Second Kiss Page 4

  “Hey!” I squeaked, jumping. I’d been messing with the pillows on the couch because I was an idiot and not a grown-ass woman.

  “So . . .” she said, drawing out the word. We’d been saying that a lot tonight.

  “So you can sleep here or . . . I mean, I don’t want to put any pressure on you. We’re both adults.” I sure wasn’t behaving like one.

  She looked at me, looked at the couch and then back toward my bedroom.

  “I mean, we’ve slept in the same bed before. Hundreds of times. I don’t know why this would be any different.” Right. Okay. We were doing this. I didn’t say anything as we walked back to my bedroom. I couldn’t stop watching her as I pulled down the blankets. I knew what side she slept on, so I let her take it. I didn’t care where I slept. My bed was a queen, so there was a possibility of us sharing it and not having any physical contact.

  She got in and then I did. We were both on our backs and staring up at the ceiling.

  “This is kind of awkward,” she said after a few moments and I busted out laughing.

  “Yeahhhhh.” I turned onto my side and she mirrored me so we faced each other.

  “I feel like your mom should be telling us to settle down and go to sleep,” she whispered. The lights were still on, but a hush had settled over us.

  “I know. It’s . . . strange.” Molly was staring at my mouth.

  “Stop that,” I said, nudging her shoulder.

  “What?”

  “Staring at my mouth. It makes me think about kissing and then kissing makes me think about other things.” Our eyes locked.

  “Would that be so bad?” she whispered.

  No. It wouldn’t be bad in the slightest. But I definitely didn’t think that was something we needed to be doing right now. I didn’t want to fuck this up by fucking her.

  “What are we doing?” I asked. I hated shattering whatever we had going on, but I didn’t do well with uncertainty when it came to relationships. I liked to know what was happening and what we were. I liked definitions.

  “I’m not really sure. I’m still in awe that you wanted to kiss me back, so I’m kind of just going with it. I haven’t analyzed it in my head like you’re doing right now.” I rolled my eyes and she stuck her tongue out at me.

  “Don’t get sassy with me. I know a lot of secrets.” It was true that most of the secrets I knew were things from childhood, but those had the potential to make you the most mortified when revealed.

  “Shit, that’s right, you do. But I know a lot of yours, so there.” I bopped her on the nose and she squealed.

  “Hey!” A moment later she grabbed a pillow and smacked me with it. Not to be outdone, I did the same and then it was an all-out war until I was on top of her and she had her hands up and was begging me to stop through tears of laughter.

  “Oh my God, we are such a cliché right now,” I said, looking down at her. She wiped her eyes and the mood changed to something else entirely. Molly pushed herself upward and took the pillow out of my hands.

  “Come here,” she said, reaching for my face. After a second of hesitation, I leaned down and met her mouth and then it was back to kissing and I didn’t ever want to do anything else. Who needed food? Who needed air? All I needed was her mouth and her tongue and the feel of her under me.

  Before I knew what was happening, she’d grabbed my hips and was thrusting upward into me and I was meeting her and the kissing became a little harder. These sweet little moans escaped from her mouth and I thought I was going to come just from her noises. I wasn’t too quiet myself.

  “Fuck,” she said. Even though we both had shorts and panties on, it was mind-blowing. I shifted so one of my legs was on the inside of hers, and one was on the outside, so we could line everything up.

  “More,” I said, moving just a little bit so she was hitting the right spot with her thrusts. She complied and I almost wanted to cry because she felt so good and I hadn’t been with anyone like this in so long. Maybe ever. I opened my eyes at the exact moment she came and shuddered under me and that drove me over the edge. I tried not to collapse on her and rolled to the side. Both of us were sweaty and panting.

  “Holy fucking shit,” she said, and turned to grin at me.

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “Oops?” she said and we started laughing again. “I think I need another shower.” I nodded because I did too.

  “You can go first this time,” she said. “I still need a minute.” I propped myself on my side and looked at her.

  “You’re really beautiful, you know.” Her already-flushed cheeks got redder.

  “So are you. I couldn’t believe it when I first saw you.” She brushed some of my hair behind my ear.

  “Shower,” I said, because things had gotten intense and I needed some time to unpack it. Before I went to the bathroom, I grabbed her a second set of shorts and a t-shirt.

  “Shit,” I said as the hot water of the shower tumbled down on my head. I hadn’t meant for that to happen and now things were going to get even more complicated. There was definitely not a good chance of us continuing with just a friendship now. We’d sort of burned that bridge. So now what? Were we going to start dating? So much had happened so fast and I was just reeling. I stayed in the shower longer than I should have, and only got out when I realized I needed to save her some hot water. I got out, got dressed again, and went back into the bedroom. She was on her phone, scrolling through an article.

  “Hey,” she said with a smile.

  “All yours.”

  “Thanks,” she said, pausing to give me a kiss as she walked by. I tried not to check out her ass, but completely failed on that front. While she was gone, I continued to fret.

  “That’s not a good face,” she said when she came back. “Tell me what you’re thinking.” She flopped down on the bed.

  “This is a lot happening really fast. I mean, a few hours ago I didn’t even know you liked girls, and here we are and it’s just a lot.” She nodded and reached out.

  “It’s okay. This doesn’t have to mean anything.” I shook my head.

  “It already does. In the absence of a time machine, I just kissed the shit out of you and we both came. I can’t undo that.” Her fingers stroked my arm, raising goosebumps.

  “I don’t want to,” she said.

  “Me neither. I just don’t know what to do about it. We’re clearly something more than friends at this point. Seeing as how most friends don’t want to take their other friend’s clothes off.” She snorted.

  “Yeah, I definitely want something more than that. But why do we have to stick a label on it right this minute? We can see how things go. There’s no shame in that.” It wasn’t the shame factor, I just couldn’t explain it. The only thing worse than being in relationship limbo would be cutting this off altogether, so I just reached out and squeezed her hand.

  “Okay.”

  “Okay?” I pressed my lips to hers.

  “Okay.”

  Five

  I woke the next morning with Molly’s arms wrapped around me. I was actually a little hot and the minute I moved away from her, she opened her eyes and looked at me.

  “Hey.” She smiled sleepily at me and I couldn’t resist the urge to kiss her, so I didn’t.

  “Hey.” I grabbed my phone as she blinked and stretched. It was still early; we hadn’t slept that long, but I wasn’t worn out. I had a scheduled day off, so I’d planned on sleeping in and watching movies all day, but now that Molly was here, I had other plans.

  “Do you need to go?” I asked, and hated how whiny I sounded.

  “Um, I need a change of clothes, but other than that, I can take a day.” I felt my face light up.

  “Really?”

  “Yup.”

  I hopped out of bed.

  “Don’t move,” I told her.

  “Sure thing,” she said, rolling onto my side of the bed and closing her eyes again.

  Rushing out to the kitchen, I set up a tray with tea,
some ricotta-filled croissants, a few lemon poppy-seed scones, and a cinnamon swirl muffin. One of the upsides of being a baker was that I always had fresh baked goods in my house that were leftover from the café. I also brewed some strong coffee.

  “That is the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen,” she said when I walked back into the bedroom with the tray.

  “I’ll take that as a compliment.” She went for the coffee and moaned as she smelled it.

  “I definitely meant it that way.” I went for the tea, pouring in some honey and stirring it up.

  We both sat cross-legged on my bed and demolished the tray. Neither of us had eaten much last night so we were both starving.

  “I always knew you were going to be a baker,” Molly said through a mouthful of scone.

  “Really? I didn’t.” I’d played with all kinds of career goals. I just never thought being a baker was a thing I could succeed at. I didn’t think it was a “real” job. Or something.

  “Yeah. Don’t you remember when you were making those intense cakes in the Easy Bake Oven? You like, made your own recipes and everything.” Oh, yeah. I’d almost forgotten about that. My mom had gotten me one for Christmas on a whim, and I’d used it until it literally stopped working. By that time I’d graduated to a real oven.

  “Huh.” I guess I’d never thought of it that way. Baking was such a natural part of my life, I didn’t consider it all that often.

  “Yeah, I always knew that’s what you would do.” I couldn’t stop from kissing her again. Sweet Molly with rumpled hair and puffy eyes and she was still the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen.

  “What made you get into PR?” I asked and she started telling me about the parts of her life I’d missed. How she went to college not knowing what she wanted to do, got a degree in Communications and sort of fell into it.

  “I guess I’m really good at getting people to click on things. And it’s creative. I get to design campaigns and track numbers and all that little weird stuff that for some reason I love.” I laughed. She’d always been more into math when we were kids. She’d always done that homework first and I’d often talked her into doing mine for me.

  “That’s amazing,” I said, and I meant it. I was also wondering if maybe she’d give Sal some ideas how the café could up their online presence. It wasn’t great, but no one really wanted to deal with it.

  “And I get to stay home and work in my pajamas, so who’s the winner here?” she said with a laugh.

  “You. Definitely you.” I let her have the last bite of the muffin and then we lay back in bed and talked. About our in-between lives. About funny college stories and mishaps and relationships. It was going to take us a long time to catch up on those eight years.

  “I missed you,” she said, smoothing out a crease in the blankets. “So much. But it had been so long and it was almost like I’d built up this story in my head that you had moved on and didn’t want to talk to me anymore. How dumb is that?” Not that dumb, because I’d basically done the same thing.

  “I missed you. A lot.” I reached out and took her hand and kissed the back of it. Like we were in a movie. She sighed.

  “But now I’m back and I don’t have any plans to go anywhere.”

  “Good. Because I don’t want you to.” I’d just gotten her back. She leaned toward me and I gathered her up in my arms in a hug.

  “What do you want to do today?” I asked and she looked up at me.

  “You?”

  I laughed. “Other than that. And I think we should cool it on the sex for a little while. Until we figure out what the fuck we’re actually doing.” Her lips formed the cutest pout that probably would have helped her get out of a murder charge.

  “Fine,” she said. “But that means I get to tease you a lot.” What the fuck had I gotten myself into? I remembered all her exact ticklish spots, so I stuck my fingers under her arm and she squealed and tried to get away.

  “No fair!” she yelled.

  “Totally fair,” I said.

  She rolled over onto her back and I wanted so much to straddle her and then lick her neck and kiss my way down her body until I set up camp between her legs. Seriously, going down on a girl was one of my most-favorite things in the world. I would devote a significant portion of my day to it if I could.

  “Stop looking at me like that,” she groaned and flipped over onto her stomach. Well, I could go down on her like this too . . .

  I needed to stop thinking about that.

  “Like what,” I said, getting on my stomach and sliding up so I was next to her.

  “Looking at me like you’re picturing me naked. It makes the whole ‘hands-off’ thing a lot harder.”

  “That’s what she said.” She shoved me away.

  “You’re terrible.”

  “Yes, I am,” I said, nodding. “So. Do you want to go to your house so you can change and then maybe come back here?” She sat up and nodded.

  “Sounds good.” After that, I didn’t know, but we definitely needed to get out of bed. It was just too easy to think about pulling her underwear off with my teeth and then fucking her all day.

  *^*^*

  In the end, I rode in Molly’s car back to her place.

  “Swanky,” I said. She lived in a brand-new building on the nicer side of town that was almost within walking distance from the café.

  “It’s temporary,” she said as we got out of the car. “I actually hate it. So sterile. But I needed a place in a hurry and this was available.” She squinted at the modern façade with its concrete and rows of windows. It looked almost like a weird office building.

  “Anyway.” She got out her keys and I followed her up the stairs to her unit.

  “This is it. I left most everything behind, so it’s a little bare.” That was putting it mildly. She didn’t even have a couch. There were a few chairs, some boxes and a small table in the main room. The kitchen was spotless and stainless steel. Gross. I hated the modern look. So cold.

  “It’s a place to crash.” She said it like an apology as she walked back to the bedroom. The place was smaller than mine. The rooms were so small that it would almost have been better as a studio.

  “I’ll just be a second!” she called from the bedroom as she shut the door. “Make yourself comfortable. If you can.”

  Okay then. I sat down on one of the chairs and looked around. There were stacks of boxes and I did a little snooping. A lot of them had books, others had clothes and other miscellaneous items. I found a few framed pictures of Molly and her brother. I had always liked him. I wondered if he’d come visit her here. I’d love to see him and I was sure she missed him too.

  “Back!” Molly emerged in another maxi dress, blue this time. It made her eyes pop.

  “Damn,” I said, standing up. She grinned and slowly twirled for me.

  “You look really good.” I walked over to her and gave her a kiss. As easy as that.

  “Thanks. You don’t look so bad yourself.” I’d worn something a little nicer than my everyday baking clothes. I mean, I wanted to look good for her.

  “You look really sexy,” I said and she blushed. “I almost don’t want to take you anywhere.” Well, anywhere besides the bedroom.

  She rolled her eyes and took my hand.

  “Come on. If we stay here much longer, I’m not going to be able to handle it.” We headed out the door and she kept her hand in mine. Our fingers linked perfectly, just as they had when we were younger.

  “We fit,” I said, looking down.

  “We do.” Molly swung our joined hands, another thing we used to do when we were kids.

  Before I got into the passenger seat, I pushed her up against the car and kissed her.

  “I thought we were cooling things down,” she said when our lips parted.

  “Kissing isn’t sex,” I said, grinning.

  “Kissing can lead to sex. And kissing can be just as intimate as sex.” Molly brushed her thumb across my bottom lip and sparks lit me up from the
inside.

  “Mmmm, yes it can.” She made a sound of frustration. I laughed and finally let her get in the car. I was a little wobbly on my own feet and grateful to sit down.

  “Where to?” Molly said, turning to me.

  “I don’t know. Normally when I have a day off, I’m alone and I just watch a bunch of TV and don’t get out of my pajamas. So I’m already ahead of the game.” She snorted.

  “Okay, I have some ideas.” Good, because I didn’t. All I wanted was to spend the day with her and see what would happen. It had been less than a few days since she had walked back into my life, and it was almost as if no time had passed. Granted, we were older, but we fell into our old patterns and it was like sliding into the most comfortable pair of shoes, but that were also the prettiest shoes you’d ever seen. The best of both words. Both comfortable and exciting.

  Molly and I arrived at someplace I didn’t think she would bring me. Our elementary school.

  “And we’re here because . . .” I said, trailing off.

  “Because why not? Come on.” She got out of the car and dashed for the playground and I followed along behind. It was summer vacation, so we didn’t have to worry about anyone calling the cops on us for being the weirdos lurking around the playground. Molly went for the swings first, which made me grin because it was just like when we were kids.

  “Push me,” she said, getting herself going. I stood behind her and pushed her and she begged me to go higher and higher. My arms got tired and I took the swing next to her and she slowed herself down until we were gently swinging together.

  “I can’t believe I’m here with you right now,” I said, shaking my head.

  “Why not?”

  “Because I never thought I was going to see you again. I actually found some pictures of us a few weeks ago when I was going through stuff at Mom’s. I got pissed and shoved them back in the box. But now I’m thinking I should get them out again.” My mom had stockpiled photos of my childhood because that was just the way she was. Molly was in at least a third of them.

  “I’m sorry. I’m still sorry. I’m going to be sorry for a long time,” she said, slowing her swing and kicking her feet in the dirt.