“I want to touch you everywhere,” he whispers. “Even in public.”
And with that, he presses his lips to mine. He doesn’t deepen the kiss, but he doesn’t pull away in a quick peck either.
And I swear to God, the earth falls out from under me.
After what feels like minutes, but is only a couple of seconds, he pulls back and smiles down at me.
“Let’s go home.”
***
He kissed me, in front of the whole town of Cunningham Falls. Granted, I don’t think more than a handful of people saw it, but he did it all the same.
And it made me feel special. Important.
That’s all I ever wanted.
It’s the next morning, after a long night of intense love-making, and I’m in the kitchen of my house in town, getting breakfast underway while Christian takes a shower.
If I let myself dwell on the fact that Christian is naked and wet in my bathroom, I won’t get anything done, so I turn on my favorite Spotify playlist on my phone, connect it to the speakers that I have wired through the whole house, and set to work while dancing to Ed Sheeran.
“I’m in love with the shape of you…”
I’m singing under my breath as I crack eggs into a bowl and whisk them up, then do a little sashay to the fridge for some milk and butter.
Knowing that I’m alone, I let my hips move, shake my shoulders, and do a little bounce back to the bowl of eggs.
“Wow.”
I jump and spin, letting out a surprised squeak.
“Oh, you startled me.”
“I’m so proud of you. Look at you, dancing and everything.”
“I didn’t know I had an audience,” I reply, my hand pressed to my chest, willing my heart to slow down, but Christian’s looking at me as though he’d like to eat me alive, and that’s not something that’ll slow down a girl’s heart rate.
He’s in sweatpants that are slung low on his hips, showing off that sexy V and his abs because the man isn’t wearing a shirt.
“I love this song,” he says, slowly walking to me, in the rhythm of the music. His hips are moving now, and he holds his hand out for mine.
“No.”
“Don’t stop now,” he says and pulls me into his arms, then spins me out and back to him. But it’s not like the dancing we did before.
His posture isn’t perfect. He’s not holding me at a respectable distance.
No, he’s all over me, moving around me, his hips and shoulders pressed to mine as he spins us in a sensual dance that has my nipples perked up and my clean panties soaked.
He turns me and presses his front to my back, still turning us in circles, but now he can press his mouth to my neck, just under my ear.
“I’m in love with your body…”
Truer words have never been spoken.
Or sung.
“See what happens when you let your body go?” he asks against my skin. “When you forget to worry about if you look silly? You don’t, by the way.”
“Next to you, a professional dancer?”
He kisses that sensitive spot, just under my ear.
“It doesn’t matter, Jenna. Doesn’t matter if you’ve been to a thousand dance classes or none at all, as long as you feel the music and the person you’re dancing with.”
He turns me back around to face him and cups my cheek, just the way he did last night and lowers his lips to mine. He doesn’t miss a step, still moving us about the kitchen.
And I’m completely intoxicated by him, caught up in the way he moves, the way he smells, and absolutely enraptured by the way he’s looking at me.
“Just watch my face, feel my body. No matter how we’re dancing. Fast, slow, or even having sex, that’s the trick.”
“There are tricks to sex?”
He laughs and twirls me effortlessly.
“I’m not going to teach you to count steps. It’s not fun, and you won’t ever have to use it.”
“No? What if I’m called to be the lead in a dance recital?”
His lips twitch. “Does that happen often?”
“We don’t know. It could happen.”
“Well, if it does, I’ll be happy to be your private coach,” he replies, wiggling his eyebrows. “And I’ll be in the front row, cheering you on.”
“Like a dance mom,” I agree, nodding with sarcastic enthusiasm that makes him bust out laughing. But then he pulls me close into a tight hug as the song changes to a slow P!nk song, and he slows our movements with the beat of the music.
“I don’t want you to think that I don’t want to touch you when we’re not in our bubble,” he says, holding my gaze intently. He leads me to the kitchen table, boosts me onto it, and cages me there, his hands on either side of my hips. He’s gone from playful to intense in two-point-six seconds.