5. Marshall #2
"Then your terrible taste in music." She shifted her weight, and the porch light caught her face, the sharpness of her jaw.
The way she pressed her lips together told me she was trying not to say something worse.
Her eyes were dark. "Some of us work in the morning, and have early client calls.
Some of us aren't twenty-two-year-old frat boys who think the entire neighborhood wants to listen to their victory party at one in the morning on a weeknight. "
"Twenty-three," I corrected. "Also, it's not a victory party."
Although that was exactly the party it was. I'd scored my first NHL goal four hours ago, and I was celebrating as I should, and I refused to apologize for that. "I'm sorry about the noise. I'll turn it down."
"You should've turned it down three hours ago. What you should have done is checked the community noise ordinance before you turned your house into a club. It's after eleven. The HOA has rules."
"The HOA has rules," I repeated, and I heard the sarcasm in my voice before I could stop it.
Her eyes narrowed. "Don't do that."
"Do what?"
"Repeat what I said as if it's funny. It's not funny. I have an important presentation tomorrow, and I've been listening to this crap you call music through my bedroom wall for three hours."
She was right. I should've apologized and turned the music down and let her go back to her house and that should've been the end.
A normal person would've done that. A mature, reasonable, professional hockey player who understood that being a good neighbor was part of being a good person would've done that.
But the way she stood there with her arms crossed and her chin lifted, giving me that same look, pushed me forward.
I stepped closer. Not enough to touch her, not enough to invade her space.
I'd never do that; I wasn't that type of guy.
But close enough that the distance between us changed.
She was now against the front wall of my house, the cold brick behind her back, and I was close enough to catch her soft scent.
"What's your problem with me?" I asked, quiet enough that only she could hear it over the muffled music leaking from inside.
Her arms were still crossed, but her breathing had changed. I could see it in the rise and fall of her chest. She wasn't afraid. I could tell the difference. She was aware of me, of how close I was, and of whatever was happening in the two feet of air between us.
"I don't have a problem with you," she said. Her voice was steady, but her breathing wasn't. "I have a problem with your behavior."
"Oh, with my behavior."
"Pounding on my door at night. Spilling coffee on me. Throwing parties that shake my walls at midnight." She listed them as if she'd been keeping track. "You've been here less than two months, and you've been a nightmare."
"You like me," I said with a wink.
The words fell out of my mouth before I could think them through, loaded and ready, and I watched her reaction. Her eyes widened and her lips parted, and for one second she said nothing.
She didn't deny it, but the silence between us was louder than the party behind me.
I leaned into her and kissed her not thinking about what I was doing.
I didn't run that play in my head, or weigh the consequences.
I didn't consider that this woman had told me to stay far away from her in a coffee shop four days ago.
My hand came up to the side of her face, my thumb against her cheekbone, my fingers in the edge of her braid, and I kissed her.
She tasted like wine, and her lips were softer and warmer than I'd expected, and as I pulled away, she stood there processing what had happened.
Then she shocked me by kissing me back.
Her hand came up to my chest, fingers gripping my T-shirt, bunching the fabric in her fist, and she pulled me closer.
The kiss went from zero to something else entirely.
Her back pressing harder against the brick as my body pressed into hers, my other hand finding her hip through the hoodie she wore.
Her mouth opened under mine and I felt it everywhere, in my chest, in my stomach, in the base of my spine.
Then as I deepened the kiss, I heard the small sound she made in the back of her throat.
Not quite a moan, but close enough to make my blood move faster than it had all night, including when the crowd roared after my first goal.
She tasted like wine, and the way her body fit against mine made the word neighbors feel like a joke.
Our first kiss lasted all of ten seconds. Long enough for me to forget about the party behind me or the fact that I barely knew this woman, but it reminded me that she drove me out of my mind. Long enough for the feeling of her body against mine to burn into my memory and my mind to go blank.
She pushed me back, both hands flat on my chest, fingers spread, putting space between us that felt like a wall going up in real time. She was breathing fast. Her lips were darker, swollen and slightly parted, still carrying the shape of the kiss. Her eyes were wide and burning with anger.
"That," she said, her voice tight, "will never happen again."
She took off down the steps of my porch and across my driveway to her own front steps. She didn't look back as she went inside and shut the light off, leaving me standing there, breathing hard and my heart hammering in my chest.
She'd stretched my t-shirt where she'd gripped it, and I could still taste the red wine on my lips. The music was still playing in the house and the party was still going, but none of that registered. My mind was on that kiss.
Once I'd calmed down, I went inside and turned the music down until it was background noise. I sat on the counter in the kitchen while Jeremy finished the story he was telling and Ethan poured us shots.
I wasn't listening to a single word being said.
I was thinking about the way she'd kissed me.
The way her fingers had gripped my shirt and the way her body pressed against mine.
I also thought about the way she'd said never again, her voice cracking on the second word.
She was trying to convince herself of that more than she was convincing me.
That was fine, she could say whatever she wanted, but I had a feeling this wouldn't be our one and only kiss.