She handed him a cupcake, took one herself, then dug into the chips bag, holding out her full palm so he could take some.
Watching each other, they bit into the cake then ate a chip. “Mmm,” she said.
“Yeah.” The flavors of salt, vinegar, chocolate and coconut blended well.
“I have to check.” She leaned in and kissed him softly, running her tongue along his lips. She sat back. It had been a quick, friendly kiss, nothing like the one at his house, but he could hardly see for how much he wanted more.
“Well?” he managed.
“Tastes the same...maybe better,” she said softly, her pupils huge, her hair trembling on her shoulders.
And he wasn’t quite done. “My turn.” He leaned in and took her face in his hands, kissing her more intently. She gave a little moan and returned the favor. He pulled her closer until they were chest to chest, the rush of it blasting through him, the need for her, the hunger. She tasted sweet and salty and like her.
She broke off again, fighting for breath, her eyes sparkling with blue fire, the way they got when she was aroused beyond reason. “Why can’t we leave each other alone?” She sounded desperate. Her words vibrated in the air, almost alive, raising goose bumps on his skin.
“I wish to hell I knew,” he said. Ten years and a lifetime later, he wanted this woman like no other before or since.
“Why are we here? In this exact place?”
“I didn’t think it through clearly.”
“I think you did, Dylan. I think deep down you knew exactly what you were doing. You have instincts, too. Maybe we need this. To do this.”
She pushed him back onto the blanket and landed over him, her eyes big, her mouth soft, lips parted. “I can hardly think for all this wanting. It’s too much with everything else going on. You know?”
“I do. I know.” He wanted her. He wanted to be inside her. He rose and rolled her onto her back, so he was on top looking down at her.
“Oh.” Her eyes widened, their blue glowing up at him eagerly. “What did you say about the gawkers last night? You don’t give them power over you? Maybe we’re giving this too much power, making it too big a deal.”
“You don’t think it’s a big deal?” His hips pressed against her, his erection against her belly, her chest heaving with harsh breaths. She was flailing around for a rationale to do what they both wanted. The desire rumbled through him, an idling engine ready to roar to life.
“I know it is,” she said, then frowned, “but denying it, fighting it so hard, makes us do stupid things. Like this. We’re supposed to be having fun, blowing off steam, but we’re in a cave where we made love, torturing ourselves, denying ourselves, getting all wound up.” She licked her lips, her tongue sticking to the dry surface. He wanted to wet them with his own, meet her tongue with his. Lust surged, washing away all the barriers he kept flinging up.
Her eyes darted across his face, seeking his agreement. “If we quit fighting and just do it, the pressure will evaporate. We’ll be ourselves again. We can concentrate. Our minds will be clear.” She paused. “I mean it can’t possibly be as good as we’re imagining, right?”
That was the problem. “What if it’s better?”
“You think it could be?” Her eyes flashed emotion after emotion—hope, alarm, despair, hope again.
“It could be.” He paused. “And that’s not helpful.” It would stoke the self-destructive urge he had to strap himself into Tara’s emotional roller coaster, take his chances on the drops and twists and hair-raising turns.
He was too old for that. Too wise. The thrill wasn’t worth the crash. And there would be a crash. For all she’d matured, Tara was the same demanding, difficult, quick-release girl she’d been as a teenager. And he was the same all-in rescuer scrambling to be everything she needed and not quite making the grade.
“What do you mean?” Her eyes searched his, a blazing blue.
“I think we’re safer staying friends,” he said.
Already, without sex, they’d been slipping into old habits, old ways of being together—good and bad. No matter what emotional safeguards they tried to build in, when she left, he would suffer. He knew himself that well.
She would leave. He couldn’t forget that. It wasn’t just geography standing between them. They wanted different things, they saw the world differently and they had a long-standing, gut-level distrust of