Page 67 of For Never & Always

She had literally had this dream. He was looking down at her with open longing in his face, and she thought Cass must have spiked the hot cider again, and now she was somehow hallucinating.

“From my constant, obsessive need to kiss you every second that we’re in the same room,” he explained, as if this were obvious and not the wildest and least likely answer he could possibly have given.

“Why would you ever stop yourself from kissing me?” she whispered, hypnotized by the green flecks in his eyes that she’d never noticed before. How had she never noticed?

“I can’t remember anymore. It seemed so smart, but now you smell like roses and I can’t think about anything else.”

“I always smell like roses,” she whispered, her brain too scattered to say anything else.

He rested his forehead against hers and growled low in his throat.

“I’ve spent the past ten years trying not to kiss you, Hannah, but if you don’t move, I’m going to stop trying.”

She held his gaze as she put one hand on the back of his neck and pulled his head to hers. She kept her eyes open as their lips came together, because she needed to know this was real. She wouldn’t miss even a second in case he came to his senses afterward and it never happened again.

What started as a hard, declarative kiss, the answer to a dare, changed as their bodies fused. Blue picked her up and held her against the doorway, her toes barely grazing the floor.

She had done a fair amount of kissing, and everything else, in college and after. None of it had felt even remotely like this. She had been imagining this kiss for a decade, and nothing compared to the reality of his lips and hands on her. This was her Blue, the one person who lived entirely inside the confines of her own soul.

She was kissing him, and he was kissing her, and the hurricane of love that swept through her left her unable to breathe.

Blue pulled back, startling her.

“Are you okay?” he asked. “You stopped breathing. Should we stop? Did I do something wrong? I haven’t…I’m not…I don’t know that I’m very good at this.”

She held on to him to keep him from pulling away and to keep herself upright.

“It was perfect. I just—” She tried to stop herself, but the words flooded out of her, her dam broken. “I’m just so fucking in love with you.”

He picked her up for real this time, all the way off the ground, and swung her around. He grinned, that old Levi Blue Shenanigans grin, and kissed her so hard she saw stars. He laughed out loud, and she realized she hadn’t heard that sound in years, not in this kitchen, anyway. Maybe when he’d been away at school and called her.

“Hannah Naomi Rosenstein, I love you more than I have ever loved anything or will ever love anything.”

This was it for her. She knew it in that moment down to the very atoms of her being.

Chapter 17

Levi

Levi watched Hannah navigate the social intricacies of Delilah’s bachelorette party—a large group of women who all knew the bride but didn’t necessarily know each other and were mostly a little tipsy—as if she’d been born with the skill. Everything she did was thought out, and he knew it sometimes gave people the impression that her bun was wound too tight. When he left, he’d only ever known her to unwind in front of a very select group of people, himself included.

Even then she could sometimes be kind of mean, which he personally thought was hot, but probably wasn’t a professional asset.

This Hannah had obviously put an enormous amount of work into becoming gregarious, effervescent, easy with strangers. She would have to be, to event plan successfully, and he knew her well enough to know she was going to be successful, come hell or high water. She steered clashing bridesmaids into activities that kept them occupied, swapped out drinks for virgin substitutes without anyone noticing, and made sure no drama came near the bride.

The morning after the party, all the women slowly rolled out of their beds, stumbled through coffee and Rosenstein’s pastries, and headed to the airport, gushing praise for the party.

Levi was sitting in the dining room, finally eating some breakfast now that all the guests were fed and gone, when his mom entered.

“You seem lost in thought, my sweet boy. Where is your mind?” she asked, sitting down beside him.

He laughed. “Hannah. As usual.”

“And what about Hannah?” his mother prodded, jostling him a little with her elbow.

“She managed to be both a part of the fun and the person running the show, without the participants noticing she was holding herself separate. It was masterful.” He sipped his coffee, staring off into space. “I’m so damn impressed by her.”

From the corner of his eye, he saw his mom smile a sly smile. “We’re very proud of her. And of you, too. Your dad and I noticed that the two of you seem to be a very effective team.”

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