Page 55 of Beauty and the Beach
“Youwere jealous,” I realize, my eyes wide.
“You wish, Amsterdam,” he says with a snort. But he breaks our eye contact, and the words are too casual to be convincing.
“You were,” I say again, my certainty growing. “You’ve been watching me. You’re jealous.” Something like triumph rises in my chest, and my lips pull into a smile of my own.
“Absolutely not.”
“Really?” I say, leaning closer to him, close enough that I can smell leather and mahogany over the scent of the bonfires. “So if I asked Briggs to dance, you’d have no problem with it?”
“Of course not,” he says, scoffing.
“Mmm-hm. And if I hugged him, you’d be fine?”
He rolls his eyes. “Friends hug all the time.”
I nod slowly. Then—I don’t know why I do it. I really don’t. It’s stupid and impulsive.
But the next thing I know, I’m rising up on my tiptoes, steadying myself with my hands on his shoulders. His grip finds my waist, probably instinctively—because the look on his face tells me he’s not paying attention to his hands right now.
His eyes flare wide, his lips part, and those are the last things I see before I lean in and kiss him.
The lightest touch of my lips to his, and I don’t stay for longer than a second, but it’s enough to set off a pleasant fizziness in my stomach.
“What about if I kissed him like that?” I say when I lean back. I don’t let go of him, and I don’t stand down from my tiptoes.
Phoenix’s hands on my waist tighten, and he glares at me,his eyes full of fire as he speaks. “You could kiss fifty men like that, Amsterdam, and I still wouldn’t be jealous.”
I kiss him again—firmly this time, and longer, my lips against his, hunting for the answers I want, because he doesn’t respondat all…
Until he does.
A low sound leaves him as his lips come to life, moving suddenly, slanting impatiently over mine as his fingers dig into my sides. I don’t even notice the pain, because this kiss is telling me something—something I can’t quite grasp no matter how desperately my lips chase his.
He’s there for three seconds, and then he’s gone—his mouth rips away from mine, and when I lean away, he’s already shaking his head.
“No,” he says, his chest rising and falling rapidly, his eyes locked on my lips. “Still wouldn’t be jealous.”
“Liar,” I say, just as short of breath as he is.
The word is barely out of my mouth before he’s back. He comes as close as he possibly can without actually kissing me, and even though he doesn’t speak again, I can feel the debate raging inside of him; his lips hover so close to mine that I can feel their heat, feel every breath, feel every rise and fall of his chest. His hands slide from my waist to my back, but he doesn’t close that last bit of space.
When I speak again, it’s so soft that I question whether he can even hear. “And if I wore a silk nightgown and spooned with him in a honeymoon suite on a bed covered in rose petals?” I say.
“That would fall firmly under theextramarital relationshipcategory, so try it and see what happens,” he whispers against my lips, the words clipped.
“Admit that you’re jealous,” I whisper back. Somehow myarms have wound around his neck, and his arms have snaked all the way around my waist. When did that happen?
Phoenix’s black eyes glitter with challenge as he looks down at me. “You first,” he says.
I swallow, and I can’t stop my gaze from darting over his features. Fire light does great things for his bone structure.
“I was jealous,” I finally say, so quietly I can barely hear myself. Then I go on. “It’s because you’ve been saying all that stuff about smiling at each other. You got in my head,” I finish, accusation in my voice.
“I got in my own head, too.” His words are reluctant, but when he goes on, his voice gets stronger. “Smile at whoever you want. But you will kiss no one else, in any way, while we’re married?—”
“No oneelse?As in…only you?”
His cheeks flush.
