“So when did you get the idea for House of Sass?” he asks.

“I don’t know.” I shrug. I settle down on one of the couches while he drops a few inches away on the same couch and pours wine for us. “I guess a few years after my parents died, after my Aunt Cecile died, and I dropped out of college. I’m drawn to things you can physically touch. I didn’t consider getting into the tech side of the business until you asked me to make it bigger.”

He hands me a glass of wine. “Tech has been big for years, and I see it continuing to be.”

“I really like the fact that we’ll have both—a physical store but a virtual advisor. I suppose I was anti-tech for a time simply because I read a study which predicted that, in our future, many of our experiences would be virtual, and what’s the fun in that? I mean, a virtual kiss is not like a real one, you’re kissing air.”

“That’d be a business I’d go for, a virtual experience where you can smell the person you love, touch them, or at least trick your brain into thinking you’re with them.”

“But you aren’t and you will always know that you aren’t,” I contradict.

He sets down his wine glass. I can tell by the mischievous gleam and the challenging lift of his eyebrow he sends my way that he’s up to something. He lifts the lid of a small ivory-encrusted box on the coffee table, and extracts something silver. “Let’s try it out. Close your eyes.”

“What?”

He waits—obviously expecting me to hop to do his bidding. I’m tempted to ignore him, except there’s that glint in his eye of pure mischief and I want to know what is causing it. So I close my eyes, smiling, and feel the barest brush over my cheeks. “Am I touching you or not?” he rasps.

“What?” The flutters in my heart caused by the touch on my cheek is proving too distracting.

“Is this my touch, or is it the tip of this pen?” he asks again.

I inhale, keeping my eyes shut as I concentrate on the feeling. His scent is too close; I can’t concentrate really. He smells like my high school years, like my most secret wishes, and like a dream. Inhaling one good whiff, I exhale it reluctantly. “It’s your finger,” I finally say.

“Why do you say that?”

“Because!” I cry in exasperation. “You’re the selfish, possessive type, you wouldn’t give a pen the pleasure of doing something you want to do.”

Amusement laces his voice as I try to open my eyes, and he runs the tips of two fingers over my eyelids to urge them back shut. Close to my ear, he says, “Newsflash, little bit. The pen has no feelings or pleasure, whereas I do, I’ll give you that. Which finger?”

“I don’t know. Don’t mindfuck me.” I exhale exasperatedly, my eyes still closed as I try to concentrate on the feeling. “It’s your pinky.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Positive?”

“Yes. Wait…it’s your middle finger.”

“Open your eyes.”

I look down and spot his pinky, then feel my stomach burn with wanting him to keep touching me, and to hide my reaction, I laugh.

“Your instinct was spot on,” he says.

“Then I blew it. Now me.” I reach out for the pen. “Okay, so close your eyes.”

He does.

I look at him, trying to determine where to touch him and with what. I pause and just look at him. I can’t take the heavy feeling I get in my chest, like there’s a giant pressing his foot on my ribcage.

God, he’s so gorgeous. I’m just having the time of my life with him tonight. It was always easy to talk to him, I always craved his company, but it was hard to endure it without feeling all these same things I’m feeling now.

I’m older now, a little less scared of them, a little more curious about them to fear leaping in…so here I am, gazing at his chiseled face, his strong features, his nose, his forehead, and his full plump lips, and even the blond tips of his eyelashes resting against his cheekbones.

I lean over, and press my thumb to his lips—like he did once—and then I press my lips to my thumb and ease my thumb downward so that my lips are touching, intimately pressing, against his full, perfect mouth.

So yeah, I kiss him—a peck on his mouth, feeling happy, carefree, light.

Maybe high on the enjoyable evening.

As I ease back, he opens his eyes. So do I.

He clenches his jaw, cups my face, and opens my mouth, tilting my head to kiss me harder.

“I need to pee,” I say, and I giggle-groan when I realize I said that out loud.

I leap to my feet in my urgency.

He chuckles and shakes his head, his eyes raking me, head to toe.

I head into the guest bedroom, do my thing, then I step out to the large sink area and wash my hands. My gaze is trapped by the view outside the bedroom. I feel him approach like a tension pulling at my belly.

“Come to bed, bit,” he whispers in my ear as he drapes the shoulder of my dress an inch down my arm. “My bed,” he specifies, kissing the round curve of my shoulder.

He turns me to face him with one hand, and I’m breathless when I see the look in his eyes as he leads me there.

He releases me inside his bedroom, walks to pull the curtains closed, then slowly turns to watch me stand in the middle of the room. I’m so nervous and yet so eager I can’t breathe right.

“Come here.”

I do, because he asks and because I want to, very much.

He pulls me close.

“You’re driving me crazy, you know,” he says, his voice so sexy and husky.