For a flash, I think she's going to press her lips forward. She wants to. But she doesn't. Instead, she says, “I know you want me.”
Again she deflects my jab. My insides twist, until I can't tell if the anger or the lust is winning. At the moment, her game is flawless. Now she leans in the kiss. I pull back, in the last fraction of a moment. The distance between our lips maintains.
“If this is what you choose, I'm walking away after Gram is dead. All of this, I'll leave it behind.”
My biggest bluff yet. Of all of them I've ever made, I'm praying she won't call this one.
She stares, unblinking, as serious as the day Charlie died. Just like any time we've ever played poker. Like she was when she decided to kill Gram. The world has stopped around us. There's no noise, no house, no heat. Just a suspended moment of tension.
“Bullshit,” she whispers.
Our lips clash, and I pin her against the chair with the force of my kiss. I trace a thumb along her cheekbone, then down the side of her throat. She relents control, arches up against me, pliant, trusting. I shift my hips away and grab her by the hip with my free hand. She makes a low noise in her throat – so tempting – but I push her back against the chair. It's the space between us that's always captivated her.
Her eyes are wide open, no romantic notions in that overt stare. The air around us is so heavy with smoke, so potent. The world may never be the same after this, but I can't stop the thought that this is not my place. I break the kiss, and when she moves to follow, the fist in her hair halts her advance. Her eyes narrow, but she hasn't moved but to lean forward.
Once again, our lips are nearly touching. I hold her eyes, that hard glare. She's pissed. Good.
What do I want from her? It can't be everything. Saying I'll walk away in a few days is like predicting that Gram's supply will get shipped up the muddy Mississippi, and that he'll die of a heart attack.
I push the hand on her hip upward, shoving her tank top up to reveal a glimpse of her brown midsection. Her skin burns beneath mine and her glare is hungry. Goddamn her fuck-me eyes.
Finally she moves, reaches – so slowly – between us to grab a hold on my shirt, to slip the top button from its hole. She holds my eyes, unsure of how I'll react as she undoes the next button. I am paralyzed, under her spell when she brushes the fabric apart and feathers her hand along the dusting of hair on my chest. I'm not thin like Freddy, or manufactured like Josh. I'm solid, naturally built, and it occurs to me in a crashing wave that she likes that about me.
I've wanted this for so long, but my panicked thoughts shift. Charlie would be so pissed. He'd kill me, without a doubt. The thought is like a slap and I jerk back. I let her go and take several steps backward. Her hand hangs in the air where I had been. The joint has gone out in her other hand.
“I can't do this,” I choke.
Her eyes widen and she sits forward, a spring painfully coiled. Then her expression slips into something angrier. Her reaction stirs more guilt than I could have expected. I should have walked away, like every other time our toes have gotten too close to the line.
“It wouldn't be right by Charlie,” I say. My voice sounds like there's something solid lodged against it. Feels that way, too.
She bolts upright to a stand, body trembling from her sudden temper. Her voice wavers when she says, “Charlie is dead. Your self-righteousness won't bring him back, so don't use his fucking name as your excuse.”
Excuse? Why argue, she won't see it any other way but hers. I heave a sigh and turn away.
She doesn't make a sound, but suddenly she's close enough to grab my upper arm and jerk me back around to face her. She's so close that I can feel her breath when she says, “And don't you dare walk away from me.”
The world tilts, whirls with my blood in my ears, and there's not a coherent thought to be had. All I know is that my fortitude – and five years of denial – is crumbling down like castle walls, like massive stones that create an earthquake as they hit the ground. All I know is the feeling of her face in my hands as I pull her to me.
This kiss is not the battle of wills the first was. This is a commanding parting of lips and reverence when I taste her tongue against mine – weed and beer and hot temper. Her hands find my waist inside my shirt, her fingers digging into my flesh, and she presses her body against mine.
I run my hands down, over her shoulders, sliding easily across the sweat on her skin. Then I take them lower, until her perfect ass is in my hands. I squeeze and lift her. Her legs wrap my waist, so trusting. As if I'd fail her now.
She's watching my face through half-lidded eyes, still searching me for something despite the euphoria. Does she see a stranger? Or has she always seen what I've tried to keep hidden?
I carry her the short distance to the table, lay her back on it. She keeps her legs around me, like maybe she thinks I'll bolt again. That's fair. She has no idea what she's set into motion.
My hands are all over her, running over her curves and planes, until I'm pushing her tank top over her head. I slip a hand under her and snap open her black lace bra. She doesn't wait for me to pull the straps over her shoulders. She does
