Page 203 of Just One More Thing

Things that shouldn’t matter.

They matter greatly.

She turns toward me in the low light. It catches the edges of her—loose hair, bare legs, the curve of her shoulder, the easy way she’s standing in my kitchen like she belongs here.

Because she does.

“I need a shower,” she says. “I’ve been marinating in stadium sweat all day, and I’m disgusting.”

“You’re not disgusting.”

“Jake. I can literally taste the sweat.”

I push off the counter and walk toward her slowly. “Then let’s fix that.”

Her mouth curves.

“Oh.”

“Oh,” I confirm.

She takes my hand and pulls me toward the bathroom with a look over her shoulder that does absolutely nothing good for my pulse.

The bathroom’s small. Old tile. Rain shower head I installed last year after the original one gave up and started spraying sideways.

I reach in and turn the water on. Steam starts building almost immediately. When I turn back around, she’s already pulling her shirt over her head.

She drops it on the floor and looks at me like a challenge. She unhooks her bra and lets it fall.

I’ve seen her naked before. I know what she looks like. That information is currently useless because my brain has decided to experience it like the first time anyway.

Her hands go to my chest. Fingers spread. She pushes my shirt up with the clear intention of someone who has been thinking about this and is done thinking.

I pull it off, and her eyes drop. Her hands follow.

Her fingers are already at the button of my jeans before I’ve fully caught up.

I’m absolutely not complaining about the pace she’s setting.

I help with the zipper because my hands still function even if my brain is three steps behind, and she pushes my jeans and boxer briefs down with both hands while I kick out of them.

She shimmies out of her shorts and panties in one smooth motion and steps into the shower.

The water hits her shoulders and runs down her body while steam curls around her, and I just stand there staring because thirty-one years of having a functioning imagination did not prepare me for the reality of her in my shower.

She looks back at me through wet hair already turning darker. “Are you getting in or just going to stand there?”

I step in behind her, and my hands find her hips.

I pull her against me, and she inhales sharply when she feels exactly how done I am with standing there.

She turns in my arms and kisses me hard.

Her tongue slides against mine, and her hands push into my hair while water pours over both of us. She’s pressed against mefrom chest to hip, and there is absolutely nothing between us anymore. Not clothes. Not distance. Not ten years of silence.

Nothing.

I back her against the tile. She gasps at the cold and then again when my mouth finds her neck.