“Five.” I moved a little closer to her.
“Four.” She turned toward me.
“Three.” I clasped her other hand.
“Two,” she whispered, tipping her head back.
“One,” I murmured, my gaze glued to her sweet, pink lips. “Happy New Year, sweet Clover.” I pressed my lips to hers. Finally. She released her hands and twined her arms around my neck. I delved into the warm depths of her mouth, and she met each swipe of my tongue with her own.
I could gobble her up. Drink her down. Consume her. Her body was pressed to mine, every inch of that belly I hadn’t been able to see. The couch was right here. It’d be so easy. She could be on top. I wouldn’t let her up for air. I could be inside her in minutes.
Her whimper traveled right through me, and instead of sinking further down, I came up for air. And logic.
I ripped my mouth away. “Shit. Sorry.” I wasn’t. How not sorry I felt was definitely an issue.
“No. It’s fine.” She still clung to me.
I wrapped my hands around her wrists. “It’s not. I don’t want to wreck things between us.”
That wide gaze was on me, so intent, so innocent. “What if it doesn’t?”
I hadn’t heard her right. “What?”
She licked her bottom lip, and my brain flipped the switch to shut off again. “I was talking… Something my sisters said…”
I flicked my mind back on. She was nervous to tell me something, but my thoughts whirled in a lust-filled haze.
She steeled herself and lifted her chin. “If neither of us is willing to take a chance on the other, then I guess that means neither of us is the one.”
Making sense of the sentence shouldn’t be so hard, but my blood was on the way to my dick. Every nerve remembered how she felt in my arms.
Her gaze dipped down before lifting to mine. “I’m taking a chance. I think there’s more between us than friendship.”
Fuck yeah, there was. I wanted her, but she didn’t want me. She only thought she did. “It’s been a month.”
She sucked in a breath and released me. “Right.”
“You wanted to prove to yourself you could do it.”
Swallowing, her eyes darted from side to side. “Sure. I mean, yes. That’s what I want. And you have your work.”
Hell with my work. Yet I had to hold on to it. This wasn’t what she wanted. I wasn’t what she wanted, not really. “I’m entering a busy time. An unknown time. I don’t want to leave you behind.” I grimaced. Did I really say that? “I mean?—”
“Of course.” Her chuckle came out weak. “Being left behind definitely isn’t my thing. Fool me once, right?” She curved around me and went for the door. “Well, happy New Year. Thank you for indulging me. Next year, wow. It’s going to be a new experience.”
“Clover.” I messed this all up. I was trying to make sure she got what she wanted, and to do it, I was giving up what I wanted. “I just want you to?—”
“No need to worry about me.” She stuffed her feet into her boots and yanked her coat out of the closet. She wasn’t looking at me. “Thanks again.”
“Clover—”
“Night.” She was out the door. If I ran after her, would she sprint and hurt herself? Slip and fall?
I stood in the doorway, getting bitch-slapped by the cold as she drove away, her tires crunching in the snow and ice. I deserved so much worse. Clover put herself out there, and I batted her away, claiming it was for her own good.
It was. She’d realize she was just scared.
Only the Clover who kissed me didn’t act terrified. The Clover who came here tonight had been nervous but excited. That Clover had planned to tell a guy how she felt about him. I’d swung the door closed in her face, and I was getting hit in the ass by it on her way out.
