An Optimist's Guide to Heartbreak (Heartsong #1)(73)

Finally, I inch away, gazing up at the lust-laced look in his eyes. “Want to get some air?” I nod my head to the glass double doors that lead out onto a terrace.

“Sure.”

He takes my hand and grabs his coat, and we weave through the thrashing bodies to find our reprieve on the other side of the doors. A few guests are bundled up, puffing on cigarettes and laughing through the smoke, so we make our way farther into the night, away from the ballroom. The reception is being held in a botanic garden, and there’s a trail leading to landscaped gardens of dahlias and winterizing roses. The snow has mostly melted, but patches of white are still sprinkled into dirt and green grass.

The temperature has warmed to the upper forties, but I forgot my jacket inside, and my body shivers against the cold.

Cal notices and starts pulling off his coat. “You’re freezing.” Wrapping me in the warm leather, he brushes his hands up and down my arms to subdue the chill. “Why did you want to come out here?”

He asks it like he’s fishing for more because he knows it’s more.

He wants to know the real reason I wanted to get him alone.

I stumble over my truth as we stand idle among the winter blooms, not a soul in sight. Glancing up at the night sky twinkling with stars, I let out a breath. “It’s peaceful out here.”

“Yeah,” he nods, still warming me through the jacket with his touch. “It is.”

I swallow. “You really have those jingle bells on the door because of me?”

“Yes.” His jaw clenches, eyes skimming my reaction. “You think I forgot about you, but I never did. I never intended to.”

“Why…why didn’t you look for me?”

“I did. One time.” Grinding his teeth together, he bends to rest his forehead against mine. “The day I got my driver’s license, I drove up to your old house, but you’d already moved. I took it as a sign to leave the past in the past,” he says gravely. “Besides…I knew this would happen.”

“Knew what?” I probe, voice shaky.

“You know what.”

He says it like it would be a devastating thing—and he’s right, I reckon. Only, he doesn’t know why he’s right. Cal has no practical reason to be scared of this.

I pull back, knowing I have to tell him the truth.

I have to tell him everything before we take this any further.

My speech is unplanned, a mess of words and sad confessions jumbled in my mind, and I need a minute to think it through. It has to be right. It has to be careful and gentle and right.

I turn away from him to gather my thoughts.

And that’s when his fingers snake around my wrist, tugging me back to him. In a single, furious heartbeat, I’m pulled against his chest as his hands reach out to cup both sides of my face.

He bends down, opens my mouth with his, and slides his tongue inside.

Instantly, I moan.

His tongue is inside me, trespassing on my confession until it flees from my lips.

He’s kissing me.

Kissing me.

It’s nothing like our first kiss, so innocent and tame.

This is all tongue and heat and pure need.

The tinderbox inside of me, once filled with flint and twigs and dying leaves, has been ignited. I’m a firestorm, a sea of flames.

I reach out and latch onto his shoulders to steady myself. One of his hands moves to cradle the back of my head, fingers fisting my hair and scraping my scalp. He groans into my mouth, tongue plunging in and out of me, desperate and wild. Cal twists my head to the side, angling our kiss to delve deeper. My own tongue meets his thrusts like I’ve done it a thousand times before, skimming across the roof of his mouth and pulling more groans out of him.

He walks me backward. Stumbling over my feet, he keeps me upright, wrapping an arm behind my back, not breaking the kiss. I’m pressed up against a trellis, his hard erection digging into my belly. It sends a rush of moisture to my underwear, and I grind into him on instinct.

“Fuck,” he rasps, pulling back and breathing heavily. His hand is still in my hair, squeezing and tugging. “Fuck, Lucy.”

“Cal…” I arc against him, aching to relieve the pressure between my legs. My skin is flushed and hot, my heartbeats thundering. I hold him tight, my head tipped back against the wood trellis.

“I know you’re a virgin, I know you’re scared, but I know you want this as much as I do.” He kisses me again, pulling my bottom lip between his teeth until I mewl. “It’s all I can think about.”

I nod, light-headed. The juncture between my thighs heats and throbs as if his mouth is already on me.

“I’ll get us a hotel room,” he husks, mouth trailing to my neck. “Tonight. Right now. Privacy, cool sheets, champagne. I promise I’ll make it so fucking good for you.”

Desire sluices me, and I can hardly function enough to remain standing. Cal drags a hand down my body, squeezing my hip, then moves it lower. Before I even know what’s happening, his fingers are inching up my dress, grazing along my inner thigh.

“I’m dying to touch you,” he says, his lips resting against my mouth. We pant in time with each other, sharp wisps of breaths warming and wanting. “I’m desperate to feel what I’m doing to you.”

I nod again because I can’t find words. My vocal cords have withered away to ash.