Page 18 of Her Age Gap Match

I reached out, cupped her cheek, and kissed her.

With me on the bike and her standing, she was right about at eye level with me…and she melted when I pulled her to me, her hands on my shoulders. The helmet fell to the ground. Probably not great, but I didn’t care.

I kissed her hard. Didn’t even try holding back. Let her press herself against me, hang onto me, tilting her head so I could thrust my tongue past her lips and taste her.

Those dozen times I’d seen her in the Bloom office completely collapsed, feeling like a sequence of events all leading to this moment.

When I pulled away from her she looked dazed, her eyes half-lidded, her lips swollen.

“Tonight,” I said. “You have plans?”

“Just finishing this Ted Bundy series with my roommate,” she breathed.

I laughed.

She laughed too.

“Think you could reschedule that?” I asked.

She nodded.

“In that case…dinner at my place? I’ll cook for you.”

She didn’t look surprised, but she did look flattered.

I cocked my head.

“Most women are a little more shocked that I cook.”

She bit her lip. “I’ve read your file, remember?”

“Right,” I nodded, laughing. “So…when you read my file, did you think maybe you would like it if I cooked for you?”

“I kinda did,” she smiled. “So yeah. That sounds great.”

I reached for her again, kissed her again…let it stay softer this time, let it linger. She still leaned into me like her knees would buckle if she didn’t hang on. I let her.

“Seven?” I said against her lips.

“Seven,” she agreed.

I made myself pull back. Picked up the helmet from the alley floor, checked it over—fine, just scuffed—and hung it off the handlebar. She was watching me with that look she'd had in the coffee shop, the one that made it very hard to be a patient man.

"Go inside," I said. "Before I change my mind about tonight."

She laughed, a little breathless, and took a step back toward the little wooden stairwell that zigzagged up her building. Then she stopped.

"What are you going to make me?"

I thought about what I had in the refrigerator. What I could pick up on the way back from Bridgeport after my meeting. What felt right for a November Friday with a woman I'd been thinking about for two years sitting at my kitchen island.

"Pasta," I said. "Nothing fancy."

"I love pasta."

"I know," I said. "It's in your file."

She stared at me.