“Mom,” I hiss, my brows furrowing with annoyance. “This isn’t happening. Dean isn’t only a business partner…he’s my…” I pause as I try to figure out what to say to get her to back the hell off this Nate thing. “Dean’s my boyfriend.”
All good humor disappears from her face and hits me with a menacing glower. “Norah Renee Donahue, you brought that Dean person here to spite me. I know how you operate. This is like that time you told me you needed money for a prom dress, and I found out later you spent it on a baking class at the community college and borrowed a used dress from Abby Thompson. Now I want you to stop being rude and take Nathaniel inside. He might be your only chance at a real future.”
My entire body tenses with an anger I rarely, very, very rarely, tap into. In fact, the last time I remember my temper spiking this fast and this hard was when the appliance company shipped the wrong commercial oven to the Denver location and tried to stick me with a restocking fee.
There was bloodshed then.
And there will be bloodshed now.
I bite my lip hard because I know nothing I can say right now will make my mother see that a future isn’t just romance and marriage and babies. She won’t hear that. She doesn’t want to hear that. She wants her only daughter to make her a grandmother with Nathaniel Hawthorne, and she’s going to live her senior years out in disappointment because that’s never going to happen.
But instead of saying all of that. Instead of repeating myself for the hundredth time in the past week…I decide to do something wildly out of character.
I turn on my heel, grab Dean by the elbow, whirl him around to face me…and kiss the daylights out of him.
Holy fucking croinuts! Norah grabs my face and yanks my mouth down to meet hers. Her lips are hard against mine, and her entire body is ramrod straight as I grab onto her sides for support and attempt to recover from the sudden assault that I did not see coming.
Is Norah actually fucking kissing me right now? Holy shit!
This is a moment I’ve been fantasizing about for…well, probably years. Ever since I walked out of my rented co-working space and stumbled upon her bakery and decided to take a number and wait for the croinut of the day. After that, I went back nearly daily, claiming my appreciation for the croinuts, but secretly, I appreciated the sight of Norah artfully glazing her creations.
Normally, I’m the kind of man who sees what I want and takes it. I’ve never shied away from asking a woman out. But as I watched Norah in her bakery, I realized quickly that she was not the kind of woman I could date and discard. She’s the marrying type…which makes it really fucking ironic that I just now found out she’s not into the whole marriage and babies lifestyle.
And knowing that makes the fact that I’m finally tasting Norah’s lips even more fucking epic. She tastes sweet, like cake batter and vanilla, and I’m pretty sure her lips are soft, but they’re not currently moving, so it’s kind of hard to tell.
Well hell, if we’re doing this, we might as well really do this.
My hands steal around Norah’s waist and dip low on her back, maybe a little too low for this type of crowd, but fuck, Norah started it, and I’m damn well going to finish it. I pull her pelvis into mine in an attempt to soften her against me, and she reacts perfectly, her tits crushing into my chest as her body bows backward, allowing me to take complete control of this gift she’s giving me.
Norah melts beneath me, and I have to hold on tight to keep her upright as her lips soften and part, allowing my tongue to do a gentle sweep between her lips. She tastes like champagne, and she’s now soft and pliant, giving me a full embrace of that plump upper lip I’m slightly obsessed with.
Okay, majorly obsessed with.
A quiet groan vibrates in my chest as I turn my head and deepen the kiss, massaging her tongue with mine as she squeaks out a soft cry. Her hands move from my jaw to my hair, and her fingers skate through my strands like they’ve done it a thousand times before.
I’ve fantasized about kissing Norah Donahue countless times, but this moment right here…exceeds all of those dirty thoughts.
A distant throat clearing interrupts our most likely indecent public display, and I force myself to pull away because from little acorns, mighty oaks do grow. And I do not need to pop a boner in front of Norah’s parents.
My eyes crack open and attempt to blink away the shock of what just transpired. Norah pulls back, still holding my head, her chest heaving with deep breaths and her lips red and swollen as she stares at me with wide blue eyes.
“I thought you said no kissing,” I croak softly, my voice deep and in a weird, raspy tone.
“I might have lost my temper.” She exhales a shaky breath, her nostrils flaring with life. “So much for those rules, I guess.”
The corner of my mouth pulls up into a smile before I painfully turn away from her to see it’s Norah’s father who was the throat clearer. He’s eyeing me like he doesn’t like me as much as he did five minutes ago. I can’t blame the guy.
I cough into my fist, and murmur, “I think it might be time for us to go, sugar lips.”
“I think you’re right,” Norah replies, detaching herself from me and turning to face her parents and their friends with a sheepish look. “Happy Anniversary, Mom and Dad. I’m afraid my boyfriend and I have to be going now.”
My body tenses at that label. When the fuck did we go from a fake date to a fake relationship? If I wake up engaged tomorrow, I might regret this favor for a friend.
Elaine shoots her daughter a murderous glare while her dad appears to be fighting back a smile. Norah then waffles her fingers through mine and practically drags me behind her through the party, out of the backyard and into the dark night full of a million more possibilities that I hadn’t considered before.
When we’re in the safety of my car, Norah exhales heavily. “Oh my God, my lip is sweating.” She jerks down the visor and eyes herself in the mirror before dabbing at the skin above her lip. “I have disgusting lip sweat.”
I start the car and pull out of the parking spot. “That’s not normally where I make women wet.”
“Shut up, Dean,” Norah snaps, pressing her hands to her flushed cheeks. “I just…I lost my mind in there.”
“You did skip a couple of steps.”
“I just tongued you in front of my parents and their friends…and Nate!” She bows her head and runs her fingers through her hair. “What was I thinking?”
“Nate’s a douche.”
“He’s not a douche,” she bites back crisply. “He was very nice. Nicer than I expected. And oh my God, he looks nothing like what he looked like when we were kids.”
“You want me to take you back so you can tongue rape him too?” I snap, my tone harsher than I intended, but the idea of her kissing that douche wagon makes my hands tighten around the steering wheel.
Norah shakes her head dismissively. “No, God. I’m just saying…he wasn’t as bad as I remembered. I don’t remember him being that tall. And he must be taking anabolic steroids because I know he didn’t have those muscles in high school.”
“Norah, would you please stop talking about your childhood crush right after you just kissed the life out of me?” I want to kiss her again just to make her shut up and forget he was ever there.