I lean back, flinging my arm from the wall down and catching my load in the bunched up t-shirt. Looking up from where I cover and hold the warm, sticky mess, I find myself in the mirror.

You’re totally fucked.

Chapter 16

“Okay, I know we don’t like know each other so well, but I have to ask…”

“Ask what?” I press Lo as I stir my margarita. I usually stay away from tequila, but when she suggested Mexican for an early dinner, it made it hard to say no. When in Rome, they say. “Keep in mind, if you ask me something about my family and I tell you the truth, I might have to kill you.”

Lo’s eyes bulge.

“I’m kidding,” I inform her, bringing the short glass to my lips. “Ask away.”

Lo eyes me hesitantly for a minute. “Did Fitz give you a pounding last night?”

I choke on my tequila.

“You waddled. I don’t know if you noticed.” Lo laughs.

Returning my glass to the table, I reach for a napkin, blotting my mouth. “I’m just sore from riding.”

Across from me, Lo raises her eyebrows.

“Not Fitz. My horse. A horse,” I clarify. “He’s technically not mine. I was at the barn all afternoon and I’m just getting back into the swing of things.”

“You need to relax a bit,” Abby says. “He can feel you hesitate.”

I try to take a deep breath, letting go of some of the tenseness I hold in my thighs as I press them into Bernard’s side. “Can he feel me manifest him making it over that set of cross poles? Because I am.”

Fourteen-year-old Parker would be ashamed by thirty-year-old Parker. I used to canter over this style of jump at triple the height without thinking.

“We have a few more minutes. Want another run?” Abby asks.

I shake my head. “I think I stressed him out today,” I say, patting Bernard. “I’m sorry, big guy.”

Horses feed off energy. Bernard is stressed because I’m stressed. I’ve got my first campaign event tomorrow, and well, a lot on my mind.

Like how I can’t stop thinking about kissing Fitz.

“If you get out of your head a little and let your body lead, you’ll be just fine,” Abby says as I dismount Bernard, leaning against the saddle.

The thing is, I did that at the bowling alley—led with my body—and I’m not sure it was the smartest decision because when I woke up, I could still feel my lips swollen and let myself lay in bed remembering how good it felt to get them that way. And days later, I’m still thinking about it.

“I didn’t know you rode horses,” Lo says, pulling me out of this afternoon’s memory.