Switched: Flirt New Adult Romance (28 page)

“Mmm,” I moan. “I don’t think I’ll get tired of that.”

I keep myself as close to him as I can while I pull my arms inside my shirt and rotate the shirt so it’s on the right way, then slide my arms back through the sleeves.

He takes my face again and gives me the grossest kiss possible, keeping his mouth as wide open as it can go as he smothers mine.

“Ew, Wesley!” I laugh and wipe my now very wet face.

“Guess you will get tired of it.” He smirks.

“You ass.”

His eyelids shut and he breathes in the smell of my hair. “I
love
when you call me that.”

“Ass,” I whisper against his cheek. And because I’m not scared anymore, I say what I’ve wanted to since I found it out. “And I love
you
.”

He whips back to focus on my eyes, and I smile shyly.

“Aw, Mickey. You beat me to it.”

“Since you called me that, I take it back.”

“Perfect.” He pulls our foreheads together. “Now let it be on the record that I said it first. I love you, Kayla.”

Will my heart ever go back to its normal pace? “You officially get a thousand good-boyfriend stars.”

“What if I want high-fives instead?”

“You take what you can get.”

His lips crush mine, and my back gets pressed against his van. We make out in the parking lot until we’re both gasping for air and our shirts are almost off again.

“Okay, we have to get in there now,” Wesley grunts, jumping away from me and gesturing to Phantom’s. “Or I’m going to end up pushing you back inside that van.”

I want to tell him I’m okay with that, but I know we have to fix things with our best friends first. Especially Reagan. I feel so damn awful about making her see Wesley only to fall in love with him myself. At least Wesley had the decency to make sure Talon and I weren’t dating before moving in.

Well, I’ve always known he’s the better person.

“What are we going to tell them?”

He sighs, reaching up to fix my major make-out hair. Good luck. My wild curls can’t be tamed.

“Everything.”

My fingers curl around Wesley’s as we walk to the back table Reagan and Talon are sharing. They’re sitting on the same side, thank heavens. I don’t think I can let go of Wesley without the fear of him never coming back to me.

The music’s loud enough that we approach without them really noticing till we’re sliding into the booth with them. We keep our intertwined hands hidden under the table, and when we’ve settled in, Wesley releases my hand and opts for my thigh instead. If I wasn’t so scared of confrontation—which I’m sure is about to happen—I’d be soaring from that touch.

“Everything okay, man?” Talon asks, eyebrows pinched.

Wesley nods and squeezes my thigh. “Yeah. Sorry about earlier.”

“You guys were out there forever.” Reagan tucks a purple-highlighted strand of hair behind her ear. Her eyebrows rise at the sight of my hair, and a flash of a smile crosses her lips.

“What took so long?”

Wesley sucks in a breath, and I know he’s about to spill, but he shouldn’t have to. This whole thing was my stupid idea.

“We were fooling around in Wesley’s van!” I blurt out, so loud we get a half dozen eyes thrown our direction. So much for being cool. I shrug them off and lower my voice, ready to tell them it’s our fault they broke up. That we spent hours together coming up with ways to pull them
apart. That during those hours and all the conniving I fell for Wesley. And if he wants to jump in and say he fell for me too, then he can go right ahead. And that I’m sorry, we’re sorry, for ruining our friendships and putting our own selfish desires ahead of them. But all my words get stopped with the ones that come out of Talon.

“It’s. About. Time.” His forehead hits the table and he fist-pumps the air. “I don’t think I could’ve kept up that act much longer.”

Wesley and I say in unison, “What?”

Reagan laughs and squeals, hopping over the table to squish both of us in a very boob-filled hug. “We’ve been trying to get you guys together for
months!
Looks like it finally worked.”

Again Wesley and I say, “What?”

She settles back into her seat, and Talon lifts his hand, gesturing for her to explain. Uh, yeah! Please explain!

“Well, someone needs to keep their journal somewhere I can’t find it.”

Oh shit! No! I was so careful. I …

Wait … she’s winking, but not at me.

At Wesley.

His face drains of color, and I smack his leg. “You said it was locked tight! How did she find it?”

He shrugs, and Reagan giggles. “He left his computer on, and I’m a snoop. Hey, you all know that about me and you still love me. It can’t be helped.”

“When was this?” Wesley croaks, face still pasty white.

“Oh, back when these two party poopers left us alone at your apartment. I went to go get games and found your laptop instead. Very juicy stuff, my friend.”

“You put your journal on your computer?” I ask him.

“It’s password-protected. I swear, I don’t remember ever leaving it open.” He turns toward Reagan. “So, you know?”

“That you and Kayla wanted to break us up? Yeah. But I also know that’s not what you
really
wanted.”

His face changes from white to red so fast, it’s like he’s trying to do a color wheel impression. He nervously runs his hand over his hair. “So you guys have been faking this whole thing?”

“It was Reagan’s idea,” Talon puts in. “Trust me. I don’t like meddling.”

She laughs, flipping her hair and bouncing in her seat. “Of course it was my idea. I know from experience jealousy is the strongest emotion ever, and if I could just get you guys to that point, you’d finally figure out you were totally in love with each other. Not us. So we let you
guys think what you were doing was working, and flipped it back on you. Here.” She pulls out her phone and taps the screen a few times. “I just sent you my own notes on the thing. Nighttime reading for you, so we’re even.”

I shake my head to get rid of the fuzz. Is this for real? “So, the breakup …?”

“Fake.”

“The whole sex argument?”

“Sort of fake.”

I want to probe into that, but I will later. Because the most important thing I need to clarify comes out.

“And you don’t like Wesley?”

She laughs, reaching for my free hand. “I like him, but not like that. I already have my guy.”

“But that night when I stormed out, Wesley came outside and his shirt was all rumpled and …”

Reagan gives me a pinched smile, and Wesley jumps in.

“Wait, you thought we …? No, no, no. You ran out and I was on my feet in a second to come after you, then this ball of energy tackled me to the ground.” He waves at Reagan, who’s laughing and snuggling into Talon’s armpit. “When I got her off me, I was out the door and you and Talon were, you know, hugging and shit.”

Talon sighs, tracing a finger on Reagan’s shoulder. “Totally platonic, dude. I was only making sure she was all right. Ray warned me about the anxiety attacks Kayla gets when people fight, but I didn’t expect that. I had to apologize for it.”

We all settle into our seats, and at an almost turtle-like pace, things come together in my head. It
was
easy. Finding time to be alone, finding a “problem” and it coming to the surface when it did. Then after the fake breakup them being so cool about everything, asking us out, the whole “I Never” episode, even Talon telling me I belonged to someone, just not him.

Damn them! How did they pull this off without us figuring it out? I mean, it was orchestrated so well, I even ended up on a date with …

“Holy hell. I almost kissed you!” I blurt out at Talon, causing more eyeballs to go our way. “What would’ve happened if … I mean, you didn’t expect
that
, did you?”

Talon shakes his head, drumming his fingers on the edge of the table. “Yeah, I panicked. The only thing I could think of was to flip that lever and ruin the moment.”

And here I thought it was me who ruined it.

“Wait, Reagan almost kissed me that night. Explain that.” Wesley’s hand is still planted on my thigh, and his fingers give me a little squeeze.

Reagan’s smile hasn’t left her face since my first outburst. “I knew you wouldn’t go
through with it. All you talked about was Kayla and what you thought she and Talon were doing.” In her best Wesley voice, she says, “ ‘Do you think they went to Stoner Boner? Maybe we should head up there and scare the shit out of them. You don’t think they’ve kissed, do you? That’d be weird, you know?’ Kayla this, Kayla that.”

She laughs as I watch Wesley’s face go red. I bite back my smile, letting go of all the confusion and snuggling into Wesley’s neck. How adorable is he? “Is that true?”

His shoulders relax and his hand moves from my leg to around my shoulder. “Of course. It drove me crazy all that night you were with him.” His mouth moves toward my ear, and in a low voice I don’t think the other two can hear, he says, “That’s the real reason I wanted you at my apartment that night. And I admit, I was stoked when you had a shitty time.” My heart may pound right out of my chest and smack him in the face.

He turns to Reagan, extending a hand. “Props to the two of you evil geniuses. I don’t think either of us had a clue.”

She gives him one hard shake, then leans into Talon’s arms. “Thank you. And be grateful you have two of the best friends in the world. Some would’ve found that evidence and called you out on it.”

“Yeah.” I smile. “We’re lucky enough to have friends who will be evil right along with us.”

We all laugh, and Talon orders us those drinks he promised forever ago. I want to ask more questions, but I let it slide. I’ll read that email Reagan sent later. Because does it matter that they totally played us? Their intentions were a million times better than ours. And when Wesley plants kisses on my forehead, squeezes my shoulder, or whispers some smart-ass comment in my ear, all those heart-pounding feelings push away everything else.

Play us all you want, guys, as long as I end up here in Wesley’s arms. I’ll never want to be anywhere else.

Progress Report: February 13 (and 14, if we’re getting technical)

How dorky is that? Wesley and I became official the day before Valentine’s Day. I hope he doesn’t try to get me flowers. I’m okay with making out all day instead.

Ha! That made him laugh. Yes, he’s reading over my shoulder as I write this, trying to get me to kiss him, but jeez, a girl needs a breather to mark down this epic day in the history of Kayla! Okay, he’s leaving me alone. Damn, he looks so sexy with make-out hair. I may have to make this short.

So Talon and Reagan are still trying to convince us this was
their
plan all along. I think I want to call bogus, because both Wesley and I got super close to kissing them. Especially Wesley, from what I heard. I try not to think too much about it, but at the same time I’m way happy he was the one to back out. (Because of me. Squee!)

I totally read Reagan’s email the second we got back to Wesley’s apartment. Okay, okay, not the very second, because it’s kind of hard to read when you’re pinned up against the wall and the person you love is doing something pretty magical with his lips.

But I spent a little time with that journal of hers, and it’s making me fall for Wesley even more. Is there a stronger emotion than love? Because that is what I feel.

I’ll bullet-point the most important parts. If Wesley would stop trying to tickle me, I’d get this done faster!