Page 37 of The Hang Up
“I already knew that one. What else?”
“Um, use your napkin often, both for your hands and for wiping your mouth.”
“Roger that,” he said. “So far so good.”
“Um, don’t put your phone or your keys on the table.” She was struggling to come up with something instead of obsessing over whether she might hiccup or if Jason would touch her again if she did. “And don’t take photos of your food for Instagram or Facebook or whatever.”
“Please,” he said with a dramatic shudder. “Do I look like the kind of guy who’d want to post pictures of a pork chop?”
“Probably not,” she agreed, still trying to keep focused on her body. “Okay, uh—don’t reach across the table to sample someone else’s food, not even if they offer. And if your food isn’t cooked properly—like if your steak is too rare or they forget to put the dressing on the side instead of?—”
Hiccup!
“Dammit!” She dropped her head into her hands. “Want to try another cure?”
“I think we should call it a night, Jason.” She peered up at him through her fingers. “I’m so sorry. This is terribly embarrassing.”
“No way.” He shook his head and leaned toward her again. He was close enough she could feel the heat of his shoulder, close enough to feel his breath ruffling her hair. “You haven’t even given me a chance to show off my first aid skills.”
“Your first aid skills extend to hiccups?”
“Not exactly. But I’m willing to give it a shot.”
“Fine,” she said, then covered her mouth as she felt another hiccup coming on. “What else do you have up your sleeve?” she said through her fingers.
Jason reached up and touched her hand. One by one, he peeled her fingers away from her mouth. Instead of letting go, he held fast to her hand, tightening his grip just a little.
“I have one more surefire cure.”
Miriam shivered, even though she wasn’t cold. “What’s that?”
“It’s guaranteed to work.”
“Then why didn’t you do it before?”
“Because,” he said as he brushed her hair back from her face, sending her heart pounding into her skull. “You told me not to kiss you again.”
“Oh.”
And then he did it anyway.
CHAPTER7
As Jason lowered his lips to Miriam’s, he remembered her words from earlier that day.
No fooling around.
He braced himself to be pushed away, to have her tell him this was a terrible idea for all the reasons they’d discussed before.
But instead of pushing him away, she grabbed him by the lapels and pulled him closer. “Yes,” she murmured against his mouth, kissing him back a lot harder than he’d kissed her.
Maybe she was taking this hiccup cure thing seriously, figuring this was worth a shot. Maybe that’s what this was about.
But her hand on his ass put a stop to those thoughts. “God, I want you,” she breathed, sending a shot of adrenaline straight to his cock.
Okay. He didn’t need any more encouragement than that. He tunneled his fingers into her hair, threading them through those thick, luscious curls he hadn’t stopped thinking about since Saturday. They felt like silk, like smooth coils of energy, electrified by the intensity of her kiss. She hadn’t come up for air or hiccuped again, which seemed like a great sign on several levels.
Still, he should probably put this cure to the test.
