Free Electrify Me (The Fireworks Series Book 1) by Bibi Rizer

girl that night but…I had ideas I was going to be some kind of hero, you know”
    “You’re my hero, Charlie.” He nods. I hope that’s what he wanted to hear. It’s the truth anyway. “Seriously. That slime ball was just about ready to take off again, and he was going to take me with him. Where do you suppose I would have ended up? Some brothel in Guatemala. Or dead.”
    Charlie takes a breath, then leans over the center console and wraps his arms around me. I hug him back. This time there is nothing sexual about it. It’s pure comfort. I realize then how much I needed this hug. And how tired I am. I hurt all over from the effort of keeping my muscles vaguely upright.
    “Charlie,” I say into the hair behind his ear. “Do you want to sleep over at my place?”
    He turns his head and presses his warm lips on my neck. “Yeah,” he whispers into my skin. “I really do.”
     

Chapter Twelve – Charlie
     
    Her apartment is in Montlake, just over the bridge. It’s a cozy one-bedroom on the top floor of a heritage-style house. The minute we walk in the door, she tosses her giant purse on a little sofa and makes a kind of clicking noise with her tongue as she pulls off those boots. While I’m averting my eyes from the torn tights coming off too, a striped cat pops through a little pet door in the window above the radiator.
    “You have a cat?” I ask.
    “Yeah, that’s Mauly. It was Molly, but then I discovered he was a boy, so I changed it. Mauly. Like Darth Maul.”
    I crouch down and give Mauly a good scratch. He seems to like it, even rolling over and letting me have a little tummy action.
    “I hated the prequels, by the way,” Gloria says.
    “What?” Mauly grows bored of me and wanders into the kitchen.
    “The Star Wars prequels. I named him Mauly because it was the only thing that fit. Not because I liked that stupid character. Those movies are terrible.”
    “Oh. Of course. Original three or nothing. Carrie Fisher rocks.”
    “Right?”
    She beams at me as though we just discovered we’re both part of some obscure religion that forbids dating outsiders. Then we stand there, grinning like fools because neither of us knows what comes next. This is uncharted territory for me. I mean, I’ve had girlfriends, of course, and hook-ups. But I’ve never rescued one from a kidnapper. And I’ve never felt so connected to a girl so quickly. Maybe I’ve never felt connected like this at all. I just want to curl up and go to sleep, so tomorrow will come faster so I can get up and make her breakfast. How sad is that?
    “Oh, my God!” Gloria says suddenly. “I just remembered something. It’s my birthday!”
    “Today? Like New Year’s Day?” She nods, pressing her lips together. I take a tentative step towards her. “What do you want for your birthday?” I hope she’ll say something involving us both getting naked. I’m dying to see her naked.
    “A hug,” she says instead.
    Oh, well. That’s good too. I take the last step and wrap her in my arms. She smells like stale weed, disinfectant and root beer. I’m certain I smell even worse. But that doesn’t change the fact that this is about the best hug I’ve ever had in my life. With her boots off, she’s small enough to tuck right under my chin. And even though her hair is full of grit and grass, I lay my cheek against it and just hold her. She wraps her arms around my waist and squeezes for a few seconds before untucking the back of my shirt and…
    “Ahhh…your hand is cold!” I step back and take both her hands in mine, trying to rub some life into them. “You’re ice cold. Why don’t you take a warm bath?”
    “I don’t have a bathtub.” She pulls her hands from mine and untucks the front of my shirt. I gasp when she slides her fingers under, partly from cold but partly, well, because she has her hands under my shirt.
    “You’ve got abs,” she says. “I didn’t notice that before.”
    “I…uh…I’ve been working out. I