gaze darted past his shoulder, taking in the spacious living room behind him, all done in soft browns and tans. The TV played ESPN but the volume was all the way down and a half-full beer sat on the coffee table. It looked comfortable and welcoming. So much of her wanted to go inside. But she hadn’t been inside another person’s house in over a year, and it felt a little like standing on the edge of a cliff with shifting soil. “I’m not sure.”
He reached out and took the casserole dish from her and set it on a table by the door. Then he held out both his palms to her. “Here, let’s try this. I won’t ask questions because it gives your mind too much time to analyze. Just listen and follow my instructions. If any of it becomes too much, you say stop and I’ll shut up. Deal?”
She nodded, not giving herself time to think about it. “Okay.”
“Now take my hands and step inside. It’s getting cold outside and it’s warm in here. I don’t want you to be cold.”
She placed her hands in his large ones, and he tugged her gently, easing her forward like a parent teaching a toddler to walk.
“Plus, I have no idea what temperature to cook this in the oven, so I need your help,” he continued.
Another step.
“And God knows we don’t want Mrs. Benson across the street gossiping about us, so we need to get where she can’t see us.” His dimple appeared.
Another step. She was inside. He bumped the door with his foot to shut it behind her. The click of it closing sounded as loud as a thunderclap in her head. Her fingers curled into his palms. “Keep talking.”
“And for the record, I’m about as far from a vegetarian as one can get. I put meat on top of my meat.”
She snorted.
“Right, good point, probably shouldn’t talk about my meat.”
Now she couldn’t stop a laugh from bubbling up. She took another step. And another. She kept her gaze on Colby and that reassuring smile of his. Wood floorboards sounded beneath her shoes, then the soft hush of an area rug.
Soon, Colby stopped moving, but her momentum carried her forward another step into his personal space. He bent and put his lips close to her ear. “Congratulations, neighbor, you’ve made it all the way to the couch without a scratch.”
She straightened and turned her head, surprised to see she was already in the middle of the living room and far from the front door. She’d only been watching him, focusing on his eyes and voice, and somehow he’d coaxed her all the way inside without her panic switch being triggered. She was in someone else’s house.
And she was okay.
“Holy shit. We did it!” Her voice was way too loud but she didn’t care.
“You did it.”
“I can’t even believe—thank you.” Victory surged in her, and without thinking, she put her hands on his shoulders and kissed him right on the lips. Smack!
He stiffened for a half second, obviously caught off guard, and she hopped back, putting her hand to her mouth. “Oh crap, I didn’t—I’m sorry.”
He smiled and tilted his head in challenge. “Are you?”
She blinked. An auto-response jumped to her lips. Retreat, retreat, retreat. But she didn’t let the cowardly words come out. She steeled herself, reaching deep for the old seeds of confidence, and held his gaze. “Okay, no, not really. I’ve kind of been wanting to do that for a while.”
“Yeah?”
She rolled her lips inward, feeling giddy for some reason—probably some combination of residual anxiety and the rush of breaking that boundary and kissing him. “Yeah.”
“Want to do it again?”
She laughed, but nerves were trying to push in. “I don’t know, I mean—”
He reached for her belt loop and tugged her gently forward, his affable expression morphing into something far more intent as he looked down at her. “Because I’d like to kiss you again. Really kiss you. But I’m not going to until you tell me it’s okay.”
She nodded, trying to swallow past the fear bubbling up. “It’s okay.”
His hazel eyes searched hers. “Remember how I told you on the walk over here that you could say stop?”
She breathed through the butterflies trying to overtake her insides. “Yes.”
He moved his hand to cup her jaw, his fingertips brushing gentle lines along her neck. The soft, simple touch had her ready to melt on contact. God. Every part of her felt so starved for touch it was as if her neurons couldn’t make sense of it. Everything firing off in all directions—want, need, fear, anticipation. His eyes traced the curves of her face. “That applies to this, too.”
With that, he lowered his head. The moment his lips touched hers she could tell that this was not going to be a quick peck like she’d given him. This was going to be so much better. Her eyelids fell shut as his mouth met hers with a gentleness that belied the intensity she’d seen in his eyes. The kiss was so tender, so softly sensual, that she thought she would die from the slow burn of the connection. Colby Wilkes, a man in no hurry. He teased her bottom lip with a playful tug and then took it between his. The tip of his tongue grazed the line of her lips, but he didn’t push or deepen the kiss yet. It was a taste, a sip of what he could give her.
Her hands went to his chest, feeling the solid muscle and a quickly beating heart beneath her palms. His T-shirt curled in her fingers and a soft sound escaped her—her starved libido begging on her behalf. Please, sir, may I have some more?
He continued to kiss her, and the hand against her hip tightened as he guided her against him, bringing her body flush with his. That was when she opened her mouth to him, inviting a deeper, more all-encompassing kiss. Like walking into a bakery after a juice fast, she wanted to gorge on all the things, taste everything he could give her. Not just a sample. But after a gentle twining of their tongues, he eased back. “I can’t tell you how long I’ve wanted to do that.”
She blinked, off balance for a second, already missing the feel of his lips, the brush of his beard against her skin. Please don’t stop. She feared if she paused, her broken brain would take over and ruin it. “You don’t have to stop.”
He smiled, that dimple flashing again, and squeezed her hip. “I do.”
“Why?” she asked, her frustration flaring.
“Because you came here to talk to me,” he said, lines of strain appearing around his eyes, proving that it wasn’t exactly easy for him to dial back either. He pushed a stray hair off her forehead. “And I know it was a difficult challenge for you to come here. So if I push you too far too fast, the panic might catch up, and we’ll do more harm than good.”
“Sounds way too logical and smart,” she declared. “I hate that.”
He chuckled and put his hands over hers, which were still clinging to his shirt. He lifted them and kissed her knuckles. “How about you tell me what I need to do with those enchiladas, then we’ll talk? If you still want me to not stop later, I promise to throw all logic out the window.”
“Deal,” she said with a smile. “And it’s twenty minutes in a three-hundred-and-fifty-degree oven, then a minute or two under the broiler at the end to brown the cheese.”
“I can handle that.” He released her and guided her down to the couch. “Sit and relax. I’ll be right back. What do you want to drink? I’ve got beer, red wine, and soda.”
“A beer would be great.”
“You got it.” He changed the station on the TV to one that played mellow contemporary music, then grabbed the dish of enchiladas and disappeared into the kitchen. The