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“You’re acting like you made a pact not to date each other’s sisters.” When he didn’t answer, I knew. “Oh, my God. You did.”
His chin jerked in response. “We promised each other we’d never do it. And I won’t break my promise to him.”
“And do I not get a say in this?”
“A say in what? The mistake I’ve made of telling you? Of setting you up with other guys? Of not keeping my mouth shut?”
“Of what happens in my life?”
“Don’t—”
“Don’t what?”
Josh turned back to me and met my eyes. His green-gray gaze was greener than usual, and his eyes were blazing with pent-up frustration that told me just how long he’d kept this to himself.
“How long?” I asked, pressing my hands to my stomach. “How long have you kept this to yourself? How long have you lied about how you feel about me?”
“I’m not answering that.” He laughed, and it was sad. Hollow. Almost broken.
And in that, I knew the answer.
Too long.
My stomach flipped and my chest tightened and my skin pimpled with goosebumps. And I gave a command I’d never given in my awkward, introverted life.
“Kiss me.”
He blinked at me. “What?”
“If you really feel like that, you’ll kiss me.”
“I just told you why I can’t do that.”
“Fine. Then I’ll have to kiss you.” I stalked over to him, fully intent on slapping my lips against his.
He caught my upper arms, holding me at arm’s length. “Kinsley…”
“Don’t you Kinsley me!” I shouted. “You stand in front of me and tell me all this stuff and everything suddenly makes sense and now you want to be a freaking white knight, Josh? No. If you feel all those things for me, if they’re real, then you’ll kiss me and—”
“I won’t do it to Colton. He’s your brother. He’s my best friend.”
“And I’ll tell him.” The petty threat escaped before I could stop it. When he froze, I knew I’d hit my mark. “Kiss me, or I’ll tell him everything you just told me.”
“That’s below the belt, and you know it.”
“I don’t care.” My throat bobbed with emotion. “I don’t care if it makes me petty. Because sometimes I feel things, too, and I don’t understand them, because it’s you, and I need to know I’m not insane.”
He softened. “Kins…”
“And if you don’t kiss me right now, I’m telling Colton and going on a date with Elliott tonight and I’ll make out with him instead.”
His lips pulled to one side. “Do you know how utterly ridiculous that sounds?”
My own lips twitched, and I nodded. “Really, really petty.”
“I can’t do it, Kins,” he said in a voice that was barely above a whisper. “I can’t do it to him.”
“Then don’t.” My lower lip trembled. “If I kiss you, and you just stand there and do nothing, then technically speaking, you didn’t kiss me.”
His jaw clenched, and his fingers twitched on my upper arms. “Do you really believe I can stand here and do nothing?”
“I don’t really care.” I shrugged his arms off and closed the distance between us.
Our bodies were almost pressed together. Josh dipped his head, and his breath fluttered over my lips as I hesitated in front of him. His fingertips danced against mine, and I swallowed, breathing in that mix of lavender and coffee and hot buttered toast that made up the scent of his shirt.
My heart thundered in my chest. There wasn’t a part of my body that wasn’t on high alert with what I was about to do. Panic flushed through me because this wasn’t who I was, I wasn’t the kisser, I was the kissee. I definitely wasn’t the forceful, demanding person I was being right now, but he wasn’t going to do it.
And I needed to know.
I needed to know if my heartbeats and my butterflies and my goosebumps were really because of him.
Because if they were, I’d deal with my brother myself.
“Kinsley,” Josh breathed. “This is a terrible idea.”
“I know,” I whispered right back.
“You don’t know what you’re doing.”
“Actually, I do.”
I proved the truth in my words by pressing my lips against his.
He froze completely, and I just held my mouth there, savoring the way the warmth of his lips flooded through my body. There was a shuffle as he moved closer to me, and I slid my hands up his chest like I’d imagined earlier.
It was solid muscle, all dips and valleys and hardness that guided my hands to the sides of his neck.
His lips twitched.
There was no denying it.
The butterflies in my stomach were staging a breakout. My heart was the ringleader of that as it pounded against my ribcage, and my skin was prickled in preparation for their great escape.
I was feeling things for Josh, and there was no way I could hide that from myself any longer.
Or him.
I fell back onto my heels from my tiptoes, breaking the seal of our lips.
