AllFreeNovel
Share Us
His hands were warm and strong on her sides as he deepened the kiss, his tongue and lips far gentler than Grace would have expected, but she found she liked the delicacy in his touch. It was slow and exploratory. Like he was feeling her out, taking his time to learn her mouth and taste. She relaxed against him, letting him hold her to him. It had been too long since someone had handled her with such care. She was so lost in the way he touched her that she didn’t process his words immediately...and then those words caught up to her brain and it was her turn to short-circuit.
I have waited for far longer.
That was some grade A romance talk. Damn.
Maybe he was smooth after all. A moan caught in her throat at the thought of it. How could this man keep changing how she viewed him? It was almost as dizzying as the way he caressed her, fingers just ghosting over her skin, tracing her while he devoured her mouth.
Tilting her head further back to give him better access to her mouth, she reached up and finally did what she had been longing to do since that first phone call had set her heart racing. She ran her fingers through his tresses and swooned at how silky-soft his hair felt between her fingers.
Anton groaned at the scrape of her nails against his scalp, and suddenly the kiss turned into something different. The energy changed from sweet to steamy in the span of a heartbeat. It wasn’t a tentative first kiss any longer. It felt so good to be wanted.
She nipped his bottom lip, a nanosecond away from climbing him like a tree, when an explosion boomed through the trees, causing them both to freeze.
“Gracie?!” Lou’s voice rang through the night, causing Grace to groan and close her eyes with a wince. “Where are you?! I’ve lost control of them! Help!”
“Mom’s calling,” Anton teased, leaning close to her. He had a smile on his face that warmed her like sunshine, and Grace bit her lip at the feel of his warm hands on her body. All she wanted was to stay exactly where she was and repeat their kiss about one or 2.5 million more times.
Alas, she had a science hoard to wrangle, and apparently there were explosions. Not that she was surprised. Heaven help them when she figured out what was going on. She’d known it was a risk to have open flames and alcohol near so many little science-makers.
“We should go back…” Grace sighed when she heard Lou shout her name again, this time closer to their hiding spot. She slipped out of Anton’s arms and moved to head back to the bonfire. She felt the world spinning around her from the kiss Anton had just laid on her, but at least the explozapalooza gave her something to ground herself with.
What did it mean when explosions at bonfires had a calming effect on her? Grace shook her head. Nevermind—she didn’t want to know. Anton slipped his hand into hers and tugged her back to him and all her thoughts came to a screeching halt. She looked down at their entwined fingers and swallowed hard.
She’d been right. He had sensational hands.
“I don’t know a lot about stable romantic relationships, but I do know hand-holding is customary when returning from a romp,” he said, holding up their linked fingers.
“That wasn’t a romp.” She rolled her eyes, grinning despite herself. “It was one kiss.” One kiss that had left her weak kneed and moaning, but why get into the details with him while things were being blown up?
“Let me call it a romp. I need some semblance of order,” he said with a pinched look on his face, but the expression vanished when she pressed a quick kiss to his cheek.
“Okay, it was a romp,” she whispered, lips against his cheek.
“Thank you,” he said, running his free hand through his hair and giving it a vigorous tousle so it looked well and properly ruined. “Now then, if anyone asks, you were thoroughly debauched, understand?”
“Deal. By all accounts, I’m practically a fallen woman. Someone get me to a nunnery. Should I mess up my hair, too?”
“No, of course not. I am a gentle lover. Everyone knows this. I’d never mess my date’s hair up in public.”
“Gee thanks, Kovalev.”
ten
“Life need not be easy,provided only that it is not empty.” —Lise Meitner
Anton blinked in surprise at the scene of utter chaos greeting his and Grace’s return to the party.
The energy was off, tense now instead of merry. This was definitelynota party anymore. When he’d asked Grace for a walk, he hadn't anticipated this kind of carnage. They’d been gone for all of twenty minutes, for Pete’s sake. He cautioned a look at Grace.
“What do you think happened?” he asked her.
She tucked a pink lock of hair behind an ear and shook her head. “I don’t know, but I don’t like this. I think I just heard an intern say their eyebrows are gone. When I said mayhem, I didn’t mean literally. Come on, I need to find Lou and sort this out.”
Finding Lou wasn’t a problem. Not when the tiny woman came barreling out of the crowd and straight toward them. Lou threw herself into Grace’s arms. “Thank god you're here! They’ve lost their minds. I blame the altitude.”
“Whoa, slow down.” Grace pulled back to look at her friend. “We heard an explosion. Please tell me it was not us.”
“It wassous.” Lou shook her head. “Or, I mean, them.It was them.” She gestured at the chaos around her. “I’m innocent, I tell you. My only crime was thinking this horde could be civil.”
