Page 41 of Blame it on the Kiss
Bryce didn’t flinch when she squeezed his hand tighter than she’d ever squeezed anything before in her life. Since the moment she’d sat in the chair, his eyes had been on hers. He’d kept her with him, kept herright therelike it was just the two of them. His eyes said even more than his words. They saidyou’ve got this. They saidyou’ve got me.
She couldn’t compare his attention to any relationship she’d had before. Guys didn’t stay. They played and left. That’s how she worked it, wanted it. If she never committed, she’d never let anyone down. No one would get hurt. Living up to the kind of love her parents had was something she’d never accomplish.
But Bryce seemed intent on getting to know her, not forgetting her.
It scared her to think about letting his friendship go. If he weren’t holding her hand and staring into her eyes with care and warmth, she would not be sitting in a tattoo parlor right now following through on one of Payton’s wishes.
It freaked her out more to think about keeping him around. Despite her best efforts, her heart had gone and gotten involved. Would Payton approve? Did Honor deserve to feel something good for a little while?
Tiny beads of sweat rolled down her sides. The tattoo gun made a high-pitched buzzing sound, like an electric razor, and she tried to tune it out. She pressed her feet into the footrest on the chair. Instead of thinking a needle punctured her skin, she pictured a tiny pin pushing down and dragging across her skin.
“You’re doing great,” Bryce said. “Tell me why Faith?”
Since reading Pay’s list, she’d given a lot of thought to the kind of tattoo she wanted and it always came back toFaith—the simple, yet meaningful word tattooed in a thin, handwriting font.
“It’s Payton’s middle name.” And maybe, just maybe, having the word inked on her skin would renew her trust and confidence in herself. “It’s not a bad word to live by either.”
“No, it’s not. I’m a pretty badass wordsmith, and I like it.”
Honor squinted. “You’re telling me you have a way with words?” He did. He so did. But she’d get a second tattoo before she confessed that.
His lips curled into an irresistible challenge. “Let’s play a game. I’ll give you a word and you tell me the definition. We’ll take turns until one of us doesn’t know the meaning.”
“Okay.” Her dad had drilled new words into her every night for months before the SAT. Not to mention she’d won the poetry slam in college.
“Ladies first.”
“Collywobbles.” She relaxed her hold on his hand, Ryder’s pinpricks not so bad anymore.
“Stomach pain or queasiness.” He scooted back into his director’s chair in an obvious attempt to show her he could do this all night. “Bumbershoot.”
She lifted her cheek from the chair and angled her head sideways. “An umbrella. Wabbit.”
“That’s not your Elmer Fudd impression is it?”
“No smartass, it isn’t.” The muscles in her legs loosened as her feet eased up on the footrest.
Ryder cleared his throat. “That’s good. You need to take this guy down, Honor.”
Bryce let out a fat-chance huff. “Wabbit means exhausted or worn out. Unless you’re in a Bugs Bunny cartoon. Then it means rabbit.” He smirked. “Hootenanny.”
“A country or folk music get together.” Honor let out an untroubled breath. “Bishop, you’re making this too easy.” She ran her thumb back and forth over his, their fingers still entwined. “Fard.”
“Repeat the word please.”
Honor chuckled. “This isn’t a spelling bee, but you look really cute all serious, so I’ll give this to you as your one free pass. Fard.” She pictured Bryce as a young boy dressed in a collared shirt and vest, listening to his English lessons in earnest.
“I won the spelling bee.”
She laughed harder. “Of course you did.”
He glared, but she felt it like the sun peeking between clouds. If he only knew how much his brains turned her on. “Face paint.” She opened her mouth to protest, but he rushed to add, “Or make-up.”
“Right,” she said.
“Ecdysiast,” he tossed out.
Crap. Was that even a real word? How was it spelled? She wouldn’t put it past him to mess with her. He didn’t like losing. But she didn’t want to ask for clarification and see a smug look cross his gorgeous face. She closed her eyes, breaking eye contact for the first time since she’d sat down and racked her brain for an answer.
