Page 36 of The Moon & His Tides

I shrugged a shoulder and pressed the button to start the percolation. The rich scent of expensive Italian coffee wafted between us like an aphrodisiac.

“If I am stuck living in my own head for the entirety of my life, it only makes sense to be kind to myself,” I explained.

Savvy looked up at me, and even in heels, it was a long way to look. She seemed so small then, so much younger than I knew she was. It was a vulnerability that beckoned me closer, that tempted me to cut the line on my parachute and tumble into the depths of love with her.

What a complicated, wonderful creature she was.

“I want you,” she said softly, intimately, her hand curling into my white dress shirt. “But I doubt we have time before my brunch meeting.”

“I can be efficient,” I said. A fast flash of wolfish teeth.

“Afraid there’s no time for fun this morning, my beauties,” Adam declared in that posh accent, sweeping into the room like a king in his court. The morning light glinted in his golden hair like a crown. “Sebastian and I must hurry if we’re to make it to the lot in time.”

Irritation crumpled Savannah’s smooth brow. “Excuse me, but I believe I have priority over using Sebastian’s services. I was the one to find him after all.”

“Yes, and what a good eye you have,” Adam agreed, sinking a proprietary hand into her carefully done hair and sealing her open mouth with a heated kiss. When he pulled away, her earlier annoyance was mingled with a little bit of awe.

I knew now what it was like to be kissed by Adam Meyers, so I understood completely. Unbidden, my fingers moved to my own mouth, pressing into the slight divot in my full lower lip as though I could feel the imprint of Adam’s mouth still there.

He caught me then, eyes brightening as they swept over my face, and noticed the raw expression there.

“Sebastian,” he murmured low, resting his hip against the island counter in mock casualness. “Come here and bid me good morning like my wife.”

Savannah made a dainty littlehmphnoise that I would have called a scoff on someone less elegant. “It was you who kissed me, Adam.”

“Yes,” he agreed before raising a brow at me. “Sebastian?”

I hesitated, shame and eagerness warring inside me. It felt wrong to want this. To want to go to him when he called like I was some kind of trained dog. To go to him and worse, to kiss him. His mouth a hot claim on mine.

My hands curled into fists and sweat broke out lightly on my forehead.

“Go to him,” Savannah cooed, and when I turned my gaze to her, she looked predatory and almost vaguely malicious. As though my discomfiture was a delight to her. As though it turned her on to know that I’d go against my grain just to pleasure her.

Fuck, these two would do my head in if I let them.

So why did Iwantto let them?

Before I could let caution eat into me too deeply, I took the five steps forward to Adam, watching the glint of deep satisfaction in his eyes as I obeyed him.

A shiver bit into my spine and left a permanent imprint.

“Good morning,” Adam said, his tone and expression exceedingly helpful like he was assisting me rehearse my lines for a play.

“Good morning,” I said, a little distracted by the way stubble dusted his square jawline like shards of pure gold. He had one of those divots in his chin, not a dimple exactly, but a depression that I thought my thumb might fit into perfectly.

A small hand found its way to the back of my neck, nails scratching at the short hairs there.

“Kiss him for me,” Savannah encouraged, her thumb stroking over my rapidly beating pulse point.

I swallowed, but the moisture had fled my mouth. This was so alien to me, the idea of kissing a man and more, the very real truth that Iwantedto kiss a man.

But who could resist someone like Adam? So handsome and talented and shockingly kind.

Someone who I’d admired so much that esteem had led to my own desire to be an actor, to wholly embody a character so seamlessly the way I watched Adam do on the screen time and time again.

Not me.

He watched me through lazily lowered lids, and I knew he wouldn’t make it easy for me. I had to go to him with only the fuel of Savannah’s desire at my back.