Page 43 of Pillowtalk

He started rocking her, just to see if she’d relax even more into his arms. She followed his lead, but she still stayed as quiet as a mouse.

An itch crawled under his skin, infesting his mind. Something was off, and he was hoping it was only his paranoia talking. That she would soon erase his unease, or at least put it to rest for the moment.

“You okay?” he asked, and she nodded a little too quickly against him. His tongue swiped across his lip, and he ran a hand over her shoulder and up and down her arm. “You sure?”

She nodded again, offering up a smile before tucking back into her comfortable position against his shoulder. His itch only grew, clawing its way to every corner of his body. He blew out a shaky breath and flicked his gaze over her head at the lake she was so focused on. Like a dumbbell to the face, realization smacked him dead center in the forehead. Of course…she was out here to be withhim,and he was intruding on one of the conversations she had daily. This one was obviously private.

“Oh…I’m sorry. Were you talking to—”

She shook her head hard, her lips pressed tightly together as she turned to look at him. “I wasn’t.”

His brow furrowed, and he pushed away a loose strand of hair that had fallen over her forehead. “You sure you’re okay?” he probed once more, unable to shake the unease that was growing the longer they stood there. His eyes searched her beautiful green irises, but they gave nothing away. She’d put up a brick wall, and he had nothing in his arsenal to break it down.

The corner of her lip picked up, and she let out a small laugh. “Yes.” She twisted in his arms, threading her fingers into the hair at the back of his head. Her body slid against his as she pushed up on her toes, and he met her lips, soft and gentle and tentative.

If this was her way of telling him that she was okay with last night, then he supposed there were worse ways of expressing it. But the thought still niggled at him that she wasn’t being completely honest.

His hands slid over her back, and he pressed her flush against him. The nagging thought had to be quieted somehow, and he could think of no better way than to kiss the woman he was falling for so rapidly.

---