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“When did you start wearing glasses?”
It was an awkward way to break the silence after an hour of no words being passed between them. Kate had been laser-focused on a chapter in her thermodynamics textbook, while Anthony had been pretending to study for a corporate finance exam. A waste of his time, really – he had been groomed to run the Bridgerton accounting firm since childhood. But no one would take him seriously as CEO without the requisite letters on his degree.
In reality, he’d spent most of the evening running his eyes up her outstretched legs, watching the cute little way her feet twitched from side to side on the chair. Her curls were riotous, spilling over her shoulders, and the glasses – a recent addition – were stirring up a lot of latent hot librarian fantasies.
But he didn’t let himself dwell on those fantasies. Because Kate was…
His friend, for one.
Taken, for another.
She’d used to come over much more. All-night study sessions fueled by caffeine and laughter until they were both a little delirious. And then she met Tom at a half-price shot night and suddenly she wasn’t Anthony’s anymore. She never had been, of course, but there was always part of him that entertained the idea.
Except he’d been going through family shit and decided somewhere in his own fucked up mind that Kate was better off not getting too close to him because she would run screaming. Like any sane person would. And he liked Kate, in a way he didn’t like that many people, she was smarter than him by a devastating amount and she made him laugh and it was just…easy.
So she dated Tom and she came over to study and Anthony kept pretending. And it worked, because he was good at it, because he had been pretending since he was eighteen and his father had surgery and didn’t wake up.
“A few weeks ago,” she said, looking up at him. Her dark eyes seemed huge behind her glasses, and something coiled in his stomach. Fucking hell, he adored her. So much more than he had any right to. “I was getting a lot of headaches. Apparently I read too hard.”
Anthony snorted. “That doesn’t surprise me at all.”
“You could stand to read harder,” she said with a raised eyebrow, nodding her head toward his tablet. “That exam is going to be hell.”
“Good thing I’m a nepo baby.”
“Mm. Thanks for reminding me, I was so close to forgetting.” Plenty of people were impressed with his family’s reputation and wealth, but Kate never had been. And if that wasn’t the factor that drew her in, it really was a wonder that she wasted any time on him at all.
She’d grown up so differently. Working her arse off to get a scholarship and putting everything into being at the top of their class. He took school seriously enough, but he would never quite know what it felt like to have his whole life riding on it. Anthony always had a soft place to land.
They weren’t entirely different, of course. Their fathers. Their mothers. Their younger siblings. Sometimes Kate felt like his mirror. He wished she wasn’t.
It was after midnight when Kate stifled a yawn against her hand, her glasses tipping low on her nose. “You want some coffee?” Anthony asked. His flat was generally bland in the way that most student flats were, except that he had no roommates and a very expensive coffee machine. Perhaps that was why she hung around. “Chai?”
Kate yawned again, seeming annoyed with herself for being tired, and stretched her arms above her head, arching her back. It was a gorgeous angle of her, chin lifted high and ebony curls tumbling down her back, her shirt riding up ever so slightly to expose her toned stomach. “I’ve already been up for twenty-three hours,” she mumbled. “At this point, any more caffeine might give me a heart attack.”
“Fuck, Kate. You need to sleep.” She shot him a look that warned him off lecturing her, but he’d long since learned to ignore it. Kate was notoriously terrible at caring for herself, and it was usually up to her friends to forcibly stop her from burning herself out. Always the first to be gentle and considerate to someone else, but that all went out the window where her own well-being was concerned.
“I’m okay,” she insisted, rubbing a hand over her face. “Let me just nap for twenty on your sofa and I’ll be good as new.”
“You are vexing.” Standing up, Anthony extended his hand, and Kate took it, letting him tug her up with him. “Crash here tonight. You don’t have class until eleven tomorrow. You can walk back to yours in the morning.”
“Anthony-.”
“Kate,” he parroted. Though he would never admit it, he enjoyed how obstinate Kate could be. She was the bane of his existence in countless ways, but she never bored him. “You’re not going to remember anything else you read tonight. You need to sleep so you can process.”
He tapped her temple, and she grumbled something under her breath that he didn’t catch. Kate might have a habit of pushing herself too hard, but even she couldn’t argue with neuroscience.
“Just give me a minute, I’ll change the sheets on the bed.” There was no chance that he was forcing her to take the sofa. His mother would murder him, and besides, he relished these small opportunities to take care of Kate. She was so self-sufficient that it was difficult to figure out what she truly needed, and even more difficult to convince her to accept it.
She would be most pliant like this, exhausted and arguing with him half-heartedly, though she did still argue with him. “That’s stupid. I’m not taking your bed, Anthony.”
“You win most of our fights, but you know you won’t win this one,” he said seriously. Anthony wasn’t quite the gentleman he hoped to be, not all the time, but he was when it mattered. When it was someone he cared about deeply. “It’s alright. Hell, I’ve passed out on the floor here and it was perfectly comfortable.”
“Because you were very drunk.”
He’d woken up incredibly sore the next morning, with a crick in his neck that took a week to work out, but he wasn’t going to tell her that. “I’m just making a point.”
“Hey.” Kate was pouting a little, and it made his heart turn over in his chest. It was strange, how women had competed for his attention for years, and he couldn’t much distinguish them one from another. But all of Kate’s tiny, involuntary quirks kept him endlessly fascinated. “We’ll share the bed.”
Anthony choked on his own saliva, clearing his throat to cover it up. She was looking at him expectantly, swaying on her feet a bit, and he knew she needed to lay down. He knew this was ridiculous, he just- “What?”
A hint of doubt seeped into her expression, and she crossed her arms over her chest. “We’re friends, Anthony. We’ve been friends. I can’t think of a single reason why we shouldn’t.”
“I can. For one, I don’t think Tom would be thrilled about you sharing a bed with another guy. Even just a friend.”
It wasn’t his biggest concern. Not even close. But Tom was an easy scapegoat. Kate’s mind wasn’t entirely clear, and he didn’t want to cause issues for her. He thought she might at least recall that she had a boyfriend and agree that it was less fraught to have separate sleeping arrangements.
He wasn’t prepared for Kate to shut her eyes, exhaling heavily. “Um, Tom and I aren’t together. Anymore. If that was your only objection.” A thousand questions ran through his mind, too jumbled to vocalize any of them clearly. How long ago had that happened? Why hadn’t she said anything? How the fuck could Tom ever walk away from her? She could read it on his face, see the cogs turning, and she shook her head. “Please, can we just-?"
"Yeah," he said without thinking too hard about it. Anthony was going to suffer for this, that was certain, but he was a masochist, so did it matter that much? Kate was asking him, and there were so few things he wouldn’t give her. “Do you want to borrow something to sleep in?”
“I’m fine.” She was wearing black leggings with a bralette peeping out from underneath her teal tank. That would be comfortable enough. No makeup she would need to take off. Anthony was sure he had a spare toothbrush somewhere for her in the morning. “Are you going to sleep now? You’re tired too.”
He didn’t feel tired, adrenaline rushing through his veins at the situation he found himself in, but he didn’t want to keep her awake. “If that’s okay.”
“Yeah. Of course it is.”
Kate’s voice was so soft. He wasn’t used to her like this, soft and unguarded, and some traitorous part of him wondered what it might be like to see it every night. To have Kate curl up in his bed, in his arms, and talk to him in that voice until she fell asleep.
He wanted it. As much as he wanted anything from her, everything. All the things that terrified him.
But as he watched her climb under his comforter, taking her glasses off and setting them on the side table, Anthony reminded himself that wasn’t what this was. The more Kate let him close, the greater his responsibility to keep the boundaries in place, not to push beyond what she actually wanted from him. Especially if she was trusting him with something as vulnerable as this.
Deciding that his own t-shirt and sweatpants combination was fine for bed – though in all honesty, he usually slept naked – Anthony turned off the lights in his flat and put Kate’s books in her bag so she wouldn’t forget them tomorrow. He set the alarm on his phone for nine a.m., enough time for them to pick up bagels from the place around the corner before she had to go home and change.
He slid under the bedding, laying on his back. Kate was on her side, facing away from him, and he tried not to let it feel awkward. He was glad she was there. She was safe, and he knew she would actually get some sleep instead of just going back to her flat and studying more, and she was allowing him to dote on her just a little. Not as much as she probably deserved, but then again, Kate was never good about taking what she deserved.
“Tom met someone else,” she said without turning around. “Some girl in his Economics lecture. He said it was like lightning.”
Anthony swallowed. “We don’t have to talk about it.”
“I know. But you’re curious.” Her voice was half-muffled by the pillow. “My ego is wounded, but my heart isn’t broken. Things were never serious between us.”
It was hard to imagine ever having a chance with Kate and not falling in love with her. Not planning a future with her after the first fucking date. She was extraordinary.
He had never been the biggest fan of Tom, or of watching him put his hands on Kate, but in some ways it was safe. Anthony respected their relationship, and it was as good a reason as any not to pursue Kate. He’d needed a reason. “I’m sorry.”
She shifted a little. “It’s okay. I think I’m happy for him. It’s just embarrassing for your boyfriend to meet the one and dump you.”
Something like pure, unadulterated rage swelled in him. He had half a mind to punch Tom in the jaw next time he saw him. Even if he hadn’t broken Kate’s heart – and for her sake, he was glad for that – he had given up something incredible. Made Kate feel even less deserving than she already did. “She might not be the one.”
“Maybe not. Who knows. I wasn’t, at any rate.”
“You’re the one for someone,” Anthony said firmly. It felt a little too much like a confession of something he hadn’t thought through himself, but he let it hang between them. If it wasn’t him, it would be somebody. There was no way they wouldn’t see Kate – beautiful, smart, determined, kind – and know that she was worth holding onto.
“Maybe.”
“No. Not maybe.”
She was quiet for a long moment. It was killing him not to see her expression, not to know what emotion was flickering there, but maybe she was only telling him this because she didn’t have to face him. “You will be too.”
The corner of his mouth quirked. Of course, that was Kate. Seeing the best in those around her, even when they were damaged. “Maybe.”
“No. Not maybe,” she echoed. “Good night, Anthony.”
That was the end of it, then. At least she had told him the truth. At least he wouldn’t stay up all night, wondering if she was secretly devastated and hiding it. Rejection wasn’t a good feeling, but he knew what Kate sounded like when she was crushed, and this wasn’t it.
“Yeah. Good night.”
Anthony hadn’t really expected to sleep. He had expected to be distracted by Kate in his bed, and anyway, he wasn’t a particularly deep sleeper. A side effect of being the oldest of eight and a father figure to at least two of them, ready to jump up at a moment’s notice to soothe a bad dream.
But he was content to lay there in the dark, ensuring that Kate got the rest she needed. Listening to her breathing deepen and even out as she drifted off, and unexpectedly, he was lulled into it too.
It was only because he was a light sleeper, though, that he woke up some indeterminate amount of time later. Hours, maybe. Anthony felt groggy and a little confused, but several things made themselves known to him in succession.
One, that there was a woman in his arms. That memory came back to him quickly: Kate. Though he would have known by the silky curls that brushed against his face and the rich scent of lilies that permeated her soft skin.
He knew that he hadn’t gone to sleep in this position, but his hand was heavy on her hip and he was pressed up hard against her, not a whisper of space between their bodies. And, oh – hard was an unfortunately accurate descriptor. Sometime in the night, most of the blood in his body had traveled to his cock, and he was digging insistently against her arse. Fuck, he was such a prick.
The third thing he noticed, while he was working out how to separate from Kate without waking her, was a noise. A tiny one, but high, like she was caught in a nightmare. He hated that sound, hated how many times he had rocked his siblings through it, and wondered if it was better to rouse her or to let it pass.
Except, as clarity washed over him a little too slowly, Anthony realized that wasn’t what was happening at all.
He could barely see her, even this close – his curtains kept the room pitch black – but Kate squirmed against him the slightest bit, and her breathing was heavy, punctuated by a muffled moan. It sounded like she was biting her lip.
Anthony couldn’t help his sharp inhale, and Kate suddenly froze, feeling the movement against her back. For a second, there was complete stillness between them, and Anthony thought it was a dick move to pretend to stay asleep so she would keep going. That would be less embarrassing for her if she didn’t figure him out, but more upsetting if she did.
“It’s okay,” he said, his voice so throaty and raw that it didn’t even sound like him. “You don’t have to stop.”
Kate was still trying to catch her breath. He had no idea if that was the right thing to say, and his doubts gnawed at him the longer she went without responding. He’d been trying so fucking hard to respect her boundaries, to tuck his feelings away and treat her as a friend with no ulterior motives, and this was a far cry from friendly.
“I’m sorry,” she responded finally, sounding shaky. “I woke up and I could feel you and I just…my body responded. I was just going to handle it quickly and go back to sleep, fuck, that was so inappropriate. I’m so sorry.”
Maybe it was, maybe all of this was a huge mistake but right now all he could think about was that the woman who owned him was touching herself in his bed. That she had been turned on by the feel of his body against hers. Everything beyond that was hazy. “Kate, it’s okay,” he repeated, tentatively stroking his thumb against her hip. She shivered, and that alone broke something irreparably in his brain. “You’re safe with me. Whatever you need.”
That was the truth. Even if this was all she wanted, even if she didn’t really want him, he would take care of her. Give her a safe place to tend to her desires and never bring it up again, if that was her preference.
He knew that had been the right thing to say when she relaxed into him. Anthony thought he might be holding his breath, didn’t move a muscle as Kate slipped a hand back into her leggings. He could hear her; she was so wet.
“Fuck,” she whimpered. Here, in his dark bedroom with his frame wrapped around her, Anthony could believe there was no one else in the world. His vision narrowed to Kate, perfect Kate, fingering herself as she ground her hips back against his. He was dreaming, almost certainly, but it felt better than any dream his mind had ever conjured. “I’m close.”
Nails pressing into her a little harshly, Anthony thought he would go insane with the need to slip in his own fingers alongside hers. To feel her tight, wet walls fluttering around him. But he didn’t know where her lines were drawn, and he was terrified to accidentally cross them. Kate would have to ask him.
“Anthony,” she breathed on the back of a sweet moan that sent another rush of blood to his cock; he hadn’t thought there was any left. “You can touch me. If you want to. It’s okay.”
This didn’t have to mean anything. It could be one friend helping out another, desperate for that extra bit of stimulation to push her over the edge. Kate was well aware of his reputation; talented and willing.
It was slightly awkward in this position, but he slid his hand from her hip to her breast, just lightly flicking his thumb over her peaked nipple as his lips found the curve of her neck. Kate let out a soft cry that would haunt his dreams for years to come. “Is this okay?”
“Yes. Don’t stop.”
He wasn’t sure how he would ever stop touching her, now that he had gotten a taste of what she felt like under his hands, lithe and warm and supple. His senses were overcome by the scent of lilies, the perfect fit of her breast under his palm, the sound of her fingers slipping through her wetness. It was obscene and intoxicating.
“Anthony,” she gasped, and then she was coming, trembling against him. He held her tightly, murmuring sweet nothings against her neck, trying to memorize every detail of her climax. The heady smell of her in the air, the twitch of her muscles, his name dripping from her lips like honey.
The quiet that followed was almost deafening. He’d never been in a situation like this. If a woman wanted to sleep with him, he always knew. If a woman wasn’t interested, he usually knew that pretty early, too.
All that mattered was that Kate was okay. That she was comfortable, that she didn’t feel embarrassed, that she didn’t regret showing him something so intimate.
He returned his hand to her hip, not sure where else to put it. “That was beautiful.” Barely audible, afraid to shatter the fragile moment. “You’re beautiful.”
Anthony half thought she might just go back to sleep. Maybe it was a good idea for him to take the sofa after all, lest his cock betray him again. One movement at the right angle and he might come in his boxers like an idiot.
But Kate surprised him, as she was singularly capable of doing. She rolled over, facing him, her eyes ridiculously wide and dark in the low light. It was so hard to breathe around her.
Her fingers found his jaw, a little clumsily, stroking from his ear down to his chin. Exploring him. Anthony didn’t know what to do but lay there and let her do it. He’d let her take anything.
It was achingly slow, the way her lips searched for his. Her mouth was soft, the taste of her sweet coconut balm lingering. Kate was cupping his cheek, and something clicked into place. Something he’d been waiting a long time for, even if he hadn’t known it.
He returned the kiss, his hands on her waist to tug her tighter against him. When his head started to feel light, Anthony pulled back, his fingers slipping underneath her tank to meet her bare side. “You just went through a breakup,” he sighed, the thought niggling in the back of his brain. He wanted her, god he wanted her, but he needed to be sure. “You’re vulnerable.”
“Don’t reject me, then,” she murmured, catching his lips again. Anthony felt drunk on her, marveling at how someone could fit in his arms so perfectly.
He pressed their foreheads together. “Kate, I’m being serious.”
She made a little noise of frustration, but gave in, staying still. “I don’t know. I’m sorry, I don’t know,” Kate admitted. “I want to feel good, and this feels good. You’re not taking advantage of me. I want you, and I trust you. Maybe more than anyone.”
Truthfully, he didn’t know whether her desire or her trust was harder to wrap his mind around. It was okay if she was hurt, if she only wanted someone to rebuild her confidence and make her feel like the goddess she was. That person could be him.
He wanted it to be him. Selfishly, he didn’t think anyone else could appreciate her the way he could. If that was all she needed, then he would find a way to be alright with that. But maybe, if he made her feel good enough, she might want more of this. More of him.
“Okay.” Anthony swallowed, gently rolling Kate onto her back. He wanted to see her, but Kate didn’t find it easy to open up to people. Maybe that small thing might make her feel exposed, make her retreat into her shell. “Talk to me, okay? Tell me what you want.”
“I will.”
“Good.” Pushing the comforter back a bit so he wouldn’t get tangled in it, Anthony hooked his thumbs under her waistband and started to peel off her leggings. Kate lifted her hips to help, and he was sure they were inside out by the time he tugged them over her feet and tossed them onto the floor, but he ventured they would survive.
His fingers pressed against her folds through her cotton knickers, lightly, and Kate moaned. The fabric was soaked, and the scent of her arousal made him ache. He was desperate to touch her, to taste her. “I want to go down on you.”
“Yes,” she said eagerly, and Anthony almost chuckled. He was willing to bet that whatever Tom’s strengths as a boyfriend, he didn’t know how to eat a woman out like Anthony did. For the rest of her life, Kate was going to compare every oral experience to him – he would make sure of it.
He stripped her panties off, disappointed not to get a good view of her cunt. But he had a hell of a consolation prize. Starting at her ankles, he pressed kisses up the inside of her calves, her knees, her toned thighs, all velvet skin over firm muscle. “Your fucking legs, Kate. So sexy.”
“Do you think about them?” she asked. Her voice was breathless, but laced through with uncertainty, like she didn’t already know his answer. “Do you think about me?”
“Would you hate me if I said yes?”
“No.”
“Then yes.” Anthony nipped at a thin patch of skin, and Kate yelped. She was so sensitive. “You’re my friend. I never…I never wanted to ruin that. But of course I’ve thought about you. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted anyone more than you.”
Until it fell from his mouth, Anthony didn’t even know that was true. But looking back, it seemed clear. He loved to flirt, loved sex, but nothing ever took the edge off his desire for Kate.
But he had seen it with Daphne, with Francesca. People they trusted who were always angling for something else with them. It wasn’t the kind of man he wanted to be.
Kate responded by weaving her fingers in his hair and directing him to where she was warm and dripping. He smiled a little against the crease of her thigh before licking into her.
She was gorgeously vocal when she wasn’t trying to hold back, and her every keen spurred him on. It made sense; she was outspoken, brash, quick-witted. So confident in her beliefs, in her values, but not in the fact that she could be wanted. That she could be everything that mattered to someone.
To him, maybe, as he seemed to be discovering in real time.
Anthony learned what she liked: his lips creating suction over her clit, three fingers alternated with two when she started to get overwhelmed, his tongue fucking her deep. He could just make out Kate playing with her breasts, and she bucked her hips against his mouth, unable to get close enough.
“You taste so good,” he groaned, curving his fingers to rub the rough patch inside her until she whined his name. “I could do this every night.”
It wasn’t just dirty talk; Anthony thought he’d be quite happy to live between her thighs. But Kate curled her hand in his hair, yanking roughly, and he nearly came right then.
When she finished on his face, he thought he might as well die now. Nothing could beat her nectar on his tongue, the pulsing of her walls around his fingers, her reedy cries of his name. Anthony kissed her skin, stroking her slowly to bring her down.
Finally, he came back up to her. Something had shifted in the air between them. He’d never been ignorant of Kate’s beauty, her sensuality, the fact that he felt something for her that he had always been afraid to define. But it felt, still, like they were seeing each other through new eyes.
“I want to fuck you,” she said, a little more assertive as she’d clearly realized that Anthony was at her mercy, wrapped around her finger. It was a wonder she hadn’t figured it out before. He wasn’t very subtle. “I have an IUD. Are you going to give me syphilis?”
Anthony snorted. He was a known slut, but he was responsible. He would never put his partners at risk, the same courtesy he hoped they would extend to him. “No. I do testing, condoms, the whole deal. Whatever you want, I’m okay with.”
He’d meant that, but he was still unbearably turned on when Kate pushed down his sweatpants and took him in hand, her thumb circling his tip. “I just want to feel you.”
Anthony managed to kick his sweatpants and boxers off – though Kate was decidedly not helping – and rid her of her tank and bralette. The feel of her bare chest against his was something of a revelation, and he tipped her head back, pressing kisses to the column of her throat as she guided him inside her.
“Holy shit,” she breathed, as Anthony thrust shallowly to help her take him. She was flooded from two orgasms, slick and hot around him, and so tight that he couldn’t think straight. “You feel…”
“I know. I know, baby.” The pet name came instinctively, but Kate didn’t hear him or didn’t mind, cradling his face as they kissed. For all his genuine intentions earlier of giving her up in the morning, letting her take everything from him once and then walk away, Anthony wasn’t sure he could do it. It had never been so good, and he had far too many encounters to compare it to.
The way she held him, clung to him, whimpering his name as he thrust into her relentlessly. Their bodies moving together like they’d been doing this for years. The almost painful swell in his chest as she breathed into his mouth, like she wanted to merge into him and never be free.
He could love her so easily, if he let himself. He thought he was much closer to the edge of it than he’d ever realized.
Anthony’s arm slipped under her knee, opening her up for him, and he drove into her a dozen more times before she fell apart on him. The only thing that could possibly feel better than her climaxing on his face was feeling it on his cock.
“There you go,” he encouraged, operating entirely on instinct now. “Fuck, Kate. You don’t know how good that feels.”
She melted into him, warm and sated. “Let go, Anthony. Come in me.”
He didn’t think he could stop himself if he tried. He gripped her hard as he emptied himself, an orgasm that turned him inside out and made his muscles ache. Kate released a contented sound at the feel of his warmth blooming inside her, his final claiming of her.
For the countless time that night, he didn’t know what to say. It was so much easier to show her what he craved, to chase that high with her.
But she saved him again. “You wanted me,” Kate said. “Or was that just a line?”
“I wouldn’t- you know I’m full of shit. But not with you.”
He could just make out her small nod. “Then why didn’t you ever…?”
If that wasn’t the question he had been asking himself all night. “I was pretty self-loathing when I met you. You had enough problems. You didn’t need me.”
She exhaled. “Anthony.”
“No, it’s okay. I’m doing better now, most of the time. But then we were friends, and I thought that was all you wanted from me. And I didn’t want to be that guy who was always looking for some in with you. And then you were dating Tom, and that was your choice and I respected that. He’s a fucking idiot, by the way.” Kate laughed, a small thing. “Did you ever want me?”
Her mouth opened, then shut. The words came deliberately, her fingers tracing featherlight against his chest. “Tonight wasn’t the first time I touched myself thinking about you,” she confessed, and Anthony knew if she hadn’t drained him so thoroughly, he would be ready to go again just at that. “Thinking about what it would feel like to be with you. To do what we did tonight. But I was pretty much the only woman you didn’t hit on and so I just thought – our friendship was more important. And that was okay. It’s still okay, if you feel that way.”
“Our friendship is important. You’re important to me, Kate. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want more.”
“I think I feel the same.” She laid against the pillow, her curls sweeping his arm as she shook her head. “But this all happened really fast. I feel like…like I don’t even know which way is up, right now.”
“I’ll take that as a testament to my skills,” Anthony murmured, kissing her shoulder, and she shoved him playfully. “It’s okay if we need time to figure this out. Just, please don’t sneak out when I’m asleep.”
“I wouldn’t.”
“I know you, and you absolutely would.” Kate was brave and full of conviction, but she was also skittish. And this was big, maybe bigger than either of them had ever felt before. The kind of thing he had always sprinted from, fast and far, before someone came along that he couldn’t leave. “Stay. I’ll go down on you again in the morning, and then we’ll get breakfast and we’ll talk.”
A bold proposition, maybe, but Kate only kissed him before resting her head on his shoulder. Anthony tugged her leg over his, stroking her sweat-dampened skin. “I don’t want to run,” she said quietly. “Don’t let me run.”
“I don’t want to run either.” He didn’t know how to do this anymore than she did. All he knew was that she was worth trying for.
And if they held on to each other tightly enough, Anthony thought they might be incredible. “Okay.”