‘Either.’
She narrowed her eyes at him. ‘We agreed that it would be a bad idea. It would complicate things.’
He nodded. They had, but he couldn’t bring himself to care right at this minute. ‘Things are already complicated,’ he told her. ‘I can’t stop thinking about you. About us together. I’ve never felt like this before, and I don’t know what to do with that. This whole thing is complicated and I don’t have the answers.’
‘You’ve been thinking about it too?’
He shook his head. ‘Jesus, Lara. Only every second since that day in London Fields.’
‘That does sound complicated.’ She nodded thoughtfully, her eyes still fixed on his mouth, and he wondered if she was ever going to put him out of his misery.
And then, finally, after all the months and years of resisting this, he was done. He was out. He couldn’t do it any longer. ‘You’re killing me here. Are you kissing me or not?’
Finally, she broke into a smile. ‘Not, if you’re not going to ask nicely,’ she said, even as her hands landed on his waist.
He let out a growl of frustration, grabbed her by the hips and pulled her closer, tipping up her chin with one hand so that he didn’t have to break eye contact. ‘I can be nice.’
She nipped at his finger with her teeth. ‘I’ve changed my mind. Nice is overrated.’
She pulled him down with a hand on the nape of his neck and rested their foreheads together for a breath, and then another.
He was braced for the feel of her, his body tense, but the kiss, when it came, was so gentle that he melted instantly. Her body sank into his as he wrapped both arms around her waist, pulli
ng her up towards him so that he could chase her lips before they ghosted away.
He breathed in her scent as he gathered her close, nudging at her nose with his, tipping her face up so she could kiss him deeper. When she moaned into his mouth, he thought he might die. Or explode. Die then explode, explode then die. He didn’t know or care. All he knew was that he wanted more. More of this. More of her. More of her lips hungry against his and her tongue flickering into his mouth. More of her arching back against the hard brace of his arms.
They had nowhere to hide this time. No excuses. No pretending that this was somehow for show, or for other people, or for whatever reason not real. This was just them, acting on the instincts they’d been fighting for years. Years. He pulled away abruptly. They’d fought this. For good reason.
‘Freaking out?’ Lara asked, and she was so out of breath it made him want to kiss her again.
Instead, he nodded. ‘Yes. You?’
‘Oh, yeah. Shall we make it hard to think again?’
He threaded his fingers in her hair and kissed her again, aware of nothing but the taste and the smell and the feel of her. Every fantasy of the last weeks...months, years, coming alive in his hands.
A boom overhead pulled them apart and he looked up to see a shower of colourful sparks falling to earth.
‘Fireworks,’ Lara breathed, looking up. ‘Think the universe is trying to tell us something?’
‘Just trying to tell us it’s the last day of the regatta,’ Jannes said, breathing heavily and looking for reason.
Lara slapped his chest gently. ‘Killjoy.’
‘Sorry,’ he said, looking directly at her and meeting her gaze for the first time in this new world. ‘We should probably talk about what just happened,’ he went on, real life starting to creep in at the edges of whatever this thing was.
‘I know. We should,’ Lara said, holding his gaze until another boom behind her made her jump. ‘After the fireworks?’
He nodded and she turned in his arms, leaning back against him and watching the fireworks over the water, explosions in blue and green and red. In blinding white. He kissed the side of her neck, his fingertips exploring her collarbone, down the side of her arm, his hand circling her wrist and then back up to just behind her ear. Later, they would talk about this. They would remind each other about all the reasons they’d agreed that they didn’t want to do this. All the ways that they could get hurt, and the reasons why they couldn’t let that happen.
Later—tomorrow—they would talk themselves out of it. Undo this step and get their friendship back. But, for this moment, he didn’t have to pretend not to want her. It was only in release that he realised how heavy this had been to carry. Only when he gave in that he could feel how hard he had been fighting. Only in kissing Lara—no tricks, no pretence—that he could feel how desperately right it was. Giving in was so much easier. It was as natural as breathing. His body welcomed it and his mind quieted at having her in his arms.
And while he was watching the fireworks he could just soak her in. Absorb how right this felt without worrying about the consequences. He squeezed tight around her waist—unwilling to waste a second of this time before they had to get back to real life.
Lara’s hands covered his, fingers threading together to hold her even tighter, and her head fell back against his chest, giving him a clear view down her elegant neck, over flawless shoulders and collarbones, the freckled skin of her chest and the shadows of her cleavage. He let his face fall against the side of hers, the luminosity of her skin a greater draw than the lights in the sky.
He pressed his lips against her cheek and felt a knot tightening in his belly when she let her head fall to the side, baring more skin, opening up a path for him to kiss down to her pulse spot, letting his lips pause there to feel the steady thud. From there he found the sensitive spot where her neck met shoulder, letting his lips pause as she sighed, untangled a hand from his and let it come up to cup the back of his head. Her fingertips played with the short hairs at the nape of his neck, and she moaned quietly when he shivered under her fingers. When one of his hands found the soft skin of her stomach she turned in his embrace, her arms winding around his neck, pulling herself higher, pressing her body hard against his, and the fireworks ceased to exist. The sky and the moon and the stars ceased to exist. There was just Lara at the centre of his universe, and it was the first time the world had felt right.