Page 48 of Road Trip to Forever
She turns to face me and takes a step closer, threading her fingers through my silk tie. Maybe I’m losing my mind, hungry, tired, or caught up in the moment of seeing Lola looking like this, but I swear she tugs me toward her. An inch closer, then another.
“Thank you,” she says.
“For what?”
“Helping me.”
“You don’t have to thank me for doing things I want to do,” I say. Beyond the door, music begins to play, a sign to guests that the wedding is about to start, and they need to be seated. A sign to us that we need to be with the group in our positions, but I don’t want to leave. “We should probably go. Vows to exchange and all that.”
“Yeah,” Lola agrees but makes no move to leave. “We should.”
“You need to go first, Lo.”
“Why?”
“Because…” I rest my forehead against hers. “I don’t want to walk away from you. Ican’twalk away from you, especially not when you look like this.”
“How do I look?”
“Like a goddamn angel. Perfect. Beautiful. Do you want me to keep going?”
“Maybe,” she whispers. It’s so soft I have to lean forward to hear her. “Maybe I don’t want you to walk away.” She presses up on her toes, her lips millimeters away from mine. I can count the freckles on her nose. I can see the little flecks of green in her eyes that only come out in the right lighting and the blush staining the apples of her cheeks. “If it weren’t for our friends getting married right now, I’d ask you to stay here with me. We’d be late to the ceremony, and I wouldn’t even care.”
My heart races under my suit jacket and my hand falls to her hip. I rub my thumb over her backside, and a whimper falls from her mouth. I know what I’m going to be thinking about the next time she’s away. When I’m lonely, and missing her like hell.
That sound. On repeat. Forever.
“I’ll give you whatever you want, Lola. The moon. The stars. Do you want our entire galaxy and every one beyond? Just say the word and I’ll make it yours. I will find a way.”
Lola stares at me. She’s never looked at me like this before. She’s looking at me the way I look at her.
Like she’s the most important thing in the world.
Fuck it.
I’m going all in.
I don’t care about the consequences.
I want this woman, and I’m going to do something about it.
I lean an inch closer, and so does she. I don’t know how there’s even a sliver of space left between us, because all I can feel is her. All I can see is her. All I can hear isher.
I turn my cheek, ready to whisper another offering in her ear, and she moves at the same time. Quicker than a shooting star, her lips graze against my mouth in the bottom right corner, just above where my smile curves when I’m grinning at something she says.
It’s accidental, done without clear intent, but it’s enough to send me into near cardiac arrest. Enough to render me useless and confirm what I’ve known for years, because it’s sweet and lovely and the best kind of torture.
Lola Jones has positively ruined me for any other woman.
I yank her to me until her chest is pressed against mine. My hand moves to the base of her neck, and when I add a push of pressure with my thumb, she melts. Her body bows forward, and she holds onto my shoulders for support. Her eyes get a little hazy, glossed over, and she looks dazed. Drunk, almost, on the last thirty seconds.
Me too.
I’m fucking intoxicated by her.
“Sorry,” she whispers.
“Don’t be,” I say. “Remember how you told me you didn’t hate when I called you love?”
