Copyright 2018 by Colleen Hoover

party out of a trash can. I’m not even supposed to be here.”
He smiled, and I’ve never wanted to taste a grin like I wanted to taste the one
that spread across his face. “Aren’t you resourceful?” he asked. His hand slipped
behind my knee and he pulled me toward him. I slid across the seat and onto his

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lap because that’s what dresses like mine were for. I could feel him growing
hard between my legs as he pressed a thumb against my bottom lip. I swiped my
tongue across the pad of his thumb, and it made him sigh. Not groan. Not moan.
He sighed, like it was the sexiest thing he’d ever felt.
“What’s your name?” he asked.
“Verity.”
“Verity.” He said it twice. “Verity. That’s really pretty.” His eyes were on
my mouth, and he was about to lean in and kiss me, but I pulled back.
“What’s yours?”
His eyes flickered back to mine. “Jeremy.” He said it fast, like it was a waste
of his time, an inconvenient interruption to our kiss. As soon as the word left his
mouth, his lips touched mine, and as soon as they touched mine, the interior light
kicked on above our heads and we both froze, our lips grazing, our bodies
suddenly stiff as someone climbed into the driver’s seat of the limousine.
“Shit,” Jeremy whispered against my mouth. “What an untimely return.” He
pushed me off of him and opened the door. He ushered me out of the car just as
the driver realized someone else was in the car with him.
“Hey!” he yelled into the backseat.
Jeremy grabbed my hand and began to pull me after him, but I needed out of
my shoes. I tugged on his arm, and he stopped as I slipped my shoes off my feet.
The driver started heading in our direction. “Hey! What the hell were you doing
in my car?”
Jeremy grabbed my shoes in one hand, and we ran down the street, laughing
in the dark, out of breath when we finally reached his car. He hadn’t been lying
about it. It was a Honda Civic, although it was a newer model, so that counted
for something. He pushed me against the passenger door, dropped my shoes on
the concrete, and then swept a hand into my hair.
I looked over my shoulder at the car we were leaning against. “Is this really
your car?”
He smiled as he reached into his suit pocket and pulled out his key fob. He
unlocked the doors to prove it was his, which made me laugh.
He stared down at me, our mouths thisclose, and I could swear he was
already imagining what life with me would be like. You can’t look at someone
the way he looked at me—with the entirety of his past—without also imagining
the future.
He closed his eyes and kissed me. The kiss was full of both desire and
respect—two things a lot of men didn’t seem to know could go hand in hand.
His fingers felt good in my hair, and his tongue felt good in my mouth. I felt
good to him, too. I could feel how good I felt to him in the way he kissed me.

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We knew very little about each other in that moment, but it was almost better
that way. Sharing a kiss that intimate with a stranger was like saying, “I don’t
know you, but I believe I would like you if I did.”
I liked that he believed he could like me. It almost made me believe I was
likeable.
When he pulled away from me, I wanted to go with him. I wanted my mouth
to follow his, my fingers to stay wrapped around his. It was torture remaining in
the passenger seat of his car as we drove. I was burning inside for him. He had
lit a fire in me, and I was determined to make sure it didn’t go out.
He fed me before he fucked me.
Took me to a Steak ’n Shake, and we sat on the same side of the booth,
eating French fries and sipping chocolate shakes between kisses. The restaurant
was mostly empty, so we were in a quiet corner booth, far enough away that no
one noticed when Jeremy’s hand slid up my thigh and disappeared between my
legs. No one heard me when I moaned. No one cared when he pulled his hand
away and whispered that he wasn’t going to give me an orgasm in a Steak ’n
Shake.