Page 187 of Naughty November
HIDING FROM LAUGHTER
SHAW MONTGOMERY
ONE
ASHTON
“Did you need to work tonight?” Micha’s words were casual but there was a hint ofdon’t bullshit mein his tone.
Fuck.
“Um, no.” Clearly, pretending to have to work late on nights it was supposed to be my turn to pick hadn’t been as subtle as I’d hoped. “I’m done for the weekend.”
The fact that I was slightly frustrated about that said a lot about my state of mind because I loved my big lug more than life itself and he was starting to give me hisI’m pissedlook.
It was subtle. He wasn’t the type to get loud and angry. No, it was worse…he got disappointed. Ugh. I was such a dick.
Micha looked relaxed as he leaned back against the couch and flicked through the options on the TV, but his twitchy foot gave him away. It was one of his only tells and I’d been careful not to point it out, so to see his foot shift up and down made it clear he wasn’t as calm as he appeared. “You know, there’s probably a new movie out we could go see if you want.”
Ugh.
I was a royal dick.
“It’s Friday.” Frowning, I glanced over at the jar on the bookshelf. “And it’smyFriday. I get to pick.”
After a night of kinky crafts like decorating a jar with penis ribbon, the silly game of pulling kinks and BDSM topics out of the jar had started off as something ridiculous we’d done to spice things up without it being too stressful…but now it had gotten stressful. After a year of us alternating picking one out of the jar each week, we were down to only a handful, and somehow they’d ended up being the ones I was most nervous about.
I should’ve never crafted drunk.
Somehow after more than one drink, I lost all inhibitions and actually answered things honestly.
It was fucking dangerous, and while I had too much self-respect to cheat and go fishing for the ones I wanted to hide, I had questionable enough morals to try to avoid them.
Which was how I’d ended up with a frustrated partner looking at me like he didn’t believe me for a second.
He was really smart.
“Ashton, do you understand why I’m questioning what you want?” His unfortunately very reasonable question had me trying not to look too innocent. He wouldn’t believe it at all and I’d just end up looking more guilty.
“Um…” Ugh. He kept asking questions that were going to get me in trouble. “Yes. But there’s nothing to worry about.”
Trying to subtly work in the truth didn’t help the situation.
Nope.
He picked me up off the couch and sat me on his lap.
Sometimes one of my favorite things about our relationship was our size difference but sometimes it made me want to pout like a disgruntled five-year-old.
“I tried being patient.” Micha looked like that plan wasn’t in play any longer. “I tried asking you open-ended questions.”
Oh, yeah.
“Sorry?” I hadn’t exactly been a dick with those but I hadn’t been helpful either.
He huffed.
Ugh.