Page 54 of Tears of Ink

“This is all very posh for a late-night picnic.”

He grins. It’s electric. My tummy tightens no matter how much I don’t want it to. Reaching over, he clinks his glass against mine. “Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow.” I let a deep breath through my lips. God, I can’t even think about it. “I still don’t know if I can do it.”

He nods. “You can.” Where does he gets his confidence in me? In what he’s seen in my portfolio? Surely, that’s not enough? I want to ask, but instead he says. “So, tell me about the mosaic.”

Chuckling, I groan. “Your mother is such a blabbermouth.”

“Yep.”

“It’s not a mosaic. I just let her think that because she was so rude.” I settle back onto the picnic blanket staring at the stars through the domed glass roof of the conservatory.

He settles down next to me. It should be weird. It isn’t. That familiar surge of obsession tingles beneath my skin.

He’s wonderful.

I grin and stretch as his eyes travel over the stories on my skin. “It’s going to be so much better than a mosaic.”

Before he has a chance to answer. Before I have time to sweep my gaze over his shape, the curve of muscles. Before I have the chance to think that maybe I do like him after all, even if he isn’t always the guy in sliders. Before I wonder what he would taste like; we are showered with water from overhead.

With a shriek, I leap to my feet as sprinklers flood the foliage and pathways with large droplets of water.

“Shit! I forgot about the water system.” He shouts over the crash of water landing on gravel. He leaps to my side and we both gather the stuff. Wine spills everywhere, soggy bread and cheese goes back in the picnic bag.

My hair is splattered to my head, my face as wet as if I were in the shower. An irrepressible giggle builds inside my chest.

His hands clutch onto me as the deluge continues to pour down. We are soaked. His pale blue shirt is dark and clinging to his chest. My vest top has disintegrated into a useless rag. I stretch the material and try to lift it away from my bra but it’s pointless, it’s see-through.

I start to laugh, the water sliding off my face, falling into my lips. Then he laughs, and we cling to one another, an upturned lifeboat in a single moment of perfection.

“Was this a ploy to see my bra?” I grin, staring up at him through the droplets falling from my eyelashes. He looks amazing, breathtaking. Unlike any piece of art I could ever hope to create. He steals the air from around me. His hair is damp, droplets clinging to short spikes. His face and eyes shine with laughter. The man in the suit evaporating with the sprinkler system.

Then he’s kissing me. His mouth hot. I gasp, shifting forward, sliding my fingers through the wet strands of his hair. His lips are firm, delicious, teasing. And I open my mouth as his warm tongue probes between my teeth, pushing mine for a response. A deep and furious fire lights me from the inside out.

I want to die. I want to combust into a million perfect pieces, spinning in the moment forever.

One of his hands lifts into my hair, tugging on the end of my ponytail and working its way until his fingers are against my scalp, while the other hand cradles my chin, his thumb brushing along the skin at the edge of my jaw.

Fibres of snapping electricity fuse the air between us and I never want the kiss to end.

It does. But his lips gently brush mine, teasing the moment for one long drawn out second.

“You’re all wet.” His voice is a low murmur.

“So are you.”

My heart pounds, crashing in my chest, and in my head and heart, the seeds of an irrepressible need root themselves and come to life.

C H A P T E R S I X T E E N

I haven’t slept, and it’s nothing to do with the nerves of what today will bring, what the youngsters turning up will be like, or if I ever get my glass mixture to not smash into a million pieces.

It’s him.

Thoughts of the kiss looped around my head all night.

He kissed me.