Page 44 of Shift Change

Riley jumped in wearing a big grin. “You have to go nose to nose and move in to kiss. First one to flinch loses.”

“On the mouth,” Brody added. “Arealkiss. No nose boops.”

Around us, the room erupted with catcalls, wolf whistles, and exaggerated moans. Someone shouted, “Don’t go easy on him, Holky. You have to use tongue.”

I replayed their words to make sure I hadn’t missed something. This was only pretend. Get close, lean in, smirk a little, add some dramatic flair, and back off at the last second. An easy, harmless show with no intimacy involved.

Dog stared at me like a deer caught in the headlights, if the deer also suspected the headlights might really want to kiss him.

I leaned in and whispered, “We’ve got this. I’ll back away at the last minute.”

“Okay,” he said, the word coming out tight and about half an octave higher than usual.

“No whispering,” Gabe barked. “Get up there and do it.”

A few hoots echoed around the room as Dog and I stood. We laughed—forced, too loud, and about as casual as a fire drill—and walked to the front like we were heading to our own executions. Every pair of eyes was locked on us, and not a damn one of them blinked.

I turned to face Dog and nodded, trying to give him my most confident smile. It probably landed somewhere between “we’ve got this” and “we’re going down.”

A muscle jumped in his cheek, and he whispered, “This is stupid.”

“Stupid’s our specialty,” I whispered back.

Packy clapped his hands, loud enough to make us jump. “Start,” he said. “We don’t have all night.”

This will be easy. We’ve already made a plan, so all we have to do is stick to it.

Except the second I looked into Dog’s eyes, the plan blew right out the fucking window. He was locked onto me like he was starving. His big brown eyes had always been expressive, but now they shimmered with so many emotions, I wasn’t sure where to begin.

The room was already in chaos—laughter, chirps, chairs scraping, and at least three guys yelling that their phones were out and recording—but it all dimmed as if Dog and I had slipped underwater. We were alone, caught in a bizarre, high-stakes, hormone-soaked staring contest.

His cheeks flushed, and I slid my hands up his warm, solid arms. When I skimmed over his biceps, his breath caught. I almost pulled back, but then he touched me. His hands found my waist and gripped it tightly. Was he afraid I’d bolt if he didn’t hold on?

We leaned in slowly. Our noses brushed and our foreheads bumped. I breathed him in—warm skin, clean sweat, and a hint of spice. Everything inside me went slippery, and I wondered if I was about to black out.

I glanced at his lips, which were parted just enough to be dangerous. A deep, red flush colored them, and my gaze lingered. I was too into him to look away.

This was a game, but Iwantedto kiss him. It wasn’t because of the dare or because we were supposed to fake it for the guys. I wanted to do it because it felt inevitable. We were standing on the edge of something we couldn’t stop, and gravity was doing the rest.

His gaze flicked to my mouth, and we started the game. We’d both played chicken before, and we knew how it was done: move in, draw back, and smirk like we were teasing each other. We’d chicken out at the last second and sit down like a couple of idiots with our hearts still intact.

But something went wrong. The longer we stood there, the harder it became to remember how the hell to back out. We leaned in again, closer this time, and somewhere deep in my brain, a voice started shrieking, “Abort mission.” My body ignored the warning completely.

We paused when our lips were a hair’s breadth apart. We were supposed to pull back, but he didn’t move, and I didn’t want to. I wasn’t afraid of the kiss; I was terrified of what might happen if wedidn’tkiss, if we blew this chance. His lips were so close I could feel their heat on mine, so all I’d have to do was lean forward a little more.

We were both trembling because we were on the knife’s edge, hanging in the space betweenalmostandfuck it. One of us had to pull back, and it was supposed to be me. I began to ease away, giving the guys the dramatic finish they’d been hoping for.

Then Dog went for it. The entire room gasped, and my brain imploded at the sensation of his lips on mine. They were soft and warm and absolutely perfect. This wasn’t some awkward first try, and it wasn’t for laughs. We were sharing a real kiss that said things. It was deep and slow, like we’d been waiting forever and weren’t wasting another second now that we had permission.

The room faded until there was only Dog and me. His fingers were curled tightly in the fabric of my shirt, and I slid my arms around his back, holding him like I never wanted to let go. He tasted like beer and pizza, but there was something sweeter—Dog, I guess, finally giving me the kiss I’d needed longer than I could remember.

Every time we should’ve stopped, we didn’t. He broke away, leaning back until we were a breath apart, but I caught his bottom lip and kissed him again, slower this time. I couldn’t help myself. You only get one first kiss, and I wanted to make it count. He kissed me back, harder now, and then slipped his tongue into my mouth.

Someone whistled, and a voice called out, “Enough, guys. Damn.”

Fuck that, because I couldn’t have stopped if I’d tried. Dog and I clung to each other like our lives depended on it, and this kiss—this impossibly perfect kiss—was the only thing keeping us alive. Our tongues played, but we kept it romantic instead of fiery. If we never kissed again, I wanted to remember Nate and Chuck’s moment in heaven.

When we finally pulled apart, it was only because we had to breathe. I opened my eyes, and he was already looking at me, cheeks even more flushed than before, pupils blown wide, and wearing a smile so soft it wrecked me.

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