“You don’t have a cleft either.”
Now his brow beetled. “It’s a fetish, right? You have a thing for chins.”
Ramsey blinked. Could she sound any more inane? Because she was afraid the answer was yes, she didn’t speak.
“I don’t believe anyone’s remarked on my chin before. Not even my mother.” Sullivan turned his head sideways, gave her his profile. “Is it noble?”
She pretended to give his question serious thought while she studied him. “Tilt your head a notch.” When he did, she placed a fist against the soft underside of his jaw. “Nobleandan easy target.”
Turning his head, Sullivan caught her wrist and lowered her arm to her side. She offered no resistance, and she didn’t look away when he stared her down. “You definitely have a thing for chins.”
“Mm.” She watched his eyes slide from hers to her mouth. Oh yes, she thought as heat blossomed in her belly. Yes, please. And then her lips parted infinitesimally.
All morning there had been the muffled background noise of Glocks and Walthers and Sig Sauers and Colts. Concentrating as she had been on her own shots, and with the suppressing benefit of ear protection, Ramsey barely heard what had seemed so loud when she arrived at the range. It was only much later that she would wonder why she was deaf to the sounds of intermittent shooting now. She should have flinched. She never did. Not once.
His mouth was warm, fixed. There was nothing hesitant about his touch, nothing calming. It claimed; it confirmed. She realized he was still holding her wrist. It struck her as odd that she didn’t mind, and even odder that she was able to put it from her mind.
He lifted his mouth a hairsbreadth from hers and whispered something that she could not make out. She felt certain it didn’t matter. When his mouth touched hers again, the slant had changed and somehow seemed more intimate. She responded, her lips set at new angle, still parted, still inviting. The tip of his tongue touched her upper lip and retreated. She inhaled sharply but not soon enough to suck him into her mouth. Ramsey raised her free hand, the purple ear protection dangling from her fingers, and slipped her arm around his neck. She stepped into him.
The kiss deepened, humid and a little unsettling. There was something else, too, something she felt pressing against the cleft of her thighs, and even though she wanted more of the kiss, she leaned her head away from it. When there was space enough to speak clearly, she said without any hint of humor, “Is that a gun in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?”
Sullivan stared at her for several long seconds. The dark centers of his eyes slowly contracted as his thinking brain began to engage. He released her wrist at the same time she withdrew her arm from around his neck. “Right,” he said, his voice husky. “Right.”
“Yeah.” She looked past his shoulder in the direction of the gun hut. “We should probably head back.”
He nodded, threw his jacket over his shoulder, and put their guns, spent magazines, and what was left of their ammunition in the canvas bag Theo had given him. “Ready?”
She said that she was. It would have been unfair to tell him otherwise. Lengthening her stride, she stayed at his side on the walk back.
13
Sullivan ordereda gyro and Greek fries for lunch. Ramsey chose the Greek salad with lamb and the house dressing. They both had Yuengling. Sitting across from each other at a table, they sipped their beer while they waited for their food. Ramsey searched for a topic that would jump start conversation. Not encouraged by the difficulty in finding one, she realized it was the kiss that made things awkward.
“Not a good omen,” said Ramsey.
Sullivan frowned, his bottle halfway to his lips. “How’s that again?”
She shrugged. “Thinking aloud.”
“I’m pretty sure I preferred silence.”
“This. Us. It was feeling uncomfortable,” she said. “I figured it was the kiss that did us in. Tell me you didn’t notice.”
“I noticed, but I didn’t go straight to bad juju. I was thinking that with more opportunity, more practice, we’d lick this thing.”
She’d like to lick him and was grateful that being mildly tongue-tied and the arrival of their food prevented her from saying it. “Thank you,” she said to Anna when the salad was placed in front of her. “It looks delicious.”
Anna smiled and put Sullivan’s gyro plate down. “Enjoy.” She dropped a hand on Sullivan’s shoulder and gave it a little squeeze. “Don’t be a stranger.” She didn’t linger long enough for Sullivan to make a reply.
Ramsey settled her napkin over her lap and tucked in while Sullivan built his gyro. “I think she likes you,” she said between bites.
“Yeah. She does.” He added a healthy dollop of tzatziki sauce to his layered lamb, tomato, red onion, and feta cheese. Pleased with the look of it, he folded the pita. “I like her too.”
“You’re not dense. You know what I mean.”
“Sure, but I didn’t really want to go there.” He regarded her over the gyro as he lifted it. “Are you okay with that?”
She nodded, looked away, and continued eating.
