Twisted Love (Modern Romance #3) - Piper Lawson Page 0,30

guy.”

She shifts out of bed, dragging a sweater over her bra. "Not everyone goes through life like you do.”

"What does that mean?"

She straightens, yanking her hair up in a ponytail. "Like you’re so focused on fixing everyone else, you ignore what’s going on for you.”

My chest tightens. "I just want you to achieve the things you want, that’s all. School isn’t the only way to be successful, but it can help. Especially with grades like yours.”

Lily makes a face. “My prof never notices me in that class anyway, even though it’s thirty people I don’t think he knows my name. If by some miracle he asked me where I was today, I’d tell him I was sick.”

“You’d lie.”

She shrugs. “He acts like he doesn’t want to be teaching that class, so why not? Don’t tell me you’ve never lied to someone you’ll never see again.”

My stomach knots with guilt, and she eyes me suspiciously. “You've been weird all week. Did something happen when you went out last night?”

I find the bracelet on my wrist.

Ben caught me off guard. Not by showing up looking outrageously sexy, or even by getting me info on Aiden Vane, but what he did for his brother.

I could steel myself against confident Ben. The vulnerable Ben I had no defense for, especially when he tried to cover his tracks with sexy teasing that felt oh so real.

The second he kissed me, every argument evaporated like water burning off as steam. I should’ve been thinking about how we’re friends, and this is fake, and whether Tris and the others could see us from that angle.

Instead, I was thinking his hair is the perfect length for tugging on when my fingers found their way there.

We were opposing forces dragging over one another, and I wanted more. His hands were possessive, his tongue wickedly teasing, his woodsy scent heady enough to make me drunk in a way cocktails never could.

I kissed him back as if I wanted him.

Because I did.

Fuck, I did.

I blink, realizing Lily’s still waiting for a response. “Nothing major.”

All day long I’ve been remembering the way it felt to kiss Ben, how much I wanted to go further.

"I would've ripped the dress off you—slowly—and fucked you against that mirror until you didn’t care.”

His pointed addition of my preferred speed did nothing to dull my reaction to his words.

I can’t stop thinking about what it would feel like if he did, if he backed me into the wall and claimed me with his body, the way it sometimes feels as if he does with his soul, his caring, his sheer intensity.

"But you wish something did happen,” she says as I turn and start for the hall.

I pause, a hand on the doorframe. “Why do you say that?”

“Because you’re in love with Ben. And even if he doesn’t love you back, you can’t walk away.”

The files slip from my fingers, papers escaping across the floor before I realize I’ve dropped them.

I bend to pick them up, to tuck them back under my arm before looking straight in those eyes that are so much like mine. “I’ll see you later.”

9

The hotel attendant enters my room with a wheeled cart. “Sir, where can I set this up for you?”

I rub a hand through my hair, nodding toward the TV. “The living room.”

It's been two long-ass days at an investing conference in London, catching up with colleagues. Congratulations, some back door meetings, even an old business school friend who moved from New York to London trying to convince me to move to his firm.

I told him I’d keep it in mind. In the unlikely event Xavier doesn’t back me to rise up the ranks, it’s good to have an exit strategy.

Usually, I thrive on that stuff, but while I was in a meeting, a notification went off on my phone of a big withdrawal from my mom's account.

I stepped out to call my mom at her treatment facility.

"Why did you take money out?"

"Your father called. His investments weren't doing well. Mine were."

I clenched my jaw. "No more, Mom. He's a user. He tells people one thing, then turns around and does something else."

“I love him,” she said simply.

“And that’s worth all the shit he’s put you through?”

She didn’t answer, and I didn’t expect her to.

Tonight, a bunch of guys are going over to one colleague's house, where he’s introducing them to his son who's starting Oxford next year. Even if I didn't already have plans, I didn't feel like spending the