The Apartment (Apartment #1) by Amanda Black Read Free Book Online Page B

from jerking her head back out of guilt. She knew it was wrong to let him kiss her where another man’s lips had recently been, and she couldn’t even bring herself to look him in the eye when he pulled away. But even physically, the kiss itself had just felt
wrong
. His lips were the wrong texture, the wrong shade of pink. They didn’t make her knees feel weak as soon as they touched her own. They were cold and dry.
    She had never noticed anything off about his kisses before; they had always seemed perfectly adequate. They were never unpleasant, but they had never kept her up at night obsessing about them, either. Lily had been with others before, a couple guys she dated in college while she still lived in Minneapolis, and they had all been fairly similar: adequate, but nothing to write home about. She just assumed that reality was nothing like the steamy encounters she hungrily devoured in books written by people like Maggie Foster.
    It wasn’t as if she was frigid. She had plenty of good memories with her little “friend” that was tucked away in her nightstand. And when Scott managed to really put some effort in, which didn’t happen often because it required him lasting longer than about three minutes, Lily sometimes felt a few warm tingles. She had just never felt comfortable asking him for more, and he had never thought to ask. The few times he had tried to go down on her had been such awkward, embarrassing fiascoes that she just let him think she didn’t have any interest in that. She’d heard people joke that there was no such thing as bad head, but Lily would beg to differ.
    She wondered briefly if her beautiful stranger would have more skill in that department. She remembered how strong his tongue had been as it swirled inside her mouth, instantly recalling the taste of him. She shook her head to clear her mind, knowing that it was useless to fantasize about something she would never get to experience. It also made her feel even more guilty when she realized how thoroughly she was comparing Scott to a man whose name she didn’t even know.
    She thought about her jacket again, deciding that she would simply have to get it back. She needed to get it back in her hands so that she could stop focusing on it. She debated simply leaving it there and forgetting about it, but she really couldn’t afford another one right now and Scott would never understand what was so hard about just going back to get it. He didn’t know that retrieving her jacket meant possibly running into her stranger again.
    Remembering that she only had a half-day of work that day, she figured that she could just pick it up on her way to the gym and have it out of her mind that much sooner. If she was lucky, perhaps Mrs. Knight could even go up and get it for her.
    A loud yowling interrupted her thoughts. She looked down to see one of the large cats staring up at her expectantly, while the other one pawed at her foot. She sighed loudly and smiled at the one who was staring at her. “I suppose you’re hungry, huh, Wembley?” When she was treated to another loud whine in return, she decided it was time to put her worries aside and finish getting ready for work.
    “Okay, just a minute, babies. Mama needs to get dressed.” She stood up and waded through the furry bodies, making her way to the small closet. She took the towel off her head and draped it over the doorknob, shaking out her damp hair. Throwing on a pair of scrubs quickly and shoving the key in her pocket without looking at it, she brushed out her hair and left it to air dry as she opened the door to the hall. “Come on, tubbies,” Lily called behind her to the portly felines who were already following her eagerly. “If you ask me, I think you two have had enough to eat.”
    As much as Lily liked to tease them, she wouldn’t have them any other way. She loved their jiggly fat tummies; they reminded her of how much they’d changed from when she first got them.
    Wembley and