.

  Then that moment goes up in flames.

  Even wanting him sexually is different from anything I’ve experienced before. I can’t stop running my hands over his back, feeling the firm muscles under his lightweight t-shirt. But I’m more than touching him, and he’s more than touching me. He’s tearing through me. Jack is a tsunami of sensation that lights up my skin and sets a blaze deep inside me, reaching deeper into my soul than anyone’s ever done before. Even him.

  I want him inside me. I need him inside me. He presses himself against me and I wrap my legs around him, angling my hips to press against him. The hard cock under his jeans grinds into me. His tongue dives deeper into me as he holds my face like he can’t kiss me hard enough. And I can’t either. God, I need him so much.

  I run my hand under his shirt onto bare skin. Touching his skin lights me up even more. Suddenly I’m afraid to push it any further. I’m afraid it’s all a dream, and that if I’m not careful the magic bubble will pop and it’ll be over. He’ll change his mind. It’ll all stop. As I wrap myself around him and our tongues dive frantically into each other, I’m almost panicked, trying to push down that fear that Jack will suddenly leave me and I won’t know how to make him stay.

  He abruptly lifts off and away.

  “Jack!” I gasp, reaching for him. Then I see he was only lifting up so he could remove his shirt. He already had it half way up his chest when he froze, startled by my cry for him.

  I’ve revealed myself yet again. He sees my fear and longing for him and there is no hiding.

  It seems to fuel something in him. He looks as hungry for me as I am for him. My breasts are heaving as he tears off his shirt. I’ve seen his chest a million times. It’s almost as familiar to me as his face. But this is different. Everything’s different. It’s Jack, but more.

  He reaches under my hips and grabs the waistband of my pants. I immediately raise my hips, and he tears my sweats and panties off in one, hurried motion.

  His hardness is straining against his jeans. He unbuttons his fly and releases his cock in a flash and I wonder how in the fuck I’ve never known until now how well-endowed he is.

  The only reaction I have is to exhale sharply, because there’s no time for anything else. He pushes his jeans to his knees but doesn’t take the time to get up and take them off all the way. He gives me a look that tells me I’m about to discover just what Jack can do with that cock and then he’s on me again, pushing his mouth hard on me. I’m matching his every move, frantic for him.

  The tip of his cock finds my entrance like a heat-seeking missile, and he takes me hard and fast. Jack fills my slick channel, stretching me and turning that blaze inside me into an inferno. Just when I thought this was already more than a person could take.

  We moan together and he rides me hard, my entire body rocking with him.

  Oh my god, oh god.

  I’m panting, overcome. I didn’t know... I didn’t know it could be like this. Every inch his cock moves inside me stirs me up higher and higher. I’m clinging to his bare back, his muscles hard and flexing beneath my arms. He urgently squeezes one breast through my cami, then frantically lifts up the fabric to expose my chest and squeezes it again. He’s sucking on my neck and shoulder and jaw. My mouth is working soundlessly with pleasure and shock and desire and wonder. Holy god. My heart is helpless against this.

  We kick into a higher gear. More intense. More desperate. More frantic as he works me faster and my body opens to him like I’ve never opened to anyone. My pussy clamps down on his hard cock and I think I’m going to come undone. He groans low and long in my ear. He almost sounds in pain. I’m panting and whimpering as ecstasy spikes in my body.

  Oh god. Omigod.

  “Jack,” I breathe, biting it out and throwing my head back. He tucks into me, holding his head against my neck as I continue to arch back. Tsunami Jack crashes against me, and I climax hard. It’s almost frightening. I can’t breathe. I can’t think. It’s the most intense pleasure I’ve ever felt, tearing through me in one massive wave after another, and then Jack is thrusting helplessly as he empties into me.

  The sound he makes only makes my heart yearn for him more.

  God, darling.

  Through it all, I’m still clinging to him, convulsing and wanting him more than I knew a person could want anyone.

  And then we’re released. Dropped, more like. The churning storm inside me folds in on itself and recedes, leaving me stunned.

  Slick with sweat, our bodies slow. Then become still. Our vise-like holds on one another soften slightly. Except for our labored breathing, we aren’t moving at all.

  By all my normal standards, what we just did could be called tame. No foreplay. No sexy lingerie. No changing positions. No slapping. No dirty talk. All Jack did was take me in the missionary position and rock me to the fucking core.

  And at the same time, I have no idea what this was for him. Was it just a spur-of-the-moment thing? That moment of passion I’ve always heard can happen between two friends even when it doesn’t mean anything? Or was it—

  Then I remember. With Jack still in my arms, and still in me and all around me... that’s when I remember.

  I pinch my eyes closed.

  Oh god.

  I’m barely breathing now. I don’t even need to look at him to know he’s remembered, too. I feel it in his body and know it by the way he’s suddenly holding his breath. Oh god, what have we done?

  He slowly, so slowly lifts off me. He doesn’t look at me. I can’t breathe. I look at his profile and that’s when my heart breaks again. Here’s another expression I’ve never seen on him, dripping with pain and guilt and regret. Fuck.

  He slowly crawls backwards, sliding out of me and leaving me feeling empty, still not looking at me. As he pulls away and goes to his knees, I pull my top down over my breasts and draw my legs together. I can’t take my eyes off his face.

  He slowly hitches up his pants, fastens the button, and pulls up the zipper. He pinches his eyes shut and brings his hands to his face, rubbing them hard over his forehead and into his hair where he grips huge handfuls.

  I want to comfort him, but what in the hell do I say?

  My wits slowly start coming back to me. We didn’t even use a condom. God, I didn’t even think about it. We’ve talked about this kind of thing before and I know Jack always uses a condom. I always insist on it too, even though I’m on birth control.

  What. The fuck. Were we thinking?

  But that’s not the worst part. Not by a mile. Jack is not over there regretting the lack of a condom. I can only imagine how horrible he’s feeling, because I practically feel like I cheated on her. In a way, I did. I knew he was off limits. He’s hers, not mine.

  I forgot. I forgot he doesn’t belong to me.

  He gets heavily to his feet and I pull up into a sit, bare legs tucked together to the side, reaching for my sweats. He turns away and I fumble them on, getting into a weak stand myself. My skin still remembers the feel of Jack’s touch, but it’s slipping away from me. I feel cold and my legs start to shiver.

 
He grabs his shirt from the floor and works it over his body. Then he looks... lost. He paces to the couch.

  “I’m sorry,” I say, and I am. No matter what happens next, Jack’s the bad guy and someone’s heart is broken.

  He looks at me then. Our eyes meet, and as so often happens, we’re joined together in understanding. I look away. I’ve seen before how men look at the woman they’ve strayed with, after they regret it. I don’t want to see Jack looking at me that way.

  Forget someone’s heart being broken. All kinds of hearts will be broken.

  He slowly comes back around the table, dully pulls me into his arms against his chest, and holds me there. I circle my arms around his waist, even though I’m afraid I know what this is. I feel the tears welling up but I force them down. I don’t want to cry again. I can do that after. Right now I try to hold on to every detail so I can keep them in my mind later: how his arms are wrapped around me, how I’m nestled inside of him, the way his back feels so firm and warm against my hands, the smell of the man I know so well, and the tender way he’s holding me, even if it is darkened with regret.

  I’m still in my bare feet, but Jack’s dressed and even has his shoes on. “I have to go,” he says quietly.

  I nod against his chest.

  Then he plants a gentle kiss on top of my head, pulls away, and leaves without a word, the door clicking softly behind him.

  Chapter 15

  Jack

  I don’t think I’ve ever hated myself more than I do in this moment.

  Chapter 16

  Sam

  I don’t call the girls. I don’t talk to a soul. I pick up my phone a hundred times to text Jack, but I never do because I don’t know what to say.