“Yeah.” I laugh. “Probably.”
“Maybe it’s acts of service for you, too,” Penn says. “Like me.”
I nod. “Maybe.” That’s certainly how my love for Ryan has manifested. And how Bridget and I have been there for each other, too. “What’s the last love language again?”
He catches my eye on a sidelong glance. “Physical touch.”
The weight of his stare and the memory of his hand on my back, flattened against me, sends a wild spark up my spine. I remember falling on top of him at the rink and not wanting to move. Wanting, instead, to fall farther into him.
I examine Penn’s hand, wanting to lace my fingers with his. To test the theory.
He catches me staring, and his gaze rises to meet mine. As if I’d asked for his touch aloud, he reaches out, gently circling my wrist with one hand. I inhale, and he looks up at me, like he’s asking my permission to keep going. I tip my chin down, nearly nodding, afraid of what this is and why I want it so much.
The hint of a smile plays on Penn’s lips as he carefully straightens my arm, still holding my wrist. With his other hand, so lightlyI almost don’t even feel it, he presses the pads of two fingers into the crook of my elbow. His eyes stay trained on mine as he traces his fingers down my forearm, whisper-soft. I feel it everywhere: pins and needles across my skin, a knotting in my chest, warmth in my stomach, and lower.
Penn’s gray-blue eyes darken, and I wonder if he can feel it, too. If he’s doing this because he wants to touch my skin or get under it. Maybe both.
He doesn’t look away until his fingers reach my wrist, and then he drags them both through the crease of my palm. “Your heart line,” he says, voice low as he slips his hand over mine, pausing before he finally interlaces our fingers together.
Slowly, Penn raises our clasped hands to his lips and presses the lightest kisses against my knuckles, one after the other. Each soft brush hits me like a thousand sparks at once, like fireworks, and when he pulls away, lips parted, my pulse hammers against my rib cage, erratic and wild.
I’ve never felt erratic and wild.
I want more. More of Penn, and his touch.
My throat is thick. I couldn’t speak if I tried.
He lets our hands fall together into his lap. Then he fights a grin and leans in, his mouth beside my ear. “Ding ding,” he whispers. “I think she likes physical touch.”
His face stays there, inches from mine, and I turn to him, stupefied. Perplexed by what he’s done to me, and how. Maybe this is when I kiss him, or he kisses me, and everything changes. Maybe it’s a beginning. Or an end.
But Penn lets go of my hand to lean back against the deck, and I feel so crazed and desperate—pained by such a sudden, sharp longing—that I almost fling myself on top of him.
Madness.
I wrap my fist with my other hand, rubbing my knuckles. Waiting for my pulse to settle.
Penn tilts a look at me. “Physical touch,” he says again, pleased with himself. “Good to know.”
11
Sexy Clarinet
We held hands.That’s it.
One hand, and the four most innocent, delicate kisses on my fingers.
For all I know, Penn was messing with me, but he must’ve also attended the Bridget “Eye Contact or Bust” O’Brien School of Flirting, because a switch has been switched. A lever pulled. A circuit in my system, very much broken. I can’t think about anything else.
As I sit at a glowing table in The Disco Diner, one of everything off the rink’s menu set on the table in front of me, all I want is another taste of Penn.
Not, like, a literal taste.
Well, maybe.
I’m screwed.
“It’s a bit too thick,” Theo says. “Don’t you think?”
