As if it matters. I won’t bring her into this. I can barely bring myself to ask Theo what would hurt Chandler the most for fear he’d ask her, no matter how much I tell him not to.
I hunch forward and cradle my coffee in my hands, which are getting colder by the minute, even inside my gloves.
“Are you staying here in the Tooth?” I ask. “Is that the long-term plan?”
“I don’t know.”
“People won’t come to a kombucha bar for breakfast,” I say. “They won’t drop in for a five-minute chat while they’re waiting for their morning fermented tea the way they drop in for a quick visit while they’re waiting for their latte. And the locals won’t abandon the tavern and the other restaurants they go to for dinner for something new in town.”
“If that’s the case, that’ll eventually be someone else’s problem.”
Exactly the answer I was afraid of. “Please don’t make me fight dirty. I genuinely like you too much as a person to want to fight dirty.”
His eyes flare and then go dark as he shifts to look at me straight-on. “Definedirty.”
The fact that he’s turned on and not wary shouldn’t be a relief.
Nor should it make my breasts tighten and my clit tingle.
I straighten and face him, ignoring the distinct lack of space between us. “I will save my café by any means necessary.”
“You think you’ll find my skeletons.”
He shouldn’t be leaning into me with his gaze dropping to my lips.
And I shouldn’t like it nearly as much as I do. “I don’t want you to have skeletons.”
“You wouldn’t use them against me.”
“You have no idea what I’d do.”
“Okay, Duchess.”
Fuck.
The bastard just called me a good person.
“If I kiss you, I’m pretending you’re still Duke,” I breathe as our lips inch closer and closer together.
“If I kiss you, I know I’m kissing Sabrina.”
“That’s a horrible thing to say to me.”
His lips tip up, but the smile doesn’t diminish the smoky desire in his eyes. “You’re a good person.”
“You just don’t want me to play dirty.”
“On the contrary. I’m intrigued at the idea of you playing dirty. I want to know what you define asdirty.”
I want him to do dirty things to me. I want him to pull me into the storage closet at the café and tease my clit with that long thumb. I want him to kiss me until I can’t breathe. I want him to rip my shirt off and shove me against a wall and thrust into me while I ride him. I want to suck his cock and I want to ride his face and I want to have our night in Hawaii again.
“We need to leave here before we both turn into icicles,” I breathe.
“I’m not cold at all right now.”
His lips brush mine. I grip his coat, pull him into me, and I let myself go.
I pretend we’re in Hawaii. That the night never ended. That we’re kissing, our tongues dancing as we claw each other’s clothes off. That he’s pinching my nipples and growling out that uninhibited noise of sheer pleasure while I shove his pants down off his hips and tackle the buttons on his Hawaiian shirt. That I can hear the surf rolling in through the open door of his balcony.
