I pinched her arm and started laughing with her. “Smartass. I’m just admiring the view.”
“You mean, you’re admiring my ass?” She squeezed me tighter, pressing her chest against my own.
“Something like that,” I murmured and lowered my head, pressing my lips against her own. I could still taste the honey and cinnamon she had for breakfast. Her scent of sweet vanilla filtered through my nose, reminding me of that night almost a month ago.
She opened her lips for me, letting me in, while her tongue darted out, shyly seeking out my own. I pushed all the bad and dark down into a box I made when I got the news, and tangled my fingers into her hair, holding her steady while I devoured her, inhaling her, engraving this moment into my brain.
Sophie gasped into my mouth and wrapped her arms around my neck, holding me imprisoned as much as I was holding her.
All these years, all this pent-up energy; need, want, love, all of them mixed together, driving me insane with desire.
“I thought you didn’t like me anymore.” She panted against my lips. “You haven’t kissed me since that night.”
“I was trying to give you space.”
“I don’t want space, Noah. I want you.”
“Soph—”
“I’m not fragile,” she whispered. “I’m not going to break. Trust me on this. But if you don’t touch me again, I might break you, and I don’t think you’d like to see that.”
I was standoffish after her time in the hospital, because it was hard separating the fact that she was still here, still breathing, still living, from the fact that she had the poison spreading from her head through her body, killing her slowly. It was hard remembering that these would be our last months together.
It was terrifying thinking about the “after.”
But my girl wanted me just as much as I wanted her. I’d been pushing these thoughts away, but as she gazed at me with fire burning deep inside her eyes, with her lips spread and her cheeks rosy, I couldn’t stop thinking about the way she felt beneath me.
About the way she took me in, or how it felt like finally being home.
She was always mine, it just took my brain some time to catch up with the rest of my body.
“I know you’re not breakable.” I pressed another kiss against her lips. “I just… I don’t know. I didn’t want to push, because this,” I grinned, “is not just some passing attraction, or an itch to scratch.”
“Oh really?”
“Really.” I smiled and pulled her head onto my chest, holding her tight. “I remember the first time I realized that what I felt for you was a lot more than just friendship.”
“Wanna tell me about it?”
“Oh, you’re going to laugh at me.”
She pulled away from me while the brightest smile decorated her face. “No, I’m not. Tell me.” She pouted. “Please?”
“Fine.” I exhaled. “About four years ago, during the summer, you came out in these tiny shorts and ran toward your bicycle, while I waited for you in front of your house. Remember? We were going to the lake.”
She nodded. “I do. You were awfully cranky that day.”
“No, baby. I was awfully horny that day. And you kept talking to Sean at the lake, completely ignoring me—”
“I was not ignoring you.”
“Oh, you so were. And that bikini you wore did nothing to extinguish the fire rising in my body. I almost ran home and jerked in the shower, so fucking pissed at you.”
“It was not my fault.” She crossed her arms on her chest and glared at me. “You were such an asshole that day.”
“I know. And no, it definitely wasn’t your fault, but there I was, barely fourteen years old, fantasizing about my best friend. Man, I had a boner almost every single day for two years back then. And you just kept smiling at me. You just kept going on as if nothing was happening.”
“Was that why you started going out with so many girls?” I hated the look of sorrow passing over her features, and I wanted to kick myself for putting it there.
