This time, I know he wants to kiss me.
I can feel it. It’s not the only thing I feel, come to think of it. Goose bumps are rippling over my skin, but he reads the moment all wrong.
“You’re freezing…”
With his free hand, he snatches up a towel, and the spell is broken.
“I catch you staring at my boobs, you’re sleeping in the car tonight.”
I wrap the towel around me and head for the bedroom.
Back on my bed, I can hear the shower running.He’s driving me crazy.I lean over the mattress and bury myself in the comforter, silently screaming into the pillow before rummaging through my bag for my car keys.
Maybe I should just hit the road. Head home before I make a total fool out of myself.
MaybeIshould go sleep in my car. It wouldn’t be the first time, after all.
I crouch there for a while staring at my keys, until he shuffles out of the bathroom, his skin glistening, a towel knotted around his hips.Like he was rushing. Like he was in too much of a hurry to dry off…
I tuck my own towel tighter around my chest and get to my feet. Maybe I should accidentally-on-purpose flash him—I’m kind of curious to see what he’d do about it.
“That’s the fastest shower I’ve ever seen.”
He’s standing there gazing at me.
“Why are you staring at me like that?”
“I’m waiting.”
“For…?”
“A sign. Some kind of tip-off,” he adds, seeing I’m not getting it. “Consent, maybe?”
What?
It takes me a moment—call it two.
Then suddenly, it dawns on me, like headlights cutting through the fog. Lewis is saying we should get it on, but in the weirdest way imaginable. Not that that’s a problem. The room around me is starting to sway, and this is one of those situations where I don’t have to think twice.
Carpe diem.
“A sign”—I don’t recognize my own voice—“like this?”
When my towel drops to the floor, the light shifts in Lewis’s eyes and a curse escapes him.
He doesn’t touch me right away. Just steps closer, close enough that I feel the heat of him, the air changing between us. Then his hand slides up, fingers curving into the nape of my neck while the other settles low on my hip, thumb pressing in like he’s testing how much I’ll let him take.
My breath stutters when his mouth brushes my ear. I drag my nails over his chest, feeling the damp heat of his skin, the tension coiled there, and he exhales hard—like that did something to him, like maybe he’s just as affected as I am.
There’s something overwhelming about how big his frame is and the way he fills the space so completely. Heat floods my body, fast and dizzying, and the room seems to blur as control slips through my fingers.
His mouth curves in a brief, knowing smile before he kisses me again, slow this time, deliberate. When his tongue slips past my lips, my knees soften, my body going pliant, yielding. It’s like it’s been waiting for this permission. I cling to his shoulders, my chest rising sharply against him as he grips me tighter, lifting me with an ease that steals the air from my lungs.
The table is cool against my back when he lays me down, spreading me out with a confidence that makes my pulse spike. He fits himself between my thighs, his weight anchoring me there, mouth claiming mine again—deeper, hungrier.
The earlier kisses were intense, but this is something else entirely. He holds my waist, guiding the rhythm as our bodies move together, the friction sending sparks everywhere at once. My breath comes apart, gasping, my fingers digging into his back as I chase the closeness, the pressure, the way he makes everything else disappear.
I want more.
