Her Kiss (Griffin) (6 page)

CHAPTER 13

When Ally and I scrambled out of
Mrs. Finkle’s classroom, Ally looked unsteady.
And wobbly.
I held out my hand to steady her. “You going to be okay?”

She looked like she was going to
keel over—not from guilt or anything. More like she was in a dizzy daze.
I was feeling it too—but I was way more used to kissing than her.

Still, our kiss—there was no
denying it—there had been sparks. And no way were other girls going to be
able to do it for me now. Unfortunately, I’d kind of already known that. The
moment I had smelled Ally, she was mine. Like I was secretly a werewolf or
something. She’d been imprinted on me. I was hers. She was mine.
Whether she knew it or not.
And unfortunately, she didn’t
seem to know it.

Since she belonged to a mouthy punk
and everything—Poser.

So when wild Willa came sauntering
by with a sexy smile, purring out, “Hi Griffin.”

I reluctantly let go of Ally.

“Hey Willa,” I said, doing my best
to smile, even as my eyes kept cutting to Ally to make sure she wasn’t falling
over or anything.

Or having second thoughts.

I mean
,
if
she wanted to dump her boyfriend, I was here. Waiting. Hoping.

But she was turning red—and
looking sick.

Nope, that didn’t look like love.

It looked like regret.

I leaned into her again. “Your
boyfriend’s off the hook,” I whispered to her, but I don’t think she heard me.
She was still lost in her own world. Regret can do that to you. But so can a
good kiss. And she’d had both.

Willa’s eyes squinted between me
and Ally—like why was I standing so close to Goody-goody Grange?

Inwardly I groaned. I took a quick
step away from Ally. I didn’t want her to get tangled in rumors. Not ones about
me. The girl was doing her boyfriend a favor—that was it. I’d feel like a
wad if she got damaged for it. I sort of felt like one anyway, though. It was
just supposed to be fun—the kiss. But she had a boyfriend. I really
hadn’t thought about it that way before. I’d just thought it’d be fun to kiss
Poser’s girlfriend—kind of get a jab at him, since I wasn’t going to get
to take an actual swing.

But I didn’t want to take a swing
at Ally. That was so not my intent. I hoped she knew that—but I doubted
it.

Still, I grabbed on to Willa,
leading her away from innocent Ally.

“Come on, Willa. I’ll let you watch
my hockey practice, since I’m in such a good mood. In fact, I’m in such a good
mood, I’m not even going to beat up anyone.”

I said that loud enough so Ally
could hear, though she still seemed out of it. Willa wasn’t though. She had the
attention of a hawk. Apparently.

As I lead her away from Ally, she
kept looking back at Cookie Girl anyway. “Isn’t that Aiden Hank’s girlfriend?
What were you doing with her? Why’s she all red like that? She looks like
you’ve been kissing her.”

Oh man.

“I’m going to kiss
you
, Willa,” I warned as a distraction.

“Yeah, yeah. Promises, promises,”
she said with a challenging smile, apparently forgetting all about Ally as her
eyes glittered with eagerness. “I thought you never kiss a girl twice.”

“Watch me,” I murmured, pulling her
close, lowering my lips down on hers—and being sorely disappointed.

I was a werewolf. And Willa wasn’t
my mate.

My mate smelled like cookies.

CHAPTER 14

Okay, the werewolf feeling lasted
about three days. It would have lasted longer—years—but what was
the use? Ally wasn’t feeling it.

She was Poser’s.

No matter how much she dug my
kiss—and I promise you, she was into it, dazed long after it—still,
she was Poser’s. Not mine.

I figured I had to face it. After
all, following that day we kissed she wouldn’t even glance at me if I looked at
her. It was like she wished she hadn’t kissed me. And I figured she wished she
didn’t.

I was slime.

So, though it hurt my heart, I let
her have her way.

The kiss never happened … but I
didn’t beat up her boyfriend. And I didn’t let anyone else slug him out either.
He had no idea he was the luckiest guy on the planet.

But man, I did.

CHAPTER 15

The next time I kissed
Ally,
I didn’t force her into it.
Not
exactly.
We were at a party. I was kind of shocked to see her there.
Ally is not a party girl. She’s a church girl. Everybody knows that. But there
she was—at a weekend hockey party at this chick Fauna’s house.

Seeing Ally walk in, I ran a hand
over my face and watched her through narrowed eyes, for a moment oblivious to
my friends, and their telling me how much this lady that works at the ice rink
wants me. (It’s pretty much just talk. I think the lady’s married. She just
likes the way I use my stick … she’s a hockey fan.)

In any case, from across the room,
I watched Ally. I figured Poser dragged her to the party. I mean
,
I already knew Ally was a good little girlfriend. After
all, she had kissed a scary guy to save her boyfriend’s face. So, of course she
would let the loser punk drag her to somewhere she didn’t want to go. Somewhere
she obviously didn’t feel comfortable at.

She kept hiding behind Aiden, like
she thought everyone at the party was like me—big scary guys. And I guess
most of them were. Not only that, they were drunk. Ally shouldn’t have been
here.

I tried not watching her, though. I
mean
,
it messed with my heart. She was so nice. The
way she held Poser’s hand, smiling at him even when he kept looking at Fauna. I
could see she was hurting.

Fauna has all kinds of curves, and
she’d been throwing them Poser’s way at practices lately. Fauna’s a hockey
cheerleader—and recently her cheers were for Poser. (Fauna gets around.
We’d all enjoyed her private cheers at one time or another. Though really, I
hadn’t enjoyed mine that much. I might have mentioned: I like nice girls. Fauna
doesn’t really fall into that category—which is why she was chasing
another girl’s boyfriend: Ally’s.)

But like I said, I tried not to
watch it—the train wreck. After all, Poser wasn’t an idiot. (Okay, he
was. Majorly. But I didn’t figure even he could be
that
dumb—to fall for Fauna when he had Ally.) Sure, I
figured he was a little dazzled by Fauna’s attention. Enough to hurt Ally with
his not-so-subtle peeks in Fauna’s direction every five seconds. But I didn’t
figure the dope could be led away from Ally.

And he probably wouldn’t
have—but Fauna is persuasive.

See, there was this game of “Three
Minutes In Heaven” that took place a little later in the basement. Really the
game is called “
Seven
Minutes In
Heaven” but that was a little too long for everyone sitting around waiting for
their
turn to kiss in the closet. Thus was born: “Three
Minutes In Heaven.” Due to limited attention spans—and a vote, which I
didn’t partake in, because I wasn’t playing the game, or really even aware it
was going on … until the bottle landed on Fauna and she got to choose her
closet partner.

These were the words that came out
of her mouth: “I want you” … and she said them to Poser.

I have to hand it
to the guy
,
he looked uncomfortable
.

All of our team was suddenly
interested in the game. Big time. They started chanting, “Go for it!”

Poser cut his gaze to
Ally
, like wanting her permission, because he didn’t want to
look whipped in front of the guys, since they were always teasing him that Ally
had him whipped. (But we tease any guy that has a girlfriend about that. It
wasn’t a reflection on Ally. I’m just kind of pointing that out, ’cause I,
myself, would have enjoyed being whipped by Ally. [Sorry about the pun, but
yeah it was intended—
as a
joke.
])

Fauna grabbed Poser’s face all
seductive-like, not letting him look to
Ally
anymore.
Instead, she made him look up at her—Private Cheers—into her smoky,
I want you
eyes. “It’s just a game
Aiden,” she purred. “Your girlfriend can handle it.”

Then she dragged Poser into the
closet with her—though he didn’t put up much of a fight. The tool had a
goofy grin on his face. Loser.

Ally watched him go into the closet
like her heart had been ripped out of her chest and shoved in the closet with
them.

Once the closet door shut, Ally
looked like she was going to jump up and run out of the room—away from
everyone’s stares and her boyfriend’s betrayal. But one of her friends quickly
put their hand on her knee and whispered something in her ear. Something that
made her settle back down in the spot she hadn’t actually moved from.

It didn’t take a genius to know
what her friend must have said to her—that if Ally left the party, Fauna
would get exactly what she wanted: Poser all to herself. It’s one thing to walk
out on a guy—it’s another to give a girl you detest exactly what she
wants.

The whole time Poser was in the
closet, Ally sat with her arms wrapped around her stomach and her eyes
downcast, biting down tense on her bottom lip, obviously trying to keep it from
trembling. Her two friends—Jazz and Destiny (who I still didn’t know the
names of at the time)—kept talking to her all soothing-like. But Ally
couldn’t look at them, or at anything but the ground. Her focus was obviously
on keeping her pooling eyes from spilling. She did a good job of it.

My heart kind of ached for her.

I wanted to go over to her and hold
her hand or something for support. But I didn’t figure she wanted that. Or me.
I mean
,
that was her boyfriend in there. Her
boyfriend
.
Who
she had tried to keep safe by kissing me—the most terrifying guy in the
world.
Apparently. (Bet she wished she had let me beat his face in now.)

Everyone kept trying to act like
they weren’t watching her. I mean
,
everyone felt bad
for her. The guys on the team had teased Poser, sure—but they hadn’t
really expected him to go into the closet with Fauna. I mean
,
the little loser had a girlfriend. Who does that
?—
a
poser. That’s who.

Anyway, everyone kept trying to go
on with
their
conversations and let little Ally lick
her wounds in peace. But when Poser came out of the closet, red faced and
tussled haired; hurting, bleeding Ally did her best to put on a show for
him—or probably it was more for Fauna. It was the
I-Don’t-Care-Show
, starring brave little Ally Grange. Suddenly, she
talked and laughed with her friends as though she wasn’t dying inside—as
though she was having an awesome time at this awesome party, and life couldn’t
possibly be any more awesome. But I noticed she wouldn’t look at Poser. Poser
noticed too.

The guy kept whispering to her,
obviously trying to get her to forgive him. But we all hoped she wouldn’t.
Especially me.

The punk was a loser.

He didn’t deserve her.

I knew I didn’t either—but
hey, I never had her. And if I did, no way would I go into a closet with
another girl. Ever. I’d hold on to her. Tight. I’d never let her go.

Funny thing was, right after that,
the bottle landed on me. Meaning my turn to choose someone to go into the
closet with.

But the thing was, like I said, I
hadn’t been playing the game. I was just chilling with my friends, telling them
about this massacre I’d seen on the ice-rink the night before. So, when the
bottle landed on me, I didn’t give it much thought—I was in the middle of
my gory story.

“I’m not playing,” I told everyone,
’cause when I glanced up from my friends I noticed the rest of the party was
looking at me—waiting for me to pick someone to kiss or whatever.

But right after I said I wasn’t
playing, I rethought my words really quick, the gears in my head turning.
“Wait—I’m supposed to choose someone to take into the closet?”

My slow grin wasn’t subtle. Neither
was my flickering gaze as it darted to Ally. “I want Poser’s girl.”

My teammates laughed, booming out
loud Ohhhh!’
s
as though it was a slam. And Poser
turned white as a ghost.

But I didn’t really pay attention
to that stuff. My eyes were on Ally. Hadn’t left her since I said the words.
When I first said them her eyes widened—like she was shocked. Only at the
same time they also glinted with something else too, something like she was
grateful.

My lips twitched slightly.

For a brief second, I swear, her
eyes looked at me the same way they did that day I carried her books for
her—all starry-eyed, like I was her hero. It stirred up my insides. The
girl does kooky things to me.
I’m not going to lie
,
she turns me to mush
.

From my spot across the room, I
stared at her, silent and slightly amused that I was in the middle of a game
that involved a dark closet and a girl. I mean, what kind of game is that?

Breathing out a soft laugh, I
watched Ally curiously, entertained that my pulse was thumping wild even though
I knew she wouldn’t go into the closet with me.

Meanwhile, my friends were
chanting, “Look out Poser!” and: “The Griff is hot for School Girl!”

Ally’s pretty eyes quickly darted
away from me. No shock there. But then she jutted her chin at Poser,
defiant-like.

When he had come out of the closet
he had kept insisting to her that it wasn’t “his fault” that he’d been called
into the closet.

Now her adorable chin inched
upwards in defiance. She threw his words back at him with her soft voice
hitching slightly, “It’s not
my
fault
.”

Then she hopped to her feet.

Rock.
On
.

I watched that with raised eyebrows
and a creeping grin.

A huge smile spread on my face.
Without a word, I followed her into the closet.

I really hadn’t expected
that—her to agree
to me and her alone in a dark closet
.
But hey, the girl was full of surprises (like cute songs about me, even though
she ran from me). I liked that…. And I liked the way I could smell her
delicious cinnamon cookie scent as soon as I shut the closet door. (I’m such a
werewolf.) It was like a little piece of heaven right there in the closet, and
I hadn’t even gotten my lips on her yet. Not that I was exactly sure I was
going to actually get to put my mouth on her again. I wasn’t sure if this was
all just her way to save face or what.

I didn’t mind being used by her
that way if it was, though. Anything to slam that punk Poser was awesome with
me. And helping Ally, that was a score too.
Of course.
So really, being here in the closet with her was a win-win. Though yeah, I was
hoping I’d get to kiss her again too.

But I wasn’t counting on it. It
seemed more likely she was probably going to start crying.

I braced myself for
that—tears. ’Cause she’d looked like she was going to cry the whole time
Poser had been in the closet with Fauna.
And now she was
alone (pretty much); in the dark.

I’d never had a girl cry on me
before—except when she was drunk. And Ally wasn’t drunk. She didn’t
drink. Any tears that came from her would be sincere—and remembered in
the morning.

Oh-kay, no
pressure.
(Man.)

“Your boyfriend’s a wad,” I told
her.

“Maybe not my boyfriend for long,”
she sniffed.

Realllly?

She didn’t say it as a come-on.
Of course.
But I can hear what I
want—I do it all of the time.

She sighed. “I don’t know.”

I could hear the hurt in her voice.
Man, I wanted to pound Poser. She was the only reason he didn’t have a broken
nose right now … yet he had broken her heart. I didn’t get junk like that. What
did she see in the guy? Hailey had said he was “safe” but he didn’t seem “safe”
to me. He was a heartless, insane punk.
I mean, he hurt Ally.
Ally
.
Who I
pretty much worshipped.
Ally, who would never hurt a
soul.
She would just make up a cute little song and play the piano and
bake cookies. She didn’t have a mean bone in her body—yet that dirt-bag
twerp hurt her.
If he came anywhere near me tonight I was
going to bash his face in—for Ally.

… Okay, that wasn’t the only thing
I wanted to do for Ally. No way. We were in a dark closet—I wanted to
kiss her blind. I could make her forget all about Poser … if she’d let me.

I leaned toward her, but kept a
slight distance, because, well, this was Ally. I knew all too well, from way
too much experience—the girl spooks.
At the drop of a
hat.
And I was going to do way more than drop a hat.

I whispered, “Are we really going
to do this or are you just mad at Poser?”

She snapped—like bit my head
off, “His name is Aiden.”

Wow, she was defending him, even
after he broke her heart.

She let out a breath, losing all
her feisty fight. Her words a moment later came out soft and contrite, “No, we
don’t have to do this.” Then she added all sweet, “I mean, if you don’t want
to.”

My eyes flickered to her. “I want
to.”

“Oh,” she squeaked, immediately
trembling.

“Relax. I’m not going to hurt you.”
I couldn’t keep the amusement out of my voice.
I mean, she
was practically hyperventilating.
Still, I said it as I slowly backed her
against the wall. I did it slowly, slowly, trying to not spook her. I ran my
fingers through her long blond hair. Man, it was so soft. I brushed my cheek
against it, feeling like a werewolf. I swear. I wanted to claim her right here
in the closet. Kiss her until she knew she was mine—
that
she had been ever since she gave me that cookie.