Nightstruck - Jenna Black Page 0,98

to turn off his PlayStation. “I’m ready for Christmas and a new batch.”

I think he was just saying that for my benefit, but I wished he would keep playing. Surely if he was playing a game, I’d be able to fade gracefully into the background. After everything Luke and I had been through together, I had finally started to feel at least mildly comfortable around him, but Marlene’s revelation had turned me right back into the tongue-tied, self-conscious idiot I’d been at the start.

And then, after he’d turned the console off, came the moment I’d been dreading. Luke sat next to me on the couch, cocked his head, and asked the Question.

“Is something wrong? Other than the obvious, I mean. You seem … I don’t know, distracted.”

I forced a smile that I’m sure looked completely fake. “I’m fine,” I lied, but the heat in my cheeks meant I had not a chance of convincing him.

Luke looked down at his hands, a worried expression on his face. “I screwed everything up the other night, didn’t I?”

“Huh?” I genuinely had no idea what he was talking about. I was too absorbed in my own turmoil to consider the possibility that he might be having some of his own.

“I shouldn’t have kissed you,” he said, and I recoiled. Since he was looking at his hands, he didn’t see my reaction. Which was just as well, because I’m sure I was turning even redder than I’d been already, and my eyes might have been getting a little shiny.

Luke regretted kissing me. So much for Marlene’s story of unrequited love. It shouldn’t hurt so much, not compared to everything else I’d been through lately, but the pain of rejection took my breath away. How stupid and naïve had I been to think he’d want me after he’d had Piper?

“I didn’t mean to make things all awkward and complicated between us,” Luke continued, and he finally turned his head to look at me. When he got a glance at my face, his eyes went wide with alarm. He reached out and took my hand, which was clenched into a white-knuckled fist as I tried to reel in all my raging emotions. I couldn’t have forced a word out of my throat if I’d tried.

“Shit,” Luke said. “I’m screwing things up again.” I shook my head in denial. “Yes I am,” he said, squeezing my hand. Then he took a deep breath. “I’m sorry I made things awkward. I assumed that was because I kissed you and it made you uncomfortable. I’m not actually sorry I kissed you.”

“You’re not?” I asked in a breathless whisper. A fragile hint of hope sparked in my chest. Hope had been in short supply lately, and I hardly dared allow it into my life.

Luke reached up and brushed the fingers of his free hand down my cheek. “Not if you’re not.”

My throat was still all tight and achy. I swallowed hard to try to push the lump down and moved a little closer to him on the couch so I could let him know without words how not sorry I was.

He leaned into me, eyes locked with mine. My heart did a happy little skip. I’d gone from gloomy to giddy in no time flat. When his lips brushed tentatively across mine, all coherent thought fled my mind, replaced by sensation and awareness.

There was tension in that first kiss, as if he couldn’t quite believe that I had no objection, but the little sigh that escaped my lips clued him in fast enough. He gathered me into his arms, holding me close, sharing the delicious warmth of his body as he deepened the kiss. It felt so good it left my senses reeling, as every nerve in my body came tingling to life all at once.

The rest of the world ceased to exist. All the pain, all the fear, all the stress—they all fell away as I lost myself in the press of his lips, the stroke of his tongue, the caress of his hands. I had wanted this for so long, dreamed about this for so long, but had never really believed it would happen.

Hope crept around the barriers I had built to protect myself. Hope that maybe, somehow, things weren’t as awful as they seemed, that my capacity for happiness hadn’t been completely destroyed. Hope that there was a future, one that was infinitely brighter than the miserable present.

Bob interrupted our kiss before it had a chance to get