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The screen lit up, and—
HOW TO KISS: TEN FOOLPROOF TIPS TO HAVE YOUR PARTNER CLAMORING FOR MORE!
I stood up from the table so quickly I knocked over my chair. I rubbed my eyes with my fists, thinking maybe I’d just hallucinated the Buzzfeed headline in thirty-six-point font I’d just seen on my laptop.
I checked again, and...
Nope.
There was definitely a kissing-tips article pulled up on my laptop.
I was one hundred percent certain I had not Googled anything that would yield a result like this the last time I’d used my computer.
I had, however, given Frederick permission to use my laptop whenever he wanted to.
“Um. Frederick?”
“Hm?”
I bit my lip. Should I admit to what I’d just seen?
If he wanted to read internet how-to articles about kissing, he had every right to do exactly that. My flushed cheeks and racing heart needed to stay out of this situation entirely, as it hadnothingto do with me.
My lack of response must have clued Frederick in to what made me jump out of my chair, because two seconds later he inserted himself like a six-foot-tall vampiric shield between me and the kitchen table. His hands shot out, gripping my upper arms like twin iron vises, cool fingertips digging into my warm flesh.
“Laptop.” His voice broke on the word. “Did you—”
No point in denying it now. “Yes.”
“Um,” he said. He licked his lips, and—look, after finding that article on the computer, it wasn’tmyfault that my eyes fell reflexively to his mouth. “Listen—”
“You don’t have to say anything,” I said very quickly. “I said you could use my laptop and... it’s none of my business what you use it for. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have looked.”
“You have nothing to apologize for,” he said, his fingertips flexing a little on my arms. “It’s your laptop. You don’t need my permission to use it. I’d meant to put that article away before you came home, but I got caught up in preparing the food, and...” His eyes dropped to the floor. “I must have forgotten.”
We stood like that for a long moment, his hands still on my arms. The soup was still bubbling away on the stove, but we both ignored it. It felt like I was supposed to say something—something to defuse the situation, probably—only I wasn’t certain what it should be.
So I said the first thing that popped into my head. “Are you... curious about kissing?”
Probably a stupid question, given what I’d found on my laptop. But he looked surprised all the same. His eyes snapped to mine. “What makes you think that?”
I huffed a laugh. “Your browser history.”
I could all but see the wheels in his mind turning as he cast about for how to reply. But after an interminable moment he seemed to regain some of his composure.
He stepped a little closer to me. At the heated look he gave me, all rational thought fled.
“I know aboutkissing, Cassie.”
He sounded genuinely affronted, and I cringed at what I’d just implied—even as my knees went weak at the implication of what he’d just said. He’d been alive—or, his equivalent of alive—for hundreds of years. He’d probably kissed hundreds of people. Maybe thousands.
In fact—he was probablyreally goodat kissing.
“I’m sure you do,” I said, too flustered to look at his face anymore. My gaze drifted down to his ridiculous apron.This Guy Rubs His Own Meat.I flushed deeper with the awkwardness of this entire situation. How was any of this happening? “It’s just... well. That website.” I paused. “You can see why I might think that—”
“Right, right,” he said, impatiently, waving a dismissive hand. “I understand what it must look like. But I swear, my only reason for reading that was... that is to say, I just wanted to see if...”
He trailed off.
