The genuine interest in his voice pulled me in even more. Emotionally and physically. My hand found his abs, fingers curling in his shirt. “I was twelve when I first discovered I could make computers do whatever I wanted. It was like magic. While other kids were playing games, I was figuring out how to make them. It felt like having a superpower.”
“Still does, by the look on your face.”
I smiled. “It’s still magic for me. Though Johnson tests that at times.”
Jake’s gaze darkened. “I just need the word, darlin’.”
“I think you’re actually being serious.”
“That bother you?”
I frowned. “That you’d ‘talk’ to my co-worker?”
“No, what I am.”
“No.” The answer came instantly, surprising me with its certainty. “Should it?”
Instead of answering, he pulled me closer, his hand sliding around to my lower back while the other came to my jaw. Time suspended as his lips hovered near mine. The anticipation was exquisite torture, every molecule between us charged with electricity.
My pulse forgot how to behave. I couldn’t breathe right. I couldn’t think.
He hadn’t even kissed me yet, and already I felt ruined.
I could feel the warmth of him, close enough to taste, but our bodies still not touching. His thumb brushed my cheek, light, slow, maddening.
I swayed closer without meaning to. His grip on my lower back tightened just enough to keep me there.
My heart was a thunderstorm. Loud. Wild. Entirely his fault.
He didn’t speak. Didn’t smile. Just stared at my mouth like it was something he’d been starving for but holding himself back from.
And then, finally, he rasped, “Fuck, Eden,” and his lips were on mine in the kind of kiss that told me he was done with taking this slow.
His hand fisted in my hair.
His body crowded mine against the railing.
His mouth demanded I give him everything.
I’d never been kissed like this.
Wanted like this.
Jake wasn’t being first-date polite. He wasn’t holding back. He was pressing every part of himself into me like he couldn’t stand the space between us.
He was burning for me. With me.
And I was kissing him back like I might never be allowed to do it again.
A noise escaped me. A desperate moan. Involuntary and mortifying.
Jake groaned. Groaned. As if he liked the sound.
And then he ground himself against me, taking his time with it. Like he wanted me to feel exactly how hard he was for me.
“That noise?” he said against my lips, his voice thick with want. “Make it again.” His hand tightened in my hair, and god yes please do that again and never stop and what did he just say?
Make it again?
