for me.
“I want to keep seeing you as that adorable little six-year-old,” I confessed. “But every time I came back, she was getting further and further away and in her place? This beautiful girl sprang up.”
“Girl?” she asked softly, and I looked down at her, my hand rising unbidden to caress the side of her face. She closed her eyes and leaned into that touch and the whimpering sigh that escaped her… I’d heard a similar sound out of myself before. Any time I stepped off the bus and I’d come home. That’s exactly what it sounded like. Like she’d come home and to be honest that scared the fucking shit out of me.
“Woman,” I said softly back, voice strained. She opened her eyes, and I fell in, falling through the ages, falling through time all over again. The same way I did every fucking time she looked at me.
I caught myself leaning forward too late, and before I knew it, I didn’t care anymore if I fell. My lips touched Eden’s, and I was lost in the silken feel of her soft mouth beneath mine.
8
Eden…
He kissed me. Sage lowered his mouth to mine, grazing my cheek lightly with his knuckles and his lips met mine and time just… stopped. Everything stopped. My breath was stolen, my heart seized in my breast and every fiber of my being held onto this golden moment and never ever wanted it to end.
It was still almost two weeks away and yet it was Christmas, with all the joy, elation, and magic that the holiday could bring.
Tears sprang to my eyes with the sheer beauty of the moment as his hand left my cheek and his arms went around me and pulled me close. I kissed him back. My lips moved against his slightly chapped ones, my hands balling in the front of his shirt as I pulled myself just that much tighter against the front of his body.
He grunted, a surprised yet supremely satisfied sound, and I flicked my tongue against his bottom lip, opening for him, begging for him to come into me more fully, begging to take this further. Even just a little.
He took the invitation, tongue sliding against mine and kissing me deeply, the salt and hops from his popcorn and beer a not unpleasant assault on my senses before those flavors faded and I was left with just the intense, wonderful, woodsy masculine scent and flavor that was just him, just my Sage.
We kissed one another breathless in the dim lamplight from the side of his bed and I loved that I not only could touch him, smell him, see him, and taste him for real… but that it was actually better than every time I had ever imagined him.
“I hate to be disappointment,” he said gruffly after breaking the kiss. I shook my head. God, never… “But the club is going to be here bright and early and we’ve got Christmas trees to go cut down and decorations to hang.”
Shit. He was right.
“Okay,” I whispered gently.
He reached behind him and clicked out the light, then settled holding me tightly. He kissed the top of my head and sighed out.
“Sleep, baby girl.”
“Okay,” I whispered again, still completely mollified and confused beyond measure about what just happened. I admit, I was giddy, too, but laying in the dark, close to Sage, his arms tightly around me, it was hard to keep my sleepiness at bay. I felt too well protected, too wonderful against him, in the circle of his arms.
“Don’t leave,” I murmured into the night.
“I won’t,” he promised. “At least not until after you’re asleep.”
I didn’t want him to leave even then… I mean, if I woke without him, what would I have to convince myself this was more than just a wonderful dream?
He chuckled slightly and pressed his lips to my forehead and I was mortified to realize I may or may not have just said that last part aloud.
“Get some rest, sleepy kitten,” he murmured, and I relaxed into him.
“I like that,” I whispered and I did. I liked that nickname a lot.
9
Sage…
Sparks – the first indication I knew anything was wrong were the sparks and then a bike slid out from the pack ahead of all of us sideways across the oncoming lanes of traffic. We all pulled to a stop, heeling down kickstands, shouting – running.
I pounded up the asphalt of the road and stopped dead in my tracks at the sight of them. Nox