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Hand in hand, we quietly slip away from everyone else and enter the house from the basement door to the left of the stairs. We sneak in and shut the door behind us; the only light is a single lamp coming from the den area where the couches are facing a massive TV. It’s usually the area we all hang out in when Odelia and Lawson host, but tonight it’s empty; just the two of us.

The house is a lot quieter than before. The party seems to have mostly shifted outside the darker it got. There’s still music humming low through the walls, but it’s muffled down here, distant.

We both move carefully, sneaking around as if someone might catch us.

Felicity stops just at the bottom of the staircase, right where the glow from a jack-o’-lantern on the console table flickers against the flowers of her dress. She turns to face me. Her smile is soft still, but less playful and more…warm. Ready and stable and assured.

I like her like this—confident in what she wants. Exactly how she wants me.

“I had fun with you tonight,” she whispers, and I take a couple steps to follow her.

“Me too. Probably our best Halloween yet.”

I’m hoping it’s about to get better too.

Felicity reaches out and grabs the neck of my collar between her finger and thumb, a gentle tug that brings me immediately chest to chest with her. I am nothing more than a dog on a leash, more than happy to do anything right now. Her fingers slip below my collar, down to my chest like she’s grounding herself there. I can feel my heartbeat jumping under her touch, my body leaning closer, desperate for any touch.

“I like getting to do things like this with you.” She smiles and I don’t know how she can manage to even talk when we’re like this. “I like…us.”

Below her hand, my chest softens and tightens all at once. “I’ve liked us for a long time.”

Longer than she knows, and longer than I’m willing to admit out loud.

Her breath catches and she leans closer to me, our lips just brushing together, more gently than we’ve kissed before. So light, it’s like a feather dancing across my mouth.

“Are we still practicing, Knox?” she asks against me.

“Sure.” Practicing for our wedding day, maybe.

Felicity pulls back, eyeing me with a sudden glance of worry, and I smile. “It can be practice if you want it to be. But you never really needed practice in the beginning, did you?” I curve her hair behind her ear and graze one of the flowers with my fingertip. “You only needed what I did.”

“Oh?”

“Mm-hmm. You’ve more than capable at all of this, you always have been. You just needed it with the right person.”

She presses a single kiss to my lips, speaking low against them. “And that’s you, right? My boyfriend?”

I still get shivers up my spine when she calls me that. I think I always will. “Yeah, that’s me.”

Our lips smile against each other, and then I kiss her, this time slow and careful, giving her the chance to pull back if needed, but she doesn’t. She never has.

I lean down, one hand finding her waist, and the other slipping into her dark curls. She tastes the same, sugary sweet and something warm that reminds me of only her. Vanilla, maybe. She sighs softly against me, hands running from my chest down to my waist, and I swear the party, the whole world actually, disappears, and it’s only the two of us.

We deepen the kiss, unhurried and steady.

I don’t know how long we stay like that, her back pressed to the wall by the steps, my hands trailing and exploring while her hands firmly press lower to my abdomen. Even when our kiss quickens, it’s never urgent. Never rushing toward something, it’s like we’re already exactly where we need to be and we both just want to…soak it in.

In retrospect, I’m glad it’s taken us this long. Taken this many years to get something this important so right.

After a few minutes—maybe an hour, who cares?—Felicity pulls back just enough to rest her forehead against mine.

“We could go back to my house if you want.” She says it almost casually, almost as if she’s not completely wrecking my chance of having normal blood pressure levels. “Maybe just hang out some more before Riley comes home?”

Riley’s terrifying reminder of us being alone in her house together—epidurals and stitches—comes to mind, but as soon as it’s there, it’s gone, my priorities shifting into something that escalates from simple want to downright desperation.

“Yeah, yeah. Let’s, uh, do that.”

We don’t sneak out so much as just escape—no goodbyes or waves to our friends in the backyard—laughter trailing us as we step back into the cold night air.