Page 119 of Business Casual
I glance up at my sister. “What did it feel like? When you fell in love with Luka?”
Stella smiles at me and this time she’s definitely crying. A tear falls from her lashes and lands on top of my neatly organized manila folders. “Like the most fun I’ve ever had.”
?I rap myknuckles against Nova’s front door, not taking my usual care to park in the alley behind the bookstore and walk the couple of blocks over. Since thevery specific branchof the phone tree knowsabout us, there’s really no use army-crawling beneath the blackberry bushes in her backyard to surreptitiously knock at her door.
As fun as that is.
A light flicks on above my head. Nova’s face appears in the window. She grins when she sees me, and my heart does something ridiculous.
Love, love, loveloops around my mind in time with the beat of my heart.
“Hey.” She leans against the frame with her arms crossed. She’s wearing a tight black tank top and no bra. Baggy high-waisted sweatpants. Plain black socks. Her hair is loose around her shoulders and all of her ink is on display. Soft. Comfortable. I want to put her in my pocket. I want to bend her over my knee. “To what do I owe the pleasure?” she asks.
“Wanted to see you,” I answer, the words bubbling out of me before I can think to contain them. I don’t know how to temper myself when I’m with Nova. It’s like the parts of me that I struggle to keep in check collapse every time she glances in my direction. I don’t know what’s too much and what’s too little. I don’t know how to do any of this.
But Nova smiles at me and those thoughts quiet, the strain in my neck easing. “And you’re using the front door?”
“I am.” I step over the threshold and pull her door shut behind me. I tip her chin up with my knuckles and brush a kiss over her lips. “I hope that’s okay.”
Her hands fist the front of my coat. “Of course it is.”
“I’m heading out in the morning.” I keep walking her backward until the small of her back hits the table she keeps tucked up against the wall in her hallway. Something rattles on it, and her breath releases with a sigh. “I wanted to spend tonight with you.”
Her brows collapse with a cute little furrow. “Heading out?”
“Back to New York,” I explain.
“Oh.” Her whole face falls. “So soon?”
I shouldn’t like it as much as I do, but it’s nice to know I’m not the only one who will miss this. Kissing in the front hallway before I even take off my coat, her hands slipping beneath to press flat against my chest.
I trace my thumb over her bottom lip. “I’ve been here a month, Nova girl,” I say as gently as I can, more for my own fragile feelings about it than hers. “Stella is back. There’s no need for me to stay.”
Her face collapses in a scowl. “No need, huh?”
A smile twitches at my lips. “Are you going to miss me?”
“Miss you destroying all of my landscaping? I don’t think so.” She pushes my heavy coat off my shoulders and it collapses at our feet. “I think you’ll be missing me more than I’ll be missing you.”
“Another bet?” I drop my forehead to hers, our noses brushing. “I’m going to run out of watches.”
“I’ll take payment in the form of cufflinks too.”
I laugh. “What are you going to do with my cufflinks?”
“Whatever I want,” she breathes, her hands working at the buttons of my shirt.
“What do you think I’m going to miss the most?” I ask, my hand tracing a path from her cheek to her jaw to the strong line of her throat. I flex my fingers there, and she lets out a sigh, a whine vibrating under my palm. Desire coils tight. “What do you think I’ll be thinking about, all alone in my apartment?”
“My peanut butter pretzels,” she whispers with a rasp.
I laugh and bend so I can wrap both of my arms around her, hauling her up so her face is above mine. I want her closer. I want to feel all of her against all of me. Her legs curl around my hips and her hands frame my cheeks.
“Yeah, that’s it,” I whisper. “Your peanut butter pretzels.”
Her thumbs make sweeping strokes from my temples to the curve of my jaw. I close my eyes and try to memorize the feel of her againstme. Her ankles crossed at the small of my back and the weight of her in my arms. The steady thump of her heartbeat pressed tight to mine. The eager, unconscious rock of her hips.
It’s not a goodbye, but it feels like one. Tomorrow I’ll go to New York and she’ll be here. No take-out coffee cups dropped off in the morning. No stolen kisses in the back hallway of her studio.
