Craning my neck, I look around the grand foyer. The dusty wood and the haunting glow from the stained glass make this place look more like a castle from the eighteenth century. I didn’t intend to like this old house. Didn’t intend to keep it standing. Didn’t think I’d want to stay here in this small town for longer than my punishmentallotted. Caroline clears her throat, bringing my gaze back to hers. My heart skips a beat. You get this feeling when you want to keep something. It’s scary and vulnerable. It makes you feel like your skin is flipped inside out. It changes everything. Keeping that quality, keepingit, has to be protected at all costs. You become obsessed with keeping that which you can’t sacrifice. Because the feelings you have right now never existed before. They will never exist again. “I like you that much,” I admit.
She pretends she didn’t hear me—turns her face toward a portrait of someone’s old relative painted in dark burgundy and white.
“You know when you have the same dream over and over again?” she asks.
I grunt, upset she won’t reply to my sentiment. “Yeah.”
“Well, I feel like you’re a dream I’m going to wake up from. But you’re here every single day. It’s like I’m dreaming. I’m waiting for the goblin to show up and suck out my brains.”
Raising one brow, that garners a smile. “A brain-sucking goblin? I’d like to think I’m a good guy, but I’m probably the proverbial goblin that will turn your dream into a nightmare. I’m learning as I go.”
Her cheeks are a dusty rose that matches the shade of her lips. Tucking her thumbs into the pockets of the overalls, she looks to her feet, but then directly into my eyes. “Will you tell me about Stella?” That name spilling from Caroline’s lips seems so wrong, but on a second assessment might prove to be okay. She’ll be the oneto erase her from my heart forever. “I brought dinner from the diner. Well, Mama sent it with me. I figured you wouldn’t have anything to eat here. I brought you that burger you like. The one with the onion rings inside it.” She’s babbling to distract me from her ask.
I pull her to my chest, one hand wrapping around her back underneath her overalls. My hands are against the warm, bare skin of her lower back. I swallow hard once. “While I will always take food from you, even my favorite food, don’t feel like you have to bribe me for information. I’ll tell you about her.”
She blinks hard. “Well, it’s just, you didn’t seem to want to talk about the relationship before, and now that we’re…official, I was just wondering if that was fair game.” It’s not the first time I’ve wondered why Caroline is so meek and mild mannered. “I’ll tell you anything you want to know,” she adds. “If you want.”
I want to kiss away her fear. I want my lips to be the ones that erase every bad thing in the world. It’s the wrong time to be obsessed with kissing, while she’s asking about Stella, but I’m not sure how to stop it without acting on the desire. “I want to know everything about you, Caroline May. Everything.” I lick my lips and trade my grasp for the side of her waist instead of her back. My thumbs skim the top edge of her panties. She sucks in a surprised breath, and every inch of her skin prickles. “Everything,” I say one more time, leaning in close to brush my bottom lip around the curve of her ear. I grab the sides of her ribcage and feel every breath shetakes, my hands spanning the whole side of her small body. “Can I kiss you? Just a little?” I ask.
“Just a little?” she asks, breathing out, her words tickling the side of my face. Inhaling her scent is a mistake I know I won’t come back from. Not right now, at least. I need to devour her.
“Yeah,” I reply, rubbing her skin, letting my fingertips memorize every pore they touch. “Just a little. A lot would be too fast,” I explain. “Your skin,” I hiss. “I want to see it. Touch it. All of it.” Leaning my head down to place my forehead on her shoulder, I close my eyes. “So, just a little kiss. Then we can eat and talk about remodeling and all of the other shit we should be doing right now.”
“Just a little, then,” she says, brazenly pressing her lips against my neck. A goddamn shiver slides down my spine, and I feel it in the tip of my toes. When I pull back to look at her, she’s smiling. “Follow me,” she says, grabbing my forearm because my hands are still inside the overalls. I let her guide me through the house out onto a terrace that overlooks an expansive lawn and the ocean. “Even if it’s a little kiss, it is our first,” she explains, eyes twinkling. “Bronze Bay should be here for it, too.” Her words wobble, and I know she’s nervous—her innocence so strong even a manners-pro like Caroline is unable to change the dynamic of this moment with her conversation.
“Caroline,” I croon, letting my chest puff out. I know how to save her right now. Smiling, I crook her closer with my pointer finger. She smiles, presses her lipstogether, and shuffles her feet so her toes are pointed at mine. Her chest lined up to my stomach, the breeze passing between us like an infidel, and my heart racing like a fucking steamroller. Gently I grab her chin with my thumb and forefinger.
Her huge blue eyes widen as she sucks in a breath. I bite my bottom lip as I survey hers. “It doesn’t matter where the kiss happens. You’re always going to remember it.”
“Yeah?” The word is almost inaudible as she squeaks out a response.
I could explain that the chemistry between us isn’t normal—that most people don’t have this unsung passion in every moment, the visible pull our bodies have to each other when we don’t have control over it—but proving it with a kiss seems like a better idea.
“Are you making me feel like this because you don’t want to talk about her?” she says, air rushing out in a breathless plea.
Dropping her chin, I place my hands on each side of her neck. “I’m trying to kiss you because I want to taste you, even for a moment. Want to know what it feels like when my lips are on yours,” I say, letting my gaze drop to her heaving chest and the swell of her pert tits. “I’ll tell you anything you want to know about her.” Hopefully she doesn’t ask anything right now, because this moment is magic. The seawater sifts through the air, mingling with the honeysuckle vines that have taken over this terrace. “Can I kiss you because I want to?”
She nods, rubbing her lips together. In this momentI’ve never wanted something more. Never held myself back for the sake of anyone or anything else. This right here is the reward. Caroline’s blue eyes, soft skin, waiting lips, and open heart begging me to give her what I want just as much.
Sliding my hands from her neck down the side of her body to land on her hips, I lean down slowly, calculating how long I’ll be able to hold myself back before the kiss has even begun. Caroline’s eyes are closed, and her full lips part moments before mine come in for the proverbial kill. The longing is so strong when we connect that I slam my eyes closed and wince as the feelings of…everything course through my body—an unfamiliar onslaught of emotions. Moving my lips against hers softly, I tentatively let my tongue slip against hers and moan when her sweetness tinges my tongue. Caroline makes a small noise of pleasure, and I think my dick might break through its jean cage to attack and destroy, but I’m careful to keep a distance, because this is a little kiss. The kind when you give a shit. The one that snowballs into a million memories that stain your soul for the rest of time. The kiss that starts and never really ends because hearts are proven correct.
I won’t get over Caroline or this kiss. Not ever.
She pulls into my body, her hands fisting my shirt. The excitement inside my pants only makes her more ferocious—her kiss deepening as I try my best to separate what’s happening inside my head from what’s happening on this terrace, in the warm ocean breeze. I bite her bottom lip, and she opens her eyes to meetmine. What I find there takes my breath away. It’s like I’ve unlocked something that’s been stowed away for all of time. I grab the braids that fall over her tits and pull lightly on one so her head tilts to the side. I kiss her from that angle, sliding my lips against hers while she stares on, mesmerized.
I repeat the gesture on the other side, yanking her braid just enough to get her right where I want her—in my control. In my arms. I’m calculating everything about this kiss, and she’s eating it up. We separate our lips, forehead to forehead, and catch our breath when she slides her hands under my shirt and sneaks her fingertips into the top of my jeans.
Her breathing is jagged, and her lips are red and glistening. I kiss them again, just once. Deep and controlled, until she slides her tongue into my mouth, begging for more. Against her mouth, I remind her, “Just a little.”
“A lot. More,” she replies, trying to get her hands back where they were before. I shift my body back to juke her intent. I pin her by the wrists against the white wood of the terrace guardrail and kiss her as a consolation prize. If she touches my dick, I’ll end up inside her. Right here. I might have strong intentions and valiant decisions about taking it slow to preserve the both of us, but I’m still a man who is wildly attracted to the woman grabbing at my package.
“Touch me,” she says, in between kisses, sliding her lips across my jaw and then down my neck.
I groan at the feel of her on my neck. It’s one of my spots. The ones that drive me absolutely crazy. I’d probably come right now if I wasn’t so focused on controlling myself with Caroline. It’s been that long since I’ve been with a woman.
“Keep your hands where I can see them,” I breathe out. “I’ll touch you, but you can’t touch me.” I shake my head, trying to shake off some of the lust. There’s no ocean air or honeysuckle anymore. It’s all sweet perfume, saliva, and desire. The gulls have been drowned out by the thunder of my pulse.
She looks crestfallen, but she nods her head up and down. “Okay,” she says, leaning back on the railing, putting her hands on the wood, almost exactly where I just had them. “Touch me,” she says again, like it can’t happen quickly enough.
