Page 73 of Boost

“You’re feeling awkward, aren’t you?” I asked.

His shoulders immediately pulled back, and his head tipped rearward to look down his nose at me. “Is it that obvious?”

I hummed, returning to the seat at the island counter where my coffee sat. “A little, but completely normal.”

Raf grunted and went back to eating.

“So, what do you do on Saturdays?” I ventured.

His eyes found mine and softened. “I visit my mamá.”

My heart gave a sharp kick. It was another piece of his puzzle he entrusted me with and was the first time he’d initiated conversation about his mom. Despite wanting to ask so many questions about her, I smiled genuinely and tried to keep our conversation from slipping to a place where it became too heavy.

“I bet she looks forward to seeing you.”

Apparently I’d somehow failed. Rafael’s eyes glazed over for a moment and something hidden behind his dark irises regressed. Within a beat, whatever it was cleared, and he found himself again. “She does.”

He shoveled in the last few mouthfuls and set the pan in the sink. When he turned to me and leaned against the counter, his lop-sided grin was firmly back in place. “So, what doyoudo on Saturdays?”

I lowered my coffee. “Well, I workout, and sometimes go shopping. Visit my parents down in Oceanside. Clean my condo. All the boring things.”

Raf snorted. “I bet it’s always immaculate!”

Giving him an expressionless stare, I deadpanned. “My sheets aren’t.”

A shit-eating smile broke out across his face and elevated my pulse. “And next time we hook up, I’ll take the credit for that, mamacita.”

We shared a secret look—the knowing kind between lovers, fueled by excitement and lust that came with a new, whirlwind romance.

Suddenly shy, I dropped my eyes to where I toyed with the coffee mug handle. “So… now what?”

A rolling chuckle came from Raf. “I was about to ask you the same thing.”

He came around the island and turned me on the bar stool. Standing between my open knees, the warmth from his bare chest immediately seeped through the thin fabric of my shirt and heated my skin.

“I never stop craving to touch you, Greer. You’re a taste I can’t get enough of.”

I relaxed against his inked torso and hummed when his fingers trailed a path over each bump of my spine from neck to waist, then back up again.

“An addiction I can’t walk away from. I’m afraid I’m going to end up ruining you, baby girl.”

The somber weight to his voice compressed my lungs. It was like he was anticipating our failure.Expectingit.

“I’m a big girl, Raf; I don’t need you to wrap me in cotton wool. I can look after myself.”

Sensual hands wove into my hair and lazily massaged. The sensation relaxed me further, creating the illusion of Rafael speaking from miles away.

“It’s not that I can’t look after you. It’s that-”

I frowned when he cut off with a sharp exhale, and I arched back to look up at him in question. “It’s just what?”

Avoiding my eye contact wasn’t going to make me conveniently forget his offhand comment.

“Raf?” I pressed.

He dropped a kiss to my mouth and lingered leisurely, moving his lips across mine like we had all the time in the world.

“It doesn’t matter. It’s nothing.”

---