Page 31 of Penalty Kiss
“I’m not saying it because I have to.” His thumb drags along my jaw, and a shiver races through me. “I’m saying it because it’s true.”
The mug wobbles in my nervous grip, seconds from disaster. His hand closes over mine before it can slip, big and warm, swallowing my fingers around the handle. He doesn’t just steady it—he takes over, guiding both my hand and the mug back onto the counter in one smooth motion.
Only he doesn’t let go. His palm stays over mine, his body crowding close with the counter at my back… and he’s everywhere else. Bare chest level with my face, all heat and muscle. I breathe him in—soap, skin, him—and suddenly nothing separates us except the thrum of my pulse against his grip.
"There's something else," he says, and now his voice carries a different note. Hesitation. "Something I need to tell you."
My heart stops. "What?"
He backs up and runs a hand through his hair, and for the first time since I've known him, Cameron Wilder looks uncertain and vulnerable.
"The memory thing," he starts. "It's not just names or faces. Sometimes I lose whole conversations. Moments. Things that should matter."
I nod, not sure where he's going with this.
"But you," he continues, stepping closer, "you make me want to remember. Every detail. The way you smell like vanilla and something only you. The sound you made when I kissed your neck. How your hands felt tangled in my hair."
My breath catches.
"I've been writing it down," he admits. "Everything about you. So I don't lose it again."
He walks back to the living room, picks up his phone and brings it back to show me. On the screen—a note titled simply "Tara." Below it, a list that makes my heart stutter:
Blue eyes like summer storms.
Laugh sneaks out when she’s not guarding it.
Sarcastic but soft underneath.
Awkward in a way that makes me want to back her against a wall.
Coffee saboteur.
Smells like vanilla and sin.
