She tipped her chin up, eyes narrowed in suspicion. “When was the first best?”
“Dark corner, the smell of beer in the air, your fingernails in my neck. I thought I was going to shed my skin from excitement when you kissed me that first time.”
Seeing the flush bloom on Evie’s face was like hearing a stadium crowd roar his name. A straight shot of adrenaline, transforming him from an ordinary mortal who sometimes had trouble managing his anxiety to a guy who’d trade everything he’d built to have his woman walk into his arms and put her lips on his.
“Have you been waiting for me to initiate a kiss this whole time?” she said.
It took a moment to realize he had. That what had stopped him last night, this morning was needing to know Evie wanted it to happen. What better way of being sure of that than waiting for her to act? He nodded. “It’s not every day I get a second chance like you.”
“I’d have let you take anything you wanted about five minutes after I saw you again.”
He blinked in surprise. “So all the rules? The attitude?”
Evie’s expression was puzzling. A bunch of emotions flowing over her features too quickly for him to grab hold of. “I needed to know you wanted us to be real,” she said. “I needed to forgive myself for letting you go. For all the things I’ve done since.”
He took another slug of water because watching her struggle tightened his throat.
“This, what we’ve been doing, is good. I don’t want to push our luck,” she said.
That emotion was doubt feeding fear in a scrum with hope and desire. He needed to win that battle. “I want us to be forever.”
She tried to hide a smile and failed. “Yeah, well, you know I’ve heard that before.”
“You’re stalling.”
“Stalling?”
He could read that expression. A softening, an ease. “You’re all the way over there, trying to imagine everything that could go wrong with us this time around and I’m over here dying.”
“That sounds serious. I should call someone.”
That flick of her brows, the corner of her mouth twitching, that was amusement. “There’s only one thing that can save me.”
“Which is?”
“Your mouth on mine. Your hand on my heart.” She didn’t exactly fly into his arms and if she didn’t make a move soon he might truly need resuscitating. Had he read her all wrong? Shit. “Evie?”
“You do look like you need a good kiss.”
“I do. I do need a good kiss. I am expiring from the need of a kiss from you. At this point, I’d take a dry, chaste peck and be sky-high.”
“Our deal is done then. No more rules. We come clean.”
“Except I’d give everything I have to do a lifetime deal with you.”
“Lifetime, huh. Forever royalties.”
He capped the water bottle and put in down. “That’s how I roll.”
“You get kisses.”
“I get everything. I never stopped loving you.”
She stepped closer. He planted his feet more firmly on the floor. They were near enough now she’d know his breath was short.
“Never stopped. I like the sound of that,” she said, standing in the vee between his legs. She put her hand to the back of his head; he banded his arms around her back. She said, “Suck in a lungful, you’re going to need it,” before she put her other hand on his face and bumped her nose on his as their faces came together.
He braced for the kiss to be impatient, hard, teeth clashing, a rush of lust and necessity. But for an eternity, the best either of them could do was breathe. It was sweet and maddening. His heart was a death metal band in his chest, his hands strummed over Evie’s body feeling the rich melody of her, the trembling restraint.