Page 17 of Ready or Not
Kiss him, my mind whispered when he looked down at my lips, then back up at my eyes.
Kiss him.
Kiss him.
KISS HIM.
But my lips didn’t dare form the thought.
Instead, I chewed the inside of my cheek, trying to play it cool, though every fiber of my being was begging me to throw caution—and perhaps dignity—to the wind.
"You know," he murmured, his thumb still tracing lazy patterns on my hand, "If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were thinking about kissing me."
"That’s a lie," my voice came out weaker than I intended, barely above a whisper, but he heard it.
Of course he did.
He tilted his head, leaning in so close that our lips almost touched, but not close enough to satisfy.
"Oh word?” I felt his breath graze my lips. “You sure about that, Butterfingers?”
I swallowed hard, my knees threatening to buckle beneath me.
"Positive," I whispered, though the word trembled at the edges, betraying me once again.
For a moment, he didn’t move, just hovered there, his lips so tantalizingly close that my heart seemed to forget how to beat in rhythm. His eyes searched mine, like he was daring me to crack.
"Y’know,” he murmured. “I don’t think I believe you.”
His lips twitched upward into that maddening smirk again, the kind that could both infuriate me and make my knees wobble all at once. He leaned back just enough to study me, to drink in the way I fumbled to keep my composure under his gaze.
And damn it, I was failing miserably.
“I’m a pretty good reader of people,” he continued, his tone teasing but his eyes darker now, more serious than they had been all night, “and right now? You’re looking at me like you want me to kiss you.”
“I’m not?—”
He stepped closer again, cutting off my words. His thumb traced one last slow circle against my knuckles before his fingers tightened around mine, grounding me while simultaneously setting me adrift.
"Don’t finish that sentence, mami," he whispered, his voice laced with a challenge I wasn’t sure I could rise to. The world around us blurred—the distant hum of the bodega’s music down the block, the faint laughter of late-night revelers passing by—everything faded into nothingness.
It was just him, his eyes locking on mine like a dare, his presence swallowing up.
“I dare you,” he finished, his voice barely louder than a breath, “to tell me I’m wrong.”
My throat clenched shut against any semblance of words, because if I finished my sentence, it would be a lie. My lips parted instinctively, but no sound came out.
Just breath—shallow, uneven—disobedient to my attempts at composure.
He had me right where he wanted me, and I knew it.
He knew it too.
A slow grin teased its way across his face as he tilted his head ever so slightly. "That’s what I thought.”
Before I had time to process it—to overthink my way out of this moment—he leaned in. His lips brushed against mine, so light and fleeting that heat exploded through me like lightning striking the same spot twice.
It wasn’t enough.
