I stroked one hand languidly down his cheek until it came to rest at his throat. Rising up onto my toes, I leant forward until the tip of my nose was touching his face. Taking a deep breath, I inhaled his perfume, a distinctive scent that reminded me of woody oud and rich lavender, perhaps a trace of cinnamon.
I thought,Blake. Thought,Cliff. Thought,Heathcliff.
I thought nothing as he cupped my face in his hands and turned it gently to the side, just far enough that I felt his lips on mine. He paused, I held my breath. And then we gave in to it.
As I shifted towards him, he gathered me close. We kissed each other at the same moment, warily and yet with such…certainty.
Nothing hesitant, nothing tentative, only his lips on mine, and my beating heart, which sank through my chest to between my legs. A kiss in the blink of an eye–and everything inside me throbbed.
I grabbed the collar of his shirt and held it tightly as he pushed me once more against the wall. My dress rasped between my shoulder blades. I still couldn’t breathe in it, and I wished he’d unbutton it.
It wasn’t raw desire I felt but something softer, more innocent, yet at the same time more intense. The kiss was scraping at the core of something I thought I’d recognised in Blake from the moment we first met. And I wanted, at last, to reach it. I wanted to crack through every false shell until there was only us. No more fabric, no lies, no secrets, no one else, no other influences. Just us.
But Blake’s hands were still on my face, his thumbs tracing soft circles on my cheeks. There was only his knee, pushing between my legs as he kissed me more deeply, more urgently. His lips were warm and a little rough, like the sound that came out of my mouth as I felt the pressure of him through the layers of cloth. Oh God, it reallywasmadness, but I loved it.
It sent a jolt through Blake. He broke away from the kiss and rested his forehead against mine, breathing heavily. His breath was hot on my face, which was already burning. I didn’t dare to move, not even to blink. ‘Why can’t I look at you when we kiss?’ I whispered, my voice brittle.
‘If you need your eyes to see me in a kiss like that, then something is wrong,’ he answered, just as softly. I wasn’t sure I understood the words, but I thought I grasped the emotion behind them.
Because I did see him. In that warm, dark moment, he was the only thing I saw. And for the first time since I’d known him, I found nothing conflicted there. No mismatch between his expression and his words, no gulf between the glittering perfection of his friends and the broken way he viewed the world, as if he were alone in it. He wasn’t perfect, and nor was I, but he was whole. Wholly himself.
For seconds we stood before each other in silence. The wind whistling through the window, the music spilling through the floorboards from below, the noisy world snatching out at us on all sides. Yet in that moment, it couldn’t reach.
‘This is you drawing back the curtain, isn’t it?’ I whispered.
‘Yes.’ He smiled audibly.
‘Is it real, or is it an illusion?’
‘It’s all too real with you, Pica,’ he murmured into my mouth. ‘That’s the whole goddamn problem.’
I was about to say something, but his lips were on mine again. And kissing him was more enjoyable than asking questions he wouldn’t answer anyway. So I put my hands on his neck and sighed into his mouth as he buried his fingers in my hair and tilted my head back a little.
‘Blake.’
The voice reached my ears as if through cotton wool. Or through velvet, because everything about me and in me felt that way: like dark, soft, protective velvet. The world bounced off me, until that little word, thatname, bristling with thorns, slipped through and tore the shell of the moment apart.
Blake switched more quickly than I did. First he stopped mid-kiss, then released me with a jerk and backed away.
I blinked, my eyes adjusting to the dim light in the corridor.
The silhouette a few yards away came only reluctantly into focus. Norah was wearing an evening gown: pale blue satin that accentuated her slim figure and made her hair look even redder. It might have made her look gentle, but the way she stared at us was sharp-edged. She was… appalled.
‘Henry’s gone, but the others are looking for you. And Ashton is’—her eyes flicked in my direction, and she lowered her voice—‘Ashton. We should go before he comes up here and…’
This time she looked at me without seeing at me. My face was tingling, my tongue too. Blake had been right. I’d been able to see him without opening my eyes. And now I could sense him even though he wasn’t touching me. He took a step forward, between Norah and me. ‘At the other end of the hall there’s a second flight of stairs. Take that, grab your jacket and go home,’ he told me.
His voice was still a little breathless, but his body was well under control now. He swept the hair back from his brow and adjusted the collar of his shirt, as if by doing so he could cast off all memory of the kiss–and of me. Yet I saw a smear of my lipstick on his mouth, and–much more important–still felt the touch of his hands. And I knew it was the same for him. I just knew.
‘I—’ I began, confused, but then he turned to me.
‘Please.’ His voice was so earnest, so deep and strained, that it almost made me flinch. ‘Go home.’
I moved unwillingly away from the wall, smoothing my dress. ‘Fine. But that’s the second time you’ve asked me to do something and I’ve said yes. You owe me.’
‘Blake.’ Norah snarled his name. His shoulders tensed, but he didn’t take his eyes off me as I took the first step past him.
‘You’ll text me?’ I asked, so quietly I could barely hear the words myself. But I could taste them–especially the bittersweet trace of hope.
