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His eyes aren’t glassy, and there’s no swaying as he stands on the front steps, waiting for me to open the door and the invitation. I’m not swaying or slurring either; the walk home leaving me stone-cold sober, with maybe the tiniest buzz… but that might have more to do with standing at my apartment door with him right behind me, potential crackling between us. Either way, I can’t tell what he thinks is being advertised here, nor do I fully know what I’m offering.
Just a movie. A movie and some snacks. You can handle that, Summer. You’re a big girl,I tell myself, as the lock catches and I turn the handle to swing the door wide.
Rowan is still behind me as I make my way up the narrow wooden staircase—a nightmare when I moved in—to the floor above. Nerves shoot up my throat, almost asking him to turn around and go home before we do something we’ll regret, but the words don’t come, and I keep moving.
On the landing, turning right to walk the short distance to my apartment, the floorboards creaking underfoot, I still don’t say anything. It’s silent between us, aside from the soft rustle of plastic and chip bags.
“This is me,” I say dumbly, like I’d just casually be breaking into someone else’s place.
Rowan leans against the rickety railing that separates the landing from the stairs below, and my heart lurches. I can’t prove there’s woodworm in this old building, but nothing is as sturdy as it seems.
I grab his shirt, pulling him toward me. “It’s not—”
I was going to say “safe,” but his lips are on mine, crushing the word back into my mouth. Everything freezes. Muscles seize. Time comes to a standstill. My heart stops dead in my chest. Even if his mouth wasn’t on mine, I wouldn’t be able to breathe; my throat has closed, allergic to the romantic attention of anyone who isn’t Ben.
But as his arms slip around me, his palms skimming up the curve of my spine, one sneaking beneath my t-shirt, pulling me close, time starts again. Like rusty clockwork, the cogs of me only jammed for a moment, and now I’m ticking slowly, coming back to life.
My lips respond with a hunger that can’t possibly belong to me: the celibate widow, holding out for an impossible reunion. But it’s my hands, my mouth, my fingertips, my body, that craves the man in front of me, clutching onto him like I’m the one about to fall over the edge of a rickety railing. I’m a woman possessed—what by, I don’t know, but there’s electricity in his kiss, resurrecting something inside me that I thought had died two years ago, on a rain-slicked bridge by the Gulf.
One of my hands grapples backward, keys held tight, scratching for the keyhole as I sink into the warmth and passion of him. I’ve never felt so… wanted. Of course, I know I’m not innocent in leading us to this point. I know I flirted a little back at the wine shop, but it’s hard not to when the weather is good, and the wine is incredible, and the company is so easy on the eyes.
Breathless, I turn around and jam the key home, gasping a little as Rowan curves himself around me, his arms locking around my waist, his lips finding that spot behind my ear that never fails to make me tingle. How does he know about that?
“I’ve wanted to do this all evening,” he murmurs, my skin prickling into the most delicious goosebumps.
I know what he means. I just can’t get the words to form. It feels like a betrayal, but as long as I don’t say anything, I can ignore the guilt that’s fighting through the fog in my brain. As long as I don’t admit to what’s happening, my heart doesn’t need to be a traitor. Full deniability.
The door swings open and Rowan walks us inside, nudging the backs of my thighs with the front of his, guiding me through the space. All the while, his lips are on my neck, his tongue caressing flushed skin, and it feels so damn good to be held the way he’s holding me—like he never plans to let go.
He pauses only to dart back to the door and grab the bags of snacks I didn’t realize he’d dropped. He throws them onto the reclaimed oak side-table that used to be a 1920s bar-top, and comes running back, sweeping me into his arms. With ease, he hoists me up and my legs wrap around him, my hands coming up to cradle his face as I give into my starvation, feeding off the passion he’s laid out. A feast of desire that I’m too ravenous to refuse.
The main space of the apartment is an open plan kitchen-living room situation; a huge, well-loved leather sofa shored up against the breakfast island that I’ve never eaten breakfast at. Up ahead, floor-to-ceiling French windows open onto the balcony, and the heavy, green velvet drapes aren’t drawn. I don’t even think about my neighbors as Rowan carries me over to the sofa and sits down on the shorter edge of the upper-case ‘L.’
I sit astride him, knees sinking into the lived-in leather. I kiss him and my mind empties. I roll my hips to the rhythm of our mouths, shedding the skin of the Summer who’s too afraid to feel anything again. She’s not here tonight, and what she doesn’t know can’t hurt anyone.
“Take your shirt off,” I tell Rowan boldly, my fingertips already working on the buttons.
He does as he’s told, unfastening the buttons quicker than I can. His eyes don’t leave mine as the two sides of his shirt collapse open, and I push the sleeves from his shoulders. There’s a bit of a tussle as the shirt refuses to come off his wrists, like the fabric is trying to stop this from going too far, but they eventually give in, and I sit back a little, admiring him. He’s got the figure of a man who enjoys life and works hard so he can enjoy more of it: a broad chest, dusted with light brown curls, defined but not so sculpted that he looks like a museum piece; his stomach is toned but soft around the edges: a man who takes care of himself but doesn’t worship at the altar of the gym. His arms are strong and more muscular than I’d pictured, flexing as he takes the weight of me leaning back. Honestly, I like everything that I see. I more than like it.
I scoot closer, smoothing back his hair as I dip my head to feel his lips on mine again. I should be freaking out by now. I should be jumping up and telling him to leave, demanding that he never breathe a word of this to anyone, especially Lyndsey. But I can’t get enough, desperate for more. I’ve been wandering in a sexless desert for two years, and he’s my shimmering oasis, promising all the relief I want.
His palms make me shiver as they slide up my back, the friction striking a match, deep inside, that I’m going to burn to the stub. My fingertips run through his hair, tugging lightly, as my hips rock back and forth, eager to start an inferno. He’s stoking the fires with me, his breath catching, his desire plain as day between my thighs.
To even out the playing field, he tugs my t-shirt over my head and throws it to the floor. I don’t stop him. I don’t want to. I’ve put the guilt on my tab, to pay off another day.
Instead, I flow back into the kiss, running my hands over his chest before giving him a light shove. He tips backward, landing on the leather cushions with a smile and a wheeze. Sitting up higher, I gaze down at him, and there’s a smile on my face, too, as I reach for his belt.
I have it half unbuckled when he rocks back up, catching me in his arms, crushing a kiss against my lips, letting him distract me. I’m lost in the rhythm as he twists around with me in his embrace, laying me down slowly on the couch, his kiss never faltering. There’s a stirring knowledge in the way he holds me and the way his mouth teases slow and fast, like he’s coaxing a stubborn fire into life, knowing that a one-note encounter won’t cut it.
My legs entwine with his, my body stretching out like a cat unfurling as his lips kiss every part of me that has waited so long to be kissed again. And as his mouth closes around my nipple, pulling a gasp from my throat, my entire being responds to the spark of a new dawn rising inside me, where tentative rays of possibility and excitement slice through the gloom of my current existence.
Rowan charts a course between my breasts and down to my stomach, his strong hands smoothing down the curves of my waist, as if he knows he’s holding precious cargo. And as he draws back for a moment, to gaze down at me, I ache to feel his lips on my skin again. When I say I ache, I don’t mean it figuratively; there’s a real, straining ache that tightens through my limbs and muscles, as if I’ve been numb for two years and I’m finally waking up, and these tingling pins-and-needles are the first sign that I don’t have to go back into the dull, dead dark.
“You’re beautiful,” he says quietly, his voice catching.
I smile back. “In sweatpants and nothing else?”
“Becauseyou’re in sweatpants and nothing else.” He laughs, hooking his fingertips into the waistband.
