Page 73 of Return To You

Fuck it.

This is the present.

twenty-one

Grace

What was I thinking, asking him to kiss me? I ruined both our lives with my stupid impulsiveness back then, and now I’m about to do the same. Because I know the moment he kisses me, I’ll be lost to him. I can tell already.

Just his voice, rumbling down to my insides. His hands, cupping my face. God… god! His hands on my face? The best feeling. Always been.

The desire behind his hooded eyelids.

And when he murmured, “I’m falling for you all over again.”

Oh god, and now his lips are trailing mine, not quite a kiss yet, just the whisper of one, his exhale a caress. My whole body vibrates, my center is a hot mess, my knees barely support me.

But what happens next? How do we pick ourselves up, when our daily adult lives, now set without each other in them, take over? When this kiss on the bridge lives on as a memory, will it carry me through my life?

Or will it destroy me slowly.

“What happens after we kiss?” A kiss with Ethan will never be just a kiss. It will be more than that. It always was. We should talk about that first. Even if we end up just kissing, shouldn’t we set reasonable expectations? Limitations? I mean, if the past has taught us anything—

His lips claim mine, shutting my brain off. I whimper under the onslaught of emotions, under the warmth and weight of his body engulfing mine, under the erotic strokes of his tongue, slow and questioning first, now downright domineering, claiming, taking.

I thought I remembered everything about him.

I was right, and I was wrong.

No matter how much I tried, his taste, the feel of him was always elusive. But now that he’s taking me, greedy, possessive, oh god—I remember all of it. The slow sweeps of his tongue, asking for a permission it doesn’t need, accessing my mouth tentatively first, then with the intense devotion Ethan always had for me. His hands press my back tighter against him, the fierceness of his rapid heartbeat confirming this is not, will never be, just a kiss.

This is ten years of yearning finally coming to an end.

I dig my fingers in his short hair, and he growls against my mouth, presses himself harder against me, claims my mouth with more urgency, as if he’s afraid I might leave and he wants to seal us together right here, right now.

I might leave. I should leave.

“God, I missed you,” he growls as he dips his mouth to my neck and suckles on it. Desire zings through me, and my head falls back, giving him better access.

My whole body caves, gives in, takes him.

I’m not leaving.

Not now that his strong arms close around me, sheltering me from the outside world. From tomorrow. Not now that his hands claim my body, roam up and down my back, caress my ass, hitch my leg up his hip. Press his erection against my belly.

“Ethan…” is all I have the strength to utter. I’m powerless in his arms.

How could I have been so stupidly impulsive, back then, to turn him away just because of what I thought I saw?

He nibbles on my lower lip, kisses my eyelids, then dips down to my mouth again, our teeth clashing as he pulls me tighter against him.

“God, I missed you,” he whispers again against my lips, his breath tingling my insides.

How could I have been so infatuated with my own self that I didn’t give him a chance to explain himself?

“Missed your smell. Missed how good you feel in my arms. Missed your mouth under mine.” He hoists me onto his hips with surprising ease, dips his head in my neck again, and suckles me, sending pleasure rippling through my center. “Fuck, but I want you so bad.”

I want you too, Ethan. So. Bad.

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