I’m thankful my parents made us learn how to dance in our early years. Irish, flamenco, ballroom. The future benefits might not have interested me back then, when all I wanted to do was be outside with a ball. I reaped the benefits once I reached puberty, though. And I’m reaping them again as I sense his eyes following us.
“You okay?”
“Yeah, I’m okay,” she murmurs.
“He’s not at all like I imagined. He’s so aggressively ... average,” I say.Okay, lie.
“I feel kind of bad. For her, I mean.”
“She’s not your responsibility.”
“Did you see that diamond?” she blusters. “Of course you did. Pretty sure they can see it from the moon.”
“You did your good turn when you provided her with a murder weapon.”
“I sounded weird, didn’t I?”
“You sounded like a badass. I wish I’d taken a picture of his face. Almost better than Bolognese.”
She laughs, and the sound gets me right in the feels. She should laugh always. Not like a crazy person, but she should be happy, content and loved, a woman like her.
“Thank you,” she says quietly.
“For the appearance of Spanish Super Mario?”
“Even for him.”
“Anytime, darlin’. And anytime you want to ride the mustache ...”
“Oh, my God,” she splutters, putting her hand to my chest. “You don’t even have a mustache.”
“For you, I’d grow one.” I cover her hand with mine. “Because you deserve someone who treats you right.”
And there, in the middle of the dance floor, Ryan stills. “I don’t care what you say,” she whispers, resting her hand on my chest. “I think you’re one of the nicest men I’ve ever met.”
“Ah, darlin’, you’re confusing nice with good mannered.” As though to prove a point, I take her face in my hands. Fuck it all to hell. I don’t care about consequences, the person she thinks I am, or the things I said were no good for me. Because right now, all I want to do is kiss her. Kiss her until she sighs. Kiss her until her body melts into mine.
Her eyes darken with anticipation as I move closer and slant my mouth over hers. And as our lips meet, I feel that spark of recognition again. Like we’ve done this before, maybe in some other time or some other universe. Is the familiarity in the flutter of her lashes or her tiny inhale? Or maybe the way she folds her fingers around my lapel? Because I sense it all. Feel it all. Like this is what I’ve been missing all along.
Fuck.Pleasure coils inside as the tip of her tongue glides against mine.
“You play dirty,” I whisper, pressing my lips to the corner of hers.
“I prefer the termcreative competitor.”
“Creative.” So much suggestion in the word as I pinch her bottom lip between my teeth. Suck on her delicate gasp. “I do like the sound of that.”
I’m too old for making out on dance floors. Too old for public displays of affection, of passion, yet here I stand, giving not one fuck for any of that. Another press of my lips, and her mouth yields once more, the dance floor dropping away, the people around us fading into the ether at the vibration of her tiny moan. I want her. I shouldn’t, but I’m too far gone. Every press of her lips, every tentative brush of her tongue is nothing short of intoxicating.
“Oh, God,” she whispers as I slow the kiss, pull back a little, and stare into her soulful eyes. Her tongue makes a deft flick to the bow of her top lip as though tasting our kiss.
Like I wasn’t hard enough already.
“A friend said something to me earlier tonight,” I whisper, stroking her cheeks with my thumbs. “He told me there’s beauty in the spontaneous. Even magic sometimes.”
“Tonight was certainly spontaneous.”
I stare down at all that beauty. A hundred things I want to say, and not one of them makes any sense. “And magical, don’t you think?”
