My lips pressed into his, lingering there for only a moment before I lowered back onto the balls of my feet. It had been an innocent kiss, unexpected and fleeting, but it had sent a torrent of emotions cascading through me. One simple kiss. That was the only simple aspect of it.
“Or you can kiss me back,” Boone finished his sentence, looking not quite as surprised as I guessed I did, but surprised enough for me to assume he’d been bracing for a slap just as much as he had for a kiss.
So many things fired to life inside me, places I thought had gone dormant, hidden caverns I’d forgotten about. I felt as if I was coming to life, shedding the shell I’d been traipsing around in the past seven years.
I pressed my body into the car, not trusting myself to listen to reason and behave if I remained so close to Boone. Instead of heeding the fresh distance I’d put between us, Boone moved closer.
His lips were parted, his breath coming in quick pulls, but no other part of him told the tale of a man being rattled. He was as solid as he’d always been. “I do believe I said I was going to kiss you.”
His smile was more crooked than straight. Our bodies locked like I remembered, two pieces made to fit together. My jagged pieces accepted his. His rough edges smoothed out mine.
“It didn’t seem like you were in a hurry to kiss me.” I returned his smile.
“It’s been seven years since our last kiss. I stall for two seconds, and its one too long?” His fingers curled into my neck lightly.
“Like you said, I’ve been patient for a long time.” I slid one hand up his chest and let it curve around his shoulder. “I’m done with patient.”
His smile stretched, then his head lowered toward mine. His smile dissolved, replaced by a look I loved even more—the intent one he got whenever he was about to kiss me. The one that made me feel like I was and always would be his beginning, middle, and end.
“Then let’s be done with it together,” he whispered right before his lips brushed across mine.
It wasn’t really a kiss, but it was something just as good. His lips brushed mine again, this time from the opposite direction, and made my heart scramble as it seemed to have forgotten its purpose. When he repeated the same thing, the sensation of it—just as satisfying as it was insufficient—made a gasp slip past my lips as my body suddenly trembled.
Either the shudder or the gasp pulled something from Boone. His lips stopped teasing mine with slow, gentle brushes, and his mouth pushed into mine with as much intention and strength as his body pressed into mine. Pinning me to the car, Boone’s hands tightened around me while mine did all they could to hang on to him.
I felt the cool metal of the top button of his jeans through the light material of my dress. I felt his narrow hips holding my fuller ones in place, anchoring me. I felt his urgency in every touch, every kiss, every breath . . . yet I also felt his careful hold on his restraint. He wanted more. From the way I’d started to feel him slide himself against me before easing back, he wanted it all, but where we’d shown next to no restraint as kids, we seemed to have picked up some as adults.
I wasn’t sure how much longer I could take all of this kissing and innocent touching before my body combusted, but it felt closer to the short end of the spectrum than the long. Leaping, I managed to wind my legs around him without skipping a beat of returning his kisses. Boone’s hands lowered around my backside, a deep grumble crawling up his chest when I pitched my hips against his.
“The backseat.” I turned my head to reach for the door handle.
Boone’s mouth moved from mine to the base of my neck, sucking at it in ways that made it seem as if that part of my body was directly hardwired to what resided between my legs.
Boone shook his head, still playing with my neck. “No.”
“The front seat?” I panted as his mouth moved lower, just skimming along the neckline of my dress.
“No,” he said with another shake.
A groan of frustration was almost immediately followed by a gasp of pleasure when his mouth found a very sensitive area on my body. His tongue circled it, drawing wet patterns through the thin material of my bra.
“I’m not going to fuck you in your daddy’s car like I might have been content to do when I was a kid.”
My inner thighs contracted. His legs spread them back apart.
“Why not? Backseat, front seat, hood, bent over the bumper . . . all sound like good options to me.”
When he pressed himself between my legs, hard and ready, my head fell back against the roof of the car. I swore if he would had just moved against me a few times right there, fully clothed, I would have come.
“Because I’m not a boy anymore, Clara.” Boone sucked my nipple, toying at it with his tongue.
My legs tightened around him, my lap pressing hard against his. He gave a sharp grunt, nipping at me before releasing me.
“Fine, I get it.”