I allowed my gaze to travel down her body in response. I took in her parted lips, her tongue darting out to wet them; I enjoyed the sight of those full breasts she’d pressed against me at the airport a couple of weeks ago. Her cinched-in waist, her legs. What was between them.
“It’s just physical,” she whispered.
“Right.”
Our eyes locked and I couldn’t help it, I leaned forward and kissed the juncture between her neck and her shoulder. Just once. Once wouldn’t hurt, would it? Or twice? I kissed her delicate skin again.
She tilted her head to allow me more room and my cock pushed against my fly. Fuck, when had a woman I’d barely touched got me so wound up like this? My heart was jackhammering against my ribs and I was having to work to control my breathing as if I’d just come off the Peloton. I pressed another kiss farther up her neck and inhaled her sweet, cinnamon scent. Cupping her jaw, I leaned my forehead against hers and tried to steady my pulse.
“Joshua.” My name came out on a sigh. Her hand slid up my chest and I groaned. Even though I knew I should stop, I just didn’t want to. I wanted her to touch more of me. All of me.
Our lips were almost touching. All I wanted was to taste her. Just once. Before I could process what was happening, she opened her mouth and her hot breath snapped the tether on my self-control. I pushed against her, pressing my lips against hers in soft, hot, wet kisses. She opened her mouth slightly, and I took her bottom lip between my teeth, sucking the sweetness from her as if it had been denied me too long.
Christ, what was the matter with me?
A small moan escaped from her and ricocheted to the root of my cock.
A loud knock on the door sounded, and Hartford jumped ten feet in the air as if I’d electrocuted her.
She put her hand to her mouth. “My key.”
She scrambled to answer my front door while I tried to will away my hard-on. Fuck. I tipped my head back on the sofa.
Shit. What had I just done? I couldn’t be kissing Hartford. Perhaps it was some kind of misplaced sense of ownership that made me cross a line tonight. I hadn’t been expecting her to announce she’d been on a date, and we’d been spending so much time together . . . I was a bloody idiot.
She sidled back into the living room. “I got my key and I’m not sitting back down on that sofa,” she said. “It’s . . . no . . . not a good location.”
I chuckled despite it smarting a little that she was clearly regretting our kiss.
“Did I cross a line?” I asked.
“We crossed a very important, shouldn’t-be-crossed-under-any-circumstances line. I mean . . . it’s . . . you’re . . . I’m . . .”
Jesus, she was making it sound like I was toxic. But she was right. Any kind of anything between us wasn’t going to lead to anything but trouble. I nodded. “It was just a kiss, Hartford.” Liar, I thought to myself. “No big deal. Let’s pretend it didn’t happen.”
She nodded enthusiastically, which I tried to mentally brush off.
“You should date,” I blurted. “You can’t give up after just one guy.” If she got herself a boyfriend, she’d have way less time to spend with me. And there’d be another good reason for me not to cross the line again. Yes, Hartford finding a boyfriend was an excellent idea. The quicker the better. “I’ll help you so you don’t feel awkward. I’ll pick your dates. I’ll find you someone you want to talk to and fuck.”
She scowled at me like I’d just assigned her a week of detention. “Only if I get to pick your dates.”
I laughed. “My dates? What are you talking about?”
“If I have to date, I don’t see why you shouldn’t.”
Where was she going to meet the kind of women I wanted to date? Easy. Nowhere, because I wasn’t interested in dating anyone. But I could go through the motions so that Hartford actually dated. That way, the pull in my stomach when I saw her, the way my heart stumbled sometimes when she touched me, and the buzz at the base of my dick when she laughed would all disappear.
“You got yourself a deal,” I said. “I set you up on three dates. I coach you through each one, and by the end of it, you’ll be able to fly into a fully-fledged dating life.”
“Three dates?”
“You’ve gotta kiss some frogs.”
A smile curled around her lips. “I have ground rules.”
“Name them.”
“No date should be longer than two hours. No sex. And we split the bill.”
“You know this isn’t us dating, right?” I asked.