Page 93 of Ladybirds

Brow furrowing, he only looks more confused. “I don’t understand.”

“Well, that makes two of us.”

“You want me to kiss you,” he says, each word carefully formed, “despite your relationship?”

“What relation—” she stops, eyes widening as realization dawns. “Oh my god. You think I’m still with David?!”

Seth stares at her, the book sliding from his lap and onto the chair as he slowly rises. His breathing is deep, chest straining against the flannel of his shirt, as he steps towards her. “Do you mean to say you aren’t?”

The edge in his voice, the heat, makes her shiver even though the whole situation makes her want to scream. “Of course I’m not! How could you even think—”

He kisses her.

It’s everything their first kiss wasn’t. Hungry and frenzied; weeks worth of pent up passion bursting at the seams matched only by her own. His hands slide over her jaw, fingertips burying in her hair as his lips slant over hers around a gasp. “You infuriating woman,” he pants between kisses, “Why didn’t you say anything?”

The words slip out between a gasp, breathy and weak. His lips graze her jaw, and the friction is electric. “I didn’t think I had to?”

“I just assumed. For so long, you wanted—I thought—” Her fingers drag over his shoulders and he groans, low and deep against her neck—his breath hot and panting against her collar. “Bloody hell, you’re magnificent.”

She guides him back to her mouth, her fingers fumbling with the buttons of his shirt. “Less talking.”

He smirks into the kiss. “Think you rather like it when I talk.”

“I don’t.”

He nips her bottom lip. “Liar.”

Her fingers run over the puckered, scarred skin over his heart—feels the hitch in his breath against her mouth. “Sorry,” she whispers. “Does it hurt?”

“Does it hurt?” he echoes, laughter coloring his voice, lips brushing against her jaw. “As if everything you do doesn’t tear me apart.” The hand at her hip slips under her shirt, palms gliding over her waist until his long fingers fan over her ribs. “As if you wouldn’t have me begging you to continue.”

A small sigh leaves her lips as he peppers kisses along the line of her neck. His hand is dangerously (deliciously) close to her breast, his thumb tracing maddeningly along the edge of her bra. She swallows thickly, eyes closing. “That’s a no, right?”

He smiles against her skin. “Yes, Princess. That’s a no.” Leaning back, he brushes a stray hair from her forehead. “How did I manage to find you?”

“You must be lucky.”

“Was it luck?” he asks, a question she doesn’t have an answer to. “To find you. Here of all places? In the very last place I would have chosen to look?” he murmurs, the words tickling her ear. “Must be, mustn’t it?”

“Seth,” she breathes. “You’re still talking.”

“Sincerest apologies,” he murmurs. Sara doesn’t believe him for a second. Especially since she can feel his smirk against her cheek. His nimble fingers are making steady work out of the buttons of her shirt.

Hers aren’t doing too shabby either.

By the time they make it to the bedroom, both of them have lost their flannel to the floor. By the time they get to the bed, his pants are hanging precariously low on his hips thanks to her, but he seems to be having greater trouble.

“I miss skirts,” he grumbles, struggling with the button of her jeans.

Sara bites her lip, smothering a laugh as her hands reach down to help him before shimmying them down her legs. She’s a second away from teasing him, but the surprised parting of his lips, the way he stares at her hip, stalls her.

Her tattoo.

It’s so small, no bigger than a nickel. He shouldn’t have even noticed it right away. But he’s always been too perceptive; has always had a knack for zeroing in on her weaknesses. Seth is so familiar with her—knows her in ways she doesn’t even fully know herself—that she never realized the ink embedded in her skin would be news to him.

His thumb brushes over the spotted flesh, a smile in his voice and a question in his eyes. “What’s this, now?”

Sara licks her lips, her mouth painfully dry. She knows he’s thinking of their afternoon in the field, laughing about spots and old wive’s tales. It would be easy to let him believe that, to lie by omission, but she can’t. Of all the people in the world, Seth is the only one she wants to share her pain with. The only one she trusts to be unburdened by it.

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