Beth Andrews - Winter's Kiss

“You are alive,” he said, the right side of his mouth lifted in a grin. “I’d wondered.”

“Alive and well,” she assured him, though her voice sounded rusty. She brushed her hair out of her eyes and tossed back the blanket, which she assumed he’d covered her with last night, before swinging her legs around, her bare feet connecting with the cool wood floor.

His gaze dropped and his mouth tightened before he jerked up his eyes to stare at a spot somewhere in the vicinity of the ceiling. She followed his gaze but there was nothing to see except white ceiling so she glanced down. Oops. Her dress had shifted and twisted and ridden up during her sleep. She hadn’t flashed him everything God had given her, but it was pretty darn close.

Lifting her hips, she tugged down the material, making sure all was covered and right with the world. When she looked back at Oakes, her breath caught at the intensity in his gaze. The interest.

The attraction.

He blinked and it was gone, just... poof , and his expression smoothed out as if it had never been. She could relate. For years she’d gone back and forth over whether to embrace her feelings for him or pretend they didn’t exist. But she knew, whatever choices they made didn’t matter. They could fight the inevitable, could pretend there was nothing between them, but if they were meant to be—and her instincts were telling her they were—then they’d end up together. Eventually.

Still, it wouldn’t hurt for her to give fate a bit of a nudge.

He held out his hand. Now, she was completely capable of standing on her own—she’d been doing so since she was a baby, after all—but she wasn’t about to pass up the opportunity to touch Oakes, to test him, just a bit. Placing her hand in his, she let him tug her to her feet, making sure her breasts subtly brushed the hard planes of his chest as she did so.

He would have backed up, she knew, but he was trapped between her body and the coffee table, her fingers still curled around his. She rubbed her thumb over the back of his hand and slowly lifted her head, her hair brushing his chin. He went completely still except for the working of his throat as he swallowed.

“Thank you,” she said, sounding like a breathy sex kitten.

Hey, if that’s what it took to get him to stop pretending he wasn’t attracted to her, she could go that route, complete with pointy ears, whiskers and tight catsuit.

Meow.

Their eyes met. Anticipation filled her, grew to an almost painful point, when his gaze dropped to linger on her mouth. He leaned forward. Her heart hammered. Her lips parted. Oh, God, this was it. The moment she’d been waiting for. He was going to kiss her. Well, that would certainly put an end to the whole I-see-you-only-as-a-platonic-nonsexual-friend act he pulled whenever they were together.

It wasn’t quite the romantic scenario she’d fantasized about when she was seventeen and in the throes of a huge, heartbreaking crush on him. And maybe having him get this close to her when she undoubtedly had morning breath wasn’t such a great idea, but if the man was finally going to kiss her after she’d waited six long years, she sure wasn’t about to deny him simply because they weren’t on a moonlit beach and she needed a mint.

She let her eyes drift shut.

Only to have them pop open when he gave her hand a friendly squeeze and slid free of her grasp. “No problem,” he said, his voice gruff.

Then, as if to make sure her humiliation was complete, as if to drive home the fact that he found her harmless and cute, like a child, he patted her head.

The man literally patted her on the top of her head.

She didn’t know whether to cry or punch him in the throat.

She settled on nipping the coffee cup from his hand as he raised it for a drink. Took a cautious sip before he’d even had time to blink or lower his arm back to his side.

“Ah, the nectar of the gods. And the only good thing about waking up in the morning.”

“Please,” he said, his tone all sorts of dry. “Help yourself.”

Feeling a bit better, she sent him a cheeky grin and drank again, deeper this time now that she knew it wasn’t blistering hot. Served him right after he’d gotten her hopes up only to cruelly dash them.

She gulped down some more, praying the caffeine kicked in quickly. The coffee could use a hefty dose of both cream and sugar but beggars couldn’t be choosers—and she was well used to playing the part of beggar. “I don’t suppose you’re hiding a bagel on your person?”

“Excuse me?” he asked, his expression bemused.

“A bagel,” she repeated slowly. Maybe he needed the coffee as much as she did. She handed the mug back to him. “Or a muffin? At this point I’d even take a scone.” When he just stared at her as if she’d lost her ever-loving mind, she wrinkled her nose. “No, huh? Too bad. I’m starving.”

“How about we start you off with some dry toast? See how that goes.”

She made a face. “How about you slather some peanut butter on that toast and we’ll have a deal.” She eyed the coffee cup he still hadn’t bothered drinking from. “If you’re not going to finish that...”

He handed it back to her.

She wished it was that easy to get everything she wanted from him.

She headed toward his kitchen, crossed to the large fridge and opened it. Grabbed the half-and-half and poured a hefty amount into the cup.

“Sugar?” she asked. She’d been to his house before, of course. Plenty of times, the most recent being over the Fourth of July weekend when he’d thrown an impromptu barbecue and had told her to feel free to drop by.

They were friends, but not the kind who knew how the other organized his—or her—kitchen. More like the kind that texted every few weeks to check in with each other, met up for coffee or lunch once a month and invited each other to casual get-togethers.

That was all about to change. It was past time they discovered if they were meant to be more .

He joined her, reaching for the sugar bowl in an upper cabinet, his shirt riding up slightly to show the ridges of his stomach. She’d touched him, she remembered, her fingers tingling with the memory. Last night she’d slapped his chest, then had kept her hand there, had felt the smoothness of his skin, the coarse hair dusting his chest.

The first time she’d touched him in anything other than a friendly, hey-we’re-buddies-and-sort-of-but-not-really-related sort of way in years. Since her high school graduation.

Progress. At long, long last.

She added sugar to her coffee then gulped it down gratefully. “That’s better,” she murmured as Oakes poured himself a fresh cup. “Now, what about that toast?”

“I ordered from Pitter Patterson’s Bakery,” he said, mentioning the name of one of her favorite breakfast restaurants. “I thought you might want something in your stomach other than wine.”

“You,” she said, setting her cup down, “are a prince among men. Thank you. But there’s no wine in my stomach. I don’t drink it.”

“You don’t?”

Was that what the women he usually dated drank? Probably. He went for the socialite types or the well-educated, high-powered corporate woman. Tall, thin and blonde, though that one VP he’d dated two years ago had been a petite brunette, the kind who worked out regularly and was going back to school for her third degree.

Daphne shook off the feelings of inadequacy. She was just as good as anyone. Better than most, certainly, at least when it came to being good enough for Oakes. Now all she needed to figure out was if she was right for him. And if, as her instincts told her, he was right for her, too.

“Nope,” she said. “Wine gives me a headache.” Plus, she never knew what to order, what color went with her dinner or the whole sniff-sip-swish routine that went with drinking it. “The credit for last night’s buzz belongs solely to tequila.”