“Teal. Turquoise. Aquamarine? Are they all the same?”
“For our purpose here, yes,” he answers. “Favorite food?”
“Tex-Mex.”
"Wait," he says. "Tex-Mex?"
I clarify, because it's no surprise he might not know about this. "A combination of Texas, Mexican and Spanish cuisine. The best. That's all you need to know, and I don't even try to tell me French cuisine is better."
Chuckling, he moves on. “Favorite movie?”
“Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure.”
“Favorite country you’ve ever visited?”
“Fiji. OK, now it's your turn," I say, and repeat the same questions back at him.
Book? “Devil in a Blue Dress.” Color? “Terra cotta.” Food? “Anything cooked by my grand-mère.” Movie? “Ocean’s Eleven. The original.” Country: “America, because I’m going to miss it here now that I’ve made a friend.”
This last part triggers a little pinch of regret inside me. Before I can stop myself, I tell him he should stay.
“Sadly, I cannot. You should come with me. My grand-mère would adore you, and you could teach her how to cook Tex-Mex.”
I have to laugh at the notion of me teaching anybody’s grandmother how to cook anything, especially a French woman who is also an accomplished cook.
“She would love your company almost as much as I do, my little petal.”
I barely have time to gasp when his words flood me with happy thoughts because the next flood of sensation comes from surprise that I’m being kissed again. Hard.
How did we get here? I don’t even remember him kneeling down next to my beach chair to lean in, cup my face with both hands this time, and kiss me with his firm, assertive lips, but here we are.
Fabian’s warm tongue teases my lips in between deep, sensuous kisses. As much as I detect some odd kind of fakery and over the top charm in him, this kiss is the real deal. It’s unrehearsed. Spontaneous. Passionate. It’s the real him, kissing the real me. He sees me, he feels me, and it’s wonderful.
The waves are crashing, this beautiful man is gently holding my hair out of my face while he kisses me. And he still smells so damn good.
“Do you feel that, my darling?” He takes my hand and places it over his heart.
“It’s beating so hard. Are you OK?” I ask.
“In fact, I am not OK. You have ruined me, mon tresór.”
“Shut up and keep kissing me.”
He starts again by brushing his lips against mine in a sweet kind of teasing that builds up a heat between us. I tease back by licking across his bottom lip. Listening to his resulting moan makes me smile.
We hear the first explosion of fireworks over the water, and I feel it in my chest.
He whispers in my ear, “Come and sit on my lap. I want to hold you close while we kiss.”
“And miss the fireworks?” I tease while he pulls me into his lap. He leans back in his lounge chair and situates me sideways across his legs. “You watch the fireworks and I’ll watch you.”
I feel his hands squeeze my hips and pull me in tight. My hand goes to his chest, my fingers teasing over the buttons. A low groan from deep in his throat tells me he wishes I would stop fingering his buttons and commence with the unfastening.
Our lips seal together and I release the topmost button.
Lust takes over my senses and I swipe my tongue slowly across his bottom lip and then across his top lip in the opposite direction.
His roving hands caress my hair, my back, my legs. He whispers heated words against my mouth. “You bring up all manner of filthy ideas about what I want to do to you, angel.”