Page 38 of Falling Backwards (The Edge of Us #1)

Something is happening with Luke, I’ve noticed, and it has never happened like this with anyone else. I don’t know when it started; maybe it was when I caught him staring at me before our workout began or when he came to me afterwards and instantly, eagerly touched me, or maybe it started when we were in my bedroom the other day, or maybe in some moment even before that. It’s definitely here now, though, thrumming through me while we kiss.

I feel sexy.

He’s just traded having his arms around me for being able to press me back against the edge of his bar counter. He has one hand sunk into the underside of my ponytail, has the other trying and failing not to slip from my lower back to the curves of my ass, and has his mouth on a mission to kiss me into forgetting anybody else has ever been on my lips. And the way he reacts to me, to my kisses and touches—the way he sounds and breathes and moves and the little words he manages to murmur….

I don’t feel gross from working out.

I don’t feel undesirable from having gained weight and shape and softness.

I don’t feel like pulling away or moving his low-gripping hand or reeling all this intensity in.

How I feel is sparking. Comfortable.

Luke asked me earlier if Marcus never told me how lovely I am, and I confessed that no guy ever had in the way he does it. And I’m realizing that is true about sexiness too.

With that in my head, there’s no helping having flickering thoughts of my experiences with other guys, but as Luke goes from wrapping a kiss around my bottom lip to delving into my mouth, his hands strong and cradling on me as he shifts our bodies together, there’s absolutely no help for me—I can’t keep from imagining being with him, can’t keep from thinking in brighter flickers of him overcoming everyone else in the most intimate of ways, too, because bared bodies and pressing hips and bold hands will never have felt as good or as right as when they’re his and mine. I know it. I already know, in this moment of me matching his deep kiss and making him groan from my fingertips going into his hair and down his spine, that us having each other is going to make me burn like nothing else has before.

I want to hold on to it forever—this growing confidence that doubles as some kind of strange quietude.

I will. I’m gonna learn how to do it.

And I’m gonna hold on to him forever, too, this time.

I attempt to do it literally right now, and God, does he feel good in my ar—

Loud knocks come at the front door, causing us to startle apart on a shared gasp.

“Maintenance!”

someone calls from the other side.

I breathlessly echo the word while Luke says.

“Why the hell…?”

Then he blows a weak raspberry and grumbles.

“Oh, right. I forgot.”

If it were an unplanned visit, I might try to convince him to ignore it, but judging by that last thing he said, that’s not what seems to be happening. We withdraw our hands from each other and he steps back from me, allowing cooler air to rush between us while we straighten our shirts.

Good Lord, the way he looks and looks at me—he’s still got that Just Worked Out vibe and his hair is a little bit mussed and his lips are more than a little bit kiss-swollen, and those blue eyes are dusky with heat and affection.

He cusses under his breath.

“Should be illegal for you to look like that,”

he tells me.

“And to look at me like that.”

The words surprise me and send extra warmth into my cheeks. I laugh out.

“Wow. You’re a mind-reader.”

Another knock comes at the door as he walks backwards from me, one eyebrow lifting, a smile coming to his face.

“Oh, really?”

He turns away, then promptly turns a scanning look back over his shoulder to me.

I do my best to think past it since we’ve been interrupted.

“Yeah. What are the maintenance people here for?”

He absently smooths a hand over his hair.

“Routine stuff. I forgot they left a notice about it the other day.”

Indeed, within moments, a couple of maintenance people are in here bearing a new air conditioner filter and some bug spray. Luke and I try to scoot out of their way while they start tending to their tasks. Then his phone rings and it’s near me, so I see his mom is calling, and he decides to answer as he sits on the couch.

I get back to drinking my water. Thinking of his mom makes me think of our Thanksgiving plans, which make me think of food, which has me realizing I’m hungry and we haven’t landed on what to do for dinner tonight yet. We need to figure that out, and I could also use a shower, and I actually need to update my friends and my mom on me being safely with Luke now….

Shortly after we’re alone again, his phone call ends and I’m as slumped back into the oversized chair as he has come to be on the couch. We catch each other’s eyes and exchange a smile, but even though our lingering shared look turns into glances at lips, the air in here has obviously mellowed out.

I’m sad about the dwindled-away smolder we’d been in together.

I also can’t keep from grinning in amusement and understanding when I hear his stomach growl even from over here.

His smile becomes a grin, too, and he folds his hands behind his head.

“Hate to say it, but I’m hungry.”

I nod. “Mmhmm.”

He looks at me for another second, then heaves himself up from the couch and comes to me. I scoot over enough to give him room to sit in the chair with me and he plops down there, then hooks his arm around my neck and tugs me in, his face nearing mine.

“What’s for dinner?”

he asks. He kisses my lips and then the bridge of my nose.

I give the kisses back to him, then joke as levelly as I can.

“Hmm. Let’s make eggs Benedict.”

The look that pops onto his face cracks me the hell up.

He starts to shake his head and undoubtedly say something like, ‘I am way too hungry to try to cook all that shit correctly,’ but I beat him to speaking.

“I’m kidding! Don’t worry, I’m just kidding!”

His wide-eyed expression melts into bright relief and amusement.

“Listen, I was about to say we can see if someone at Lucent will be a friend and make us a rogue eggs Benny, but there’s no way in hell I’m attempting to cook….”

We dissolve into laughter together while I nod and pat at his sides.

“Yeah, no, I don’t feel like getting pissed off at homemade hollandaise right now.”

“Right? We’ve had such a good day.”

At that, his gaze goes a little bit flirty and his face tips in towards mine again. I want the new kiss he’s offering and I want it for longer than the ones we had moments ago, so I take it.

He lets it last longer, too, his arm around my neck drawing me a little closer yet. His other hand covers one of mine where it rests on his side, and his thumb swipes over my skin in a way that makes my nerve endings feel tingly and soothed at once.

When our kissing slips to an end, I think both about how much I love being like this with him and, rather suddenly, about pizza and cheese bread.

“Hm,”

he muses.

“What do you think about having pizza? Maybe cheesy bread, too, ’cause that sounds good.”

Freshly surprised and amused, I lean back enough so he can see the finger I point at him.

“Okay, you might be a mind-reader for real.”

Excitement has his eyes widening and his mouth dropping into an open smile, and it is so silly.

And as we laugh together, I love it all: that silliness and all the other ways he’s good at making me laugh, how good it feels to be close to him, how steady and safe he makes me feel.

What a fullness it puts in my chest—what a sense of warmth, of light.

I have to hug him about it.

I memorize the strong hug he gives back to me.

Then I slip away, stand from the chair, and enjoy a better view of his smile before I pull him to his feet, too, so we can get the ball rolling on that cheese bread. After all, can this really be called a sleepover if we never order from a pizza place?

“Oh,”

he says suddenly.

“I have a little surprise for you.”

He smirks at me.

“And buying it was the thing I temporarily forgot to do, and I remembered it without the help of a reminder.”

Although I stand by my advice to use reminders for things, his lovable silliness strikes again.

I say.

“A surprise? You shouldn’t have! Thank you!”

“I definitely should have,”

he disagrees. The look in his eyes turns his smirk downright mischievous.

And I don’t know what I expected the surprise to be, but discovering that it’s him having bought himself another pair of sweatpants so I can wear them while he wears his is damn perfect. Learning he already washed them so I can put them on after my shower is somehow more than damn perfect.

I wonder how it is that I can feel so at home when I haven’t spent much time here at all.

Then we start talking about us being in the fitting room the day he bought his first pair of sweatpants, and we joke and laugh and he kisses the blush in my cheeks, and I don’t wonder anymore about this feeling of being at home. It actually makes total sense.

It’s not where I am that matters. It’s who I’m with.

—

On one hand, the easy passage of time with Luke is fun and pleasant, but on the other hand, I’m disappointed it’s going by so quickly.

It seems like I blink and my first night staying with him—well, it’s technically my second, I guess—is over and we’re once again waking on his couch in the sunlight. I blink again and our snuggling has somehow turned into being immersed in the day with a walk around his apartment complex and food and a trip to the grocery store for his mom and bickering about how he still doesn’t use his turn signals in the car. The work shift we both have in the afternoon zooms up, too, like all the hours of our day have been full and busy.

Even work itself doesn’t seem slow despite the excitement and readiness everyone feels to have tomorrow off. I don’t suppose that’s a bad thing, though. It feels festive and warm here, between the staff and the patrons alike, between normal work and my extra task of decorating the front of the house and the bar area with Christmasy things. It all speeds the time along.

And I find things still skipping along after Lucent is closed and Luke and I are free to go. It’s late now and we’re hungry, getting tired, planning how early we need to get up tomorrow so we have time to cook before we go to his mom’s house….

It seems like no time at all has passed before we’re getting comfortable in his bed, having chosen it over staying on the couch again. In fact, I’m so comfortable that I’m almost instantly sinking into drowsiness instead of being able to relish the intimacy of being here for the first time.

My brain slow-dances around how good it feels to have Luke tucked all strongly to my side and across my legs, how much I like his mattress and pillows, how I’ve been growing increasingly nervous about meeting his mom.

I hope she’ll like me.

Is she nice? Does she know about Luke’s and my past? Whether she does or doesn’t, will she be sneakily…or outright…judgmental towards me?

Luke loves her so much, I remember sluggishly as I vaguely register how deep his breathing is getting against my body. He’s tired too. He’s excited to bring me around her. I don’t think that would be true if she…were a jerk….

He twitches as he’s falling asleep, but he somehow still half-hugs me with the arm he has around my middle. It’s like he’s reassuring me that everything will be okay even though he’s quickly dozing and he doesn’t know what’s on my mind.

And as I feel myself drifting, I’m soothed.

—

I come to as a light rush of cool air goes over me and fabric goes away from me. With a shudder, I clumsily smack around for something to cover up with. My hand lands on that fabric I want, which is draped over something—someone—solid and warm.

Luke.

I’m just awake enough to feel happy he’s there.

But I comprehend that he stole the comforter as he was rolling away from me.

It takes my sleep-weighted muscles longer than I like to tug some of it free of his body. I forgive them once it’s done and I can get covered up again and mold myself along the back side of him.

Mmm. He’s not just warm like this, he’s toasty.

Home, murmurs through me as drowsiness beckons me back.

I love….