59

Adam

How They Sell Movies

That was the thing with the ice princess. When she put her mind to it, nothing got in her way. If she was going to clean me up, she would clean me up. No matter how insignificant the whole thing was. Just freshmen being assholes. Nothing surprising about that.

"You don't have to do this," I reminded her

"Uh-huh."

"I'm waiting on an interview, Piper. I have to talk to a podcast." I stretched back to check the door. Still shut. "They'll be here soon."

"That's even more reason not to have blood on your face."

Piper tucked her legs underneath, sitting up on her knees. She pressed two fingers against the side of my face. Gently, she tilted me to the right to have a look. Still touching me.

Holy shit.

I tried to focus on the couch or where the paint chipped on the walls or the ugly-ass lamp, but it was hard to tear away from the skin-to-skin contact, the soft, gentle way she touched me. The warmth under her fingertips. The sweet smell of her perfume.

My breathing labored. I gripped part of the couch cushion away from her eyesight. Away from where she could see me and how hard I was struggling to stay normal.

Carefully, she cleaned my face in smooth strokes.

Giving me no choice but to look at her.

Trying to remain calm, I gazed into those doe eyes of hers, a soft gray, narrowed in concentration. Her pink nail polish drifted in and out of view while she cleaned me up, moving even closer, breathing in my air, forcing me to react every time she moved. The moment she shifted anywhere, I slipped in even closer.

"See?" she murmured, showing me the blood on the wipe.

The table got me worse than I thought, but I'd fall on it again if it meant Piper, touching me. Hell, I'd take a ball to the chest.

Her eyes flickered to mine. "You're quiet. Are you sure you're okay?"

All I could do was nod. If I spoke, my voice would've cracked.

Piper tried to be quick about the antibiotic cream, but it stung like a motherfucker, and I grunted. On pure instinct, I reached up to rub it away, but Piper's hand caught me instead. She couldn't have hoped to hold me back, but she did it anyway.

Fuck .

"Don't touch," she whispered.

A groan was so close to escaping, I could barely hold it in.

She released my hand. "I'm sorry - it's going to sting. Try to think of something else, okay?"

Think of something else .

My eyes trailed down her face, the most interesting thing in the room, and I caught sight of her lips again. When wasn't I staring at them? She had a sheen of lip gloss on, a darker red than usual.

What would it be like to kiss you?

My fingers dug further into the couch cushions, ripping part of the fabric. I thought back to the parking lot, Piper had been so adamant there was absolutely nothing between us. But what if there could be?

The longer I gazed at her face, the longer my mind wandered.

Taking Piper in my arms, crashing my lips to hers, giving her everything she'd been missing out on. The shower. The water, dripping off her body. The fucking heat between us, so hot I thought it burned me. My hand, between her legs, and her simple request.

Not on the lips .

Because Piper…believed in first kisses. Just like her parents said.

I straightened up on the couch with the realization while Piper finished up the bandage. She didn't kiss me because she was afraid it would mean something more. To her? To me? That's why she pushed away from it.

"That's why you said that in the shower," I muttered.

Piper met my eyes. "What?"

"Not on the lips," I quoted. "The first kiss thing. It's what your parents talked about at dinner."

Blinking slowly, Piper drew away from me and a flush crept up her neck as she put together what I was saying. But what I was saying was right . I could read it on Piper's face. It was my turn to shift up and Piper's to stay still. My fingers released the couch cushion.

Ah, man.

Piper was so sweet. So pure. She walked around with these kinds of fantasies and the truth was, they were just going to hurt her in the end. Real life didn't include things like that. I had to tell her.

"First kisses don't matter." I sighed. "It's how they sell movies."

"That's not true," Piper said quietly.

"Yeah, it is."

"No—I'm not talking to you about this."

She tried to stand up but I reached for her arm. This was something we had to talk about. If I wanted to protect her, I needed to correct this. "Come on, ice princess. Tell me."

"Adam—"

"Piper."

Pursuing her lips together, she sat back down on the couch. "Are you going to make fun of me?"

No, but I'm about to shatter some dreams and I fucking hate that I have to do it.

"I won't make fun of you," I promised.

"First kisses—to me—are magic," she explained slowly, giving me a hard look out of the corner of her eyes, daring me to laugh. But I didn't want to laugh. I listened with rapt attention while Piper wrung her hands together. "It's a soul connection. You can feel it."

Goddammit.

"What?" Piper's eyebrows furrowed. "What's the look on your face?"

"I'm sorry." I shook my head. "That's bullshit."

"I knew you were going to make fun of me."

"It's not making fun of you," I pointed out. "It's arguing. There's a difference. And first kisses aren't magic, that's just something people say when they haven't kissed enough people. There are good and bad kisses. Simple as that."

Her blush deepened. "You're missing the point. It's not about good kissing—"

"What?" My mouth hung open. "Sullender kissed like shit?"

"I didn't say that!" Piper blurted out.

"You just did. Goddamn."

I didn't feel bad for Thomas. Not for a fucking second. Instead, a deep sense of pleasure washed over me from the depths of somewhere I'd never felt before. Her ex-boyfriend kissed like shit. Ha. It made me feel good just hearing that—which was fucking stupid—but I just got knocked in the head with a table, so I could feel anything I wanted. I smirked.

"Oh and what?" Piper rolled her eyes. "I could go figure it out? Kiss every guy on campus?"

The smirk dropped off my face. "I didn't say that."

"Just because you don't know what a soul connection is, doesn't mean it doesn't exist. First kisses are magic," Piper said, exasperated.

"It's technique."

"It's magic."

"Technique."

"Adam, it's something you'll never understand because you're just a—"

I shifted up and my heart thumped in my chest. "We could test it out together."