The Very Naughty List

11. Nick

11

NICK

I press harder against Hailey, squeezing out the space between my overpowering frame and her soft, small body that I’ve pinned against the cold metal door of my car.

God, I want her.

It’s been nearly impossible hanging out with her this whole time and keeping myself together. I feel so drawn to her that even sitting next to Hailey on the couch at her grandmother’s house was like torture. Whenever I’m near her, I can’t help but be aware of her every movement.

The way her exuberant smile lights up a room, the curve at the edges of her lips when she laughs. The delicate lacing of freckles over the bridge of her nose and top of her cheekbones. And that mischievous little twinkle in her eye—fuck, that one really gets me.

Everything about Hailey makes me want to touch her. Even the way she’s so unafraid to wear her emotions on her sleeve. And when she moves—even if it’s just a casual brush up against me, a breath that I can feel on my cheek if we’re sitting too close, or a strand of her hair that happens to fall against my skin—it’s all the most delicious kind of torture.

Now that my hands are on her body, feeling the fullness of her breasts and the delicate curve of her waist beneath my palms, I feel like I’m feasting.

With every passing second of our kiss, my lips moving against hers and my tongue sweeping into her mouth, I want more . I’m quickly reaching the point where I won’t be able to make myself stop. Everything feels too good.

With my lips on hers and my hands on her body, I’m like a starving man at a feast. I just can’t get enough, can’t help myself.

My blood thunders in my ears with every pounding heartbeat, and Hailey’s initial shock must have passed because she’s responding to me now. She pushes up on her tiptoes, squeezing her arms around my neck to get closer and kiss me back. She even starts to lift one leg and wrap it around mine like she’s trying to convince me to take her right then and there, and if she’s not careful, that’s exactly what’s going to happen.

The warmth of her body against mine, and the way she’s winding herself around me like a vine, turns me into a wild man. My hands find hers and my fingers link with hers so I can push her hands backward, pinning them against the car along with the rest of her. Her body arches as she wilts and lets out a moan. With her exposed like this, I can’t stop myself from grinding against her, dragging my almost painfully swollen cock against her thigh through my pants.

“Oh my god, Nick,” she whimpers as my mouth kisses and nibbles down the side of her neck to her collar and back up to her lips. I crush my mouth against hers, then again, and on the third time, I trap her lower lip between my teeth, biting down. She gasps, and the sound of it cuts through the fog in my mind.

My chest heaves as my senses return and I remember what the hell I’m doing.

This is Hailey. Off limits Hailey.

I can’t touch my best friend’s little sister like this. Not in the way I want to.

Fuck.

I press my lips harder against hers for a split second, then wrench myself away from her, releasing her hands. She looks up at me, dazed and clearly reeling as she tries to catch her breath.

Goddammit. It would be so easy to pull her against me again. My cock is straining against my jeans as if it’s desperate to get closer to her and is pissed as fuck at me for stopping. I drag in a breath and step backward so that she won’t feel the bulge of my hard-on against her stomach.

Hailey’s eyes have a hazy sheen to them, the deep green of her irises dark in the dim light. Her tongue slowly darts out to lick her lower lip, as if she’s trying to remind herself of how I tasted, and it almost fucking undoes me.

If things were different, if this wasn’t all still supposed to be pretend and if she wasn’t my best friend’s little sister, I wouldn’t be ending things like this. It takes everything I have not to kiss her again.

“That kiss under the mistletoe was because your grandmother was watching, songbird. This one was because she’s not ,” I say, working to keep the rasp out of my voice.

She blinks, her expression clearing a little. “Songbird?”

Shit.

I’ve called her that in my head for years, but I’ve never spoken the nickname aloud. It was easy enough for Sebastian and Reid to get away with calling her teasing, lighthearted nicknames, but considering that I could barely ever work up the courage to talk to her, it would’ve felt strange to call her anything but her given name. I don’t know why I said it now, and I instantly regret it.

I don’t know how to answer the question in her voice, so instead of giving any explanation, I just take another step backward, shoving my hands into my pants pockets.

“Come on. I’ll take you home.”

My voice sounds gruff as I try to shut things down and regain my usual stoic composure. It’s the only way I know how to deal with all the shit knocking around in my chest and keep myself from giving in to the desire to kiss her again. Because giving in to it would mean crossing a whole lot of lines that I know I shouldn’t cross.

“Oh. Uh, okay.” Hailey looks a little taken aback, but she nods.

I open the door for her to get into my car, then walk around to the other side.

As I drive her back to the place where she’s staying, I can tell she’s nervous, or flustered, or maybe both. She breaks the silence in the car by talking, but our conversation is stilted. There’s so much tension filling the car that it’s as if there’s an entire extra person sitting in the back seat, and Hailey keeps fidgeting with the sleeve of her shirt like she’s trying to keep her hands occupied.

“So the next season of Shadow’s Edge starts after Christmas, huh?” she asks. “Now I kind of want to go back and start from the first episode.”

“Yeah.” I nod, almost wishing that Reid and Sebastian had crashed our date like Seb and I did to Reid earlier. I feel like one of them would be able to say the right thing to ease the tension, but me? I have no idea what that might be. “Good idea. You’ll probably like it.”

When we get to the place where Hailey has been renting a short-term room, I insist on walking her inside. It’s not a “date” gesture or part of the act of fake dating her. It’s more due to the fact that no matter what, I can’t stop myself from being protective of her.

“Oh, you really don’t need to,” she says, making a face. “Ted’s probably sitting in his underwear with a fat cigar hanging out of his mouth, since it’s almost his self-proclaimed ‘jamming time.’ Trust me, it’s not a sight you’d want to see.”

She chuckles wryly as if it’s funny, but I’m not amused by it at all. In fact, it pisses me off to think that she’d be living in such a shitty situation.

If Ted is going to charge money for a room rental, then the very least he can do is provide decent accommodations free of cigar smoke, noise pollution, and the sight of her apparent ‘landlord’ in his briefs. Now I really want to go inside and check it out.

I don’t take no for an answer, and I don’t let Hailey brush it off. Instead, I get out of the car and walk her up to the front door. The second we step inside, I realize just how much she underplayed what a dump this place is.

“Fucking hell, Hailey.” I glance around, my brows pinching together. “This place is a shit hole.”

Ted Bigelow strides into the living room—not in his underwear, thank fuck—and his eyebrows rise as he sees me standing beside Hailey.

“You’re not allowed to have guests,” he says blandly.

The fact that he sounds like he’s chastising her makes me bristle. “ She’s not allowed to have guests? She’s not the one doing something wrong here, asshole. You are.”

He frowns. “What? Is there a problem?”

His feigned ignorance pisses me off even more. I take a step toward him, towering over him with my hands curled into fists at my sides. “Yeah, the problem is that you’re a piece of shit for taking advantage of a woman needing a place to stay.”

“Whoa, whoa! I have no idea what you’re talking about. I’ve never laid a hand on her.” He raises both of his palms in the air, a flash of worry entering his eyes.

“I don’t mean like that, you jackass. I mean she’s paying you to rent this room and stay in this house. The very least you could do is keep it clean and wear your fucking clothes in common areas. You’re ripping her off because you know Chestnut Hill gets packed around this time of year. You knew she didn’t have a lot of options, so you decided you could get away with overcharging her for a piece of shit room rental, huh?”

Ted’s face pales. His gaze slides sideways toward Hailey and then back to me, and he licks his lips nervously.

“Okay, okay.” He keeps his hands held out. “You’re right, man. I’m sorry. I’ll get the place all fixed up tomorrow. And I’ll even credit her a night or two of rent for the trouble.”

“Fuck that. Not good enough.” I shake my head and turn my attention to Hailey. “I’m moving you out of here right now.”

“You’re what ?”

I don’t let her visible shock deter me from the idea. There’s no way I’m letting her stay in a place like this and pay money for it too. She mentioned that losing her job in LA was part of what brought her back to Chestnut Hill for the holidays, so I’m assuming funds are a little tight. She shouldn’t be paying at all.

And luckily, I know a way to fix that.

“Come on.” I glance around quickly, looking for the room she’s staying in. “I’m going to help you pack up your stuff.”

Hailey’s gaze darts toward a door to my right, so I make a beeline in that direction. The second I open it and step inside, I know it’s hers. Despite the musty scent that seems to permeate the entire house, I can smell a hint of honeysuckle in the air.

She follows me into the room, shooting me a quizzical look as I grab one of the suitcases on the floor and set it on the bed before opening it. “And go where, exactly?”

I open a dresser drawer, fully prepared to reach in and start grabbing things, but Hailey rushes over and loads her arms up with a bunch of clothes before I can. She drops them into the suitcase as I answer her.

“I’m moving you into the house with me and my brothers.”

Ted, who trailed after us and is standing in the doorway watching, throws his arms in the air and makes some sort of remark under his breath about how he “didn’t really need the rent anyway,” then leaves us alone to pack up. He’s lucky I don’t go after him and beat his ass into giving her a refund for every single night she stayed here already—including a surcharge for having had to listen to him play music all night.

But at this point, my only focus is on getting her out of this shit hole and back to our house where she can have a decent and comfortable living arrangement.

She might be okay with staying in a dive like this, but I’m certainly not okay with anyone that I care about getting charged to live in a dump. A home should be a place that you want to get back to and spend time in, even if it’s just a temporary room.

Hailey stops packing and stares at me. “What about Reid and Sebastian? You haven’t even run this by them or asked if it will be an imposition to have me there. It’s a sweet offer, Nick. Really. But maybe you should sleep on this for a night and then?—”

“No, I’ve already made up my mind. They’ll be fine with it.”

I shut down her attempts to weakly protest and motion for her to grab whatever toiletries and stuff she has in the bathroom.

As soon as her modest amount of belongings are packed up and in my car, we head out. I drive a little more aggressively than I mean to on the way back to the house I share with my brothers, but I’m still stewing about Ted thinking he can get away with treating Hailey like that. The car is silent like it was before, but it’s a different kind of tension now—a better kind than the awkward, post-kiss one, at least.

Sebastian is in the living room, sitting in one of the easy chairs that bracket the fireplace, so he’s the first to see us when we enter. He looks up, his mouth opening to greet me, but then his eyebrows shoot up as he notices Hailey by my side.

“Hey, no fair,” he grouses, rising from his chair. “Reid and I didn’t get overnight dates. I call foul on you getting to have Hailey sleep over. It’s against the rules.”

Reid walks in just as Seb finishes speaking, his gaze scanning Hailey and me and the suitcases we’re carrying.

“Everything okay?” he asks, eyeing the bags.

“It will be now.”

I set both of the suitcases down, recruiting my brothers to help me grab the rest of Hailey’s belongings from the car as I explain the situation and describe the shitty living conditions that I moved Hailey out of.

Once all her stuff is inside, Sebastian pours us all a drink as we gather around the kitchen table, and I surreptitiously check Hailey’s face to make sure she’s okay. I know I caught her off guard more than a few times tonight.

First with the surprise visit with her grandmother, then with the reckless kiss by the car, and now I’ve uprooted and abducted her here to our house. That’s a lot for a first “fake date.” But at least I know that she’s here now and all right. She looks like she’s still reeling a bit, but the whiskey seems to be helping her relax a little.

“Damn, that’s fucking bullshit. I can’t believe you were dealing with that on top of everything else.” Reid gives her a sympathetic smile, and Sebastian sits down on the other side of her.

I take a seat across the table from her and top off my drink from the bottle in front of me. It doesn’t surprise me at all that Hailey never complained to us about living in that shitty room in Ted’s house. It’s just the way she is—always looking for the silver lining no matter how tough things get. She’s tenacious while also being soft and contagiously positive. I could probably stand to have some of that rub off on me.

“All right, it’s settled then.” Sebastian raises his glass in the air as if we’re toasting to something. “Hailey’s staying with us.”

Reid clinks his glass against our brother’s, and I make the obligatory gesture as well, even though I’d already decided that she would be staying no matter what my brothers thought about it.

It takes Hailey a second or two, and she still looks a bit worried that she might be imposing, but she finally lifts her glass and touches it to ours.

“Thanks, you guys,” she says with a soft smile that makes my chest tighten in an almost painful way. “I really appreciate this. And I’m happy to pay you rent, of course.”

“Fuck, no.” Reid shuts her offer down instantly. “We don’t want your money.”

“But—”

“Sorry, shortcake.” Sebastian chuckles. “It’s three against one here. You’re better off letting us have this one, or we’ll be here all night.”

Hailey purses her lips as if weighing whether or not to argue more. Then she finally shakes her head, making her honey blonde hair shift over her shoulders. “Okay, fine. But no matter what you say, I still owe you guys.”

“Nope.” Reid arches a brow, leaning back. “You don’t owe us anything.”

“Yes, I do.”

“No, you don’t.”

She narrow her eyes at him. “Have you always been this bossy?”

“Yes,” he answers instantly. “Have you always been this bratty?”

A faint tinge of pink colors her cheeks, but she smirks as she holds his gaze, clearly not intimidated by him in the least. “Maybe I’m only a brat to you.”

Reid blinks, clearly taken aback by her response, and I can’t help but grin as I down the rest of my whiskey in one swallow, relishing the way it burns down my throat.

That’s my songbird .