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Before I even turned around, I knew it was Cooper, and not just because I recognized his voice. I could literally feel him approaching me from behind. My boots scuffed on the gravel as I turned and waited. He stopped a few feet away, and I could feel the voltage reverberating between us.
“Hey,” I said, stuffing my hands in my jacket pockets.
“Are you walking home?” he asked.
“Uh-huh.”
“Mind if I walk with you?”
“Of course not.”
Without another word, I turned, and Cooper fell into step beside me.
It was maybe a ten-minute walk from Wildlands to the building beside Firehouse Café where our apartments were. We didn’t even talk. I was both comforted and electrified by his presence. I wanted him with such fierceness, I couldn’t talk myself out of it.
He held the door for me when we got to the building, making sure it was locked behind us before we walked up the stairs together. Our footsteps echoed on the hardwood floor after we crested the top of the stairs and turned down our shared hallway. I stopped before we reached our doors, which were directly across from each other. I looked up at him, instantly caught in the beam of his gaze.
I opened my mouth to say something, but he took a step closer and lifted his hand, brushing a lock of hair off my cheek. His fingertips trailed along the side of my neck, sending sparks leaping over my skin.
I let out a frayed breath, scrambling to gather some kind of composure. The second I lifted my eyes to his, the heat pooling low in my belly turned molten.
He studied me, and I felt as if his eyes alone were reaching through the layers wrapped around my heart. On the one hand, what I felt was pure need and raw passion. Yet spun within those silken fiery threads was an intense intimacy, tugging loose emotions that I’d kept wound tightly behind layers and layers of protection.
His hand slid to cup the side of my neck, his thumb moving in an idle pass over my thrumming pulse. All of my awareness narrowed to that tiny patch of skin with licks of fire emanating from his touch.
And then, his mouth was on mine, claiming it with a bold, masterful kiss. I could’ve kissed Cooper for days. His kisses alone were enough to push me to my very edge. They were all-consuming, thorough, and intense. His kisses embodied attention to detail. I sighed into his mouth, my knees liquid. I was melting all over, in thrall to him as he slid an arm around my waist, holding me firmly against his strong body.
I had no idea how much time had elapsed when we finally broke apart. It took an effort to lift my eyes. “Your place or mine?” he asked.
“It doesn’t matter,” I rasped.
“Mine then.”
I didn’t even question why until we stumbled through his door and Humpty meowed. I wanted to grasp Cooper and pull him back to me when he stepped away.
“I have to fill his food bowl.” He shrugged unapologetically as he crossed to a small table by the end of the kitchen counter. A moment later, Humpty was happily eating, and Cooper was walking back to me.
I was so awash with need, my thoughts hazed with it, my attention centered solely on Cooper, that I barely registered that I had walked over to the kitchen counter. He stopped in front of me, his gaze sweeping up and down. He opened his mouth to say something just as I reached for him, fisting my hand around the fabric of his shirt.
“Come here.”
He obeyed my raspy command, and a moment later, we were kissing and yanking at each other’s clothes. We were rushed and messy and fumbled, and I didn’t care. All I knew was the fierce rush of desire driving us forward.
When I was naked, he lifted me, spinning me to slide my hips onto the counter before he filled me. It started there and ended in his bed. In his bedroom, I was on my knees, and I felt the press of his fingertips on my hips as he filled me from behind and teased me to a climax with his fingers when he reached around.
A while later, we were resting in his bed, and I felt his fingertip trace along the scar on the side of my back, just above my hipbone. I tensed slightly, but ignored the worry that started to build.
“What happened?” he asked quietly.
“I fell and cut myself on a broken vase.” My voice was steady, and I was telling the truth. I just left out the part about why I fell and why the vase was broken.
Blessedly, he left the topic alone, simply smoothing his palm over the scar as if he could make it all better.
We fell asleep later. That one corner of my mind that was usually so noisy, prodding and poking at me, reminding me of all the reasons I couldn’t trust any man, was uncharacteristically quiet. I came awake in the darkness to the sound of a cat purring. I felt my lips curve into a smile. Humpty had nestled himself between our feet.
The weirdest part was I fell right back to sleep. I couldn’t remember a time in my life when I fell back asleep after I woke up during the night.
With Cooper, I felt safe.
