Her Sexiest Mistake

take advantage of him.

That's when he told her what had happened. How he felt he'd failed Mike.

In truth, he'd probably never failed anyone a single day in his life. She sat on his bed, surrounded by his things and his scent, aching, and not just physically. She wanted to help him, soothe him, take away his problems.

Apparently his wanting-to-fix-people thing was contagious.

Finally he appeared, his long, lean body still wet, only a towel around his hips, and he arched a brow.

'Want to talk about it?' she asked.

'About what, the weather?'

'No.'

'Hope?'

'About Mike,' Mia said.

He dropped his towel and walked naked to his closet.

She eyed his very fine ass and shook her head. 'Much as it pains me to say this, you can't distract me with your body.'

'Well, damn,' he said and shoved his legs into a pair of jeans.

Commando. God, she wanted him. Wanted to use that edge and temper she could see simmering just beneath his surface to her advantage. 'Are you okay?'

'Sure.'

'You don't seem okay.'

'My brother hates my guts, did I tell you that? Oh, and I suspended a kid today, and he hates my guts, too. So does my boss, by the way, which he made clear when I was suspending said kid. Oh, and half the other kids hate me, too.'

'Why, because you tell it like it is? Because you want them all to better themselves? Because you-'

'Butt in at every opportunity trying to make people be something they're not?'

Standing, she moved closer to him, feeling that heat of his carefully banked temper. 'Then stop doing it. Worry about only yourself.'

'That's your answer? That's what you came in here to tell me? Worry only about myself?'

'No, I came in here to jump your bones.'

He stood there shirtless, shoeless, attitude-ridden, and gorgeous, and let out a sound that seemed to say That works for me.

She glanced back at the bed wondering if they could somehow-

He let out a harsh laugh. 'Don't tempt me.'

With a small smile, she slipped her arms out of her camisole dress and let it fall.

The breath whooshed out of his lungs, a satisfactory reaction indeed. Wearing only a demibra, a thong, and four-inch satin sandals, she put her hands on his chest and pushed him backward into the bathroom.

'Mia, we can't-'

She locked that door, too. Double protection, though she had no such help for her heart.

He made another rough sound. 'This won't help-'

'Wanna bet?' Then she did as she'd promised. Jumped his bones.

***

The next morning, Hope didn't want to get up. It was their last morning at Kevin's, and Mia was in a snippy rush, snapping at Hope to hurry, hurry, hurry. Well Hope was hurrying, thank you very much, but she was also still feeling the heat of Mia's disappointment from the night before, and it made her snippy, too. Snippy enough that she felt the need to cause trouble.

It brewed inside her until she got to class and went up to Kevin's desk. 'Mia wanted me to tell you that as our first night back in her house, she's cooking tonight to celebrate.'

Surprised, Kevin looked up. 'Cooking? Are you sure?'

'Very.' Even as Hope said it, knowing Mia could burn water trying to make tea, she felt a grim sense of satisfaction.

Now that should bring Mia from disappointment mode straight to temper mode, no problem. Temper was something Hope understood and knew how to deal with. 'She said to come over and have a homemade dinner with us tonight.'

Pleased with herself, Hope went to her desk. Feeling someone looking at her, she turned around. The group of girls behind her, the popular girls, were glaring at her.

She smiled.

They glared harder.

Hope turned forward again, and a moment later felt something hit her in the head. It was a note, which read: We know what you did.

Too bad Hope didn't know.

At break, one of the guys explained it to her. The girls blamed her for two things: Adam being suspended, and that she'd 'put out' for him in the woods before they'd gotten caught.

Put out? She hadn't put out, that rat-fink bastard!

Her neck was burning when class began again. She'd blown it in two out of two schools now. Nice record. She tried to concentrate on Kevin. He stood in the middle of the classroom holding a cylinder, head bent, boots unlaced, jeans looking as if maybe they'd been around for a few years, his T-shirt stretched taut over his shoulders and adorably frayed. Smiling.

He was usually smiling.

She loved that about him. She loved him. Not that she'd admit this upon threat of torture or even death, but sometimes, in the deep, dark of the night, she fantasized about him.

Fantasized that he was her dad.

It embarrassed her that she had that need, but it was there, burning in the pit of her belly.

He lifted his head and asked, 'Okay, so if we use a vacuum on this cylinder and sucked out the oxygen, what's left?'

She knew the answer but bit her Up. She'd long ago learned to keep it to herself when she got things too quick, but especially here, now that everyone hated her, it would be worse.

'Cole?' Kevin asked.

Cole shook his head. He didn't know.

Kevin looked around. 'Anyone?'

No one moved. No one appeared to even be breathing.

And Kevin let out a disappointed sigh.

Damn it. Hope raised her hand.

His eyes warmed. 'Hope. I knew you'd know.'

Her heart took a flying leap and hit her ribs. 'Nothing. There's nothing in the cylinder.'

His smile spread. 'Correct.'

The classroom was so utterly silent she could hear people breathing. Someone snorted, and someone else snickered. Heat flooded Hope's face. Then, from behind her, Cole shifted, leaning forward. 'Cool.'

In surprise, she craned her neck and looked at him.

At over six feet, he didn't fit into his desk so well, his long legs bent at a funny angle, his elbows hanging off the tabletop. He had dark hair on the wrong side of long, falling way over his collar and into his eyes. And he was so skinny she'd always thought of him as a scarecrow, but he had the kindest eyes she'd ever seen on a kid his age,