Lizzie
Ihavenoidea what’s gotten into Caleb. He drives the truck with the same care as normal, but there is something different. He’s driving faster. He’s driving harder. His knuckles are white on the steering wheel. It’s past midnight now and, even in the darkness, I can see the clenched square of his jaw. A tendon flickers and pulses just in front of his ear.
What in God’s name?
The words linger on my tongue for perhaps the hundredth time, but I know they’ll be shot down. There’s no sense in wasting my breath. Instead, I am left to stew. For his words and attitude to whirl around in my mind as the truck bumps and crunches its way through the woodland near Caleb’s place.
He’d been fine when we’d danced. Of that, I’m sure.
He’d whirled me around the dancefloor with an energy that suggested he did in fact have some skill. His hands had wrapped around mine. The lines of his body had complimented my more feminine shape. Hard edges of muscle had come flush with curves and left me breathless more than once. It had been… enrapturing.
Caleb Walker, who had insisted that he could neither dance or be sociable, had let down those curls of his and taken me for a ride.
I’d even caught him smiling at one point.
The song had come to an end, dance partners had been changed, and the next moment Caleb had disappeared. For three dances I’d subtly tried to pick him out from the crowd and failed. He’d been off somewhere, away from the crowds and no doubt lost in his own thoughts.
I reach for the edges of my seat as the truck bangs and bounces along the road, its wheels screeching on rock and stone. I glance nervously at Caleb, but he seems unfazed. Entirely in control.
The truck skids to a halt, pebbles fly in all directions, and a branch lands way too close to the windshield. Caleb seems to not care and jumps from the cab before I can even get my seatbelt off.
“Just what is?” The door opens and he hurriedly guides me out. Every time his hands wind around me, it’s like I’m suddenly plugged into a space heater. All pleasant zips and little tingles.
In three quick steps, he has me up the steps to the porch and through the front door. I barely see the glint of a key.
Two steps into the warmth of his house, a heavy slam of the door, and we’re inside the dark of his house. I exhale, and try to glare at him through the dim shadows. “Would you care to tell just what is so urgent?”
“This.”
And before I know what’s happening, Caleb Walker kisses me.
And I’m kissing him back.
From the moment his mouth touches mine, my brain gets immediately with the program. No confusion and no delay. It doesn’t matter that he’s interrupted my evening and delivered me home with all the gentility of a neanderthal. Suddenly, the speed, the urgency… it all makes perfect sense to me.
Because there is no possible way I could have waited any longer for this kiss.
Caleb’s hands cradle my face before digging deep into my hair. The pads of his fingertips spark little frissons of heat along my scalp, his palms press hot against my cheeks. Mine are braced against his shoulders, holding myself up under the waves of sudden passion that threaten to knock me sideways. Together, as if by design, we gasp, our mouths filling with the essence of one another.
“Oh!”
My back hits the wall, the framed picture over my shoulder shuddering against the paintwork. Suddenly, Caleb is everywhere. He invades my space, one of his arms wrapping around the small of my back to draw me closer. Another exploring the curve of my bottom.
Just how many hands did this man have?
I gasp again as his body comes flush to mine.
Caleb Walker is very, very aroused.
The next kiss takes my gasp and consumes it, reducing it to a mew of sensuous delight. A deep rumble of pleasure calls back to me.
“Caleb…” I whisper as I finally catch my breath. “What is this?”
He takes his own sweet time answering. He claims my lips again, kissing me with the same determination in which he’d done everything since I’d met him. He finds an angle that suits, one that allows him complete control of my mouth, and settles in to explore. My lips grow sensitive and thick. His kiss turns hungrier. I couldn’t breathe save for stolen moments of air. I can feel my heart rate ramping up, thumping behind my breastbone. My mind is growing foggy.
“Caleb…”
“What does it look like?” He finally murmurs back. The velvet of his lips has grown hot and swollen. A flash of teeth and my lower lip blazes with a little zing of pain.