“Because I don’t want her. She’s nice and a way to pass the time, but if you would give me a real chance this time, I’d be yours.”
“You’re offering to ditch your girlfriend for me.”
“She’s not my girlfriend. What about you? Are you and Greg together?”
“No. I’m not with anyone.”
“Then I guess you won the better person lottery,” he said ruefully.
“Did you sleep with her? The first night, like you slept with me?” she asked, although it cut to ask it.
“No. I kissed her twice. Once you saw. I shouldn’t have.”
“We are not together. You can kiss anyone you want,” she said flatly. “And now I need a drink.”
“I’ll take one too,” he said.
She opened two beers from the fridge. They talked over a few more beers trying to figure everything out.
“I’m trying to process all of this,” Britt said. “But it’s hard.”
He set down his beer. “Just let me help.”
With that, Jack took her by the arms and kissed her, his mouth coming down over hers almost before she could get a breath. The rush of her senses overwhelmed her as she opened her lips to let his tongue invade her mouth. Her hands were on his back, her tongue stroking his. Jack moved his hands to her face, holding her there while his mouth plundered hers. Her breath grew ragged, her hands pulling at his shirt, rucking it up so she could touch his skin, lay her hungry palms flat on the heat of his muscled back.
After a moment, he drew back, looking at her with an intense, heated gaze.
“You said I could kiss anyone I wanted. I want to kiss you. Every day, every minute possibly.”
“You’ll have to get rid of Miranda,” she said a little breathlessly. “And I’ll have to have dinner with your dad so I can get over this thing where you’re my boss’s son and it’s unprofessional or awkward or something.”
“We’ll do that tomorrow. He has a charity golf tournament but we can meet up with him after that. So do we have any other problems?”
“Your gross overreaction to the fact that Greg called me.”
“I’m sorry about that. I was so...jealous. I think I could have handled that better if I hadn’t felt so threatened. Like I was about to lose you to some other guy.”
“You were never about to lose me. Not until you started ranting about Greg and acting like I was on trial.”
“Fair enough. So we can kiss and make up?”
“I thought we already did.”
“Then how about we fuck and make up?” he said and she grinned wickedly at the dirty word he used to describe what they were about to do. “Because I’ve made love to you, and I want to do that again, tonight even. But it’s been too long without you and I need to claim you. Prove to myself that you’re mine. If you’ll have me, Britt.” He said, raking a hand through his black hair, adorably uncertain.
“I’ll have you but you may have to persuade me. I think you’ll have to sing to me,” she said playfully.
“In that case,” he said, vaulting off the couch and bounding toward the door.
Jack opened the door and got an acoustic guitar out of the hallway. She burst out laughing.
“I brought this in case of emergency,” he said, brandishing the instrument proudly as she giggled.
He settled onto the couch beside her and strummed a few chords before singing, low and dark, the song he’d written for her about the clever girl and two margaritas. She curled up beside him and held his arm possessively, her head on his shoulder. She was by turns thrilled and bashful about the song he’d written, the one he performed so beautifully right there beside her. When he was finished, she tipped her face up to his and kissed him softly. It was easily the most unabashedly romantic thing anyone had ever done for her.
Jack set his guitar aside and slowly, languorously, he brushed her hair back from her face and kissed her cheek. “I love the way you look at me.”
He kissed softly along her cheekbone, her jaw, her chin until he came to her lower lip.