Page 133 of Between the Lines

“I didn’t realize you were coming back.”

She shrugs, her cheeks windswept in this chilly winter air.

“I just wanted to kiss you goodnight. I hope that doesn’t make me sound too?—”

I swallow the worddesperate, sealing my lips over hers. I know I had her in my office this morning, but it wasn’t the same, wasn’tenough. We have to be cautious at work, but not here in the doorway of my home. Not here, where her gasps and moans are now good acquaintances with the foundation.

Here, we don’t have to hide.

I pull away from her long enough to see the glimmer in her eyes, to feel the way she has relaxed beneath my touch.

“I texted you when I pulled up, but I may have made a run for the porch.”

She’s so cute with her nose scrunched into a button that I forget her promise to text me when she made it home, pushing aside thepanic that, if she hadn’t made it here safely, I wouldn’t have known where she was going. The fact that matters right now is that I get to hold her for a few stolen moments. I don’t want to waste them on negativity.

I pull her inside the doorway.

“How long can you stay?”

“Just for a few minutes. Penelope will probably be home soon from dinner. I just wanted to say goodnight. It felt weird leaving you without…”

I run my hand down the side of her head and grasp her chin in my thumb and forefinger.

“I agree. It was torture.”

She giggles. “So you said. Can I make it better?”

She presses up onto her toes to kiss me first chastely, then deepens it as she slants her mouth over mine. I wish we could stay like this forever. I’m becoming greedy, and for the first time in my life, I don’t care, so long as she is what I’m gluttonous for.

“When can I see you next?” I ask, my words scratchy with desperation.

“I’ll have to see when Penelope will be out of the house again.”

“I understand.”

“The sneaking around is getting harder and harder, Nathan.”

Her whisper pierces my heart like a needlepoint.

“I’m open to suggestions.”

She chews on her bottom lip as a few quiet moments pass, then says, “What if we just… tell them?”

Themcould only mean the people we have in common.

My subordinates. Her friends. The people who know that we met at work, and can deduce the rest for themselves.

I tense.

“No, just, hear me out, okay?” I nod stiffly. “I’m done at River Valley soon. Once I’m no longer working there, what’s to keep hidden? I’m not underage, and you won’t be my boss. And besides,theylikehanging out with you. It might be a bit of a shift when you start coming around more, and as my…Withme, but I’m sure they’ll get used to it quickly.”

I don’t miss her pause, the one that can’t quite name what we are. I don’t miss all of the justifications she has to make about her age and our compromising position. I swallow around shards of glass as all of this comes to a head with the thought I’d had an hour ago about unearthing more of myself to her. I haven’t let this crossroads bother me for quite some time, but here it is once again.

“I’ll think about it,” I say, kissing her forehead. “Maybe we’ll have to suffer just a little longer until you’re officially off the River Valley staff.”

“I don’t know if I can take it.”

The sadness in her eyes grips my heart even tighter. I know exactly what she means. I miss her body, but I miss her mind so much more. Her heart. The way she holds me as equally as I do her. I miss having her in my kitchen and cuddled up on the couch in my study. But all good things must come with a price.

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