I felt a flutter of movement near my cheek and I lifted my face, but the touch never came. Instead it was his voice, as hard and final as a hammer falling, that reached me. “We need to move. It’s too dangerous to stay here now, Luna. Too many saw him chasing you. It won’t be long before they come nosing around.”
“You’re ready to go right now?” I shook my head, my stomach churning. This would take some planning. It would be harder to slip away from him when it was just the two of us on the Outside. He would track me down before I got very far. “Midlight is the safest time to leave, don’t you think? Tomorrow is soon enough.”
“Luna—”
I stopped him by pressing my fingers to his mouth.
“Tomorrow,” I insisted, my pulse fluttering at my neck. My stomach clenched.
This day would be the last I’d have of him. Perhaps it was selfish, even foolish, but I wanted it. One more day and night together for me to cling to during the days and nights I was on my own.
He’d brought me this far. He hadn’t wanted me with him in the beginning, but he cared about me now—at least whether I lived or died. Something told me I was one on a short list of people he cared about. Maybe I was the only one. My heart swelled, feeling privileged to have that.
“Luna.” My name sounded pained, strangled and choked against my fingers. “The things you do to me . . .”
“Show me,” I challenged.
“We can’t—”
“You mean you won’t?” I dropped my hand from his face. He didn’t realize this was all the time we would have. He was tossing it aside when I needed it to be everything—a final, sweet memory to carry with me.
I turned away, but then he spun me back around. His hands held me by the shoulders, then my face. Warm palms rasped against my cheeks, pulling me in. Those hands anchored me, holding me as his mouth came down on mine.
His mouth was all I felt. This single searing contact became my entire world. His lips on my lips, moving, caressing, sliding and slanting, giving and taking.
I clung to his shoulders, my fingers curling deep into the hardness of his body.
He lowered me back on the furs. I went willingly. He balanced his elbows on either side of me, careful not to crush me, but I wanted that. I needed the weight of him, all his warmth to envelope me.
He kissed me until my lips felt tingly and swollen and I couldn’t breathe. I didn’t need to breathe though. I just needed his mouth. Him. My bones melted alongside my muscles. All of me felt like warm pudding, sinking beneath him.
My hands roamed, free finally to touch, free to feel and memorize all of him. My fingers tangled in the strands of hair that brushed his warm neck. I stroked silky tips, tugging gently.
He growled into my mouth and I swallowed the sound, taking it into me. My chest swelled and tightened. A sense of empowerment flowed through me, heady with the rush that I affected him. That I made him feel.
I shoved his jacket off his shoulders. He pulled back slightly without severing our kiss, allowing me to slide it the rest of the way down his arms.
I touched his bare throat, fingers gliding to the top of his chest, as far as his shirt would allow.
“Fowler,” I sighed against his lips.
He pulled back and I felt his gaze on me, his hands holding my face. His thumbs grazed the edges of my mouth. “I’ve fought this, Luna.”
“What? What is it you’re fighting?”
“You. Me. I wasn’t supposed to feel this way for anyone. Everyone that ever matters, I lose.”
The tightness in my chest turned into a throbbing ache. “So you’re saying that I matter to you?”
A shudder rolled through him that I felt to my very depths. “You matter to me. You’re the only thing that matters anymore.”
I smiled, trying to hide the curve of my lips with my hand, feeling like one of the lovesick swains in that book of poetry that belonged to my mother.
He tugged my hand down. “You don’t need to hide from me. Especially not your lips. How will I kiss them?”
I smiled openly then, exposed. “You make me happy,” I admitted, “but I know you didn’t want this between us. You didn’t want to care about me. I feel as though I owe you an apology. You were set on one course and then I came along—”
“And changed everything. Thank you for that.” His mouth brushed mine once, then again, lingering before lifting up. “Don’t apologize. I’m not sorry and you shouldn’t be either. I’m done fighting this . . . you . . . us.”
We kissed again. Feverish, breathless kisses. To think we could have been doing this sooner? I almost wanted to weep at the lost time. Why fight it indeed?
“Exactly,” he muttered against my mouth and I realized I had spoken aloud.
Then all words stopped. The pressure of his mouth grew deeper, more urgent. We had almost missed this.
And tomorrow I would. Tomorrow I’d be gone from here and there would be no more of this ever again.
A deep pang punched me in the chest. I wanted this and not just for now. I wanted it to be like this always. But more important than this happiness I had found with him was saving the lives of countless others.
I pushed him onto his back, taking charge, desperate for him, to make the memory of this so indelible that I never forgot it.