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Luke’s mouth finally broke, a small smile forming in the corner. “No, Sang, no, that’s not ... sorry. I’m not good at explaining.” He sighed, straightened a little to collect my other hand and held them together toward his bare chest. “What I’m saying is, everyone in the Academy is really nice. Nice and helpful and capable and talented.”
“Like you,” I said absently, trying to understand his point.
His smile broadened. “Some much more talented than me.”
My hands clutched at his chest as he pressed my palms to it. “You’re worried I’ll like them better?”
Luke let out a breath, strong enough I felt it whispering through my hair across my forehead. “Family is a choice,” he said quietly.
The line and realization that came with it struck me so hard that I nearly clawed his chest. I released him to avoid hurting him. “You think I’d like them better and I’ll replace you with someone else?”
“I don’t want to think so,” he said.
I slapped at his chest. “Luke! I swear, I thought you were going to tell me they were going to ... Why would you ever ... how could you think ...” I was livid. I couldn’t imagine anyone ever luring me away from them. As if that would ever happen! I never talked to anyone but them. Why would anyone even bother? I thought they barely put up with me now, especially since I’ve been so much trouble. But they’ve done so much for me, how could I ever forget about them?
Luke smirked, rubbing at his chest where I’d hit him. “Is that a no?”
I wasn’t even sure what the question was. “If you don’t want me to work at the diner, I won’t, but don’t say it’s because you’ll think I’ll stop liking you.”
Luke’s face fell a little. “It’s always possible.”
“Why would I stop?”
He blinked at me. “What?”
“Why would I stop liking you?”
His lips moved like he wanted to respond but he couldn’t figure out the words. He reached behind his head, rubbing at his scalp behind his ear. “Well ...”
“And what if I liked someone else from the Academy? Does that mean I have to stop liking you?”
“No,” he said. “I just didn’t want you to like them better.”
I paused, pushing a finger to my mouth. “You could like them better,” I said. Isn’t that what I sometimes wondered about them? What if one day girls were approaching them and they started talking? What if he liked her more than me? Wouldn’t it be selfish of me to try to intervene? I’d thought at one point Victor liked someone else at school. Then Silas told me girls tried to win Victor over all the time. I was a girl trying to blend in and be ordinary, and with a whole lot of family problems. They’d swept in and saved me, and I cared deeply for them because of that reason. I also worried all the time they’d get tired of having to deal with it and would want friends, or girlfriends, without such complications.
Luke laughed. “I already know them. Most of them at least.”
“And you’re still with Kota. And you’re here with me.”
His eyes subdued. “Yes.”
“Why do you think I’ll be different?”
“You don’t know them yet. You could still like them better.”
Something Mr. Blackbourne told me earlier caught in my mind. “We can’t worry about things that might happen,” I said.
Luke’s eyes fixed on me. “Sang.”
“Yes?”
His head tilted forward, close enough to my face that I felt his breath on my cheek. “I can’t stop thinking about it. About you ...” He whispered.
My heart stilled and I held my breath, worried I’d miss his words. I was afraid to speak, afraid to interrupt but when he paused, I was worried he’d change his mind and wouldn’t tell me. “What do you mean?” I whispered.
He took up one of my hands again, bringing them to his mouth. He pressed my finger tips to his mouth as if covering them. He kissed them.
I stiffened, afraid and enthralled at the same time. Luke just kissed my fingers.
“Remember when we all slept at Kota’s?” he said behind my fingers. “When we were in the closet together?”
I nodded slowly, drawing in a breath and unable to look away from his handsome face gazing back at me.
“I pulled you in with me, and you looked so nervous. It was dark.” He twisted slightly, finding the light switch and turning off the overhead lights. When we were cast into darkness, the room lit up with glowing stars painted into the wall. “Darker than this.”
I nodded but realized he probably couldn’t see me. “I remember.”
His fingers found my mouth in the dim light, the tips traced against my lips. The gentle touch left me trembling. “Playing that joke on the others wasn’t what I really wanted.”
My lips trailed along his fingers as I tried to speak around them in a whisper. “What did you want?”
He covered my mouth with his fingers and leaned in closer. His eyes closed.
So did mine. My mind blanked out.
I felt his lips through his fingers. He kissed them like he did the night we were in that closet. My heart sparked something sharply, enough that I felt my lungs needed air. Unlike the night in the closet, where I was giggling and knowing the others were opening the door, this time there was nothing to interrupt. I felt every movement of his lips.
He pulled back, his fingers retraced my lips and brushed away toward my cheek. He cupped my cheeks into his palms. The palms were soothing, and his fingers massaged at my skin. “I was going to move my fingers,” he said. “At the last minute, when I knew you were close. I was going to move my hand.”
“Luke ...”
“I was going to steal a kiss,” he said. The glow of the stars above our heads outlined his face now, and while it was difficult to see his eyes, he focused on me, enough to drown me where I sat next to him. “I wanted to steal you away from them by kissing you first, and do it right in front of all of them.”
There it was. Everything I was worried they were trying to do, only I didn’t quite understand. Luke wanted me? “You didn’t,” I said.
His lips tightened in the corners. “No.”
“Why not?” Whoa. What was I asking? I made it sound like I wouldn’t have minded. He was talking about stealing me away from Kota and the others. Part of me was curious, though. I really wanted to know.
Luke’s eyes widened, his palms at my cheeks drew me in an inch closer. “Because I didn’t want you to hate me. You’d said earlier you didn’t think someone should be forced to kiss someone. I thought maybe you wouldn’t want me to.” He brought my hand to his mouth, kissing my fingertips one at a time. “I don’t want to trick you, Sang. Not now. I didn’t want to steal a kiss. I don’t want our first kiss to be like that.”
My breath escaped me again. He was thinking about a kiss. “What do you want it to be like?”
His mouth popped open. He beamed. “You mean you’re not mad at me for wanting to steal you?”
“How can I be mad about something you didn’t do?” I asked. “I mean, you changed your mind. It’s not like you did it and now you’re asking me to forgive you.”
He laughed. “Forgiveness and permission, huh?”
I didn’t understand but I made the
mistake of nodding, as if I knew what he was talking about.
He smiled at this, settling back into the bean bag chair. He tugged me along with him. His fingers threaded through my hair, pressing my cheek to his chest. He nuzzled the top of my head with his cheek. “Where would you want our first kiss to be?”
I blushed, afraid to answer him. It was like admitting I wanted him to and I didn’t even know what it would mean. Would kissing him mean I couldn’t kiss anyone else? Nathan already kissed my hand. I almost kissed Kota ... or maybe I didn’t. Even in the dim light, I worried he could sense my embarrassed face. “I don’t ... I’m not sure.”
“I was going to say inside Kota’s closet, but that’s probably a terrible place,” he said. “I mean, what would we tell everyone?”
“Maybe at the diner,” I suggested. “Where we first met.”
“Ah. Yeah. That’d be good.” His fingers combed through my hair, and traced down along my neck. “One night, we’ll work super late. Maybe there’s a lingering crowd. You’d be frustrated with the register that stopped working. I’d have a rough table, with kids that are whining. People are yelling at both of us to hurry.”
“This sounds ... amazing,” I said, not hiding my surprise. Did that sound romantic to him?
He laughed. “Maybe someone gets frustrated with you, drops cash into your palms to pay and walks out. You’re about ready to fall apart and quit and walk home.”
“I wouldn’t quit on you,” I said, convinced that was true.
“Hang on, I’m getting to the best part.” He pushed his cheek to my head. “I’d find you. I’d come over to the register.” He pulled back from me, picking my head up in both palms, glancing into my eyes in the dim light.
My heart thundered. My fingers found his lips, covering his mouth like he’d done to me before and my mind catching on to his vivid imagination. “People would be watching,” I said quietly. “Wondering if you’re about to fire me or start yelling.”
His eyes locked on mine. “I wouldn’t be able to stop myself. I’d jump the counter to get near you.”
