Chapter 21
Twenty-One
W ithout a second of sleep, not a single moment, Tori eased into Monday morning rush hour with a grin she continuously tried to suppress. Tried and failed. If her back wasn’t sore and Mia’s lingering perfume weren’t wreaking havoc on her nervous system, she might’ve convinced herself the whole thing had been a dream.
She wanted to close her eyes and drown in the memories of last night. Lose herself in the way Mia’s mouth felt against hers. The way the sunrise had revealed the green in her eyes, her kiss-swollen lips, the faint freckles tossed across her nose. But with traffic crawling around her, Tori forced herself to focus on the road.
Even with dark sunglasses on, the sun was brighter than it had ever been in Tori’s entire life. She couldn’t find the will to be annoyed. She’d trade irritated eyes for Mia’s kiss any day. Laughing to herself because she was definitely living in some vivid fantasy, Tori leaned against the headrest.
Over and over, she replayed the words Mia whispered against her parted lips. Inhaled the desperation in her kiss and the way she promised she wanted to find out what they could be.
It was crazy, Tori decided. Absolutely impossible. And yet, she couldn’t deny that Mia hadn’t let her go until it was nearly six in the morning. Until Tori absolutely had to go home to shower and change for work. And even then, goodbye had been repeated and intense and unending.
Tori’s chest ached as if Mia was still pinning her against her driver’s side door. Like Mia’s nails were still scraping her scalp and her sighs were ravaging Tori’s sense of responsibility. With her hands on Mia’s hips and Mia’s teeth on her throat, Tori had considered cancelling her mid-morning meetings. She’d considered wiping her entire damn schedule to stay with Mia.
But Mia had convinced her she’d regret her momentary haste. Promised that she wasn’t going anywhere. Tori’s stomach heaved. Mia wasn’t going anywhere today, but they had less than a month before she had to go home. Before Mia had to go back to her home and career and?—
Tori stopped herself before the anxiety in her chest converged into a black hole and swallowed all the light in her body. She refused to let thoughts of the ending ruin the beginning. Not when she was cautiously stepping into something she’d wanted for so long. She wouldn’t crush the joy of being with Mia just because she was afraid of losing it. Because it might not last forever.
The noise of her phone ringing through the Jeep’s speakers pulled Tori out of Mia’s kiss. Clearing her throat and the hearts in her eyes, Tori straightened and took her client’s call.
By the time Tori strode into work, she’d slipped completely into broker mode. She had a lease agreement to review, a negotiation for retail space to finalize, and a call with a developer about zoning variances to return. She was going to head straight for her office, but came to a screeching halt in front of the reception desk instead.
Sitting on top of the poured concrete desk was an old-fashioned metal Thermos. Taped to the side was a little folded triangle. The sight of her initials in Mia’s handwriting sent Tori’s racing heart into free-fall.
“Ms. Falcon dropped that off for you,” the receptionist said while doing her very best to conceal her smile.
Tori couldn’t stop hers until after it sprung onto her lips.
“Leaving you little gifts at work,” Larissa said, strolling into the reception area and making zero attempt to hide her delight. She handed the receptionist a file and leaned against the desk. “And you look like you were up all night.” She wiggled her brows in a way that was so over the top, it wasn’t as obnoxious as it would’ve normally been.
Reaching for the cylinder, Tori kept her expression neutral. “Good morning to you both,” she said, tone as dry and detached as she could make it. Turning away from both of them, she took a few steps before she tossed a look over her shoulder. “I’ll thank you both to stay out of my love life.”
With a bark of laughter, Larissa glanced at the receptionist as if to say told ya . The receptionist grinned and replied with a conciliatory shrug.
“Hear that?” Larissa was still vibrating with amusement. “There’s a love life!”
Tori had only managed to peel the note off the side of the container and wonder where the hell Mia had found notebook paper when Larissa was suddenly at her side.
“You see? This is why you’ll never learn,” Larissa joked, hand on Tori’s shoulder. “The universe keeps rewarding your reckless choices.” She followed Tori into her office, but didn’t sit down.
Running her thumb over the corner of the paper, Tori was dying to know what was in the note. She imagined Mia’s mischievous expression when the idea popped into her head. Pictured her hurrying to Tori’s office to beat her there.
“I don’t know.” Tori twisted the top off the canister and took a sip of the espresso. It was stronger this time, though a little too sweet. “Can’t say I’ve ever won a cosmic lottery,” she added before taking another mouthful and wondering whether Mia had made the Cuban coffee herself.
Larissa made a point of looking at Tori from top to bottom like she might see Mia’s fingerprints on her skin. When she seemed to linger on Tori’s sleep-starved eyes, she offered a lopsided smile. “That concealer is doing the Lord’s work today. Why’s that? Not because you were running with me this morning?—”
“Oh, shit.” Tori’s eyes slammed shut. “I’m so sorry. I completely forgot?—”
“Listen, it’s fun to see that you miss shit like the rest of us mortals.” Larissa laughed. “But I bet it would be even more fun to know what the hell kept you from running club this morning.” She looked at the note in Tori’s hand. “And what you did to get that cutie to look all smitten.”
“You saw her?” Tori tried to keep her tone neutral. Tried not to vault over the desk and grab her by the shirt and beg her to spill, to interrogate her until she shared every detail about having seen Mia. How she’d looked. What she’d said.
Larissa’s grin crept up one side of her face like ivy. “I did,” she replied, intentionally coy. “She looked…pleased.”
“Pleased?” Tori repeated too fast. “Pleased like how?” She used her best nonchalant voice, but it lacked an ounce of chill.
“I don’t know, bro. I’m not the one who spent the night with her.” Larissa’s eyes were alive with curiosity. “What did you do?”
Overcome by the visceral memories of Mia’s kiss and the sound of her breaths, Tori dropped into her chair. She did her best to put the impossible night into words while Larissa sat and listened like she wished she had popcorn.
“Holy shit.” Larissa leaned back in her seat, shit-eating grin gone. “You must be a hell of a kisser.” She gestured at the espresso on Tori’s desk. “She couldn’t even go to sleep when you left.”
“I’m scared I’ll fuck this up,” Tori confessed to her own surprise, strange anxiety coiling in her empty stomach. “If I make the wrong move?—”
“Hey, you seem to have made the right moves so far.” Larissa rocked forward in her chair. “Trust your gut. Looks like it’s been right for longer than you thought,” she added seriously.
The moment Larissa was gone, Tori carefully unfolded Mia’s note. She blamed the pounding in her chest and clamminess of her hands on her lack of breakfast. On too much caffeine on an empty stomach.
Hi… So this could either be super cute or a blaring stage-five-clinger alarm. (For the record, I’m shooting for door number one.) I know I’m not supposed to show my hand or whatever, but I haven’t stopped thinking about you—okay yes, you only just left—but it’s like… I don’t know… Like I can still feel you on my lips. Anyway, I figured you could use some rocket fuel after someone kept you up all night. (God, please tell me this isn’t creepy.) — Mia
Tori closed her eyes and tipped her head back. She still felt Mia’s kiss too. In her life, she’d never kissed anyone for that long. Not only kissed, anyway. But every part of Mia’s mouth had been worthy of slow exploration. She wanted to savor the tiny moans that sang in her throat and the way she curled the tip of her tongue.
Smiling to herself, skin tingling and pulse racing, Tori reached for her phone. Normally, she’d make a joke about Mia’s gesture, but she stopped before her thumbs started moving. If Mia had made herself vulnerable, Tori owed her the same in return.
Tori: I haven’t stopped thinking about you either .
Tori’s phone rang in her hand the moment she sent the text. Mia’s name on her screen woke up every butterfly that had passed out after working hard all night.
“We’re going to be those people, aren’t we?” Mia asked, music playing far in the background.
“What people?” Tori asked to buy herself a second to catch her breath and remind her nervous system that she wasn’t about to fall out of a plane.
“Revoltingly adorable,” she replied. “Like, am I really sitting here missing you even though you just left like two hours ago?” Mia paused after her rhetorical question. “Because I am. Even though I’m not supposed to admit any of this.”
“Supposed to?” Tori paced around her office like that might discharge the energy building too quickly in her chest. “Says who?”
“Umm, only all the dating advice there is,” she replied with an exaggerated duh woven through her words. “There are rules, Victoria.”
Tori laughed. “There are at least two major flaws with your reasoning.”
“Oh?” Mia couldn’t conceal the smile in her tone, but Tori doubted she was even trying. “Do tell.”
“For starters, your dating advice is at least a decade old and therefore stale,” she replied before registering that they were throwing the word dating around like it was no big deal.
“What’s the second one?” Mia asked when Tori paused too long.
She’d planned to point out that advice for seeing dudes didn’t necessarily transfer to women, but she was stuck in her head.
“Oh, Jesus. I misunderstood, didn’t I?” The sound of Mia’s smile was gone and replaced with the vibration of a mild panic. “We’re not dating. Why would we be?—”
“No, no.” Tori wished she could move through the phone lines and land in Mia’s house. “That’s not—I just—” She reset her brain-mouth connection with a deep breath. “Isn’t all of this weird for you?”
“Is it weird for you ?” Mia echoed, sounding calmer.
“Are you really answering my question with a question right now?” Tori sat in the chair across her desk because her shaking quads weren’t taking her a step further.
“I mean, I feel like it’s your turn to stick your foot in your mouth,” Mia joked.
“Pretty sure I’m the one who confessed a very pathetic, very old, crush last night.” Tori’s laugh was too loud and too nervous.
“Fine,” Mia decided after a beat. “You’re making me show all my cards and I don’t like it. And also, I’m not that old.”
“You don’t have to?—”
“Nothing has ever felt so right,” Mia admitted, voice low and penetrating straight to Tori’s soul. “It’s kind of embarrassing to be this eager. I’m used to being very cool, you know?”
“Oh yeah?” Tori’s racing heart added a tremble to the two syllables she managed to form.
“Yep.” Her smile was audible from miles away. “But here I am wondering when I’m going to see you again and kiss you again and, well, to answer your question… No, not weird. Kind of amazing, actually.”
Tori closed her eyes and agreed. “Yeah, kind of amazing.”