Page 60 of Before We Break

So, why does she suddenly feel like mine?

“There hasn’t been anyone since?”

She tucks her hair behind her ear and nibbles on her bottom lip. “I was too focused on Lexi. Then school. After that it was work. The only people I meet these days are other teachers or parents of my students, and I don’t make a habit of kissing their dads.”

“But I’m not Auggie’s dad,” I murmur more to myself than anything.

“No. Technically not.”

“So, your rule doesn’t apply.” My hand moves of its own accord, cupping her round cheek in my large palm. “I could kiss you.”

“You could kiss me.” The words come out breathy, drifting away on a breeze.

“If I wanted to.”

“Do you want to?”

“God, yes.”

The air crackles between us.

“I might be bad at it,” she says.

“I doubt that.” My gaze trails down to those perfectly soft pink lips I’ve been dreaming about for months as my thumb arches over her cheekbone in a soft caress. If Clio hasn’t been kissed in seventeen years, I want to make it good for her. It’s an honor I don’t deserve but fuck if I’m not going to relish it.

I lean forward, and her eyes drift shut, a soft exhale ghosting over my cheek as I press my mouth to her right cheekbone. I move lower to her jaw, then to the other side where I draw a path across the freckles on her cheeks.

Her pleading eyes meet mine, and all pretense of tenderness evaporates.

Our lips collide in a frenzied kiss, a clashing of tongues and teeth. Neither of us bends to the other. It’s a battle I intend to win.

I haul her onto my lap, and her blanket drops away, exposing her bare shoulders and a sliver of cleavage I want to run my tongue over. How she’s gone seventeen years without so much as a kiss is a goddamn mystery.

Her fingers slide into my hair, her nails grazing along my scalp, eliciting a groan. She squirms on my lap, ratcheting up my desire, my cock hardening beneath her round ass. Can she feel how much I want her?

She tastes sweet like honey with a hint of spice.

My fingers trace her exposed collarbone, and she shivers under my touch. When I finally break the kiss, we’re breathless and panting. “How was that for your first kiss?”

She giggles. “It wasn’t my first.”

I sweep a lock of blonde hair away from her forehead. “Might as well be.”

Her cold fingers toy with the hair at my nape. “Not sure. Maybe we should try again.”

This is a bad idea, exacerbating an evening full of bad ideas. “We should go inside.”

She frowns. “Why?”

“So I can kiss you as much as I want without us both freezing to death.”

Her mouth tips into a bemused smile. “I thought you hated me.”

“I never hated you, princess. You just… you’re in my fucking head.”

In my head, under my skin. She’s everywhere all the time.

When she doesn’t respond, I let her go and stand, adjusting my semi-hard cock as I wait for her to climb through the open window. Back inside her apartment, I set the plates on the island, then pull her body against mine. Her arms twine around my neck, and she pops onto her tiptoes, bringing her lips to mine for a sweet kiss.