Flirt: Bad Boy Romance by Ashley Hall

Take a risk. Dare to live a little on the wild side.”
     
    I risked glancing at him. His grin was lopsided, irritating…and irresistible.
     
    “And I beg to differ,” he continued. “I know all about intimacy.”
     
    “That…” I fumble for words, “…whatever it was in the hallway, that wasn’t intimate.” It had been surprising. Invasive. And kind of a turn-on.
     
    “Did you want it to be intimate?” He whispered the last word and leaned closer to me.
     
    I was so glad I insisted he wore a seat belt. This car was feeling way too small as it was. I didn’t need him to be any closer to me. Concentrating on driving was proving almost impossible.
     
    “Intimacy is about a connection,” he added. “Do you know anything about a connection of bodies, April?”
     
    I hated, and loved, the way my name sounded on his tongue. But I was done feeding into him. My side of this conversation was over. Yes, ignoring him was the way to go. Forget about him and his smile and his teasing and his sexiness.
     
    This was lust, pure and simple. Nothing substantial. Nothing meaningful. So maybe I’d daydream about him. It was harmless. Nothing would ever happen between us, so what did it matter if he replaced Adam in my daydreams? If my daydreams just happened to be a little sexier than normal?
     
    Mom would be so disappointed in me right now. Not just for thinking about Wesley this way, but for thinking about any guy this way. Like an object. She always wanted me to be a strong female who was willing to stand up for myself and not be reduced to a piece of meat, and here I was, doing exactly that to Wesley.
     
    No more dirty thoughts about him. And for the rest of this car ride, no more talking to him either.
     
    “I think I might be able to make a connection with any of your three pretty friends,” he said. “What do you think? Think they want a piece of this?” He gestured from his head down to his toes.
     
    I rolled my eyes and tried to concentrate more on the road and less on him, the sexy but frustrating step-brother.
     
    “Your friends did an awful lot of talking, thinking about me sexually. You, I noticed, stopped after a while. Were you fantasizing too?”
     
    Without thinking, I nodded as I cleared the intersection.
     
    “I knew it!”
     
    I glanced at him, trying to feign surprise. Why had I nodded? I was distracted by the road. That, and I grew up with strict parents who taught that lying was wrong. By default, I almost always tell the truth.
     
    In this case, a little white lie wouldn’t have hurt.
     
    “Knew what?” I blinked innocently.
     
    “Knew you all were thinking about all the hot lovin’ you want with me. Admit it.”
     
    “I will not—”
     
    “Admit it!”
     
    My face had to be bright red. My entire body felt way too hot. “You know what, Wesley? Why don’t you confess? Why weren’t you at school in the morning?”
     
    “You know what, April? It’s none of your business.”
     
    Him parroting my words back to me felt like a slap in the face.
     
    The rest of the car ride was silent. Funny. I had wanted to stop talking to him, but now that he wasn’t talking or teasing me, the silence felt suffocating.
     
    I just couldn’t win.

Chapter Five
     
    Wes
     
     
     
    I didn’t know what got into me, but once I started to tease April, I couldn’t stop. It was just too much fun watching her squirm. Seeing her bent over the water fountain, her ass sticking out…I just had to approach her, and when I got close, I had to get even closer until we were touching. It was a good thing she jerked away when she did or else she would’ve realized just how much I enjoyed our proximity. Just from feeling her ass against me for a little bit had gotten me so hard.
     
    But even I knew I went too far for too long in the car. Now that we were back at the house, her eyes would widen and she’d make an excuse and jump out of every room that I entered. I confused her. Not necessarily