“Ember,” there he goes, saying my name again, “you’re beautiful,” he repeats it like maybe I didn’t hear him the first time. “Whether you see it or not, it’s true. And if I have to spend every day trying to show you, I will. I’ll do it until you believe it. Until you feel it.”
The space between us is almost nonexistent now. Just his eyes on me and mine on him.
“Why?” My voice is tiny and hesitant.
“I think we both know why.” He smirks, reaching his hand out to touch my face. His thumb brushes against the lower part of my scar, the small piece running over my right cheek. “If you haven’t noticed what you do to me,” he gulps, “you haven’t been paying attention.”
He just stares at me, but in a way, no one ever has before. Like he’s studying every part of me, trying to remember this moment forever. And when his tongue darts out and runs over his lips, I wish it was running over mine.
Before I have time to think, before there’s time for someone else to interrupt us, his palms cup my face, his fingers get lost in my hair, and he kisses me. His lips are soft and warm, which surprises me because of how cold the air is around us. The kiss is firm yet gentle. It’s like we’re both trying to read the situation. Figure each other out.
He tastes like beer and peppermint. A weird combination, but not something I care enough to question.
Especially while I’m concerned, he’s going to regret this. That he’ll realize that night was just a spur-of-the-moment kind of thing.
“Get out of your head Em,” he says against my lips, then he goes back in for more. This time I allow myself to melt into him.
My hands travel around his neck, finding their way into his hair. His travel down my body to my hips, mimicking his action in the kitchen as he hooks his fingers around the belt loops to pull me against him. His warm body against mine makes me gasp as I feel just what I do to him, and he takes the opportunity to take complete control of the kiss. I surrender to his tongue, which grazes against mine as it enters my mouth. Dominating it, almost like he knows my mouth better than I do.
One of his hands cups my face again, savoring the moment, like he’s expecting me to pull away at any moment. But he doesn’t have to worry about that. I don’t care about anything aside from his mouth against mine. And the heat his body is sending through my own.
And in that second, I know I’m in trouble. Thinking about him kissing me was one thing; letting him do it was worse.
When he finally pulls away, all I hear is the mixture of our ragged breathing as we try to come down from the high. If this is what kissing him feels like, I can’t imagine what everything else with him will feel like.
“Let me take you home,” he whispers, his thumb finding my lower lip again and brushing across it.
I don’t say anything; I just nod and follow him back to his car.
Yup—definitely in trouble.
twenty-one
Declan
It took everything in me to not pull over on the way to her place and kiss her again. Now that I know what it’s like, I can’t go back. I don’t want to.
It’s like my body is drawn to her in every way. And for some reason, I’m worried if I lose contact with her body, if my hand isn’t on her hip or hooked on her jeans, I’ll wake up, and none of this will be real.
I don’t even know what happens when we get through this door. Or what happens tomorrow morning.
As Ember finds the spare key under the mat and opens the door, I question if this is where it ends. We never talked about what happens once I bring her home, just that I planned on doing it.
Luckily for me, Ember takes control of the situation, taking me by surprise, as she grabs a fist full of my jersey and pulls me inside. The front door swings shut behind me before I’m pushed against it, and her lips are on mine.
“I’ve wanted to do that since we got in the car,” she whispers against my lips before kissing me again, with even more urgency, if that’s even possible.
And when a soft moan escapes her lips, it's like a whole new side of me is awakened. I flip us around, pressing her back against the door, pinning her with my hips. My hands roam her body until one of them slides around the back of her neck, tugging just enough to give me more access to her mouth.
Her hands find their way into my hair as my tongue fights with hers for dominance, but the second she sighs against my lips, I take the opportunity to receive complete control. And by the way her hips grind against mine, it doesn’t seem like she cares one bit.
My hands slide down her body, sneaking under her jersey just long enough to brush my fingers against her skin. It’s warm and welcoming, and even though I love seeing her in this jersey, I have a feeling I’m going to enjoy seeing her out of it even more.
I pull her off the door, and my hands graze over her hips before sliding around her ass and lifting her body against mine. Her legs tighten around my waist as I feel against the wall to make sure I don’t run into anything on our way to her room.
I’m trying to be sexy… and that would be anything but.
I’ve imagined what it would be like to kiss Ember for months, but I never could’ve imagined this. It’s like she’s a different person than the girl I was working on our project with.
