“C’mon.” Miles threads our hands together, tugging me along the riverwalk.
“You gonna tell me where we’re going?”
“Not yet.”
“You’re no fun.”
His grin says otherwise.
We walk for another ten minutes, maybe longer. Time feels slippery tonight. Somewhere between Michigan Avenue and Millennium Park, we stop trying to keep things light and start saying things that feel true.
He tells me about his teammates dragging him to games at Wrigley, about the best deep-dish place that’s “not tourist garbage,” about how hard it was to sit out last season when hockey’s always been the center of his life. I tell him about Nashville, about singing songs in dive bars for crowds of twelve people, about my mama’s prediction that I’d “make it big someday, darling, just you wait.”
By the time we reach the Bean, my cheeks hurt from smiling.
The sculpture sits in the middle of the plaza, exactly like it looks in pictures: a giant, shiny, kidney-bean-shaped… thing.
“What do you think?” Miles asks.
Our reflections stretch and warp across the shiny surface, and I catch his head moving there before I turn to meet his actual gaze. “I like it.”
His breath clouds the air between us as he laughs. He pulls out his phone and snaps a picture, then tilts the screen toward me for approval.
I like that he captured this. It might be something I want to remember.
He pockets his phone but doesn’t step back. We’re close enough that I can see gold flecks in his eyes.
Miles reaches out, cradling my jaw. His thumb traces a slow path up my cheek, and I wish it were the heat of his skin instead of his leather glove.
“It’s been a while since I’ve done this,” he murmurs.
“Really? Don’t athletes have a reputation for?—”
“Not that,” he huffs. “Well, actually... kind of that, too. Recently, at least—” His words cut off with a shake of his head.
I press my hand against his chest, and he steps closer. His gaze drops to my mouth and then back to my eyes.
“I’m gonna kiss you,” he rasps.
“I think I’d like that.”
I rise onto my toes, fingers curling into his coat as his arms wrap around my waist. He pulls me in until I’m flush against him. His heartbeat jumps through all the layers, or maybe that’s my own. I can’t tell anymore.
His lips meet mine, and my breath hitches.
The kiss starts slow, almost cautious. Then he deepens it, teasing me with his tongue, and a sound escapes me that I didn’t know I could make.
He slides a hand up to cradle the back of my head, holding me, and I forget about the cold entirely. Forget where we are. There’s just the warmth of his mouth, the scratch of his stubble against my chin, and the way he tastes faintly of hops and mint.
Time does that slippery thing again. Seconds, minutes, hours—I have no idea. I only know I never want this to end.
Eventually, he eases back. Just enough that our noses skim one another, breaths mixing in the frozen air.
The world tilts.
Sweet and dizzy.
This might be the falling-on-your-ass part, but I don’t care.
