Goldie glanced back down at her paperwork, “Do you need help with something, Rhea?”
“Yeah,” I said, slow and cautious, “You.”
Her head snapped up, her lips parted slightly before she closed them again. Her fingers stilled on the desk for the first time since I had walked in.
“I’m not great with…subtlety,” I admitted. “I don’t flirt well with someone I’m not sure is as into me as I am with them. I don’t ask questions or wonder, because I usually know. That’s not to sound cocky or anything, but I’m a very confident woman.” I exhaled as she stared at me, “But I need to know, Marigold. Are you into women?”
There. I said it.
She blinked at me for a second. And then again. Before finally saying, “Yes.”
One word. One syllable. And it hit like a firehose to my chest.
“I’m bi,” She added quieter. “Always have been, I think. I just don’t label myself to the world because I hate feeling like I have to fit into a box for other’s understanding.” She gave me a tiny shrug. “You’d be surprised how many people think the little hippy girl who bakes cookies and paints pretty pictures on her walls should only want to kiss boys.”
I stepped closer, unsure of what I was doing until I was right beside her desk. “But you like kissing girls, too?”
She stared up at me through her lashes, “Are you asking because…?”
“Because I’m interested in kissing you. Really, really interested.” I replied, steeling my spine, “And I think you are too. At least based on how we’ve interacted all day today, anyway.”
She smiled then, slow and wide, as if it had snuck up on her as she stood up. “Good,” she said. “Because I am interested.”
It didn’t take much after that.
One breath. One step. One tilt of her chin.
I kissed her.
And damn, she kissed me back.
It was quick, and softer than I meant, but no less real. Her lips tasted like vanilla and cinnamon, and maybe a little like sin in her sugary sweet way. Her hands fluttered at my waist, but didn’t push me away or pull me closer.
When we broke apart, she pressed her fingers to her lips and let out a breathless laugh.
“Well,” she whispered. “That answers that.”
I grinned. “I think I’m going to have a hard time focusing on anything but your lips when we sit down in that meeting tonight about the charity hockey tournament.”
She gave me a look. “You’re telling me,” She groaned. “I’ve got it worse.”
“Why?” I questioned, “Because Tanner will be there?”
She took a quick breath in, and I could see the conflict in her eyes, speaking volumes that her lips wouldn’t.
“It’s okay,” I smiled at her with a sarcastic nod, “I’m not going to hold your horrible taste in men against you.”
She snorted a noise that shocked us both, and she covered her face in mortification before dissolving into a fit of giggles that made me relax like we weren’t toeing a line of no return with the name of a man on both of our lips.
“Do you think I’m a terrible person,” She asked after calming down, looking at me cautiously, “For wanting my cake and to eat it too?”
I shrugged as I picked up the box of décor and turned back to her, “No, not really.” She stood at her desk; hands twined together in front of her as she waited for me to reassure her. “Listen, it’s not that there’s anything wrong with Tanner Brooks, if you’re into thegood-boykind, which I’m not. I’m bi too, I see the appeal there for someone like you. He’s just not who I would pick if I were looking for a male partner. But you could pick worse.”
She held my gaze; head tilted slightly in that unnerving way she always did when it felt like she was trying to see straight through my forehead into my thoughts. What would she find in there if she could? Would she find the lie in that statement?
Finally, she took a deep breath, “Why does your calling Tanner a good boy feel incredibly—” She hesitated as she searched for the words.
“Mean? Cruel? Correct?” I babbled on with a smirk.
