“You really thought I was going to be a smart-ass about this?”
“Well, that was what happened in the nightmare I had about how this would play out. Though you also took off your skin and revealed you were actually Coach underneath, so…I probably shouldn’t have put too much stock in it.”
“Not unless you’re secretly crazy abouthim.”
He shook his head, but he didn’t laugh.
Instead, he said, “No. Just you.”
Then held her gaze until it started to destroy her.
She had to glance away in the end, just to hold on to her few remaining brain cells.
“Stop. I already need to climb down off this incredible cloud of total romance. If you do one more thing I’m going to end up on the romantic moon. NASA is going to have to send people to come get me.”
“For real? You like it?”
“I like it.”
“It’s not too weird?”
She had no idea why he would think it was. What would make him bite one thumbnail like that and seem so awkward about it. But then she remembered what he had said before he brought her up here:
He had never done this before.
He had never done it for anyone, excepther.
“Tate, weird is spending your whole life dreaming of blankets in barns and candlelight and looking at the stars with the guy you like, and never thinking you’re worthy of it. Actually getting it is amazing. I don’t know what to say. I should probably stop talking altogether before I make a fool of myself.”
“No, no, keep making a fool of yourself. It actually reads a lot more like something awesome.”
“Now I know you’re just full of it,” she said.
But her cheeks were tugging at the corners of her mouth anyway.
One more good pull and she would be grinning wildly.
“You only say that because you can’t see how cute you look. Blushing and trying not to look too excited.”
“I’m not blushing. It’s just super warm in here.”
“It’s fucking freezing and you know it. But don’t worry—I came prepared.”
He had, too. Behind the picnic basket was a battery-powered space heater, of the sort that was probably going to set them on fire. Damn though, did it feel good. He switched it on as she made herself comfy on the blanket, and seconds later she was taking off her jacket and he was taking off his hat.
Though she protested the latter.
“Seriously, the hat does it for you?”
“It makes me really appreciate all your features.”
“Guessing that means you didn’t appreciate them before.”
“Not like this. Not like I can’t stop staring at every little part. I feel like I’m eating you with my eyes. I feel like being six inches from your face isn’t actually enough.”
“Come closer, then,” he said.
Because he was a tricky fucker. He beckoned, and she was helpless to do anything but. She leaned and he leaned back and then his mouth was on hers. Gentle, at first. Soft, like at the door to her dorm room. But then she put a hand on his face, tentative but clearly greedy to feel all the things she’d only just accepted as handsome, and something shifted almost immediately. It was like flicking a switch.
