“Your whole life?” she asks in disbelief. Gosh, this woman can really get under my skin. “There’s nothing else you’ve been more sure of? Not even the time you took the wrong exit to El Reno, and you werepositiveyou’d find a new way there?” A mischievous glint flashes in her eyes, both irritating and irresistible as she looks at me, challenging me.
Her breath tickles my neck as I close the distance between us completely. “You drive me crazy, Stanley.”
I grip the sides of her face, feeling her cheeks twitch with a smile against my palms. Her body stiffens for a moment whenI press up against her. Then, as if a dam of restraint is broken between us, we’re kissing. My hands tangle in her hair, and she grips my suit jacket, both tugging each other closer than humanly possible, like it’s not enough.
Being this close to her, with her lips on mine, isn’t enough.
Everything around me goes still. Quiet. As if the Earth itself is slowing down so I can soak up every part of this. The glide of her strawberry lips against mine, the smoothness of her cheeks against my rough hands, the fit of her delicate body against mine. All of it burns into my brain, wiping out every other pipe dream I’ve had about this moment. They don’t compare.
The muscles in my body practically turn to Jell-O as she wraps herself around me. Something inside both of us releases under the relief of it all, like we’ve been starving in the desert for years and finally found water. I have been starving for her, but something about the wait makes this feel that much more satisfying.
Delayed gratification in a sense. And damn was she worth the wait.
Just when the taste of her is starting to consume me, something cold and wet trickles down my face. Slow at first, then it hits me like a rocket—repeatedly blasting me from every side. I blink at Kate, who is also getting hit. I turn around to see what is happening, getting drenched in the process.
The sprinklers.
Chapter thirty-five
Kate
“I am in lovewith you.”
Malcolm’s words ring in my ears like the bridge at a concert, being chanted by thousands of people. I feel them rumble all the way down to my toes. But like being at the concert, I still can’t believe I’m here, experiencing it. I can’t believe this man standing in front of me feels the way he does…about me.
I pester him—I mean, how can I not? But I need to know for sure. Malcolm isn’t a liar. I’m just not a believer. Not fully, anyway. I need proof.
A sign.
Something from the universe telling me that all of this is real, and I’m not dreaming.
LikeJoe Jonas barging into my high school and offering me VIP tickets to his concert in Europekind of dream.
And then, his lips are on mine.
Now, let it be said, the concussion kiss was every bit as spectacular as one might think. It was uncontrolled and passionate. But this kiss… This one is different.
It’s all Malcolm. It’s every bit of him that I didn’t know I needed.
A rugged intensity at first, then a slow tenderness. The moment he’s been truly waiting for is here. I can feel his body snap into the moment, like chains being broken and he can run free. But instead of becoming a wild man on the loose, he takes his time, soaking in each moment like it could be his last. I think about someone seeing a sunset for the first time, the colors blending together in a hypnotizing fashion. You can’t look away. You’re itching to run to it, reach up and touch it, but you also know it could be gone in an instant, so you slow down to soak it all in—the universe orchestrating something so breathtaking right before your eyes. A symphony of light and color that can be so fleeting you want to savor every second of it. You commit your first sunset to memory. Isn’t that what you want to do with all your firsts?
That is how Malcolm is kissing me. Right here in the middle of our football field, he savors every second of this first.
I melt into him too, realizing that every part of me wants him just as badly. His breath trembles as his hands move into my hair. I used to think his joking obsession with my hair was just that, a joke. But based on the continuous gliding and stroking of his fingers through my wild curls, I realize it’s not. He truly loves them, and something about it makes me ache.
Him loving something about me that I don’t. Something that took me so long to accept, even if it is something as small as the texture of my hair.
Is this really happening?
Kissing him and questioning actually kissing him is enough to rip me in two, but I can’t seem to stop my lips from moving with his. As he pulls me closer into his chest, I almost snap like a rubber band. The agony of wanting this but also not really knowing what I wanted releases inside me. Just as I’m aboutto accept that this really is happening, and I have no reason to question something that feels so right…my face is blasted with water.
Then my legs.
Then my back.
Before I know it, I am soaked from head to toe, curls falling flat against my cheeks. Malcolm turns around, attempting to block me from the field sprinklers, but it’s too late. We’re surrounded.
I press my head against his back and want to cry. “This can’t be happening,” I whine to the cosmos.
