Page 155 of Your Place or Mine

“Just testing something.”

“Oh myGod.”

I set her down—gently, carefully, wickedly—on top of the violently spinning washer. The hum turned into a heavythud-thud-thud,like the drum inside was trying to escape.

She bounced slightly with each cycle, her thighs parting instinctively for balance.

Her eyes locked on mine.

And then we were laughing.

Giddy, ridiculous laughter that made my chest ache in the best damn way.

“You’re completely out of your mind,” she gasped, breathless and blushing.

“Maybe.”

I stepped between her knees, planting my hands on either side of her hips, holding her there as the machine bucked beneath us.

“But if this thing rattles us both into another dimension, I want it on the record that it was your idea,” she said.

I dipped my head, brushing my lips across hers. “Noted.”

The kiss started softly.

Gentle. Curious.

But something about the hum of the washer, the way she fit so perfectly in my arms, the electric buzz under my skin that had been there since the first time she threw attitude at me in my bar…

It all exploded.

Her hands flew into my hair. Mine tightened on her waist.

The kiss deepened.

Hot. Hungry. Full of everything I hadn’t said and couldn’t stop feeling.

The washer jerked beneath us, and she gasped into my mouth, laughing again. I growled low in my throat and kissed her harder, needing more, needing all of her.

She was completely game. Wild and wicked and tangled in my flannel shirt, kissing me like she was never letting go.

And just like that, right there, in the middle of the damn laundromat with a machine on spin cycle and her legs wrapped around my hips, I knew.

I was going to marry this woman.

Not today. Not tomorrow. Maybe not even this year.

But someday.

One way or another, she was it.

The woman who could match me stride for stride. Who made my bar feel too small, my bed too cold, and my future feel like more than just something to endure.

She was the spark I didn’t know I needed. The fire I’d been afraid of striking again.

And here she was.

Kissing me breathlessly in a laundromat and laughing while she did it.

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