“That won’t be necessary,” he said. He seemed to steady something within himself, holding her gaze with an uneasy expression that no doubt matched her own.
Erryc took a step towards her, closing the distance between them in one motion. The sheer crampedness of the room multiplied tenfold as he stepped into her space. Fawn didn’teven realize she moved backwards at all, some knee-jerk attempt to keep a polite distance between them as she usually did.
The storage shelves met her hips, her back, her shoulders. Her hands found one of the wood shelves to grip and try to steady herself.
Though there had never been an occasion that she fainted dead away from her heart pounding so much, Fawn felt this was a likely contender for the first.
She swallowed.
She wanted this. She just was afraid of it as much as she wanted it. She never imagined that it could happen, and that was why it had been easy to want as much as she had, never voicing the desire from her little corner table. But faced with the possibility, it seemed very likely that if she pressed her mouth to his, something in her would untwist, and all of the thoughts she’d had about him over the years might come spilling out.
Erryc didn’t feel that way about her. He had, of course, kissed her cheek before, among several other tavern regulars during holiday revelries, and that had been enough to send her home warm all over.
She wasn’t prepared for this, but somehow she doubted she ever would be.
It was just a kiss.
She had been kissed before. Perhaps not by someone so…
Fawn’s head tipped all the way back to look up at him.
Erryc looked just as nervous as her, his hands in tight fists at his sides, his mouth set in an uncertain line, framed by his tusks.
It was that moment she realized she had been gnawing into her lower lip. She couldn’t help but let out a laugh in spite of herself.
She touched her hand to his, and he loosened his grip, letting her curl a hand around a couple of his fingers.
Fawn tugged him into her space. She let him crowd her against the shelf, easing him in an inch at a time, until there was barely room to breathe.
Erryc’s fingertips drifted up her sides, keeping her steady as he leaned down to her. He cupped her face, and the breath was promptly stolen from her. Her lips parted, a sharp inhale when his forehead touched hers and their lips met.
Perhaps she expected a peck, a mere momentary meeting of mouths. What Erryc gave her was so much more.
His kiss was tender as he was, soft as a breath against her skin, as he held her face as carefully as he’d hold a bird. His tusks grazed her cheeks, smooth and blunt, as his lips moved against hers. To have him touch her like this was something else entirely. The heat that seemed to live in her cheeks whenever she was around him traveled further, spreading through her chest, low in her belly, deep in her nethers. It bloomed into a force unruly and needy.
“Mmf,” Fawn gasped, as he caught her lip between his teeth, tugging it gently. The sensation of his gentle drag over the place she’d worried raw made her back arch away from the shelf, pushing into him. Her ribs brushed his, and she put her hands on the broad expanse of his chest, to keep herself from falling into him even more. She might not come back if she did.
Erryc pulled back immediately. “Did I hurt you?”
“No, no. That was…” she gazed up at him for a long moment, unable to think of words when her entire vision was taken up with his long eyelashes and deep brown eyes holding hers.
She forgot she had meant to say anything at all, lost in his gaze.
The sound of a glass breaking startled their attention to the door. Erryc let go of her, stepping back.
Clearly Fawn wasn’t the only one affected– Erryc’s face was flushed a deeper green, his chest heaving with his breath.
“I, uh, think we’ve got it. I think that was good. I mean it was. It was good. It was convincing. And believable. Right? Right,” he stumbled to say, his voice cracking on his question. He ran a hand through his floppy hair and looked away. “The front. I oughta check the front. I’ll be, uh, over there.”
He pointed, as if he hadn’t been clear enough.
Fawn nodded vigorously until Erryc ducked out the storage room door again. Her knees finally gave out, and she slid onto the nearest crate. Her heartbeat was so loud it left her body ringing.
She was supposed to do that again, with an audience?
Dazed, Fawn stood and pushed open the door, following him out.
“Another one, barkeep,” one of the patrons called, raising his broken glass and waving it to show just how empty it was.
