“That’s all right,” she told him. “You don’t have to do that. I’ll just work on my article tonight, try to put it in the best light—”
“No,” he contradicted her, “I said we’re going to do something to help you unwind and a Cavanaugh always lives up to his word. You want Casablanca, you’ll get Casablanca,” Morgan told her. “Although why is beyond me.”
His determination managed to coax a smile out of Krys. “Don’t forget the popcorn,” she reminded him.
“Heaven forbid,” he said, turning his car toward the closest grocery store.
“So this really does it for you?” Morgan asked in amazement. They had returned home and true to his word, he had provided her with popcorn and the classic movie. They had finished almost all of the former and the better part of the latter.
She had settled in against him and was rabidly watching the black-and-white movie.
“Each and every time,” Krys answered, never taking her eyes off the wide-screen TV.
“Each and every time, huh?” Morgan repeated. “Just how many times have you watched this movie?” he asked, curious. He couldn’t conceive of watching this even once, much less more than that. At least, not willingly.
“Probably ten, maybe eleven times,” she told him, making a calculated guess. Her eyes never left the characters on the screen.
“You’re kidding,” he said, stunned.
“No.” She continued watching. “How many times have you seen it?”
“Counting this time?” Morgan asked.
Krys spared him a quick glance before answering, “Yes.”
“That’s easy,” he told her, then answered, “Once.”
Her hand stopped mid-dip into the tiny remaining handful of popcorn. Turning toward him, she stared at Morgan as if he had just informed her that he was an alien life form.
“You’ve never seen Casablanca?” she asked him in disbelief.
“Well, I have now,” he reminded her. “Or at least most of it.”
“But it’s a classic,” she cried.
Morgan shrugged. “My education has some gaps.”
“Apparently,” she concluded, looking back at the screen.
Morgan decided that it was better if he just kept silent until she had finished watching the movie. That was why he’d downloaded Casablanca for her in the first place, so she could watch it and gather whatever benefits she could from watching what to him was a rather predictable movie—except for the small fact that the hero didn’t end up with the heroine when the credits finally rolled by.
After what seemed to him like a long time, the final words, about this being the beginning of a beautiful friendship between Bogart and the policeman, Claude Rains—the only words he was familiar with—were finally uttered.
Thank Heaven! Morgan thought with relief.
Krys, he noticed, had sat riveted through the end, and then through the credits. Wondering how much longer she intended to watch, he turned toward her—which was when Morgan realized that the woman sitting there had wet cheeks. Both of them.
“Are you crying?” he asked in amazement.
“No,” she answered in a voice that was close to cracking. “It’s raining and I forgot to wear my hat.”
“Okay, wise guy,” he said, approaching the situation from another angle. “Why are you crying? I thought you said that you like this movie.”
“I did, I do.” Sniffling, she went on to explain, “He did something noble and beautiful for her—he gave her up—because he loved her.” Krys let out a long, shaky breath. “Things like that don’t happen in real life,” she said sadly.
He felt for her. More than that, he could feel himself being drawn to her. “Sometimes they do.”.
Her tears were still flowing as she shook her head. “No, they don’t,” she told him.
Morgan could feel something stirring inside of him no matter how hard he tried to block it. Oh damn, maybe he was going to regret this. But she seemed so unhappy and he really hated seeing her like this.
He had sat through this movie because he wanted her to shake off the frustration she had experienced today, wanted her to be happy, at least for a little while even if it was vicariously.
But that obviously hadn’t worked.
In an effort to comfort her, Morgan put his arm around Krys’s shoulders.
That was all it was supposed to be at first, just a simple act of comfort. Human contact between two people who had spent a rather frustrating day that had one thing after another piling on top of each other until she was all but buried underneath it.
But that human contact led to something more. Before he was fully aware of it, holding Krys against him had her turning her face up to his. He knew he should have just left it at that, or, if he felt he had to do something, he should have simply brushed his lips against her cheek.
But then she had turned her cheek toward his chest and he wound up kissing her lips. Before he fully realized it, he was full-on kissing her.
Rather than just stopping there, the kiss blossomed into a deeper one.
And an even deeper kiss after that.
Morgan’s pulse quickened. He kissed her over and over again until he finally pulled her onto his lap, enfolding her in his arms. He deepened the kiss between them until it felt as if her very soul was touching his and everything that had come before this moment was just a prelude to what was happening between them right now.
No, damn it, he was getting ahead of himself, Morgan’s mind all but shouted. He couldn’t let this happen even though every part of his soul was begging him not to stop.
He wanted her.
But it didn’t matter what he wanted, Morgan silently insisted. He wasn’t the one hurting here. He wasn’t the one in need of something to raise his spirits and bolster his very soul. He wasn’t the one who mattered here. She was and he couldn’t allow himself to take advantage of this situation, not if he felt that she was swept away without being given a chance to think.
And he did.
So, as hard as it was, Morgan forced himself
