Stitches

Her smile dims and she nods. “I just wanted to stop over and say how sorry I am for your loss. I think it’s beautiful that you’re doing all this in tribute to your wife. You must have really loved her.”

That drains the humor right out of me.

Noticing that, she grimaces. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to… I’m sure tonight sucks enough, and there I go—”

I raise a hand to stop her, shaking my head. “You’re fine. Thanks.”

She’s still sitting here and I don’t really know what to say, so I grab my glass and take another drink. Her eyes go straight to my left hand, to the wedding band on my finger. “You still wear your ring,” she remarks.

I look at my hand, now that she mentions it. “Uh, no. I mean, yeah, I wear a ring, but it’s not…”

It would be complicated to explain to someone who wasn’t sitting here offering me condolences at my dead wife’s benefit, but I can’t even begin to explain it under these circumstances. Normally people see the ring, but know just enough not to ask about it.

“I think it’s sweet,” she says, somehow mistaking my hesitation for something else.

“I’m not in mourning. It’s not like that.”

For some reason, she slightly brightens.

Everything I say somehow comes off as positive to her, so I just stop talking. I feel like I’m digging myself a hole—probably my own guilty conscience, but it’s still uncomfortable.

“Do you dance?” she asks.

“What?”

Nodding her head toward the floor, she says, “I think they’re about to play another slow one. I mean, if you think it would be weird, I understand, but if not….”

I didn’t see that coming at all, so I’m sitting here dumbstruck when Moira comes back and leans down behind me, wrapping her arms around my neck and leaning close. My new friend’s eyes widen at the clear show of affection/ownership.

“Am I interrupting?” Moira asks.

“Not at all,” I assure her, placing my hand over hers.

The newcomer’s gaze drops to Moira’s hand beneath mine, to her wedding band that matches mine. She can’t see Seb’s hand as he walks around to his seat, but if she could she’d see he has the exact same one. Even without knowing that, she’s wildly confused.

“Sorry,” I tell her, pushing back from the table and putting a hand on Moira’s waist. “This dance is spoken for.”

Moira doesn’t say anything when we’re standing there, but as I haul her away, she says, “All your dances are spoken for, mister, not just this one.”

I grin at her possessiveness. “You’re allowed to have two lovers but I’m not allowed to dance with another woman?”

“Absolutely,” she verifies, with a vehement nod.

I smile down at her as I pull her close on the dance floor. “You’re the only one I want to dance with, anyhow,” I assure her.

Her blue eyes sparkle with warmth as she secures her arms around my neck and sways with me. “Good.”

I hold Moira close as the song goes on, breathe her in when she rests her head against my shoulder and sighs. I love when she does that. I love when I can feel her contentment rolling off of her in waves. This is my home. Not the house we all live in together or the bed where we fall asleep each night.

This. This is where I want to live, in moments like these. With Moira pressed against me, the smell of her, the taste of her…

Well, hell, I can’t taste her right now, can I?

Gently lifting her chin until she pulls back, I lean down and fix that. I taste her lips and she opens for me so readily. Even here, in this crowd full of people, her hunger for me bleeds out of her in soft little sighs, in the way her heart rate kicks up. Her teeth catch my bottom lip and I growl low in my throat, yanking her hips against mine.

“Keep that up, baby, I’ll haul your little ass right out of this ballroom.”

Grinning as she lingers close, she teases, “Is that supposed to be a threat?”