Knox (Chicago Blaze 4)

When she tips her chin up slightly in approval, I lower my lips to hers, using all my self-control to start the kiss soft and slow. But as soon as Reese melts against me with a small moan, I slide my other arm around her waist and let my tongue brush against hers.

Kissing her is like coming home. Inside, I’m roaring with the force of a packed arena because finally, Reese is in my arms again.

She presses a palm to my chest, sliding it up to my shoulder. We both need to come up for air, but I can’t make myself stop. I’ve waited fifteen months to kiss her again, and I never want it to end.

There’s a slight whooshing sound as the door to the walk-in cooler is opened. Reese immediately steps back from me, bringing her fingertips to her lips to try to hide her smile.

“Hey, sorry,” a man in a white uniform says as he steps inside. “I just need to grab some butter.”

All three of us stand in awkward silence as he walks over and gets a giant slab of butter, then waves at us as he exits the cooler. Once he’s gone, Reese and I just stare at each other, both of us smiling.

“We shouldn’t have done that,” she says softly.

“Said with absolutely no conviction.”

She gives me a look. “It’s not that I didn’t like it, it’s just…”

“I know. You’re afraid of getting hurt again.”

Reese’s look turns sharp. “I’m happy with my life as it is.”

“You keep saying that like you think you have to give something up to be with me, but you don’t. Just give it a chance and you’ll see.”

There’s sadness in her mossy green eyes as she says, “You don’t understand, Knox. I don’t trust people—not even myself. Eric did what he did right under my nose, and I had no idea. I’d be suspicious of you all the time, and forever asking myself if I was doing enough to keep you happy.”

“That’s not fair, because I’m not Eric.”

She rubs her temple, agitated. “Kauai was perfect. Why can’t we just leave things like that?”

“I don’t want perfection, Reese. I never did. I just want you.”

Tears pool in her eyes as she stares at me. I can see the war happening inside her—whether to trust me or doubt me.

She looks away and moves toward the door, and I see that she decided on the safer route.

“We should go,” she says.

Reluctantly, I follow her. It was almost painful to have a short, sweet taste of her again. Because even though Reese is only a few feet away from me as we make our way down the hallway and out of the restaurant, she’s still incredibly far away.Chapter FourteenReeseThe shelter’s kitchen is quieter than usual when I walk in the Thursday morning of the same week Knox kissed me. That seems to be how I measure time now—how long it’s been since that kiss, because it’s pretty much all I’ve thought about since it happened.

“What’s up?” I ask lightly as I set my canvas bags full of supplies on the counter. “Did you guys get into it about the Cubs and White Sox again?”

Angelia looks up at me from the stove she’s wiping down, her expression somber. “Danielle went back to her husband.”

“No,” I cry in protest. “No, no, no.”

She nods and turns back to the stove. “She and the kids left last night.”

“We tried to get her to stay,” a resident named Gina says, shaking her head. “Her husband bought her a diamond bracelet and said he’ll never hurt her again.”

Angelia scoffs. I feel a surge of shame over my preoccupation with a kiss when the women here are dealing with such heavy issues. Danielle’s husband has given her several black eyes and broken her arm. Thinking of her and her three sweet kids back under the same roof as him makes me feel sick.

I sigh heavily and unload produce from my bags. Everyone works in relative silence, the mood glum, for the next hour. When Angelia wipes her hands on her apron and leaves the kitchen, I follow her.

She goes into her “office”—a cramped space that barely has room for her makeshift desk and a single chair. The space is drafty in the winter and unbearably hot in the summer. No matter the temperature, though, the clear glass vase on her desk always has a few fresh carnations in it. She buys them from a homeless man she passes on her walk to work. Her current carnations are a pretty pale pink.

When I knock softly and open the door, sticking my head inside, Angelia is sitting at her desk, her head in her hands.

“Hey,” I say, sliding inside and closing the door behind me. “Want to talk about it?”

Angelia’s expression is tortured as she looks over at me. “What was she thinking? Bringing her babies back into that mess…I thought she was smarter than that.”