Her attention dropped to his lips again.
A tell.
An invitation.
Intentional or not, it undid him.
He should stop this. Keep things light. But strawberry cream lingered at the corner of her mouth like an added temptation.
And the last of his restraint shattered.
“How long has it been since you’ve been properly kissed?”
She cleared her throat, spine straightening like she’d just been called on in class. “I’ve had my fair share of kisses, thank you.”
But the whisper-soft words lacked conviction. Not the kind that saidrecently. Not the kind that saidwell.
“Not from me.”
Her breath caught.
And the air shifted.
“Impressive,” she murmured, staying close, almost leaning in. “You think that’s going to win me over?”
“I don’t know.” He reached for her, his hand finding the small of herback—and when she didn’t pull away, the fragile leash on his control snapped. “Let’s find out.”
Before he could talk himself out of it, he dipped forward and caught her gasp with his mouth.
The kiss was supposed to be simple. Flirty. A quick indulgence.
The kind of kiss you could chalk up to impulse and walk away from.
But the second their lips touched, a quiet desperation seized him. A longing he hadn’t expected. He meant to tease, to dazzle, to leave her dazed.
Instead, he was the one coming undone.
He gentled his caress, urging her to answer his nonverbal request.
And she did, melting into him—warm, yielding, heart rattling—and every careful line he’d drawn around his life blurred. Her sigh sent something through him that felt too much likebelonging.
He drew her closer, breaking every rule he’d made to keep people out. And when she answered his kiss with a gentle purr of pleasure, he nearly staggered.
He wasn’t ready for this.
He wasn’t ready forher.
And still, he didn’t stop.
Instead of shaking up her world a little, she was anchoring him in ways he hadn’t anticipated.
This wasn’t just a kiss.
This dangled hope.
And he drank it in like a starving man who didn’t know how empty he’d been.
He nearly pulled away—nearly did the responsible thing. But then she slid her palms to his cheeks, cradling his face like she didn’t just want him—she trusted him. And that wrecked him more than the kiss ever could.
