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Luke knew he’d done something terrible. He did feel bad about it. He’d accepted his punishment. He’d lived in a dormitory for forty months. Three and a half years.
He went out a door in a burst, pulling in a breath that felt so thick it wouldn’t go down right. He bent over and braced himself with his arms against his knees, trying to find a proper amount of air.
“Dear Lord,” he gasped. “Help me.” He couldn’t say more than that, and he hoped agony and embarrassment couldn’t swallow a man whole.
The door opened behind him, but he barely heard it. “Luke,” a woman said, and a ray of light burst through the darkness cascading through him. She touched his back, and even through his jacket and shirt, a zing started.
“Baby, what’s wrong?” Hannah pressed in close to him and bent down too.
His angel. Luke got a breath to go into his lungs the right way, and he used it to stand up straight. Luke couldn’t remember the last time he’d cried, and he had no tears today either. He also didn’t have an answer for her.
He simply took her into his arms and held her tightly. Thankfully, she didn’t ask again, and she allowed him to hold her in silence until he felt like himself again.
“We should go,” she said, still examining his face. “I just saw Slate go down to the altar, which means they’re getting close.”
Luke nodded, taking a look out toward the chairs, which had filled in the past several minutes. “One thing first,” he said.
“What’s that?” she asked.
He looked at her, wondering if this was a smart thing to do or not. A hint of distress still streamed through him, and maybe he just wanted to kiss her to make himself feel better.
No, he thought. “I want to kiss you,” he said out loud. “Because I really like you, Hannah.”
A smile bloomed on her face, and she ducked her hair, causing some curled tendrils of hair to fall forward. “I really like you too, Luke.”
He reached up and curved his fingers along the side of her face and neck, the way he’d imagined several times in the past. Her skin rolled like silk along his, and he stepped right into her personal space. “It’s been a while for me.” His heartbeat crashed against his ribs for an entirely new reason now, and Luke prayed desperately that he remembered how to kiss a woman properly.
“You’re good at everything,” Hannah whispered.
Luke smiled at her gentle encouragement, and he let his eyes drift closed as he took a breath of her. She smelled sweet as sugar, and clean as fresh laundry, and decidedly feminine in a floral way that drove Luke mad.
He finally closed the distance between them and touched his lips to hers. A roar moved through his whole body, filling his ears as fire raced down his throat and through his veins.
His other hand slid along her waist as she put her hands on his shoulders and moved them up into his hair.
He’d planned to keep the kiss sweet and simple after such a long hiatus, but he found he couldn’t stop. Everything with Hannah had been explosive, and Luke wasn’t sure why he’d expected their first kiss to be any different.
