“At all, smartass,” I deadpan, my breath catching when he lowers his head and brings his face so close to mine that our noses are touching.
“That’s a shame.” His hands find my hips. “I can think of one or two things we could be doing.”
“Shampooing and conditioning?”
“If that’s”—his fingertips lightly skim my hipbones; his lipsalmostbrush the corner of mine—“what you want.” He inches away before I turn my head to kiss him, and then he presses the weight of his body down between my legs.
Heat blazes through me, unfurling deep in my chest. My palms land on his shoulders, my knees nudging his thighs quite incessantly, as I mutter, “Ethan, if we’re not in the shower in the next sixty seconds?—”
“You’ll personally break my neck yourself?”
“Well, I wouldn’t go that far,” I say, letting loose a peal of laughter when he scoops me up from the mattress before my knees can prod him some more. “I’d just send in an update form to Help Desk and ask them to revise your SOPs.”
“You’ll do no such thing.” Laughter lines crinkle his gorgeous dark eyes. “You’re going to do exactly what I tell you if you want tonight to go anywhere.”
“Ooh, I like where this is going again,” I say, and his hair flops over his forehead as he cracks up.
“Yeah. Me too,” he says, his crooked smile widening. It goes straight to my chest, a fluttery feeling rippling across every inch of my body. “I know you don’t kiss on the first date?—”
“I think today counts for at least six dates,” I cut in. “Not including the aquarium, the museums?—”
“Let’s just round up to ten,” he says, and we both break, snickering while he carries me to the bathroom. God, I love that he’s dorky. It’s the best thing about him. “What happens on the tenth date?”
“This.” I twine my arms around his neck and draw him in, my lips already curving before they meet his, and Houston, we have liftoff.
We are kissing. Finally.Fucking finally.
Ethan Carter is kissing me like there’s no tomorrow. Like this is our only chance. Like this is something we should have been doing since the first moment our eyes locked on the plane, and we’re now making up for lost time.
His teeth pull at my bottom lip, his hands squeeze my ass firmly, his blunt nails digging into flesh. I’m panting eagerly intohis mouth, a dizzying blend of heat and desire crashing over me like the ocean wave during high tide.
I want to stay here forever. Succumb to the bliss. Never let this end.
He tears away from the kiss, and my fingers thread into his hair to reel him back in. “Just this?”
“Swear to God, Ethan,” I gasp. “Now’s not the time to be funny.”
Amusement glitters in his eyes, but he doesn’t say anything else. Not that he can when his mouth crashes upon mine, all urgent and certain. Yes,yes, yes.
A groan rumbles from the back of his throat while his fingerprints embed into my skin. My back thumps against something hard, and my hand fumbles with a door handle as he sucks a mark on my neck.
“Wait.Shower?—”
His teeth graze sensitive skin. My breathing becomes a little unsteady.
Somehow, we end up in the shower without tripping or falling. His body practically cages mine the moment I’m pushed against the wall. With my lips occupied with his, my fingers blindly skid against the tiles until I find what I’m looking for and twist the knob.
We both jerk apart as cold water sprays us.
“Fuck,” he swears.
“Sorry—”
“My phone.”
“Oh, no—Isn’t it waterproof?”
“How should I know? I’ve got better things to do than look up the specs right now.”
