Chapter 15 #2
"That's not the whole why," I say, because what the hell—in for a penny, in for the entire vault.
"The whole why is that I used to watch you in the library.
Lunch periods. You'd be at the corner table with some book the size of a cinder block, and when you hit a word you loved, you'd mouth it to yourself.
Just your lips moving, like you were tasting it.
Savoring it. You never knew anyone was watching.
" My heart is going like I'm in the door of the plane.
"I knew. I secretly watched you do that for three years.
I was thirteen and stupid and terrified of exactly two things on this earth.
The written word, and you. So I torched it.
Easier to make you the punchline than to be one. "
Her lips part. Nothing comes out. Darcy Gable, out of words, and I did that, and under all the wreckage of this confession some ancient scoreboard in me lights up anyway.
"You watched me read?" she finally says. Barely above a whisper.
"Every chance I got."
"For three years."
I shrug, but it feels forced. "I thought you were cute.
" The last of the smooth is gone from my voice.
There's nothing left in my mouth but the truth, slow and unarmored.
"I think you're beautiful now. Same girl.
Same words. I just stopped being too stupid to say it.
That's the apology, Darcy. No excuse attached.
I'm sorry. I've been sorry for half my life and too much of a coward to pick up the phone or drive two hours and say it. "
The bulb hums at the top of her stairs. Somewhere down the block a screen door claps shut. And Darcy looks at me for a long moment with those gold-shot hazel eyes, and then she steps closer.
Not a stumble. Nothing accidental about it.
One deliberate step that closes the gap to inches, her face tipped up, her breath touching my jaw, and every alarm system I have goes off at once and I do not care.
My hands have gone still. My whole body has gone still—the big stillness, the open-door-at-peak-altitude stillness, when the only thing left in the world is the jump.
"Finn," she says.
I gently take her jaw in one hand, tilt her face up the last inch, and kiss her.
Soft. Barely anything. Her lips part on a breath and I keep it tender—asking, giving her all the room in the world to step back.
She doesn't step back.
She makes a sound instead. Small, low in her throat, and her body curves into mine, her free hand closing in the front of my shirt, and gentle is over.
I pull her in. Her breasts press against my chest through that criminal cardigan, soft and full and exactly as good as I've been telling myself not to imagine.
My hand slides from her jaw into her hair, and I kiss her the way I've been not letting myself think about kissing her since I held her in my arms on that tango dance floor days ago.
Her mouth opens under mine. She tastes faintly of beer and mostly of her, and when my tongue touches hers she makes that sound again, louder, and I feel it everywhere.
I'm hard inside of a minute. There is no hiding it at this range and I don't try.
She can feel exactly what she does to me, and instead of pulling away she presses closer.
Jesus, this woman is a revelation.
Her keys are digging into my chest where her fist is caught between us, four little metal teeth right through my shirt. I could not care less. She can brand me. Fair trade.
I tilt her head and leave her mouth to put my lips on the side of her neck, right on the curve I've been staring at since she tipped her head back laughing an hour ago.
Her breath catches. Her fingers slide up into my hair and pull, not away, and the sting of it goes straight down my spine and lower, and the sound I make against her throat is not a word.
"Finn." She sounds different this time. Ragged around the edges. I hear the sound of her keys hitting the pavement after they slip out of her grasp.
I kiss my way back up to her mouth because I'm not done there. Might never be done there. For a while there is nothing in the world but her lips and her hands and the small sounds she keeps giving up like she's furious about every one of them.
My free hand finds the curve of her waist under the hem of the cardigan, one thin layer of cotton T-shirt between my palm and her skin, and damn how I want more. I want all of her, right here, right now.
Which is exactly why I stop.
Not tonight. Not like this, on the heels of an overdue apology, and after half the town watched us leave the pub together. Darcy's not one of my casual flings. She's not a one-nighter I can simply walk away from before sunrise and forget. She's Darcy.
My Darcy, some insane part of me adds before I can tamp it down. She deserves better than what I want from her right now, and for once in my life I'm going to do it right.
Even then, stopping takes everything I've got. I lift my head from her neck and pull back an inch, and she chases my mouth before she catches herself, and knowing she chased it doesn't help my situation even a little.
We stand there breathing hard, her fists still full of my shirt, her forehead coming to rest against my jaw. Under my palm her heart is pounding as hard as mine.
"Okay," she breathes finally. A shaky little laugh comes with it. "That was... unexpected."
Unexpected. Understatement of the year. If I stand here any longer, I'm liable to do something worse than unexpected. All she needs to do is glance down at the strained state of my zipper to get a good idea of where my body wants the night to go.
I crouch, find her keys on the sidewalk, and press them into her hand, closing her fingers around them before mine can stage a protest. If she invites me up, I don't have a second no in me.
I know my limits. I've built a career on knowing my limits, and every single one of them is standing in front of me with a kiss-swollen mouth.
"Go on upstairs, Darcy." My voice is rough. "Before we really give the town gossips something to chew on."
Her nod is shaky. She backs up the first step, then the second, watching me the whole way.
At the third step she smiles. Slow. Private.
A smile I've never seen on her before, and I want it again already.
I want it tomorrow. I want it beneath me while I rock inside her.
I want it across a breakfast table, which is a thought I have never once had about a woman, and I let it stand anyway.
She blinks slowly. "Goodnight, Finn."
I struggle to find any shred of my voice, or my self-control. "Night, Darcy."
She climbs the stairs, not hurrying. At the door she looks back and finds me exactly where she left me, because I haven't moved. I can't. The man who can't sit still is bolted to a sidewalk in Mattichogue, hard and happy and grinning in the dark, watching Darcy let herself in.
Her light comes on upstairs. I make myself start walking. The way my heart is pounding, my blood still racing south to my cock despite the futility of it, I may need to walk for twenty miles to recalibrate myself.
All because of Darcy Gable.
And that kiss, which felt an awful lot like coming home.
Fuck.
I am in so much trouble.