No Kissing Allowed (No Kissing Allowed #1)(22)

“Everyone all right?” one of them asked.

We both nodded and thanked them, then I rushed for the door, eager to get outside. I closed my eyes as soon as the chilly night air crossed my face and drew a long, long breath. Air. I wanted to cry it felt so good, then I heard the sound of someone chuckling and peered over.

“And so the laughing begins. I knew it’d come eventually.”

He smiled. “Sorry. You just look like you’ve won the lottery.”

“I did. The oxygen lottery.”

“Do you want me to get you a cab?”

This time I laughed. “Another small space? No, thank you. I’m walking.”

Aidan considered me, then the street. “Then I’m walking with you.”

“Aidan, that’s not—”

“I’m walking with you.”

“All right,” I said, unable to keep from smiling. “Fine.”

We set off down the sidewalk, the air seeming to cool down with each passing moment. I loved the city in early fall, how all my favorite holidays were right around the corner—Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas. I absolutely loved the city at Christmas.

“Why do you look so happy?” Aidan asked after a few blocks of walking in silence.

“I love the city, especially this time of year. It’s weird, really. My parents are very big on Southern pride, but it never really stuck for me. I remember getting excited when I was little when my parents would tell me we were going on vacation. My dad, my real dad, used to take us all over, but it was like once he died, my mom refused to step foot on a plane and hated being in the car for too long. Some of my friends were going to the Grand Canyon or on a cruise or Disney World. Me? Every year we went one of two places—Panama City or Chattanooga.”

“So that’s why you came here? To get away from the small-town life?”

I bit my lip, considering the question. “I think I went to NYU to prove that I could. I wasn’t some small-town girl, afraid of the city. My mom cried when I told her I’d been accepted, and at first, I thought they were happy tears, but then I realized she wasn’t happy for me. She was sad. To this day, moving here was the most disappointing thing I’ve ever done, in my mom’s eyes.”

We reached the outside of my apartment building, and I turned to look at him, confused at how I’d once again revealed so much of myself to him. “How do you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Get me to tell you things I never tell anyone. Things I refuse to admit even to myself.”

He tilted his head, his gaze penetrating, warming me with that simple look. “I could ask you the same question.”

We stared at each other, lost in a moment we shouldn’t be having, but I couldn’t make myself go inside; I couldn’t make myself turn away.

Aidan hesitated, then said, “I can walk you to your door if you’d like? Ride on the elevator so you’re not alone.”

“I think it’s safe to say my love affair with the elevator has come to an end. It’s the stairs and me from now on. Two peas in a pod.”

He smiled. “Well then, I’ll just—”

“But I’d still like you to walk me to my door.”

His gaze drifted down the sidewalk, watching as people went by, and I wasn’t sure whether he was checking to see if anyone we knew was around or if he was trying to convince himself to leave. Or convince himself to stay. I prayed for the latter, and then immediately felt like crap. This was my first real job, my first opportunity to prove myself, and here I was risking everything over a guy who didn’t date. But right now, standing on the sidewalk, the small trees planted outside my building whipping around in the wind, a cloudy night sky above, all I wanted to do was take this chance.

“It’s just a walk,” I said.

“You know it’s more than that.”

I brushed a loose strand of hair from my face, and Aidan watched me tuck it behind my ear like he wished it were his fingertips touching me instead of my own. “So, what are you going to do?”

He took a slow step toward me, invading my personal space, swarming my senses. “I’m going to walk you to your door.”

His words repeated in my mind as we slipped into my building—you know it’s more than that—coiling around and around as we ascended the stairs to the second floor, where I’d insisted Lauren and I live because our building didn’t have apartments on the first floor. My heart picked up speed as we passed door after door, my nerves telling me this was wrong, I should thank him and end it there, but I knew I wouldn’t. I’d let this go as far as he would take it.

Dear God, let him take it all the way.

I slowed to a stop just before my door and turned to him, unsure if I should invite him inside or say our good-byes now, but then his eyes met mine and he took that delicious step of his. “Why can’t I stay away from you?” My breathing slowed as he leaned into my ear. “Your smell, the memory of your warm body under me. It’s all I can do to remain still when I’m around you.” He pulled away a fraction of an inch, his gaze dropping to my lips. “Ask me to stop. Tell me you don’t want this.”

“I can’t.”

“I was afraid you’d say that.”

And then his lips were on mine, one hand behind my head and the other pressed against the small of my back, securing me to him. My fingers threaded into his hair, and he moaned lightly into my mouth, making my body quake with need. I fumbled for my door handle and pushed it open, refusing to break the connection between us, but then the sound of loud talking, following by a sharp hush, had Aidan pulling away, his eyes going wide as we took in the scene in my living room. Lauren and Grace and two girls from Lauren’s office.