Three Wishes(60)

“I’m going to kiss you,” Nate answered.

“You are not!” she snapped, her voice filled with surprise and anger.

“Yes,” he stated implacably, “I am.”

His hand went up further, slid along her neck into her soft hair to hold the back of her head. Her body came into contact with his, her br**sts brushing his chest, her h*ps a whisper away and he fought the urge to crush her against him.

“Take your hands off me!” she cried.

He dipped his head and brushed his lips against hers.

“No.”

Still struggling, she demanded, “Let me go!”

Against her lips, he said, “This time, Lily, I’m not letting you go.”

And then he kissed her. The minute his lips pressed against hers she froze in his arms not trying to struggle but keeping her body perfectly rigid.

His lips coaxed and teased but she didn’t react. She stayed still and motionless and entirely unresponsive.

Nate wasn’t buying it and he wasn’t giving up.

He ran his tongue across her lower lip but her lips didn’t budge.

“Open your mouth,” he demanded boldly.

She shook her head, her hair sliding against his arm.

His other arm tightened at her waist bringing her into full contact with his frame.

“Lily, open your sweet mouth. Let me taste you again.”

She made another noise in the back of her throat, this guttural with some emotion he could not decipher. He decided to take this as a good sign.

“No?” he asked softly, his lips still on hers.

She didn’t move.

Undeterred, he tried another tactic.

He slid his mouth across her cheek to her ear.

“Do you know,” he murmured in her ear, kissed her there and he felt her still body turn rock solid, “that I remember everything. I have this… ability,” he flicked his tongue against her earlobe, “and I never forget anything.”

She kept her body completely controlled. One hand was flattened against his chest pressed between them. Her other hand was at his waist putting pressure there to push him away.

He moved to rest his forehead against hers, his nose along hers and his hand slid from the back of her head to cup her jaw, his thumb stroking her cheekbone.

“I remember everything about you,” he told her, looking into her eyes, those remarkable eyes hadn’t changed, hadn’t faded, with their pale blue irises ringed in midnight. “All these years they would torment me, those memories. The sound of your voice, your laughter, the sight of your smile, the feel of you pressed against me while you slept.”

She shook her head, her forehead rolling against his, both of her hands pushing against his chest now to get away. Her eyes were filled with fear.

Nate kept going. “I thought I lost you but I never forgot, couldn’t forget. You were so sweet, incredibly sweet. The taste of your mouth, the taste of you between your legs, your hands on me, your mouth on me, the feel of you underneath me tightening around me when you came.”

Her lips parted, in shock at his words, he knew.

And he didn’t care.

“That’s it,” he whispered encouragingly and he kissed her again, his tongue sliding inside.

She fought for a second then she gave in with a soft moan. He felt a searing of triumph as her hand at his chest slid up and around his neck, her other arm went around his waist and she held him fiercely there as if she’d never let him go. Her head tilted one way and Nate’s slanted the other and her tongue touched his.

And she tasted exactly as sweet as he remembered.

Sweeter.

He deepened the kiss as she leaned forward and fit her body into his just as she used to, wriggling to get closer, press deeper, like she wanted to be absorbed. His arm tightened at her waist as his hand did the same at her jaw, holding her head tilted to his. He felt his body harden with need, eight years of need as eight years of yearning filled the kiss, surged through his frame, heating his blood to that familiar fever that he never felt for anyone else. A fever that was only for Lily.

He groaned into her mouth and she shivered as she accepted it, her hand sliding into his hair to hold his head to hers.

The kiss was desperate and wild with eight years of longing and he was completely lost in her.

But she was not lost in him.

The kiss had proved to him that nothing had changed in Lily, except one thing.

She was a mother.

With mother’s ears and a keen mother’s sense.

She tore her lips from his and turned half-stunned, half-passion-filled eyes to the door.

Slowly, Nate followed her gaze.

And in the doorway stood Natasha staring at them with wide-eyed wonder.

Then Natasha’s face split into an exquisite, gleeful smile and the little girl broke into a run.

Before Lily could disengage from his arms, Natasha slammed into them, throwing her arms around both their waists and burying her face in the spare space between them.

That moment for Nate, who had never had such a moment in his entire life, was so profound it nearly brought him to his knees.

But he had to remain standing to support Lily and Natasha who were both leaning into his body and his arms.

The hand Nate had at Lily’s face dropped to the back of his daughter’s neck.

Lily’s head lifted from her sober contemplation of Natasha, the girl still pressed at their sides. He noted, when he looked in Lily’s startling blue eyes, she’d had time to get herself under control.