The Heart Principle (The Kiss Quotient 3)

Because I can’t stand her discomfort, I move to the couch, next to her, and she immediately curls up against me, pressing her face to my neck. I wrap my arms around her, and those same feelings from before swamp me: tenderness, protectiveness.

“I don’t really see why that’s so embarrassing. I do it all the time,” I say, and her body shakes as she laughs. “Like every day, sometimes more than once a day.”

“It’s different for guys,” she says, hitting me lightly on the chest with a small fist.

I pick up her fist and kiss her knuckles. “It shouldn’t be.”

“It still is, though.”

“I think it’s hot as fuck when chicks do it,” I tell her.

She laughs again, and I gently pull on her until she looks at me.

“I mean it,” I say, completely serious. “If you can’t tell me what you like, you could show me.”

Her lungs expand on a sharp inhalation, and her face flushes an even deeper shade of red. “I could never, ever, ever . . .”

“Why?”

“Quan,” she says, her tone accusing, like I should know why.

“It’s just you and me here. It’s not like anyone is watching.”

She shakes her head quickly and looks away from me.

“You’re okay with never having good sex, then?” The idea is horrifying to me. “And what about all those times you’ve had sex in the past? They were all shitty?”

She says nothing.

“Anna, it would have been so easy just to—”

Her body tenses, and she sit upright, shooting daggers at me with her eyes. “It’s not ‘easy.’ Not for me. If it was, I would have done it.”

“I’m sorry. I just think—”

“I think this is as far as we’re going to get,” she says, and there’s a finality in her voice that tells me she’s done. Her dating profile was clear that she only wanted one night, and this was our one night—since the first night didn’t count.

A sense of loss threads through me. I don’t want this to be how we part. I didn’t accomplish what I wanted, and I don’t think she did either, not if she wanted to get over her ex—whoever that dickhole is—by having rebound sex. But we really are at a standstill. We both want things the other won’t give.

I stand and pick my shirt up off the ground. As I pull it on, I’m aware of her eyes on me. She likes what she sees. That’s something, even if it’s only skin-deep. With the right person, I think she’ll open up, and it’ll be fucking glorious. But that person isn’t me.

“Thank you for tonight,” I say when I’m standing in front of her door. “I know it was rocky in the end, but I had a great time.”

She joins me in the entryway. “It was the same for me. Thank you—for being you.”

It seems like the right thing to hug her good-bye. When I have her in my arms, it feels like the right thing. She fits against me like she belongs here. I don’t mean to kiss her. It just happens. And she kisses me back. There’s a moment when we hesitate, both unsure of what we’re doing, but our lips come together again. I don’t know who initiates it, her or me, maybe it’s both of us, but I kiss her like it’s our last kiss. Because that’s what this is.

When we finally separate, her eyes are dreamy, her lips red. I run my thumb over her swollen bottom lip, unable to stand the fact that this is the last time I’ll be able to do this.

Without stopping to think, I say, “What if we tried again?”

She blinks several times, her brow wrinkling. “You think we can finally have a proper one-night stand if we try one more time?”

I huff out a soundless laugh. “Third time’s a charm.”

“But you—I—we . . .”

“I think there are things we both could work on. Why not try it together?” I hold my breath and wait for her to answer.