I shouldn’t have eaten the whoopie pie, which now rolled in my stomach like a ship batted about in a heavy sea. Nervous energy spiked through me.
“So.” He leaned against his desk. “What did you come here for, Shira?”
I cleared my throat. “You said I wasn’t going after what I really wanted. That I was picking what was easy and looked good on paper.”
“Yes.” He watched me carefully.
“Maybe you’re right. It’s not how I thought of it, because I liked Isaac, but maybe I really liked the daydream I had of him.”
“Which you gave up on.”
“Yes. Because he’s not who I wanted.”
“Oh?” He stared at me, unmoving. “And who do you want?”
I pushed the words out, stark and clear. “I want you. I want this.” I swallowed hard. “I’m utterly terrified, but I think about you all the time.”
“Allthe time?” He pushed himself straight and came toward me—sauntered, really. “What do you think?”
God, he was beautiful. I thought about how determined I’d been not to fall for him again, how I’d sworn no feelings could ever develop for him a second time. And here we were, and the way I felt for him was too big for words to describe, like a balloon in my chest stretching larger and larger, big enough to encompass the both of us. “Tell me if it’s just in my head like it was last time,” I said quietly. “If I’m the only one who feels this.”
“It’s not,” he said, just as softly. “Or this time, it’s in mine, too.”
I closed my eyes in relief. “So what do we do? What do you want?”
“I want the same thing I’ve wanted since we were snowed in together.”
“Oh?” I said a little breathlessly. “And what is that?”
He took a last step forward, closing the gap between us. Andthiswas a moment, and we were in it. “To kiss you.”
I was terrified and excited and frozen. “You don’t have to butter me up.”
“I’m not buttering you up.” He brushed his fingers underneath my chin, tilting it upward slightly. “I’m being honest.”
“I”—I couldn’t get the words out, couldn’t say the same thing even thoughgodI had thought about him constantly, even when trying not to, only to have the thoughts infiltrate in the twilight before sleep—“Tyler, I—”
“Yes?” he murmured. I could feel the heat of his body. He looked down at me from so very, very close, his eyes twin sapphires, his hair palest gold. “What do you want?”
“I want—I want to kiss you,” I whispered.
The way this boy smiled, starting small, then blossoming full and wide... His smile was a spider’s web, beautiful and complex and impossible to escape, and I didn’t want to escape it. “Even if you don’t know what to do with your nose?” he teased, and I broke into a startled, unexpected laugh, and he bent his head the last few inches and pressed his lips to mine.
His mouth was hot and firm, and this wasTyler. I was overwhelmed by sheer sensation, by the bolts of heat sparking through me, by the pressure of his lips on mine, by the heat of his hands on my waist, pulling me closer, until our bodies pressed against each other. His tongue nipped at the seam of my lips, slipping through them, sliding against my own. And I couldn’t help but respond, leaning into him—
I pulled back. “Oh my god,” I gasped. “What was that?”
He smirked at me, infuriatingly smug. “Thatwas kissing.”
“That was—that—” I licked my lips, watched his eyes fall to them. I swallowed. I needed to get ahold of myself. “You’re, uh, not bad at that.”
Apparently, my coolness didn’t work, because his smirk broadened. “You’re not so bad yourself.”
“I’m not?” I paused to think. Ihadn’tbeen thinking, I’d been following. But it had worked right. “I was—I did okay?”
“Jesus Christ, Shira,” he said. “Yes.”
I held up my hands. “Just checking.”
