“Hmm?”
Aiden leans forward. The faint scent of his cologne surrounds me. My gosh, he smells good. Too good. I take a breath and turn my head. Bad decision because now our mouths are an inch apart. My eyes drop to his full lips. All I’d have to do is tilt my head a tiny bit and—
Aiden growls, and my eyes snap to his. The heated look in his eyes has me squeezing my thighs together. He brushes his thumb beneath my lower lip and holds it there for a beat, ratcheting up the anticipation within me so tight that I have to fist my hands in my lap to keep from reaching for him.
Oh, God, is he going to kiss me?
Do I want him to kiss me?
Will I kiss him back, or will I push him away?
I didn’t realize I’d been biting my lower lip until he uses his thumb to pop it out from between my teeth.
He lowers his head. Warm breath tickles my neck. “Stop looking at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you want me to be Mr. Right.”
“That would be foolish because we both know you’re not. That’s not who you are,” I breathe, casting my eyes to the side.
“People change.”
I nod. “You’re right.”
He doesn’t reply until I look at him. “I’ve changed.”
Has he? I flip back over the last few months in my mind and then back more than a few months. The last woman I remember him going on a date with was that redhead he met while we were playing darts. Wait…that can’t be right. That was over a year ago, which means—
“Lizzie?”
I blink. Aiden brushes a strand of hair out of my face. His fingers linger on my skin, and this is it, he’s going to kiss me. I close my eyes, still trying to decide what I’m going to do while waiting for his sweet lips to touch mine.
“Can you hand me the remote?”
Those aren’t the words I’m expecting. My eyes fly open. Aiden is grinning. Bastard!
“You’re sitting on it,” he says, nodding to the other side of me.
I grab the remote—which I am sitting on—and throw it in his lap.
Aiden laughs and wraps an arm around my shoulders. “You’re so thinking about it.”
“I’m not thinking about it.”
“Yes, you are.”
“No, I’m not.”
“You’re either pondering the possibility of me being Mr. Right, or you’re thinking about me kissing you. For the record, I won’t kiss you until you ask me to.”
“I won’t ask.”
He grins. “Oh, you’ll ask.”
The memory of him rejecting me all those years ago pops into my head. I press a hand to my chest because the wounds his words caused are still raw and hurt more than I expected them to after all this time. That can’t happen again, not with you.
“Why are you doing this?” I ask softly.