Page 183 of Wish You Were Mine
I laughed. “You were so good at pretending.”
“Not really.” His hand found mine and threaded our fingers. “You should’ve seen me after class.”
My eyes suddenly stung with emotion, the idea of him still loving me even when things had seemed hopeless completely undoing me.
I leaned in, kissing him again, slower this time. My arms circled his neck, his slid around my back.
“You have no idea how many nights I’ve dreamed of this,” he murmured, voice low and rough against my neck as his mouth traced a slow path along my jaw and down the column of my throat, lips warm and open, breath hot enough to make my pulse trip. “Needed this.”
“I think I have an idea,” I breathed, more moan than words as my hands slid beneath his shirt, palms flattening over the firm planes of his back. “Since I’ve been dreaming about it, too.”
A groan rumbled from his chest, and my heart pounded so hard I was sure he could feel it. When his lips found mine again—slow, reverent, full of everything we’d been forced to hold back—I melted into him completely.
One of his hands gripped my hip, drawing me closer, while the other slid higher along my spine. The contact pulled a soft whimper from me—so intimate, so familiar, yet still new enough to steal my breath.
We were just getting even more lost in the moment when the sharp slam of a distant door cut through the haze.
We froze, still pressed together, panting. His forehead rested against mine, his thumb tracing absent circles at my hip like he couldn’t bring himself to let go.
“We should probably take this somewhere else,” Iwhispered with a shaky laugh, brushing my thumb along his jaw. “Don’t need anyone discovering what Professor Park is like behind closed doors.”
His low chuckle vibrated through me, and I saw the moment he came back to his senses. “You’re probably right.” Then, softer, “You hungry?”
“Starving,” I admitted, my heart still thudding against his.
“I was thinking we could go out to dinner.”
I tilted my head. “Like…to a drive-thru?”
“No.” That slow, sure smile curved his mouth—the one that made me want to kiss him all over again. “I was thinking more like a sit-down place with a cozy booth.”
“You want to get dinner in public?”
Could we actually do that now?
“I do.” He grinned, taking my hand in his as he led me back down the hall. “I want to show you off and let everyone know you’re finally mine.”
60
LUCY
The energyinside the Dickies Arena in Fort Worth, Texas, was everything you'd expect from the NCAA Gymnastics Championships—loud, pulsing, alive. We were in the final rotation of the semifinals—the meet that would determine who took home the all-around title and which four teams would advance to the finals on Saturday.
And I had one event left.
Floor.
The crowd was still recovering from the routine just before mine. Oklahoma’s star gymnast—last year’s all-around champion—had just nailed her landing with the kind of grace that made your stomach twist. Her final all-around score?
39.675.
Which meant that if I wanted the all-around title…I would need a perfect 10 on floor.
A near-impossible feat.
Especially because it would be my third perfect 10 of the night.
Bars. Beam. And now floor?
