One Kiss:. Lisa Fox
She made some noise, or maybe exhaled a little louder than usual, and his eyes flicked to her glossy red lips, plump and slightly parted, close enough to kiss.
For a heartbeat he considered it. All he had to do was dip his head a centimeter more and his lips would be on hers, her taste in his mouth. A part of him craved the contact, demanded it, but he pushed the temptation aside. It was nothing new. He was always kind of tempted, from the moment they met. But he was with the congressman’s daughter at the time, and when that ended, there was the Knicks City Dancer, and then, not much later, Marine. He might have gone for it during one of the few occasions when they were both single, but he never quite knew if she would welcome it or not. Sometimes he thought she might, other times, not so much. He decided long ago that finding out was not worth the risk. She was already his in the best possible ways. He didn’t need to gamble what they shared on one kiss.
Instead, he dropped his gaze to her lap and took her hand, running his fingertips over the tattoo around her wrist, the words, “We’re All Mad Here.” He was with her the night she got it done, holding her other hand while she laughed through the discomfort. Afterward, they’d gone to his rooftop, drank a bottle of Jack, and danced to “Don’t Stop Believin’” until the neighbors complained about the noise. It was one of his best memories.
He laced his fingers through hers and squeezed. She smiled over at him and returned the gesture. And just like that, his entire world was better.
“So, tell me about this guy,” he said, breaking the comfortable silence. Teasing her was one of his favorite activities, and he wasn’t about to let this prime opportunity pass him by. It had nothing to do with the niggling worm that wanted to squirm its way into his heart.
Kat snorted. “I don’t really know that much. He’s Alan’s sister’s massage therapist’s brother.” She waved her hand, dismissing it all. “Something like that.” A lock of hair dropped in front of her face and she swiped it back behind her ear. “According to Ron, he’s ‘perfect for me,’ whatever that means.” Her hair was messier than she usually wore it, a chaotic tumble of waves that fell around her shoulders and almost looked as if she’d had a good romp in bed. He liked it. “You know how Ron and Alan are,” she went on. “Just because they’re happily married, they think everyone should be too.” She smiled, but it looked strained. “I don’t know how they talked me into it.”
“I was wondering that very same thing,” he said. “Are they blackmailing you or something?” Getting set-up on blind dates was very much not Kat’s style. She was a notorious commitment-phobe and over the years he had known her, she’d had flings, but not much else. Agreeing to a blind date, a match from Ron no less, was completely out of character. Ron and Alan were hopeless romantics and because they wanted everyone to find their “soul mates,” they often set up the Sharpe Designs family members with suitable prospects. They were good at it too—three of their matches had turned into marriages. Kat knew what agreeing to a set up like this could mean and he was surprised that she might be considering something more long-term. He wondered what had changed. And why.
“Or something.” She shook her head and shrugged. “I guess they caught me a weak, horny moment.”
Dean smiled. A very typical Kat response. He tapped her knee, her stockings silky under his fingertips. She could be a hard woman, even cold at times, but her body was always soft, her skin warm and supple. “Guys are for more than just sex, you know.”
“Are they?” Her eyes widened with feigned innocence. “I can’t image what else I would do with one.”
“Oh, I don’t know, we can be handy to have around. We can lift heavy things, get the tops off most jarred products, kill spiders.” He was rapidly running out of examples, and he tried to think of things his dad did that made his mother happy, grasping onto the first thing that came to mind. “Yard work.”
“Yard work?” Her laugher made his insides hum. She had such a great laugh, bold and vibrant. “I live in an apartment in Brooklyn. Why would I ever need anyone to do yard work?”
He couldn’t think of a single reason. “You never know,” he said as enigmatically as possible.
The cab slowed down as the traffic ahead came to a grinding halt in the middle of the Manhattan Bridge. Horns honked and tires screeched, but no one was moving. He could see the Brooklyn Bridge over Kat’s shoulder and the skyline was a dazzling array of sparkling lights on the horizon. The view never failed to take his breath away. He loved New York.
“How was your Christmas?” he asked. The last time they had seen one another was the night of the holiday dinner. The night he broke up with Marine.
She grimaced. “The same as it always is. My first night there, my sister and I argued about the best route to get to back from the airport and because I disagreed with her, she refused to speak to me for the rest of the trip. My mother flaunted her new, much younger, boyfriend. She thinks she’s gloating and she loves it immensely.” The look on her face made his heart sick. “At ‘gift-giving time,’ she tossed a store bag in my lap and said, ‘I wish you’d get yourself a man already so I can stop wasting all this money on you’.” She glanced at him and then quickly away. “It’s all so completely exhausting.” She gathered herself, but he knew she forced that smile onto her face. “I did manage to make it to the beach a couple of times though.”
“Did you wear a tiny string bikini?” She would never wear anything like that, but he desperately wanted to make her laugh. Visiting her family was always a trial, and Dean did everything in his power to bring her back from the abyss she sank into whenever she saw them.
Her lips curved, her smile turning more genuine. “Not this time. But I was naked underneath my clothes.”
Naked—now there was a pleasant thought. His gaze dropped to the gap in her black wool coat, touched on her bare shoulder, followed the line of her dress over her clavicle, down to the swell of her breasts. Heat rushed to his groin, and he had to clear his throat before he could speak again. “Hot.”
“I know.”
“What did you do at the beach while not in your bikini?” Her face got animated and his heart was lighter. No matter how much he wanted to, he couldn’t take away her pain, he knew that, but he could make her smile.
“I thought about you, actually.” She shifted in her seat, and her knee touched his. He knocked her leg playfully aside, and she chuckled, knocking him back. He pressed his knee to hers, and they engaged in a short, violent battle of who could make the other’s knee move. She grunted, her butt coming up off the seat with the effort. He laughed as he gave in, letting her win and push his legs aside.
“So, what did you think about when you were thinking about me?” he asked after they settled back down. “Anything good?”
“Very good. ‘Member how we talked about that homicidal bunny working in customer service?”
“Of course.” He remembered the night well. It was a couple of weeks before Christmas, and they were going to go into the city to check out a new restaurant, but the night was cold and sleeting and they decided to stay in instead. They got a bottle of Jack, camped on his couch, and got drunk off their asses. Somehow they got on the topic of Kat’s comics, spitting out ideas for a new series she could write. Some of them were pretty wild, but the bunny was a good one: a deranged rabbit driven to murderous insanity from dealing with the general public. “A great idea.”
“I was thinking about what you said and instead of making him an actual serial killer, I think maybe he’d kill them in his mind. He could be a chain-smoking, alcoholic bunny who is as insane and evil as the people who call him. Every episode could be a battle of who is more evil, the complaining, annoying customer or the psycho bunny rep.”
Dean nodded, catching her enthusiasm. “That’s good. You could give him a regular cast too. A wife, a boss, a drinking buddy.” He ran his knuckle along the edge of her thigh. “Maybe even a mistress,” he suggested with a wink that made her laugh. “That way it isn’t all one-shots.”
“You’re