Page 36 of First Comes Marriage

Liar.

He swept up their bowls and moved them to the counter by the sink. “Do you want any more?” he asked, his back to her as he rinsed out his bowl.

“No. One bowl of ice cream is probably enough for now. But don’t hold me to that later. Especially if all the other flavors are as good as the strawberry.”

He chanced a glance at her over his shoulder for a second to catch the way the corner of her lips quirked up in a smile. “Noted.” He set the rinsed bowls in the sink and washed his hands, taking an inordinate amount of time to scrub the dish soap into his skin. “I heard you on the phone with your mom again earlier. How’d that go?”

“Awful,” she said with a huffed laugh. “But no worse than I expected. She didn’t really want to talk about us. She just wanted another excuse to remind me how important this party is. She only ever calls this often when she wants something.” She paused, but he kept his attention on carefully drying the space between each of his fingers with a dishtowel. “I’m going to drive up Friday evening, stay the extra night. She can get the worst of her questions out of her system before all the guests arrive on Saturday.”

He nodded, turning around to face her as he leaned against the counter, keeping the kitchen island between them. “What time are we leaving?”

“You don’t have to do that, Sebastian. Really. I appreciate the offer, but—”

“Will it make it easier for you if I’m there?” She paused, opened her mouth as though she might speak, and then pressed her lips together and nodded. “What time are we leaving?”

“Six? We’ll get there with enough time to talk, but not too much before we can excuse ourselves to go to bed.”

Heat flared in her cheeks at the mention of a bed and he wondered if she was remembering the way they’d slept curled around each other in Vegas, if she knew he’d woken harder than stone and dying to kiss her again. He had the strangest desire to press his lips to that pretty blush climbing up her throat, to see if her skin tasted different because of it.

Her voice was thready when she continued. “They’ll expect us to share a room. Since we’re married.”

“I figured.”

“And to act like a couple.”

“Since we’re married.”

“Right. Since we’re married.”

He pushed off from the counter and moved around the island, stopping in front of her. Her eyes widened as she tilted her chin up to meet his gaze. “And how would a married couple act?”

Her eyes dipped to his lips. “Maybe we could hold hands, or do that thing where you put your hand on my back when we’re walking.”

He hummed in thought, noting the way her breathing grew heavier in response, and for a moment the wondered what it would feel like to have her pressed against him when she breathed like that, to feel the rise and fall of her chest against his. “Maybe I could kiss you when you come into a room. Or before you leave.”

“That is something a married couple would do.” Her eyes flickered to his lips. “Or you could kiss me just because. Since we’re married.”

“We are that.”

Without thinking it through, he tugged the elastic from her bun, her hair falling in messy waves around her face. He set the elastic on the counter, covering it with his palm as he leaned forward until they were eye to eye. Her breathing stuttered, but still she held his gaze.

He fucking loved it.

“Time for bed, wife.”

She sucked in a breath, her little gasp shooting like an electrical current down his spine.

What the fuck am I doing?

He stepped away from her and scrubbed a hand over his jaw. Christ, he’d almost kissed her. The memory of the last time he’d kissed her, of her little sighs and his hands in her hair and her nails on the nape of his neck, mingled with the vision of hauling her onto his pristine marble countertop and burying his face between her thighs.

“Sebastian?”

Her breathing was still shaky, her ample chest rising and falling visibly with each breath, even as her eyes searched his for answers he didn’t have.

He broke their staring contest and moved down the hall, only pausing once he’d reached the safety of his bedroom door. When he glanced back at her, still sitting at his kitchen island, her brows pulled low in confusion, that lump behind his sternum grew and twisted.

“Goodnight, wildflower.”

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