Page 110 of You Float My Boat

‘Violet, what are you doing here?’

She bit down on the corner of her lip, ‘Because you kind of left me standing in my doorway, and I wasn’t ready to end Valentine’s Day with you just yet.’

‘So you came over?’ I asked quietly, though she might not be able to hear me over the hammering in my chest.

‘Yup. And I know you have rowing in the morning, so I can totally leave if you need a good night’s sleep. Or …’ she paused, biting into her lip again, and I wanted to pull it free. ‘I could stay.’

‘Stay?’

‘We don’t have to do anything, but I just wanted you to know that if you did want to do something, I’m okay with that. More than okay.’

‘You are?’

With every word she spoke, she was stepping closer to me, slowly like she was afraid she might scare me off if she went any quicker.

‘Yes. I am,’ she replied, taking position between my legs.

If there was any part of me which thought this was a bad idea, it was silenced the second my hands touched the backs of her legs. Running up and down her firm hamstrings. No, there were no bad ideas here. Every cell in my body was thinking Violet in my room was the best thing that ever happened.

If my body was cheering, my dick was holding the megaphone.

It was as she ran her warm palms along my shoulder and up my neck, pushing fingers through my hair, that I realized I was half naked. The t-shirt I’d removed along with my jumper was currently lying in a heap on the floor. And my door was still wide open.

‘Hold that thought.’ I leapt up and slammed the door shut as quickly as I’d opened it, turning the lock behind me.

She looked so beautiful standing where I’d left her at the foot of my bed.

I had a girl in my room. A girl I really liked, and one I couldn’t get caught with. I may as well have been fifteen again.

And I knew that fifteen-year-old would be yelling at me to stop being such a pussy.

I made my way slowly back to where she was standing, her eyes raking over me until I sat down and pulled her into my thighs. The sigh that escaped as I dropped myhead on her stomach went part way to releasing some of the tension knotting between my shoulder blades.

‘I’m so sorry I left you, Violet,’ I whispered, before leaning back to peer up into her beautiful face. ‘I shouldn’t have … I …’

Fuck. God, I was lame. I swallowed down the thick ball building at the back of my throat.

‘You what, Charlie?’

It was hard to think with Violet’s fingers twining through the ends of my hair. I reached up and stilled them. ‘I shouldn’t have left you. You looked so beautiful tonight, and you deserve everything to be perfect, and truthfully I panicked.’

‘Charlie –’

‘No, hang on. I know this is new and we’re figuring it all out, and even though we’ve known each other forever, we’re actually just getting to know each other … shit. I mean, what I mean is …’

I was stopped mid-sentence, silenced by Violet’s lips, and her tongue sliding into my open mouth. She was an elixir, relaxing every muscle in my body with her calm. Her touch was so soft that I barely felt her hands leave my grip and ghost their way back to my neck, pushing into my hair.

By the time she pulled away from me, my breath was shaking. Me a semi-professional athlete shaken from a kiss.

‘You talk too much, Charlie Masterson. Did anyone ever tell you that?’

‘No,’ I chuckled. ‘Not with you around. The queen of talking too much.’

‘Ah yes, true. But I also know when to shut up.’ She shifted away and I almost asked where she was going, but then she straddled my lap, fitting as perfectly now as she did that afternoon in the Blue Oar. ‘As I was saying, I just didn’t want tonight to end, and you looked too freaked out to leave alone. Plus, I didn’t get a proper goodnight kiss. And I want one.’

‘That’s all you came for? A kiss?’

‘Yup.’

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