Page 45 of Healing You
It took him a few minutes to reach the docks where Yvonne had already kicked off her shoes and gone calf deep into the water.
The sun glittered off of the water's surface, highlighting her face with a golden hue, her blonde hair sparkling like rose gold. Steve slowed, gently lowering his bag. Unzipping it, he pulled out a blanket, spreading it over the dock. He grabbed the two small bottles from inside the bag, holding them up to Yvonne. “Sparkling grape juice or champagne?”
“Juice, please,” she called back, her eyes cast on the boats farther out in the lake. He placed the champagne back into his bag, popping open the cider and pouring them each a paper cup of the sparkling juice. Then, he laid out a block of cheese, strawberries, and the container of lunch meat he'd packed for them.
“Lunch is served.”
She splashed her way out of the lake and plopped down beside him. “So,” Steve asked, “on your run... did you pass—”
“Jonah? Yeah. He waved. I waved back. That was it.” She shrugged, grabbing a strawberry. Steve pushed his other thoughts aside. She didn't seem upset or worried about it and he didn't want to be “that guy” around her. He could never tell her who to be friends with.
“Well, he didn't wave at me.”
“You expected him to?”
He chuckled at that. “Guess not.” He pushed thoughts of Jonah out of his mind and instead focused on Yvonne's perfectly pink lips, wrapped seductively around the fruit. She had no idea how damn sexy she was. Overtaken with the desire to taste that strawberry directly on her lips, he leaned in, kissing her. God, he loved kissing her. It was hard to imagine her lips any sweeter than they already were, but doing it with fruit involved—well, it was. Sweeter, that is.
He traced his thumb over her jaw, gathering a bit of sweet juice that dripped from her lips and bringing that thumb to his mouth.
“Does it scare you?” she asked quietly, pressing closer to him.
He went still against her. “What?”
“How fast things are moving? How strong our feelings are—?” Her voice cracked and she buried her face in his neck.
He chuckled, kissing the top of her hair. “It scares me more that you're asking that,” he answered honestly, his voice much more casual than he felt on the inside.
She cleared her throat, pulling back to look into his eyes. “But the feelings themselves?”
“Those never scared me. Not in the way you're asking. But it's okay if they scare you... you can tell me things like that. I want to know your thoughts. All of them.”
She went quiet, her eyes drifting out over the lake. He let the silence wash over them, soaking them in a tub of it as he skimmed the back of her neck with his fingertips, back and forth. After a few minutes, he shifted the movement in broader strokes down her arms and up again.
She moaned, pressing into him. “Know what I'm thinking now?” With her head resting against his chest, her back pressed to his front, she turned her head up to look at him. A wicked grin curved on her strawberry stained lips. She leaned over, her lips to his ear, whispering a precursor of events to come. His grip on her arm tightened right along with his groin.
“If we weren't in the middle of a very public lake right now, Eve...” She spun, kissing him and his hands skimmed up her shirt, grazing her breasts.
“How about we pack up and finish this at home?” she said, biting his bottom lip. His arched brow was the only response he could offer because her mouth was still fused to his. And he didn't want to do anything to disrupt that.
A FEW DAYS LATER …
“Never have I ever...” Yvonne rolled her eyes back, spinning her shot glass filled nearly to the brim with tequila on Steve's coffee table. They hadn't been playing the drinking game for long... she'd only had a few sips of her tequila and Steve, ever the gentleman, wasn't insistent that she do the entire shot each time. “Ummm, never have I ever been kissed on a boat.”
His eyebrows twisted as he held his shot glass near his lips without taking a sip. “Shut up,” he said playfully. “We live on a lake! You were engaged to a lawyer... you're telling me he doesn't own a boat?”
She shrugged, circling her finger along the rim of her glass. “Oh, Jonah owns a boat. But he was always too busy playing Captain and I was too busy trying to be his Tennille. Or maybe Donna Reed.” She shrugged. “I don't even know who I was with him, but it definitely wasn't me.”
“So he never kissed you on his boat?”
She shook her head. “Other than the occasional peck, no.”
“Tool,” Steve muttered before throwing back the rest of his tequila and pouring another shot for himself.
“Your turn,” Yvonne said. The room was only spinning a little and she was having a hell of a good time. They'd spent nearly every night together that week, switching off whose house they were at. In less than two short weeks, they had fallen into a very comfortable routine. They would get off work, go for a run, order dinner or walk to into town for a bite, then spend the night at one of their homes with the dogs. If it wasn't for all the mind-blowing sex they were also having each night, Yvonne would swear she was hanging with a best friend.
Steve took a moment to think. “This game is hard when you've known someone half your life.”
“There was a huge break in between, though.”
