His heart thumped hard. “Felicity.” His voice sounded like a groan, a question and a warning wrapped into one husky word.
“Gabe.” She pushed onto her tiptoes and crushed her lips to his.
He froze just long enough to make sure this was real. Then everything in him surged to life.
He cupped the back of her neck, angling his head to deepen the kiss. She made a needy sound that sliced straight through him, fisting the front of his shirt to keep him where she wanted him.
He kissed her slow at first, savoring the give of her mouth, the faint taste of mint and a flavor uniquely her. She moved with him, learning his pace and matching it with her own demands.
When he traced the seam of her lips with his tongue, she opened for him with a soft gasp. Heat flared, and he gripped her by the waist and yanked her against him.
She fit like she was made for him.
Then she was tugging off his ball cap and raking her fingers through his hair. He groaned into her mouth, instinctively turning her away from the front window into the shelter between bookcases.
“Gabe!” She tugged at his shirt, fumbling with his buttons, issuing a little sound of frustration when they didn’t concede to her immediately.
He chuckled against her lips and caught her hand, stilling them on the button. “Easy,” he murmured.
“I don’t want easy, Gabe. Not with you.”
“Christ, Felicity.”
Her voice trembled. “Tell me you feel this pull too.”
He groaned. “I feel it. I want you. More than I’ve let myself admit.”
She laughed, her lips open near his.
He couldn’t control himself anymore—he plunged his tongue into her sweetness and they crumpled to the floor among the fallen books.
* * * * *
For a blink, Felicity didn’t know which way was up.
One moment she was standing with her fists bunched in Gabe’s shirt. The next the world tipped and she went down with him, landing safely in his arms on the spot of floor they just cleared.
A laugh bubbled up—half shock, half disbelief that this was happening—but he smothered the sound when he crushed his mouth over hers again.
God, he kissed like he meant it. Like he’d been holding back for longer than they’d even known each other and the dam finally cracked.
Like he meant to doallthe things to her that she fantasized during long, lonely nights.
She stretched her hands across his broad, chiseled shoulders and dragged him closer. The floor was hard beneath her, but all she cared about was Gabe’s hard body locked against hers and the way he braced himself on his forearms so he didn’t crush her.
He was a gentleman, even while kissing her like a man starved.
Her heart pounded into her ribs, and every nerve inside her buzzed with desire. She hadn’t done this in so long. Flirted, sure. Accepted the odd dinner date and even tried a dating app, yes. But this—this wild, unplanned, undeniable collision?
This was new. This was terrifying.
This was everything she’d been trying not to want since she set eyes on him.
He was helping her during a difficult time. She didn’t want him to mix up obligation with desire.
As he slanted his mouth over hers, she moaned, her insides gripping as his tongue brushed hers. Heat shot through her, pooling low, turning her bones to liquid. He plunged his tongue deeper, and she arched into him with a gasp.
He responded with a growl low in his chest that she felt in every little needy spot on the way down her body.
