My heart stammered, and my mouth dropped. He’d do that for me? Insert swoon here.
“I honestly couldn’t care less about Chace anymore. It’s not about getting payback for me anymore. I don’t care. It’s about getting back at him for whatever he did to you and—” I stopped talking when I saw the smile on his lips. Suddenly those lips were on mine with such force that I fell backwards into the bed of soft pillows with Ryder half on top of me.
“Well, that was rather enthusiastic of you.” I laughed when he removed his mouth from mine.
“Sorry, I got a bit carried away.” His fingers brushed the hair off my forehead. His green eyes stared into mine as he hovered above me. “Did you mean it?”
“What?” I asked, unable to look away from his eyes, which were darkening dramatically every second.
“That you don’t care about Chace anymore?” Oh, that. I didn’t mean to say that because I didn’t want Ryder to leave me yet. He had helped me so much, and I was afraid I would go backwards if he were gone.
“I’m still pissed at him, and it still hurts that he treated me like that, but yes, I meant it. I don’t care about him anymore because of you. And now I want to help you get your revenge. He deserves everything he gets.” I smiled, admitting the truth and hoping like hell he didn’t want to end our fake relationship.
“You have no idea how glad I am to hear that,” he whispered, dipping his head and bringing his lips to mine again. I instantly curled my hands into his hair how he liked it, tugging gently. I opened my mouth for him. I felt his tongue pressing against my lips. It was warm and smooth in my mouth, and I had this sudden need to have him closer. Desire flooded my body. I brought my leg up and hooked it over his hips, causing him to lower all of his weight on top of me. What was he doing to me?
“Bailey.” He groaned against my lips before trailing soft kisses down my neck and along my collarbone, forcing an involuntary moan from my mouth. “You need to stop doing that. I’m barely in control right now.”
“Doing what?” I moaned when I felt his hand grip my thigh closer to his waist while his teeth grazed across my shoulder.
“Stop wiggling beneath me. I can feel every inch of your body,” he hissed between kisses. “And stop pulling on my hair. I like it too much.” He kissed back up my neck, his teeth skimming my ear, making me moan again. “And please stop making those noises. They’re turning me on.” He brought his mouth back to mine, roughly pushing his tongue through my parted lips before I could even comprehend what he’d said. Was I turning him on? Oh!
“Hell,” he mumbled. He pushed off me, leaving me missing the close contact of his warm body. He threw himself down on the pillows beside me and covered his face with his hands. “What are you doing to me?” He rolled over to look at me.
“Me?” I rolled onto my side to look at him too. “What are you doing to me?” I had never kissed anyone like that before.
He rolled his eyes.
It was a gift really, that I could make him roll his eyes so often.
“I meant what I said earlier, Bailey, about wanting to see that dishevelled just been fu…mmd oog.” I tried to stop him from finishing that sentence by squeezing his mouth shut again, but he still managed to say it somewhat muffled and garbled, and I knew exactly what he meant. He threw his head back and laughed.
“Come here. Let’s watch this crap.” I didn’t see the point. We had already missed the beginning, and it didn’t look good anyway. He held his arms out, and I moved into them nonetheless. Resting my head on his chest, I let my fingers trace along the v of his exposed stomach where his shirt had ridden up. He shivered at my touch but didn’t say anything, so I continued my exploration of his abs, hips, and chest until he finally stopped me.
“Bailey,” he said, his warning tone evident as he grabbed my hand tightly to stop its movements.
“Sorry.” I widened my eyes and pressed my mouth shut. I must have pushed him too far. No one could see us back there. There was no reason for me or us to be so…friendly, for lack of a better word. Ryder groaned, and before I knew it, he had flipped me onto my back so he was hovering over me once again with my hands pinned above my head.
His eyes searched mine for a moment. He must have found whatever he was looking for in them, because the faintest ghost of a smile crossed his beautiful pink lips before they were on mine once again.
I was so lost in his kisses and the warmth of his arms that I lost all sense of time. Apparently, he did too. We kissed and kissed and kept kissing until a pounding on the side of the truck made Ryder pull back with a groan and a frown on his face.
“Kinda busy here.” Ryder growled over his shoulder.
I bit my lip to suppress the laugh that was threatening to explode at the disappointed look on his face.
“Is everything okay? The movie end—” I heard Chace’s voice falter and turned my head to the side to see him peering over the edge of the truck, “—ed twenty minutes ago. What the hell, Bailey?” he shouted.
“Get lost, Chace.” Ryder pushed himself off me, reaching out to pull me up too.
“What the hell are you doing, Bailey? This isn’t you.” He gestured to what I assumed was my very messed up and dishevelled appearance as we climbed out the back of the truck. Ryder and I had apparently kissed throughout the whole movie and twenty minutes after. The entire drive-in was empty. I let out a bitter laugh.
“Like you know who I am, Chace. This is exactly me. This is me when I’m not pretending to be someone I’m not. This is me when I’m not trying to please you,” I said, smoothing my hands through my hair and trying to ignore the smirk on Ryder’s face at my attempt to fix my appearance.
“No, this is crap. This is him. He’s a bad influence on you. You were never like this until he came along.” Chace raised his voice.
Ryder’s fists clenched by his sides. He went to move but stopped when I tugged on his wrist, pulling him to me.
“This has nothing to do with Ryder,” I shouted. I could feel all the anger I had for him boiling inside.
“Of course it does,” Chace yelled back.
“You know what? You’re right. This has everything to do with Ryder,” I said, feeling Ryder tense beside me and try to pull his hand from my grip, but I only tightened it. I knew he thought that I agreed with Chace all of a sudden, but I didn’t. “Because of Ryder, I’m confident. And I am so over you. Because of Ryder, I’m happy. And you can go and screw Christina. Or yourself for all I care. Just leave me alone.” I looked at Ryder, and he stared back, chewing on his lip ring again.
“Chace!” Christina called out like nails scratching down a chalkboard. “What are you doing?”
“Better run along before she gets angry,” I told Chace while still watching Ryder, trying to work out what he was thinking and if I had said the wrong thing.
Had I just freaked him out? Probably.