“Preston,” I said, my voice unsteady. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”
“I know,” he said. “I’m not asking you to know.”
“Whatareyou asking for?”
I was afraid of the answer, but not for a reason I could articulate.
Before he could give it to me, I leaned in and closed the distance between us. But only enough that he could still pull away if he wanted to.
He didn’t.
The kiss was gentle at first, almost hesitant, like neither of us was sure what we were doing. And maybe we weren’t.
But for one quiet moment, with the storm raining down outside, the mess I’d just run away from behind me, and the truth neither of us had said out loud yet, I let myself believe that maybe wanting something didn’t automatically make it a mistake.
And that scared me almost as much as I liked it.
Chapter Fifteen
Preston
Kissing Jess was a bad idea.
A very bad idea.
I knew I should pull back and put space between us.
I also knew I wasn’t about to do that.
I’d been thinking about this moment for far too long, probably longer than I cared to admit. And now that I had her in my arms, I had no intention of letting her go anytime soon.
Except…
“This is a bad idea,” I said, because someone had to say it.
Her mouth curved a little. “Is it?”
“You said it yourself,” I continued, desperately trying to hold onto some self-control. “You don’t know what you’re doing. You just ran out on your wedding. You’re?—”
“A big girl, Preston. I can make my own decisions.”
Dammit. She was making this way too hard.
“This is too much,” I said, no longer sure why I was trying so hard to put a stop to this. My hand skimmed down hercheek, cupping it gently, unwilling to move away from her. “Too fast.”
“It doesn’t feel that way,” she said softly.
And fuck it, I couldn’t disagree with that. “That’s the problem.”
But it didn’t feel like a problem.
Jess shifted closer to me on the bed. The puppy let out a cute growl in protest and jumped to the floor, dropping with a thud in front of the fireplace.
She was close enough that the scent of her filled my senses. The whiskey on her breath, the unfamiliar smell of the hairspray in her fancy hair, and something softer, sweeter, and familiar. Her fingers slid across my chest, gripping the fabric of my shirt like she was steadying herself.
“You want this.”
It wasn’t a question, and I couldn’t deny it.
