Page 65 of The Moon Also Rises
“Problem, Forester?”
Noticing his hands aren’t quite dry yet, I decide to take full advantage. I step close enough so my body is pressed against the side of his, the front of my thigh against the side of his leg.
“I never know if I want to slap you or kiss you, so I’m going to do a little research,” I say.
“If you slap me, HR will hear—” Rami begins but I don’t let him finish. I lean in and place my lips on his, much in the same way he did to me earlier, but this kiss lasts a lot longer, and in no time at all, our mouths are open and our tongues begin to dance. At some point, Rami turns so we’re chest to chest but I don’t notice the warm wet patches where his hands are on my back until long seconds, maybe minutes have passed. When I do, I pull back a little, our noses still touching.
“You got me wet,” I say.
“Are you complaining? Again?” He presses his forehead against mine and my grip on his shirt tightens so I can keep him close.
“I never said getting me wet was a problem,” I say in a faint voice.
“So, you’re not going to slap me?”
“Not yet,” I say and then I dive in to take more of his mouth.
A few minutes later and it’s Rami’s turn to pull away.
“We should finish washing up,” he says but he then leans in and pecks my lips once, twice more.
“Wow, now I don’t believe you think I’m a good kisser if you’d rather put your hands in dirty dishwater than keep kissing me.”
“I don’t want you to wake up to it tomorrow.”
“Fine,” I agree because I would quite like that too, even if I would much rather see if our kissing could go a little further.
It should feel strange when we complete the rest of the dishes in near silence, but it doesn’t. When we’re done, I blink a few times as I watch Rami start cleaning the sink, but then I snap out of it and put a tablet in the dishwasher. As I turn back, I see Rami wiping down all the countertops before going to the table to give that a once-over. Watching him, I start to wonder if I have a new cleaning kink because there really is something about him wiping down surfaces that is doing something to me.
Or maybe it’s just Rami, because suddenly I’m a balloon of fizzy, energetic air. I lean my hand on the countertop above the dishwasher as if that will ground me because I almost feel capable of floating away. My head is light and spacey, my breaths are short and sharp, and my groin is once again getting increasingly warm and heavy and full… Oh, God.
I am incredibly horny and I really need to do something about it.
“You should go,” I say.
Rami looks up, his eyes soft and light, but his brows heavy.
“Yeah, I probably should. Are you going to be okay looking after these two in the morning?”
“They should be so lucky.” I huff, hoping it covers up my instant disappointment that he also wants to leave, even though that is what I need in order to sort out my current… predicament. “I’ll show them where the teabags and paracetamol are and that’s about it.”
“I’ll bring you a coffee in the morning. Or would you prefer lemon and ginger tea again? For your hay fever?” he asks as he rinses out the cloth in his hand and then squeezes the water out. I swear if he hangs it up on the special hook I installed just for that purpose I may actually come in my underwear. When I see his hand move to do just that, I look away at the last second.
“The lemon and ginger would be lovely,” I reply, and this reminder of something incredibly kind and considerate that he did for me this morning, on top of the last few hours of being kind and considerate, has my thoughts spinning to a fever pitch. When I then bring my fingertips to my lips and trace where his mouth was and how firm and silky soft and needy his tongue was, I think I am about to self-combust.
“Rami, what the fuck is going on?” I demand, placing my hands on my hips.
“Oh, is that not where your dish cloth goes?” Rami looks at the hanging cloth. “It seemed like the perfect hook for it.”
I groan. “No, not the dish cloth, although yes, that is its rightful place. But what about us? What the fuck are we doing?”
“We were cleaning up, and I thought we were about to say goodbye,” Rami says neutrally but I swear I can see the corner of his lips twitch with what could be mirth.
“But the kissing… tonight and at the wedding. The kissing when nobody else is in the room—”
“Technically, Lionel is in the same room. He’s just unconscious.”
“Rami,” I say in two short staccato sounds. “Do you fancy me?”
