Outside, under the glow of a streetlamp, she turned to him.Her voice was almost a whisper.“Tripp…”
He didn’t let her finish.His hands framed her face, and then his mouth was on hers.
The kiss was desperate, searing, years of grief and want colliding.She gasped against him, then melted into it, her hands clutching at his shirt, pulling him closer.Tears streaked her cheeks, but she didn’t care.Not when his lips claimed hers like he’d been starving for them.
They broke apart only to breathe, foreheads pressed together.
“Too many years,” he murmured.
“Too many,” she whispered back.
And then they were kissing again, deeper, hungrier, oblivious to the world around them.
When he finally pulled back, his breath ragged, his eyes dark with heat, he said, “Not here.Not like this.Come with me.”
Her heart thundered.She didn’t ask where.She just nodded.
She’d dreamed of this night for years, imagined it a hundred different ways, the moment they found their way back to each other, the first time she melted into his arms again.Now, as it finally loomed real, a shiver of unease spiraled through her.And yet nothing—no fear, no doubt, no ghost of the past, could keep her from him tonight.Nothing.
Minutes later, his car pulled into the gravel lot of a nice seaside hotel, the kind with balconies that faced the ocean.It should have felt tawdry, reckless.Instead, it felt inevitable, the only place their twenty years of longing could finally break free.
The elevator crawled upward, every second stretching like an eternity.When his hand closed around hers, her breath hitched, anticipation coiling tightly inside her.God, what was wrong with this elevator?Why did it feel like it was moving through molasses when all she wanted was for the doors to open?
Inside the room, the door barely clicked shut before his mouth was on hers again.Kisses rough, tender, urgent, all at once.Her fingers fumbled with his tie, his hands skimming her back, pulling her closer, needing her as much as she needed him.
This time, she didn’t stop herself.
This time, there would be no running away.
Chapter21
Tripp had managed a room at the nicest hotel on the gulf facing the ocean.He didn’t care about the cost.He only wanted to give Nicole the best.This was not the night they stayed in a cheap motel when they were kids.
This was a new beginning.The hotel room door shut with a soft click, sealing them into quiet.The hum of the air conditioner filled the silence, faintly mixed with the smell of salt drifting through the old balcony door.The place was glamorous, the best he could get on such short notice.
Yet standing here with Nicole, it felt like the most intimate place he’d ever been.
She leaned against the door, her hand pressed flat against it as if to steady herself.The light from the bedside lamp spilled across her skin, catching in the strands of her ebony hair, making her look like a portrait he’d dreamed and lost and somehow found again.
For a moment, he couldn’t move.He was afraid this was a dream, that if he blinked too long, she’d vanish.
“I don’t want to waste another second,” he said, his voice low and rough.
Her lips parted, trembling.“Then don’t.”
That was all it took.He crossed the space and caught her face in his hands, kissing her like a starving man who had just been given bread.The touch of her mouth sent fire through him.She tasted of wine and salt, but underneath was something that was only Nicole, familiar, intoxicating, and devastating.
She melted into him, her arms twining around his neck, pulling him closer, as if she, too, had been waiting years for this moment.Her body pressed tightly to his, soft against hard, and the sound she made, a quiet gasp that broke into a sigh, nearly unraveled him.
“God, I’ve missed you,” he whispered against her mouth, pressing frantic kisses to her jaw, her temple, the hollow of her throat.
Tonight, the moment her hand slipped into his, it felt like coming home, as if every road he’d taken had been leading him right back here.This was where he belonged, where he’d always belonged.And he swore, then and there, nothing, no one, was ever going to rip this away from him again.
“Too many years,” she breathed, her hands clutching his shirt, tugging, desperate.
“Never again.”His vow was harsh, almost broken, against her skin.He kissed the line of her throat, felt her pulse leap beneath his lips, and nearly lost himself.
His hands slid down her arms, over her waist, reacquainting themselves with the curves that had haunted his memory.She trembled, not with fear but with want.When his fingers found the zipper at the back of her dress, she caught his wrist, her breath ragged.For a heartbeat, he froze, but then she lifted her gaze to his.Her eyes glistened with tears, but her voice was steady.
