“It was very romantic. I’m freezing and emotionally naked in your kitchen. Work with me.”
I laughed again, and his eyes dropped to my mouth like the sound had pulled him there.
The air shifted.
I looked at his lips, still faintly blue from the cold and the fight, still cut near the corner, and every part of me wanted to erase the space between us. “Can we make up now?”
His gaze snapped back to mine.
The heat in it almost buckled my knees.
He stepped into me, one hand sliding from my cheek to the back of my neck, fingers firm and familiar as he angled my face up to his. Not rough. Not careless. Certain in a way that made my breath disappear.
“You want to make up, Clarke?”
I slapped his chest, though the sound was ruined by the wet hoodie. “I hate you calling me that.”
His mouth curved, slow and beautiful and dangerous. Then he kissed me softly, only once, his lips brushing mine like he had all the time in the world and every intention of using it to learn me again.
“Never again, then,” he murmured against my mouth. “I promise.”
My fingers twisted in his hoodie.
His lips touched mine again. “Want me to call you sweetheart?”
Another kiss, warmer this time.
“Honey?”
Another kiss, lingering enough to make my toes curl against the kitchen tile.
“My darling?”
I made a sound against his mouth, half laugh, half ache, because Easton Wade saying my darling in that low, rain-roughvoice should have been illegal in at least twelve states and most of Canada.
I pulled back just enough to look at him.
His eyes searched mine, hungry and hesitant and so full of love it hurt to breathe around it.
“Just call me yours,” I whispered.
Something snapped in him.
The softness didn’t vanish. It caught fire.
His mouth crashed into mine, and I went up on my toes as his hand tightened at the back of my neck. The kiss was nothing like the one in his apartment. That had been rage with teeth. This was worse. This had hope in it. This had hunger and apology and every unsaid thing he’d carried through the rain. His other arm banded around my waist, hauling me against him until his soaked hoodie chilled the front of my sweatshirt and his body heat burned through both.
I gasped into his mouth.
He took the sound like it belonged to him.
My hands shoved into his wet hair, and he groaned, low and rough, backing me into the counter with enough control to keep me from hitting it hard and enough need to make me feel the restraint. His hips pressed into mine, and the proof of how much he wanted me dragged a broken sound from the back of my throat.
He pulled away just enough to breathe. “Tell me to slow down.”
“No.”
“Aura.”
