Chapter 13
Thirteen
Ky
“Tell me that ChatGPT was used without telling me that ChatGPT was used,” Colt says on a groan, tossing the essay aside and reclining back on my couch. “How do you deal with this shit?”
I laugh and toss my own paper aside. “I don’t,” I say, sweeping my hand out at the stack that’s barely gone down in size, even though we’ve been at it for what feels like hours.
(But it is really only thirty minutes).
“Should we give them all As?” he asks, leaning forward and picking up the essay again.
“Even the ChatGPT one?”
His expression is so disgruntled, I can’t help but laugh again. “You really don’t have to do this, you know that, right?”
He sobers then slowly lifts his free hand.
It’s tentative, cautious.
Part of me hates it with an intensity that makes me want to overturn the coffee table, to launch my wineglass against the wall, painting it red with the chardonnay.
But that would be a waste of perfectly good wine.
And it would ignore the other part of me, the bigger part.
The part that’s warmed by his actions, soothed by the way he wants to take care of me, healed that he’s seen the broken pieces and he’s still here…
Grading papers.
He tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. “I want to be here.”
My lungs seize and even as I’m absorbing the impact of that, of how good it feels, he sits back.
“You know what would make this better?” he asks.
“More wine?” I quip.
Lips twitching, he shakes his head.
“Even more wine?”
A chuckle. “No, baby.”
My heart feels like a skittish jackrabbit leaping about in my chest. “Then what?” I ask quietly.
He leans close, close enough for that jackrabbit to transform into an elephant.
He has a scar near the corner of his mouth and I want to trace it with my fingers, with my lips…my tongue.
His breath is on my skin, his body is close.
But before I can feel that, before I can get lost in that…or the panic that’s sure to cling to its coattails, he snags the remote from the coffee table and points it at the receiver.
“Reality TV.”
“Baby,” I hear from a distance. “Baby, wake up.”
I’m warm and comfortable, cuddled against a pillow that smells like spice, a pillow that’s warm and…hard?
I blink, trying to claw myself out of the depths of sleep.
The next thing I’m aware of are fingers stroking through my hair, gentle and steady, and then that hard, spicy pillow…
Or Colt’s thighs, rather.
I’m sprawled out on the couch, my head in his lap—
My eyes fly open on a gasp.
“Easy,” he says quietly, glancing down at me, those fingers never stopping their gentle movements. “You fell asleep, baby. But it’s getting late, I should head home, let you go up to bed.”
“You fell asleep too,” I say softly.
He’s deliciously sleep-rumpled, a lock of hair having fallen forward to tumble over his forehead, his lids heavy, the stubble on his jaw longer than normal, calling for my fingers to stroke.
His mouth kicks up. “Yeah, I did.”
Quiet falls between us and it’s not strange, not scary.
It’s…comfortable.
“You didn’t like the show?” I ask softly, knowing I should move, but unable to make myself sit up.
“I’m not the only one who crashed out between dinner parties gone wrong and obscenely large shopping trips.”
“Rude,” I say. “I had a trying day”—and three glasses of wine, but who was counting?—“that’s the only reason I fell asleep.”
“Touché.” He chuckles and I finally make myself sit up.
“Was it that bad?” I tease.
“The show or the grading?”
“Either.” My blood is full of champagne, leaving me feeling joyful and effervescent. “Both.”
“Terrible,” he teases back, holding up a hand with pen and pencil stains along the inside. “And I’ve been marked.”
“Your fault for being a lefty,” I counter.
“Now that’s a rude thing to say to the person who helped you get through that stack.” A nod at the now-graded pile of papers. “I expected gratitude and instead I’m getting sass.”
Amusement in my belly. “I think you like the sass.”
“I think”—he tucks that unruly strand of hair behind my ear again—“I like anything and everything about you, Kylie Connors.”
That amusement morphs, turning into pleased surprise, into tentative hope, into a yearning to grasp tightly to this moment that’s not clouded with the past.
“Colt,” I whisper, shifting an inch closer.
Warmth in his eyes.
No. Heat in those gorgeous brown eyes of his. They darken, turning the color of melted chocolate, tempting me to dip a finger in, to bring it to my mouth, to…
Taste.
God, I want to taste.
And that’s…
Well, it’s not scary.
Holy heck, it’s not scary.
I lean an inch closer, testing myself, trying to find the edge of my control, where that panic begins to crawl up and take over, to suck the pleasure out of this moment.
But the inch doesn’t do that.
So, I take another.
Then another.
Then suddenly freeze when I realize exactly how close I am to him, our bodies almost touching, our mouths a bare few centimeters apart.
He’s still, the only movement that of his lungs, his breaths coming fast.
So are mine.
“I—”
But I can’t find the right words, can’t give voice to the need that’s burning inside me.
“Take it,” he murmurs.
My pulse hitches. “Wh-what?”
“What you want.”
“I—”
He spreads his hands on his thighs, fingers clenching at the material of his jeans. “I won’t move, won’t touch. You can just…” He licks his lips, eyes sliding to the side then coming back to mine, hot and tempting. “You can just take what you want and I’ll stay exactly like this.”
My heart hiccups, starts beating rapidly, trying to escape the cage of my lungs.
“What about what you want?”
His fingers flex, digging into the hard muscles of his legs.
His jaw clenches, a muscle flickering along the defined edge.
But it’s his eyes that steal my breath.
Because they burn into mine as he says,
“What I want more than my next heartbeat is too feel your lips on mine.”