Page 20 of Cozy Girl Fall
“Seems silly to say, what with all the water outside, but I’m actually incredibly thirsty.”
She giggled and made her way back over to her spot next to him in front of the fire and pulled a can free from the box, passing it over to him. “Summer fruits OK?”
“Anything except—”
“Elderflower,” she answered, nodding, and thenbusied herself with pulling out her own can. “Well, cheers. To thunderstorms.”
“To reunions,” he murmured, and the crack of their cans opening was nearly as loud as the thunder they’d heard earlier. They sipped their drinks slowly, the cider a little warm and flat. But it was sweet and the fire made everything feel cozier, the gentle heat enough to warm the small space.
“So last night—” she began, at the same time that he spoke.
“Can I kiss you?”
Her mouth dropped open and for a second she forgot how to speak. “What? No. Of course not. Why would you—”
“Are you seeing someone?”
“Well, no, but—”
“Then you should let me kiss you. For old time’s sake. For the goodbye we didn’t get.” He smiled and it wasn’t one she’d seen him wear before. Sad but not. “Because I’m sitting here with you, the girl I loved and who broke my heart when she left, and for the life of me, I don’t know why I didn’t go with you. Follow you.”
This was not what she’d expected at all. “Ethan—”
“Are you telling me you don’t feel it too?” he challenged, leaning a little closer and smirking when she scrambled up to her feet and took three steps away. “Do you feel like the spark between us faded in the last ten years? It hasn’t for me.”
No.“Yes.”
He raised an eyebrow as he pushed to his feet, mimicking her pose but staying where he was. “If I’m wrong, it’s OK. I won’t bring it up again,” he said and she relaxed until he continued. “But I think you made a mistake before, when you left. You know it, I know it, hell, the whole town probably knows it because what’s between us is obvious and that’s just the kind of place this is.”
He wasn’t wrong, but this … she wasn’t prepared for this.
“Tasha—” she tried and he silenced her with a look.
“I don’t blame you for what happened. We were young, you had dreams, I had too much pride to admit that you might need more than just this town, than me or Tasha.”
Penny couldn’t tell if it was just her or if the room had risen in temperature by a million degrees. She was half-surprised steam wasn’t rising from their clothes, even as she knew logically that nothing had changed inside the shop. It was him. Ethan. He was the one setting her ablaze with things she couldn’t want, things she’dpromisednot to have.
You already broke his heart once.Tasha’s disappointed eyes, the frown she’d wear, all of it ran through Penny’s mind in the space of a heartbeat. And yet …And yet.
“We’re not just dumb kids anymore, Pen.” He took a step closer. “We’re all grown up now.”Step.” I’m not the nervous eighteen-year-old you remember.”Step.“If you’ll let me …”Step.“I’ll show you what you’ve been missing out on.”
She couldn’t speak. Couldn’tbreathe.
Ethan’s hand cupped her jaw and he moved slowly, like she might spook and run at any second as he brushed his thumb over her bottom lip and looked into her eyes, waiting for her decision.
Her senses filled with him, the sandalwood scent of his skin and hair, the sweet cider on his breath and the heat in his eyes. Before she could think it all the way through, she was nodding and Ethan was closing the remnants of the distance between them.
Kissing Ethan Blake was like coming home. Easy as breathing, familiar but altogether new. His mouth teased hers with an expertise he hadn’t had before, wringing gasps out of her when he tasted her mouth like he couldn’t drink her in fast enough. The warmth of the fire was lost in the heat of his kiss and when he tugged her closer she didn’t resist, her hands falling to his shoulders and then moving with a mind of their own until they were twined in the damp strands of his hair.
One of his hands tightened on her waist as the kiss deepened, his tongue doing its best to coax all of her secrets and desires out of her and into him. Her body was pulled flush against his and the evidence of his arousal was firm against her hip, his low moan telling her he wasn’t as in control as she’d believed.
When he pulled back, she followed. Not ready for the kiss to end.
He chuckled under his breath as they panted, eyes like warm chocolate as they roved over her face. “Have dinner with me.”
The heat in the room vanished, as though he’d pulled it out of the atmosphere with his words. She took a breath, held it, ready to say yes,willingherself to accept even as she shook her head. Disappointment made her dizzy, or maybe that was the lack of oxygen, and her breath left her raggedly as she muttered, “I can’t.”
Penny had made Tasha a promise and it was bad enough that she’d broken it once by letting Ethan kiss her.
