Page 146 of Haunt Me

“Well, it kept me sane, much more than those doctors did, I can assure you.”

“I’m glad.”

“It was either that, or getting even more crazy,” she laughs. “You were kind of hard to miss, you know. You were everywhere, like oxygen. One would have to suffocate in order not to breathe you in.”

I shiver violently.

“But you ended up saving me, Isaiah, even though you didn’t know you were,” she adds.

“Eden, please, don’t, or I’ll—I just won’t be able to stop myself anymore.”

“Stop yourself from what?”

“Kissing you.”

She sits up.Oh no. Please don’t let me lose her right now.I shouldn’t have said that.I shouldn’t have said that.

“You want to kiss me?” She looks so surprised.

Of course I do.Wait, does she doubt it? Did she think that what happened between us yesterday was just to make her feel better? Does she not realize that I would have died if I hadn’t kissed her?

“What is the question here?” I take a step closer, and she sucks in a breath. “Are you wondering if I want to kiss youagain? If I want to kiss you and donothing else?”

My lips are less than an inch from hers; her mouth is trembling. I love how flustered it makes her, me leaning in. I can hear her struggle to inhale, see her lips moisten, feel her cheeks grow warm under my intense gaze.

“All of it,” she breathes.

“I want to kiss you.” I brace a hand on the wall behind her. My sleeve is almost touching her shoulder, but not quite. I’m not caging her between my body and the wall, but, oh, I want to. “I always want to kiss you, Eden. Since I met you. You’ve driven me crazy since day one. You… your proximity changes the chemistry of my brain. All the noise of the world, all the ugliness and the grief, everything stops the minute I am in your presence. It’s been the same way since I first saw you in the woods, your knee bleeding, your laces undone. It hasn’t changed, it’s only grown.”

“It’s the same for me,” Eden murmurs and I inhale sharply through my nose. Is she trying to kill me? “Always has been. The same way you just described it, the way your songs describe it. That’s what it’s been like for me too.”

Her eyes are made of liquid honey, widening as she looks up at me. She is wearing the oversized hoodie again—an echo of her ill-fitting clothes when we were teens. But this time her shirt is bright red, bringing out the highlights on her hair. All I can think of is the way it slides off her left shoulder, revealing a strap of pale pink bra underneath.

It’s driving me crazy.

Wait.She’s talking to me. Must. Focus.

“My songs?” I croak.

“Yeah, your music, your lyrics.” She licks her lips and I almost fall apart in front of her.

“Are you looking to get kissed out of your senses?” I ask her, inching even closer. She doesn’t back off. “Because I am hanging on by a thread, but your sisters are liable to walk in on us any second now.”

“Everyone else being here didn’t stop you before.” She raises her eyebrows at me.

“It so did.” I lower my head over hers, and a strand of my hair falls forward, brushing her brow. “If I remember correctly, I literally had to go outside of the house to kiss you.”

“IfIremember correctly, I literally had to beg you.”

That’s it.

I grab her by the waist, my arm coming around her slender body, and pull her to my chest. She bumps into my chest with a breathy gasp. Her eyes are smiling up at me, but then they darken. She shivers against me. I am not laughing now. I cup her face as if it is the most precious thing in the world, and fight to keep my eyes open as I lower my mouth to hers.

I run my tongue over her lips, moaning lightly as my whole body stands to attention. Her fingers are on the back of my neck, trailing the tips of my hair. She opens her mouth for me, but I barely get to taste her before I feel her withdrawing from me.

“Wait,” she says, and I freeze. Well, my hands do. My body has a mind of its own and it’s still on fire. “We can’t… Hey, you ok?”

I nod, leaning heavily against the door frame.

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