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Hard to see as it was in the dark, he spotted the curving beginning of a smile. It was the first he’d seen since he’d come home during Thanksgiving, where they’d chatted only half as much as he’d hoped. Every second near her was an iota of bliss stolen straight from heaven.
Seventy-thirty. Seventy percent of it was selfless: Tess deserved better. Thirty percent of it was undeniably selfish: he wanted her more than he’d ever wanted anything. Impossible as it was, he couldn’t resist fantasizing about a reality where her startlingly poignant blue eyes lingered on him. He’d spent much of the car ride home indulging in one such fantasy.
“That’s…good.” Tess drew in a shuddering breath, slender arms wrapping around her body as she tried to shake some warmth back into it. “This might be the coldest day of the year so far. I’m not made for this kind of weather.”
Nor was she dressed for it. Departing whatever task she’d been enjoying in the warmth of her home upon noticing he’d pulled into his driveway, she’d only thrown a light sweater over her top and some fluffy house shoes on before coming out to offer her angelic aid. Neither the sweater nor her fleece leggings—something he’d never seen her wear before today—could hide her astonishing figure.
She was of medium height and possessed a beguiling hourglass figure that had titillated him from the moment he’d hit puberty. She had prominent, shapely breasts, though she rarely wore blouses or dresses that showed any cleavage. Though she wasn’t much of a pool-goer, he had a few precious memories over the years of when she’d come up to the neighborhood pool in a modest bikini. He knew he wasn’t alone in that sentiment.
“Yeah, I’m about to crank up my heater like crazy,” Liam said, resisting an urge to drop his gaze and make as many memories of her lithe, shapely legs wrapped in leggings as he could before they parted. As much as his rampaging libido tried to coax him into giving in, he always felt terrible about leering at her. She’d draped him in her warmth since the moment they’d met; it was so, so wrong for him to lust over her as he did.
“Did your parents leave it low when they left last week?”
He nodded. “It’s not much warmer in there than it is out here.”
Tess shivered again. “It might take a little while for your house to heat up, then.” She paused, but only briefly. “If you’d like, you could warm yourself a door over while that happens. I could make some hot chocolate, too.”
Either the cold had seeped into his brain, and he was a goner, or… Tess had just invited him over. Which was a rarer happening than witnessing her in a bikini.
Liam’s memory of their encounters almost exclusively occurred outdoors. Whether gardening or going for one of her daily jogs, or when one of them drove to or from their respective home while the other was outside, they’d always chatted for a while. In recent years, one daily jog had turned into two, and her horticultural interests had also seemed to expand. Burdened with an understanding of her rocky marriage, he knew now why she’d spent so much time outdoors.
Thus, he'd rarely intruded upon her hospitality, especially given that a glancing eye catch of Douglas was more of him than Liam ever wanted to see. Chewing on his thoughts, he found he couldn’t remember the last time he had. Maybe… after his graduation? No, she’d come over to congratulate him.
“Liam?”
Her question zapped him out of his musing. Barring divine intervention—and it’d better be a doozy, not just a swarm of locusts or a storm of blood—there was only one answer he would have ever given her.
“Yeah, I’d love that.”
How much he’d love it, he kept to himself. The smile Tess favored him with scoured the cold from his body long before her heater could.
Chapter Two
An Ethical Debate
After chucking—almost literally—his tv in with the rest of his luggage, he slammed his door shut and sprinted through the cold one more time. This one time, he didn’t mind it in the slightest. She could have lived four blocks away, and he’d still have come on foot if he had to.
Taking the barest second to calm his nerves, though nothing but death could have stilled his racing heart, he grabbed her door handle and let himself in—like she’d told him to do.
The same architect had built both homes, and there were similarities aplenty in just the first few steps, yet Liam felt as if he’d arrived somewhere alien and unknown. Whenwasthe last time he’d visited? The nagging question had returned, and he knew he wouldn’t be rid of it until he supplied the correct answer.
“It’s almost ready, but just make yourself at home until then!” Tess called from her kitchen, having heard his entry.
Stopping to take off his shoes and hang his coat in the entryway, he followed the sound of her earlier shout. She kept a tidy house, but he couldn’t help but notice all the empty spots on shelves and end tables where he suspected photographs had once sat. Tidy as it may be, a peculiar melancholy draped itself like a thick fog within the house. He wondered how long the gloom had been here… and how long it might linger.
“Welcome, Liam,” Tess said as he arrived at her orderly kitchen. She banished the melancholy attached to him like spiderwebs with just a radiant smile. “Here you are.”
He accepted the steaming hot mug she offered; it stung the cold laced to his fingertips. While his body absorbed its heat relievedly, he gently blew on the liquid’s surface. Tess did the same with her mug.
Here, where the light shined bright, he could adequately perceive her stunning beauty without needing the help of memory. Her brunette hair flowed in gentle waves until its tide brushed upon her shoulders, which put it at half the length he’d seen her wearing the past summer. By all accounts, it suited her, framing the delicate pronouncements of her cheeks, flowing by her fair skin, and drawing him in again for another plunge into two deep blue whirlpools.
He wanted to say as much, but he found his stomach roiling. His courage diminished, and he left the compliment about her new hairstyle to die in the dark.
Tess took the first test of her brew. She smiled. “It may be a touch conceited, but it’s quite good.”
Liam sipped from his mug. Warm cocoa delighted his tongue, and he quickly agreed with a nod. Tess’s smile widened.
“Do you want to move to the couch so we can sit down?” she asked, beckoning toward her adjoining living room.
