But this kiss is barely making a blip.
I change the angle of the kiss, sucking hard on his lips and trying to reignite the feelings that sent my pulse into overdrive just a few seconds earlier.
It’s no use. Maybe I’m not that great of a kisser because he’s not doing anything except standing there, which makes this rather boring.
With time against me, I keep my lips frozen on his and focus on getting his wallet out. My arm wraps around his back, and I keep wiggling his wallet past the confines of his jeans pocket.
I can feel it coming loose.
Almost there…
Almost…
Finn snatches my hand, and the wallet tumbles out of his pocket and lands on the floor with a soft thud. I whip my eyes up to his guiltily. Did he sense that I was going for his wallet? Was I discovered?
His jaw muscles clench as he moves back. But not too far. Our lips are still on top of one another. I’m so close, I can see the cuts on his face. His skin burst open from whatever happened to him today and the wounds are beginning to scab.
“Why’d your watch go quiet?” His voice is dark velvet threaded with an accusation.
I force my chin up as my breath steadies. He didn’t notice I took his wallet.
“I guess kissing you so much made the novelty wear off. It doesn’t make me feel anything anymore.”
He glowers at me as if it’s my fault.
“Or,” I add, stepping back, “maybe you’re not that good of a kisser.”
A slow, rolling storm passes through his dark eyes.
And then he smiles fully. And I almost wish that he’d go back to not having any expressions.
That smile doesn’t soften Finn an inch. In fact, it makes him look manic and dangerous, like a beast set free from its cage.
Monsters only laugh when they’re about to destroy something.
I try to swallow, but my throat has gone dry. “Y-you disagree?”
“You’ve kissed me all night, J. But… I…” He undoes the button of my shirt. “Haven’t…” Another button. “Kissed you.”
My watch starts beeping again, which is the absoluteworsttiming.
His gaze doesn’t even flicker to the device. It’s like he expected it to go off again. Didn’t think for a second that it wouldn’t.
This is his game now.
I sense the shift in him. The intensity of his stare probes at me in a different way, as if he’s finally allowing himself to play with his toy.
Breathless, I pin my shirt closed with my pointer finger and thumb. “W-what are you doing?”
Finn easily captures both of my hands and pulls them behind my back. With his free hand, he catches a strand of my hair, rolling it between his fingers like a cigarette.
“What exactly do you want from me?” He’s talking in a musing way, like he’s thinking out loud rather than addressing me as a person.
His fingers release my hair and trail down my neck, stopping at my pulse point. I hate the way my body turns into him. Hate that my heartbeat seems to throw itself against his fingertips, beating for him in a way I’ve never experienced before.
The air around us turns unbearably hot, and it doesn’t help that my watch has not. Shut. Up.
“I want to squeeze it out of you.” Finn’s voice is so low that I can barely hear it over the watch’s alarm. “But…” His hand brushes down my collar bone where my pacemaker was inserted and slides into my shirt until it rests against my heart.
