Page 93 of The Ruse

And it was nice.

Nash’s lips were soft, and he was so gentle with me like he thought I was made of thin glass and might break if he wasn’t careful.

When he slipped his fingers beneath my jaw to support the kiss, I noticed they were trembling slightly.

He was so nervous.

I was about to slip my hand behind his neck to signal that it was okay for him to treat me less like a china doll and more like a girl with raging hormones who had been waiting weeks and weeks for this moment to happen—but he pulled away from the kiss a second later.

“Wow,” he said, releasing a big sigh and smiling like he’d just had the best first kiss of his life. “Did that actually just happen?”

“Yeah,” I said.

It just did.

Nash kissedme again when he dropped me off at the school, and it went a little better than our first kiss.

It was sweet.

Very sweet.

And I tried to get myself a little more into it. But for whatever reason, whether I was just having an off moment, or I was too tired to figure it out, the sparks that I’d been expecting just didn’t come.

Not like they had when I kissed Asher.

I pushed the thought away.

I didn’t need to compare the two guys.

They were very different from each other, so of course the way they kissed me was different.

Most likely, Nash and I just needed a little more practice to get used to each other. Two mediocre kisses didn’t mean we couldn’t have amazing chemistry later.

We could figure this out.

26

ASHER

IsNash ever going to bring Elyse back?My knee bounced as I looked at the grandfather clock in the corner for about the fiftieth time tonight. It was ten minutes to midnight, and I’d been watching a movie in the common room with Hunter, Scarlett, and a few other students.

Could I tell anyone what the plot was for the movie playing on the large TV in front of me?

No. I probably couldn’t even name two characters since I’d been so distracted by what might be going on between Elyse and Nash.

Was she enjoying their date?

Had it been as romantic as it sounded when I’d heard Nash talk about it?

Had he kissed her?

Had she liked it?

Were they making out in the back of the Escalade right now in the way I had wanted to make out with Elyse last night?

It took about an hour and a half to drive here from the city, so if they’d left on time and didn’t make any other stops, they should be back by now.

Curfew was in ten minutes. If she didn’t get back soon, she’d be late.

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