Touch & Go by Mira Lyn Kelly Read Free Book Online Page B

hands into his pockets and nodded in the direction he’d come from. One question he could handle.
    “Down the road. Other side of the river. Last house,” but then because he thought they might go down there and that would be really bad, he added, “but my dad works different hours so he doesn’t like to have company.”
    Ava nodded and then pointed a little finger at him. “Because this is your first time at our house and I’m a gracious hostess, you can hide first. The backyard is in bounds but my dad’s office is off-limits and if you hide inside, you have to leave your shoes by the door. I’ll give you until sixty, starting now.”
    Eyes closed, Ava started counting aloud, but he didn’t move.
    If Sam was still walking and his dad decided to go to the liquor store, he’d drive past and see. But if he was hiding…if he was in the back, or even—
    One accusing brown eye cracked at him. “Why aren’t you hiding?”
    Ford stared back at his sister. “Why are you peeking, cheater?”
    She sucked a breath and crossed her arms, leaning into her brother like she wasn’t half his size. “Because I didn’t hear you leave. I wasn’t cheating, Ford.”
    Sam lifted his hands between them and made himself smile so everyone would see things were okay. “Sorry, I wasn’t ready. Start again and we’ll hide.”
    And he did. And his father hadn’t found him, but Ava had. And she’d liked him enough to decide to keep him for the next twenty years.
    But this, tonight.
Hell.
What they’d done tonight—what she’d given him tonight—he didn’t know if it was something she should have let him have or not. Yeah, yeah, their friendship was solid and they were more than good, but the fact that he was still holding the remains of her panties in his fist, pretending that he was on the fence about whether to toss the evidence or save the souvenir when he knew exactly which way it was going to go—it didn’t sit right with him and he wasn’t sure why.

Chapter 7
    “So how’d it go last night?” Maggie asked, sliding into the booth beside Ava.
    Sam was sitting on her other side, his glass of orange juice halfway to his mouth when he set it down untouched, causing Ava’s heart to skip and a slow heat to build around her neck.
    If it were just her sitting there talking to Maggie, there’d be no risk in this conversation at all.
    Ava had twenty years’ experience guarding the kind of secret girlfriends were notorious for nosing out, and this latest bit of hush-hush would be cake to keep quiet,
if
it were just her. But it wasn’t. Sam was a key player in the goings-on of the night before and even though they’d agreed to keep the sordid details of their extracurricular activities private…well, this was Sam, and he could be a bit of a wild card.
    So as he turned to her, stretching his arm along the back of the booth, she didn’t have a clue what he was going so say.
    “Good,” he answered casually, waggling his head to the side as if in further consideration. “Actually, I think last night went pretty great. I was happy with the turnout. What about you, Ave?
Satisfied?
”
    Ava felt the corners of her mouth tugging up, warm heat spooling through her center at the suggestive response.
    But she wasn’t biting.
    “Yeah, it was good,” she answered to Maggie. “There were a few moments where it was looking a little touch-and-go as to whether Steven was buying it. But Sam stuck by my side and by the end of the evening, I think Steven got the idea.”
    Sam nodded, raising a hand toward the front of the crowded diner, signaling the guys who’d just walked in. “Turned out to be a good time too. Gotta say, I’m glad I went.”
    The corners of her mouth were twitching, fighting desperately against the cat-who-ate-the-canary grin attempting to break wide across her face. She was glad too. And even though a part of her ached at how easily they’d slipped back into “friendly,” she’d been relieved when Sam