Page 34 of Her Age Gap Match

You spent too many years taking the fall for someone else. Like she understood that it wasn't just something that happened to me—that it was a choice, and that my time inside had made me, and that she cared about the person that time shaped.

Nobody had ever said that to me before. Not like that.

"What?" she said.

"Nothing," I said. "Just—you."

She tipped her head slightly. "Me what?"

I slid my hand from her jaw into her hair, tilted her face up.

"You see me," I said. "That's all."

Her expression went soft and affectionate, a soft smile on her face, and that was the moment I stopped thinking about Tuesday.

"Poppy," I said.

"Yeah."

"Is your roommate home?"

Her breath caught. "No."

But—

“How many glasses of wine have you had?” I asked.

“I just opened it. That was my second⁠—”

I kissed her again hard, leaving her breathless.

“Good,” I said. “Because when I fuck you the first time, I don’t want you drunk.”

The moment stood still.

Then she launched herself into my arms.

She kissed me now, taking what she wanted, whimpering against my lips and tugging on my jacket. I shed it on the kitchen floor, let her undress me as she started to guide me to her bedroom.

“I’ve been wanting this—” she was saying between kisses.

“I know, baby⁠—”

“Wanting it so long⁠—”

"I know." I walked her backward down the hall, hands on her waist, letting her set the pace. "I've got you."

Her bedroom door was already open. Small room, warm, exactly what I'd expected — books stacked on the nightstand, a lamp with a scarf over it casting everything amber, the bed unmade in the way of someone who'd gotten up in a hurry that morning. It smelled like her. That warm sweet thing I'd been noticing across her desk for two years.

I walked her back to the bed and sat her down on the edge of it and stepped back just enough to look at her.

She looked up at me, chest rising and falling, those green eyes dark, her red hair loose around her shoulders.

The unicorn shorts.

A purple t-shirt shirt with University of Kansas Anthropology emblazoned across her perfect breasts.

I reached down and took the hem of the t-shirt in both hands.