Page 55 of Until Then

“Do you . . . do you want to?” My voice cracks.

Noah’s warm breath skates over my cheek. “More than anything. In fact, you ought to know what I intend to do with you, Wildfire.”

I shudder when he tilts my chin, urging me to hold his heated stare.

“I intend to take a re-do.” His thumb tugs on my bottom lip. “I plan to make up for lost time with you. I plan to make certain when I have these lips again, you know there is nothing fake about it.”

Another word, and I’m going down. Nothing more than a big heap of lovesick woman at his feet, not an ounce of feminism in her blood.

“You might dig deep enough you don’t like what you see,” I whisper. “You might change your mind.”

“I can say the same.” Noah’s nose brushes my cheek before he takes an awful step back. “But you’re worth the risk.”

So was he. My breath hitches. So. Was. He.

For the first time in so long, I know without a doubt, this man was worth risking it all again. The heartbreak, the disappointment, the self-doubt.

Noah Hayden was the one I wanted to step out on the ledge and jump for. Either he’d catch me at the end, or I’d break apart like the past.

“May I see your phone?”

His question jars me out of my trance. “Um . . . yeah.”

It happens quickly. Noah holds my phone to my face before I realize he’s unlocking it. In the next second, he dials a number. His own phone hums in his pocket. With a sly sort of grin, he wiggles his glowing screen with my number flashing over the front.

Then, as though he did nothing, he hands me back my phone.

“There,” he says. “Now I’ve put the ball in my court.”

“You stole my number.” I swat at his arm, but there’s no heat behind it. “Shouldn’t it be my say whether I hand over the ball to your court?”

“Nope. I gave you an opportunity before and you fumbled it.”

“By making a choice.”

“The wrong choice.”

I feign annoyance. “Ah, you’re the type of fake-boyfriend who makes all the decisions because he knows best.”

“When I’m fake, yes.” A little squeak slips from my throat when Noah circles my waist with one arm and yanks me against his body. His face is close again—so close. He lowers his voice to the rough, low rasp. “When I’m real, I’d get on my knees to give you anything you asked of me.”

This isn’t real.

I’ve conjured him up as a trauma response from all past rejections.

He’s a delectable figment of my imagination.

“But until then”—Noah kisses the tip of my nose—“I will at least get your number. I hear even pseudo-relationships should communicate.”

Right. We should have each other’s numbers.

It would be out of order if we didn’t.

“I better go,” he says. “It’s getting late, and I think I have a date with sandcastles tomorrow.”

I offer to drive him. Noah refuses, insisting he’ll call a car at the gate, then waits steady while I force myself to walk away. My weak little heart would be content to never have the man leave.

But therein lies my problem—I fall too fast for this man. To fall was exhilarating, but more than Jasper, more than others, to end up bruised and bleeding from the hurt of losing Noah, I’m not sure I’d recover.

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