“Mood?” I echo.
“You’ve got a grumpy one. Figured I’d fix it.”
She’s not wrong. I take a bite—expecting bland health food—and get hit with a riot of flavor. Warm, earthy, bright. I grunt, unwilling to give her the satisfaction.
She leans on the counter, watching. The faint scent of lemon and ginger drifts closer as she shifts her weight, her laugh humming just before it spills out. “See? Fuel can taste good.”
I don’t answer fast enough, so she adds, “Swallow before you choke, big guy.”
The liquids go down wrong. I cough, trying to cover it, but she’s already laughing—low and musical, the kind of sound that shakes something loose in me.
“You okay there?” she teases. “Need me to perform the Heimlich?”
“Fine,” I rasp, clearing my throat. “You trying to kill me?”
“Not yet.”
Her smile lingers just long enough to turn into something else—softer, heavier. The kind of silence that makes the air thick.
And then we’re too close.
She’s still holding the spoon, and my hand finds the counter behind her, boxing her in without meaning to. The scent of ginger and lemon and her skin fills the small space between us.
Her breath hitches. My heart does, too.
I should move. I don’t.
The air hums—low and electric—as her back grazes the counter. My pulse thunders, too loud, too fast, matching the sound of the bubbling broth behind us.
Sage blinks up at me, eyes wide but not afraid. I catch the faintest hitch of her breath, the way her hand tightens around the spoon like she’s deciding whether to swing it or drop it.
“Leo,” she says quietly, warning in her tone, but her voice isn’t steady enough to convince either of us.
“What?” My voice comes out rougher than I mean it to.
“You’re in my space.”
“Pretty sure you stepped into mine.”
Her lips part—ready to fire back—but I’m already closing the gap. The movement isn’t planned, not even thought through. It’s instinct. Heat. The kind of pull that makes logic irrelevant.
One second, she’s glaring at me; the next, her hands are on my chest, pushing—or maybe holding on—as my mouth finds hers.
The kiss hits like a power surge—heat and static colliding. Beneath the rush, there’s the faint warmth of her skin, soft and grounding, pulling the chaos into something achingly real. Sharp. Messy. Too much and not enough all at once. She tasteslike lemon and salt, her breath quick against mine. I feel her gasp more than I hear it, the sound vibrating against my lips.
Her spoon clatters to the tile. My hand finds her waist. Her fingers twist in my shirt, pulling me closer instead of away. For a few wild seconds, the world shrinks to heat and breath and the scrape of metal on countertop as she’s lifted onto it.
Then—like hitting a wall—it’s too much.
We break apart at the same time, both breathing hard. The air rushes back in, thick with the scent of ginger and something new I can’t name.
Her eyes search mine, wild and uncertain. “That was?—”
“—a mistake,” I finish, too fast, the word rough and uneven. My hands twitch at my sides, caught between the urge to reach for her and the instinct to pull back.
She flinches, and I hate the word the second it leaves my mouth. But I can’t take it back. If I let this spiral, if I give it oxygen, everything I’ve built—the control, the discipline—burns up on contact.
Sage hops down from the counter, face unreadable. “Right. Big mistake. Got it.”
