Page 50 of Like First Love, Again

From the moment Tori walked into Mia’s house on Sunday morning with coffee and croissants, she’d known something was off. Mia had greeted her with a kiss at the door, but then she’d gone off to the small pool house to sort through stuff. Considering that Mia had made absolutely zero progress inside the house, and the pool house was full of old stuff even her mom didn’t want, Tori was sure she was avoiding her.

It had been too much. They’d moved too fast. Mia was freaked out.Torihad freaked her out.

A spiked mass of acrid regret roiled in Tori’s belly when she stepped outside to the pool. The mid-morning air was hot and humid and immediately made her regret wearing jeans. Made her regret having gotten carried away on the phone the night before and made everything fucking weird. Made her regret having fumbled her chance by being impatient.

Standing at the door of the pool house, Mia wiped sweat off her flushed forehead with the back of her arm. In shorts and a V-neck, Mia was so heartbreakingly cute with all her freckles on display.

Ugh. Fuck.

“Hey, I’m going to go,” Tori said, ready to bolt before she made things worse.

Maybe if Mia wasn’t looking at her, she wouldn’t feel embarrassed or uncomfortable or whatever was going on. She’d give Mia space and what little time they had left, and Mia would let her know when she was ready to talk.Ifshe was ready.

Hazel eyes blinding in the sun, Mia nodded. “Good idea.”

Two words shredded Tori from the inside out. She tried to absorb the impact. Tried not to let rejection and remorse and dread lasso her chest with barbed wire. Tried not to cry until she fled to her car.

“I think I need a break from the house, anyway.” Mia tossed an empty box through the door of the pool house that looked unchanged over decades, and slammed it behind her. “How about we go see your place? I’m unconvinced you don’t just live in your fancy office.” She tugged Tori closer by the hem of her shirt and lifted onto her tiptoes to kiss her. “Just give me a minute to shower.”

Relief collided with confusion while Tori watched Mia meander into the house. There was absolutely something going on in Mia’s head—maybe her mom or the divorce—but it wasn’t about Tori. About what they’d done, or sort of done, last night. Legs unsteady from the whiplash, she followed Mia inside.

In the car, Mia reached for Tori’s hand like it was the most natural thing in the world. She interlaced their fingers and dropped their hands into her lap while she scrolled through her phone, lamenting that it was too hot to take the top off Tori’s Jeep.

Tori sat there, pulse dancing in her throat, trying to absorb the casual intimacy of Mia’s touch. Trying to pretend that her whole body hadn’t leaned into the small gesture.

“I don’t know what I was expecting,” Mia said when she walked into Tori’s loft half an hour later. “But I guess this is kind of it.”

Instead of heading for the brown leather couch near the uncovered windows bathing the open space in light, Mia went for the kitchen. While Tori leaned against the counter with a smirk on her face, Mia opened her fridge.

After making a borderline judgmental sound, Mia looked between the fridge contents and Tori. “You know this is borderlineAmerican Psycho, right?”

“Having food in a place intended for food storage?” Tori crossed her arms over her chest and pretended she didn’t know what Mia meant. “Wild,” she deadpanned.

Mia’s brightening expression cleared the lingering unease in Tori’s belly. “I don’t know a single person whose fridge looks like a damn storefront for cold-pressed juices and pre-packaged meal delivery services. Look at this.” She did a grand sweeping gesture at a thing Tori looked at every day. “You don’t even own condiments!”

Tori laughed. “I’m sorry you came over here to ogle my ketchup and are leaving disappointed.”

Closing the door, Mia turned away from the fridge. She was wearing an increasingly familiar expression—sharp, possessive, vaguely predatory—when she stalked toward Tori.

“This whole place is giving bachelor pad, you know?” Mia’s question was obviously rhetorical. “Like you got used to love-struck women cooking for you and never learned how to do it for yourself.”

Unable to suppress her grin, Tori pulled Mia into her space, widening her stance to make room for Mia as she wrapped her arms around her waist. She interlaced her fingers so she wouldn’t be tempted to run her hands over Mia’s ass, which looked incredible in a thin, floral sundress.

“It’s just food,” Tori said, gaze fixed on Mia looking up at her. Fixed on her favorite freckles scattered over her cheeks and the bridge of her nose, fading over her orbital bone. The scar on her eyebrow and the eyes that reminded Tori of rain-drenched forests. Green and brown and lush with unknowable secrets.

“Where’s the passion in that?” Mia’s voice trailed away like Tori’s attention dropping to her lips, parted and soft and inviting her in.

Tori had never cared less about a topic in her life. She leaned down, finding Mia’s mouth with hers. Instead of pulling her into the kiss like a slow current, Mia was a riptide. An inescapable force dragging a willing Tori into watery depths.

Hands clasped tight around Mia to keep herself from wandering, Tori deepened their kiss. She was already drunk on the rhythm of Mia’s tongue—on the way she breathed faster and used her teeth like she didn’t know how to get more—when Mia’s hand found the shallow curve of Tori’s side. And then Mia was skimming her ribs, palm searing when she met the side of Tori’s breast.

At the unexpected touch, Tori stilled. She couldn’t control every instinct at once. She was too busy not pulling up Mia’s dress when her thumb found Tori’s hard nipple through her shirt.

Tori’s barely contained desire roared, smashing against its confinement, as Mia’s confidence grew. Even through the material, Mia’s insistent touch sent a hard rush of need pulsing through Tori’s body.

Fingers digging into Mia’s back, Tori didn’t mean to pull her flush against her. Didn’t mean to slip her leg between Mia’s thighs. To guide her hips, urging her to grind against her, to find the friction from her jeans.

With a moaned curse, Mia grabbed Tori’s breast too hard. Hard enough to make Tori wince and break their kiss. Mia let go of her like she’d touched a hot stove.

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