Pure Seduction by Frank, Ella (first ebook reader .txt) 📕

He reached out and took off my hat, and when he put it on his head backward, I was thrust back into the past and that afternoon here under the bleachers.

“We were a lot younger then.” He moved in closer and ran the back of his fingers down my cheek. “A lot more…inexperienced.”

My legs trembled as his fingers continued down my neck to the V of my shirt. When I didn’t stop him, he smirked. Arrogant. Over the years Noah’s cocky schoolboy confidence had turned to arrogance, and God help me, it was so damn hot that I almost melted at his feet.

I tilted my head up, and when he took hold of my chin to hold me steady, I softly sighed.

“I had the hottest dreams about you last night. You were naked and straddling me, your hair all down around my face…”

He slid his thumb along my lower lip, and I sucked it between my lips. Noah cursed, let go of me, and put his hands on the rails by my head, then thrust his hips forward and rubbed his erection against me.

“Ah…” I grabbed at his waist.

“Yeah, there it is. That has to be the sexiest fucking sound I’ve ever heard. I replayed it over and over in my head last night, imagining you downstairs finishing what I started.”

Noah brought a hand down to my chest and grazed his fingertips over my nipple.

“Tell me, did you finish?”

I closed my eyes and thought about the satisfying orgasm I’d given myself thinking about this man. But I wasn’t about to give him that—hell no. Noah had left me aching last night, teasing me on purpose. But I wasn’t some sweet, naïve girl anymore, and two could definitely play at this torturous little game.

I smiled against his lips then brought my hands to his chest and pushed him away. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

Just when I thought he’d take my lips in a crushing kiss, a playful smirk crossed Noah’s mouth instead. “Have dinner with me.”

This time it wasn’t a request, more an order, and the demand did nothing to help quench the fire I was trying to extinguish. “I don’t—”

“Have dinner with me. We’ll go somewhere private, just you and me. I want to talk to you, get to know you again.”

With my body now back under some kind of control, I pushed off the rails and took a step toward him. “I don’t want to become the subject of town gossip, Noah.”

“I understand. I promise. No one has to know. You can even meet me at Willa’s. She can keep a secret, right?”

She could, and it had been months since I’d been on a date—and even longer since I’d felt the kind of attraction I did to Noah.

I could already feel myself caving when I saw him hold out my baseball cap.

“Come on, Bonnie, where’s that adventurous streak of yours?”

My fate was sealed. I’d never been able to resist a charming Noah, and it seemed that hadn’t changed.

Plus, maybe I’d be able to exact some revenge for his teasing the night before. That seemed like a win-win to me, and also a good way to justify the fact that I really wanted to go.

“One dinner.”

His slow smile made me think of a wolf in sheep’s clothing, and suddenly I wasn’t so sure about this decision.

“One dinner.”

Really, what harm could that do?

19

Laurel

THE GAME WAS well underway by the time I made my way back to the stands, and I made sure to sit far, far away from Noah, who was sitting with his brother on the opposite side of the field.

Betty’s Braves—the home team—were pitching first. So it was no surprise to see Jake standing at the pitcher’s mound waiting for his next victim, as he liked to call them. Walton’s Warriors had a man on second base but had yet to score a run, which was hardly surprising, and the fact that I even remotely knew what I was talking about still shocked me to this very day.

I’d never been one for sports, even back in high school when I used to go and cheer on Noah. I’d spent most of the game with my nose in a book, but he hadn’t cared as long I was there.

The memory made me smile. I stared out at Jake now and remembered thinking it must’ve been some kind of cosmic joke the day he’d come home and told me he wanted to play ball. Luckily, I’d had a town full of gossipy do-gooders who’d gone out of their way to teach him the game since he was old enough to hold a bat.

Ever since then he’d become obsessed with the all-American pastime, and I’d had no choice but to learn the ways of the bat and the ball.

Phil Granger, the local bank manager, walked out from the dugout with the bat by his side. He was a middle-aged guy with a pot belly and glasses so thick they resembled Coke bottles, and today he was the fifth batter up.

As he took his place at home plate, I sent out a take it easy on him prayer in Jake’s direction. But as Jake took his spot on the mound, cracked his neck from side to side, and eyed old Phil from below the bill of his cap, I knew there was no take it easy mode inside him.

Jake was here to win, and while he might play a little softer than he would against the neighboring high school kids, he sure as hell wasn’t about to let a chance to kick some ass pass him by.

Jake threw one hell of a fastball. The thing flew so quickly by Phil’s face that he didn’t even have a chance to blink. Once, twice, and then bam, he was out. And I wasn’t all that upset that Jake’s pitching usually meant that the first inning flew by in no time at all.

Actually, that was