Crystal Cove (Friday Harbor #4)(27)

Neither of them were.

Ten

For the rest of dinner, Justine felt way more intoxicated than two glasses of wine would have justified. The conversation had assumed its own momentum, flowing without effort. They had similar taste in music—Death Cab for Cutie, The Black Keys, Lenny Kravitz. Jason tried to explain Japanese anime as an art form, the stylistic exaggerations, the linear quality derived from Japanese calligraphy. She agreed to watch Howl’s Moving Castle with an open mind.

Some men were so good-looking that they didn’t have to be sexy. Some men were so sexy they didn’t have to be good-looking. For this man to be both was proof that life was essentially unfair. He was one of nature’s randomly created genetic lottery winners.

No one would blame me if I slept with him. That beautiful face, those hands … I wouldn’t even blame me.

They shared a dish of orange-ginger sorbet, crisp and tart against her tongue. It dissolved instantly in her hot mouth.

I want to kiss him, she thought, staring helplessly at the firm contours of his lips.

Trying to distract herself, she asked more questions about his family, his mother, and he answered obligingly. Her name had been Amaya, which meant “night rain” in Japanese. She had been kind but cool-natured. She had kept the house clean and organized and there had always been cut flowers in a vase on the table.

I want to lie on a bed with him and feel his hands on me. I want to feel him everywhere. I want his breath on my skin.

“Were your parents ever in love?” she heard herself ask. “Did it at least start out that way?”

Jason shook his head. “My father had the idea that marrying a half-Japanese woman meant he would have an obedient wife. Instead he ended up with an unhappy one.”

I want to feel him move inside me and see the pleasure on his face. I want him to tease me until I beg for more.

“Why did she marry him?”

“I think it came down to a question of timing. She was lonely, and he asked. So she settled.”

“I would never do that,” Justine said.

“You haven’t been as lonely as she was. She was an outsider. Most of her family was in Japan—”

“I’ve been exactly that lonely. You’re not connected to anything. Some nights it feels like you’re dying by the hour. You’re so desperate you can’t even attract the kind of person you once swore you’d never settle for. So you stay busy working, and you take magazine personality quizzes, and you try not to hate couples who wear stupid coordinating shirts and look happy just to stand together in the checkout line—”

She stopped abruptly, blinking, as Jason took one of her hands in both of his. He stared at her steadily, his thumb circling into her palm, which had turned acutely sensitive, nerves prickling at the thin-skinned center.

Her voice had risen, she realized with a stab of sick horror. She’d been talking too loudly in this tiny restaurant. Ranting. About loneliness.

Spirits, please kill me now.

Humiliation like this could not be endured. She would have to leave the country and change her name. Self-deportation was the only answer.

“I usually do better than this on a first date,” she whispered.

“It’s okay,” he said gently. “Whatever you do, or say, or feel. It’s all okay.”

Justine could only stare at him. Whatever she did was okay? What kind of man said something like that? Was there a chance he actually meant it?

Jason had already paid the check. Standing, he helped her up, pulling back her chair efficiently.

They went outside. The sky was cloudy and milk-pail gray, the air filled with mist that tasted like sea spray. The blare of the arriving ten o’clock ferry coursed along the street, reverberating against darkened shop doors and quiet buildings.

The serrated caw of a crow scraped along Justine’s nerves. She saw the flap of raggedy black wings as the bird flew away from its perch on the restaurant roof. A bad omen.

Jason took her elbow and drew her to the side of the building, his movements slow and deliberate.

She drew in a quick breath as his arms went around her. Shadows surrounded them in stone-scented coolness, fine gravel excoriating the thin soles of her sandals. She was briefly disoriented by the darkness. One of his hands slid behind the nape of her neck in an electrifying grip. His other hand went to her back, pulling her against his unyielding body. The wool of his sports coat, the scent of his skin and plain white soap, mingled in a clean and intoxicating fragrance.

His head bent, his mouth finding hers with searing pressure. She gasped, and he went after the hushed sound as if he could taste it, his mouth stroking over hers. Kisses easy and slow, melting heat wrapped in coolness.

He stroked a wisp of hair that had slipped from her ponytail, gently tucking it behind her ear, and his mouth went to her exposed neck. So gentle, as if her skin were as delicate as jasmine petals. He found a tender pulse point, and she shivered and arched against him. Pleasure pooled low in her stomach and the tips of her br**sts and between her thighs.

Shaking too hard to support her own weight, Justine leaned against him. His arm braced her back, reinforcing her balance. His lips shaped hers, pressing them apart. He tasted like oranges, sweetness on his tongue. Some of her breaths broke into moans, and she tried to swallow them back, tried to make herself be quiet.

Harder, deeper kisses, slowly ravishing until she couldn’t breathe or think, all she could do was feel, her body absorbing sensation, brimming with it. She didn’t know how many aching minutes had passed before Jason eased back. His mouth was slow to leave hers, stealing back for another brief nudge of a kiss, then grazing her cheek as if he couldn’t stop tasting her.