Page 143 of Raven

He looks like a dark angel.

I want to taste tobacco on his lips. I want to taste like him. I want to be close enough to catch his smell and smell like him. I want to be with him when he’s cocky and playful. But more importantly, in moments like this, when pain etches his face.

I take slow steps toward him, my shoes sinking into the sand. When I’m several feet away, I step onto the rocky surface, and sand crunches under the soles of my shoes.

Raven’s eyes snap open. Right away, they are on me. Electrifying. Intense. Full of pain. There is so much hurt in them as he gazes at me that my knees buckle. Messy strands of black hair fall over his brow, and I want to push them aside so I can drown in his gaze.

Taking a step toward him is like approaching a caged lion, knowing that the cage door is unlocked, and he might break free any moment.

The ocean is so deafeningly loud. Or maybe that’s my heart. It’s raging at the way we connect through this one gaze. We always did. But right now, as his gaze melts into mine, we are open books.

He lowers his arms to his sides, watching me as I take step after step toward him, confronting my own untamable feelings.

I want to kiss him.

And when I reach him, I cup his face, stand on my tiptoes, and do just that.

54

RAVEN

A kiss. One kiss. I never knew that moments in life had tastes. Especially this one, the fucked-up blackmail that I tried to cook up that grew into something I didn’t expect, something that took me by storm—this beautiful girl.

Our first kiss… Maddy tastes like love and acceptance and coconut and sunshine. A long time ago, I made it my mission to coax her into giving in and beg for a kiss. But it feels like something I’ve been begging for silently for weeks.

I hope she finally accepts me, and the moment she kisses me, it takes me aback—like witnessing a miracle.

She kisses me just for a few seconds, her soft lips pressing against mine. She pulls back, meets my eyes, and I’m stalling, stalling, trying to reconcile in my head what’s happening.

She kisses me again, and now I know that my desperate brain is not making this up, that it’s not a test or some wicked game.

She pulls back, and her beautiful eyes are on me again. There’s a question in them and a speck of glee, like she finally figured out something so powerful that it takes her as much by surprise as me.

The third time she kisses me, I don’t let her go. I hold her face between my palms and kiss her with all I have. And I fall apart at the feeling and the truth—I am utterly, madly in love with her. No intimacy we’ve ever shared before had a fraction of the power that this kiss does. I’m dissolving in her. My entire body resonates with hers.

That treacherous beast inside my chest beats like mad.

She doesn’t want you, the voice in my head says. I often listen to it. But a voice and intuition are different things. That voice is doubtful. The intuition coming from my heart is hopeful. That voice failed me many times. But intuition often saved my life. And it told me the moment I laid eyes on Maddy that she was meant for me, whichever way you put it.

And now I want her all. No contracts. No deals. Fuck the voice in my head.

We kiss until my lips are swollen, and she pulls back and studies my face. No words. Like we can communicate through our gazes.

I want to say something, explain the last months better than I did in a moment of anger. But I don’t know what she wants to hear.

I can’t stop looking at her, my hands still palming her face. I know all those little signs in her expressions. When the corner of her mouth curves into a little smile when she is amused. When her pursed lips shift to one side in contempt. When her face turns into a still mask—she’s learned to hide her emotions so well. And the vein under her chin pulsating in the hummingbird pulse. It always gives her away.

Like right now.

She is not trying to hide her vulnerable gaze. There are so many emotions in it that instead of talking, I slowly stroke the sides of her face, then lean in and kiss her soft lips again.

I don’t know for certain if she feels the same. Is this a peace offering? Does she want protection? Feels bad? Or regrets she never kissed me and did that just to test it out? Or…

I’m hoping for or. I might be making a mistake hoping. But I can listen. I can. I can ask what she wants, if only that doesn’t mean she wants me gone from her life.

I pull away from the kiss and study her face.

She is the first one to break the silence. “Do you want to go to my place?”

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