Page 131 of Almost Ours

“A guy can’t smile these days?”

She backs up, talking faster while I keep coming. “I’m still annoyed with you, so if this is some bizarre attempt at distracting me, it isn’t going to work. You left me asleep in your bed with a card and fucked off to sit in my bedroom. I still haven’t worked out why any sane person would get their friend that many presents—” She breaks off as her back hits the wall next to my bedroom door. “Oh.” Ruby glances over her shoulder, then looks back at me through slits. “Well, that’s fucking brilliant. Now I’m trapped.”

“You’re not trapped.” I stop in front of her, forcing her to tip her head back to look at me.

The fact she doesn’t move sideways even though she could goes straight to my head, and suddenly all I can think about is getting closer until there isn’t any fucking space left between us.

My voice is husky. “You backed yourself into a wall.”

“Because you keep coming towards me like some sort of feral animal.” She presses the flask tighter against her stomach. “I was in the middle of making a point about the presents, because fourteen presents is not normal friendship behaviour, Josh. It’s really insane when you think about it. I know you’re going to try and do that thing where you act like it’s no big deal but—”

Taking her flask, I drop it onto the side table.

Ruby’s eyes narrow. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you, Joshua Hardy, but I was enjoying that. Whatever you are trying to do, it isn’t going to work.”

“What is it I’m trying to do?” I’d quite like the answer myself.

“You’re trying to distract me.” She informs me. “You’re doing that thing where you get all intense and weird instead of answering a simple question, and I’m not letting you get away with it this time because last night you told me you’d chosen me, then we nearly kissed, then you left me and—”

I put my hands on her waist and her words cease for just a second, but Ruby being Ruby, she ploughs straight on.

Her hazel eyes drop briefly to where I’m holding her before snapping back to mine. “—and now you’re touching me, which is exactly the kind of mixed-signal bullshit I was talking about because you cannot keep doing boyfriend things while insisting you’re not my boyfriend, and if this is another attempt to confuse me into forgetting what I was saying then—”

I pull her into me, making sure her body lands flush against mine, sexy and hot and so fucking close. I hear the sharp little breath she takes and the thud of my own heart under her hands.

Ruby goes rigid with surprise, palms flattening against my chest as her eyes drop between us. “What are you doing?” she demands, but she doesn’t move away, doesn’t shove me back, just stands there staring up at me with her lips parted and her fingers beginning to curl into my jumper.

I look at her mouth, then back at her eyes, my hands tightening at her waist while her breathing turns quicker against my chest, and I know she knows what I want because her gaze drops to my lips and stays there.

“Seriously, Josh. What is going on? Are you—”

“Ruby,” I murmur, leaning closer until there’s barely an inch between us and her chin tips up towards me, “will you shut up and fucking kiss me?”

Her eyes widen. “What? Like right now?”

A laugh tears out of me. “No, Ruby. I thought we could pencil it in for some time after Christmas.”

“Oh, well I’m free in the New Year—”

“Shut. Up.”

“No.”

“I guess I’ll have to shut you up myself.” I lean down and kiss her, and every stupid thing I thought I understood about wanting someone turns out to be complete bollocks.

Ruby makes this tiny, startled noise into my mouth, like she can’t believe I’ve finally done it, and then her fingers clutch hard at the front of my jumper, and she kisses me back with enough force I groan.

Her hands slide up my chest, over my shoulders, around my neck, and I swear I feel the exact point where months of holding myself away from her finally collapse under the weight of having her this close.

I’ve thought about kissing her more times than I’d ever admit. In the library when she’s chewing the end of a pen. In the pub when she laughs so hard she goes pink. In my bed when she’s asleep beside me and I’m staring at the ceiling trying not to be the kind of prick who thinks about her like that. None of those versions got it right, though, because none of them accounted for how quickly Ruby would ruin me once she kissed me back.

My hand slides up her back beneath the loose cotton of my T-shirt, stopping at the warm strip of skin above her knickers, and the contact turns me feral. Ruby shivers against me, one hand tangling into the hair at the back of my head while the other stays curled against my neck, and the wall behind her is the only reason I trust either of us to remain upright.

Fuck me.

I’ve kissed girls before. I’ve kissed Bonnie more times than I can count. I know what this is meant to feel like, and that is exactly why this scares the shit out of me, because this feels nothing like any of it.

This feels like relief.