The Scumbag's Guide To Heroism novel Chapter 366

Chapter 366: 366 | The Price of Honesty [PS BONUS]

I pushed through and found Sloane standing in front of her floor-length mirror, fussing with her hair in a way that suggested she’d been fussing with it for twenty minutes and was now annoyed at herself for caring this much.

She’d gone with the dress.

Black, fitted, shorter than anything she’d wear to class. The straps sat thin on her shoulders, the neckline low enough to make a statement without making a promise, the hem stopping mid-thigh in a way that put her legs on display and dared anyone to mention it. Her pink hair was down for once, loose around her shoulders instead of pulled into the high ponytail she used for training, and she’d put on makeup, subtle, just enough to make her blue eyes look brighter and her lips look fuller.

The choker was there. Always there. Black against her throat like a statement of identity.

"Hey." My voice came out rougher than I’d intended.

She met my eyes in the mirror. Something flickered in her expression, quick, satisfied, gone before she could pretend it wasn’t there.

"You wore the blue thing."

"You told me to."

"I suggested." She turned away from the mirror, facing me fully, and crossed her arms in a way that pushed her modest chest up slightly. The dress did not have a lot of room for error. "There’s a difference."

"Uh huh."

"Stop staring."

"No."

Her cheeks went pink. The flush crept down her neck, across her collarbone, toward territory the dress barely concealed. Nine years I’d known this girl. Nine years of watching her blush when I said things that landed too accurately, nine years of the gap between her aggressive presentation and the softness underneath, and it still did something to me every single time.

"You’re doing it on purpose." She tried for annoyed and landed somewhere closer to breathless. "The staring. You know it makes me, you know."

"Makes you what?"

"Shut up."

"Tell me."

"Lukas."

"Sloane."

She crossed the distance between us in three steps and grabbed the front of my shirt, dragging me down to her height, which was a full eight inches shorter than mine, and kissed me like she’d been thinking about it all day.

Which she had. I could feel it through the bond, the accumulated tension of hours spent in classes that weren’t anywhere near as interesting as my mouth, the frustration of sitting through Hero Law while imagining this exact moment.

"Mmph." The sound came from her, muffled against my lips. Her hands fisted in my shirt, pulling, and I let her pull, let her set the pace, let her have the control she needed because Sloane Fitzgerald handled vulnerability by pretending she was in charge of it.

When she finally released me we were both breathing harder than the contact warranted.

"Hi," she said.

"Hey."

"You’re late."

"I’m early."

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