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Owen waits for me, peering at me while I sweat through my shirt and study this pot. “Any interesting letters this week?” he asks.
Work. Yep. This, I can talk about. I think for a second. “This one girl wrote in asking how to help her mom realize that she’s the mom, not one of her girlfriends.”
“That’s a little sad.”
“Not really. She’s not wrong—there needs to be boundaries. Yes, your mother can—” I pause my words and my scrubbing.Owen’s fingers trail at my neck, moving my hair to the side and sending small exploding sparks down my back and into my head.
“Your mother can what?” he says, but the soft touches and trailing fingers don’t stop.
“Your—your mother—um, well, your mother can be your best—” I pull in a breath as Owen’s lips find the base of my skull. “Your mother—” I start again, but another kiss, and then a third trail over the back of my neck.
“Your mother,” he says, with another kiss. He’s marking a path, adjusting my wide collar to kiss at the bare skin over my neck and right shoulder.
“Owen…” I puff and gulp and try very hard not to pee my pants. I haven’t decided—am I going to pee myself, or am I going to turn around and smother him? Nope. Neither. Neither is happening. “O, stop.”
He lifts his head and immediately the warmth of his skin and breath are gone. They’re gone. And with them, my self-control.
I huff out a breath, keeping my focus forward—on my dirty pot, my lifeline pot. “Okay,go. Go.”
Owen’s hand snakes around me, flattening over my stomach. He holds me close, my back to his chest, while leaning in, pressing kiss after kiss over the bare skin of my neck and shoulder.
I am a goner.
Who knew Owen had allthisin him?
Not me.
50
Owen
I’m pretty sure I’m a drowning man who’s just come up for air. Or a starving man who’s just been given his first meal. I’ve been living inside of a box—one that hid my feelings and desires from Annie. The lid is off, and there’s no fitting it back on.
I can’t help myself.
I mean, I can. When she asked me to stop, I did. Painfully. But I did it. I’m not an animal. But when she gave me the go-ahead, I happily obliged.
After kissing every inch of Annie’s neck, she releases a small moan. I’m pretty sure it’s accidental, but I’m also sure this is code forI’m done with the dishes.
I whirl her around to face me. Annie’s arms snake up to my neck without any encouragement at all. Then she rises on tiptoes, her mouth finding mine.
I can’t pull her close enough. She can’t hug me tight enough. I lift her up, and while her hips and bottom rest on the thin counter edge right in front of the sink, her legs wrap around my waist.
I trail kisses along Annie’s jaw to her right earlobe and makemy way back again. Every touch, every kiss, every sigh she unintentionally makes feels more and more right.
I know Annie almost better than I know myself. This is a piece of her I’ve always wanted to explore. The piece that titles us more than just friends. The part that makes me hers and her mine.
“Owen,” she says my name in a gasp of air, her hands tangled in my hair. “We should slow down.”
I am a genie, and she is my master. I may not want to slow down. But I will. For her. Only, Annie’s lips find mine just then, parting and exploring and contradicting every word she just forced herself to mutter.
Because I know that too.
Annie doesn’t trust herself when it comes to relationships, and sheisforcing herself to speak this minute. Still, I let her lead, and she guides me right into another bout of kissing. The window above my sink, the one directly behind Annie, is starting to fog up, and I’m not sure if it’s from the sink of hot water or Annie and me.
It’s warm in here.
At least it is, until—
