Page 68 of Kiss the Girl
“We’re having a nice moment. Please don’t make me feel like murdering you.”
“Fine,” he said with a small smile. “I expected the wedding to be rough. Moments were hard, but the more time goes by, the more my perspective changes. Like just now, talking to you, I had one of those moments.”
“Which was…?” I liked the idea of being a perspective-changer.
“You said it was bull that Lauren didn’t figure out she felt more than friendship for law school guy, and I thought that too. But now I understand what it feels like to hang out with someone as a friend and get blindsided by your feelings for them.”
Oh, good. We were going the super awkward route.
Except…
It felt…not awkward to hear him say that? He was naming thoughts and emotions I’d had since our mistletoe kiss.
“Grace?” He said my name softly, and my name sounded like the prayer my mom had always meant it to be.
“Noah?”
“What is this?”
“You’re asking the hardest question.” I tried to give him a jokey smile, but his expression didn’t waver.
“I’m serious. I thought I understood it. We’re friends. We’re putting on a stupid show because I panicked when my boss was talking to me last month. You’re a good sport. But yesterday, that didn’t feel like a show. And for me…”
I wanted him to finish that sentence. I also wanted to clap my hand over his mouth so he couldn’t. I was a mess, and I did nothing, waiting to see what would happen next, yearning for it and dreading it at the same time.
He rested his elbows on his knees and kept his eyes on his clasped hands before he took a deep breath. “I don’t know what’s going on, but that kiss was real for me.”
The devil made me do it. That was the only explanation for the next words out of my mouth. “We should try it again and see if we can figure it out.”
His head whipped around, his eyes wide as he met mine. “What did you say?”
I could back out of this. Laugh it off, lie about what I’d said, change the subject. But I wanted him. “You heard me.”
“Try it again?”
“Try it again.” It was a dare, and he knew it.
And in case I hadn’t been clear, I shifted to my knees and crept toward him on the sofa, not taking my eyes off his.
He settled back into the corner, a small smile playing on his lips as he watched me prowl toward him.
“What do you think you’re doing?” he asked, his voice low, as I stopped inches away.
“This.” I leaned forward the slightest bit and brushed my mouth against his, my eyes open so I could read his.
His answer was to catch my bottom lip in between his teeth and hold it lightly until I pulled away slowly.
“Do we have to figure out what ‘this’ is?” I asked softly, my breath a puff against his lips. “What if we let it be its own thing and not pin it under one of Brooke’s microscopes?”
His answer was to lean forward and kiss me back with a hunger that would have scandalized Miss Lily’s guests. But I welcomed it, giving as good as I got, learning the contours of his lips, exploring the planes of his chest and shoulders with my hands, the soft boundary of his hairline over his collar. Every sense went on high alert, and it was all good. Taste, feel, smell. So good.
His touch was both soft and demanding as he traced light lines along my jaw and down my throat, never breaking the connection of our mouths. He pulled me tighter against him, and I toppled into his lap, exactly where I’d wanted to be.
I pulled away and he murmured a protest, but I wanted to explore him more, the faint saltiness of his neck, the soft spot behind his ear that prompted his hands to close around my arms tight enough to almost hurt when I kissed it.
“Why is this so good?” I asked, but he didn’t answer, just pulled my mouth back to his and explored it more, a soft tangle of tongues and lips, of sliding hands and quickening breath.
I’d never been so lost inside of a kiss, like time stopped but it had never mattered, not like kissing Noah mattered. Not like being kissed by him mattered.
