Page 93 of A Sweet Destruction

The reason why I’d even kissed Ford in the first place.

Liar, the Bond scoffed.

“Sorry to, um, interrupt,” the intruder said, adjusting their spectacles high on their nose. The hand he pushed his glasses up with bore the edges of a Mark, something like vines curling around his wrist and ending on the back of his hand.

Suspicion rose in my gut, doing its level best to chase away the pounding desire still pooling there. I should have known that it was a bad idea to crack open this can of worms. It wasn’t even the years without affection of any kind, though that certainly had its other side effects, but it was just…Ford.

“This had better be for good reason,” Ford barked, his hold tightening on me.

“We…uh, we heard something. A banging sound.”

Ford hit his hand against the wall, causing an echo to reverberate around us. “Something like that?”

A blush sprouted high on their cheeks. “It’s just…if I may, is this not a rather odd place for…”

“We were on a ride with our horses. Then…” Ford broke off, choosing his next words carefully. “Affection rose, as it often does with one’s partner. Is your own of romantic nature?” he finished, nodding at the Mark on his hand.

I didn’t know who’s blush was worse. Mine certainly felt strong enough to cause a wildfire, but his was quite potent.

He swallowed, wringing his hands together. “Yes, it is.” I wondered if that was a lie or not. If he was faking romance with his pretend Match or if their arrangement had blossomed into something real.

Ford hid any of his own suspicion expertly. “Then you’ll understand that when that happens, you aren’t concerned about odd locations.”

“Oh, yes, certainly. You’ll forgive me. It’s just that…” his words trailed off as his eyes centered in on me, then my Mark. When recognition hit, it chased away any sense of suspicion lingering in his expression. He straightened with relief, nodding to himself. “You’ll understand my concern with the noise, but again, excuse the interruption. I’ll leave you both to your private moment. I’m sure you haven’t had much of that since your arrival.”

“Thank you,” I said, sweeping my free hand down Ford’s arm to curl over the back of his hand and lace our fingers together, the Mark on full display. “Apologies for any fright we caused.” I looked up at Ford, using no effort at all to pull a besotted expression to my face.

“No worries at all,” he said again, this time slightly more panicked. I guessed it was to our advantage that anyone on Muli thought I would explode into a murderous rage if anyone slighted Ford.

I would enjoy it if you did, the Bond, very unhelpfully, added.

“Good day now.” With that, he was running back around the side of the building like his tail was on fire.

Ford was already looking at me by the time I braved the courage to turn to him.

“I’m sorry,” I blurted out, then promptly regretted it when Ford’s face fell. “Wait, wait, that’s not what I meant.”

Ford nodded, and patiently waited as I scoured for what few brain cells I still had left after that kiss. It was especially hard, seeing as the Bond was kicking them right out of reach, clearly wanting me to abandon all reason and just go back to satiating physical desires.

It felt like my heart had moved down to my stomach, the beat centered there.

Eventually, I managed to say, “I’m sorry for just doing that. It wasn’t really how I wanted—”

Ford let out a heavy breath, but his face lightened, even tilting towards a smile. “I’ll be the first to say it. I’ll say it even if that’s not what you were going to say. I wasn’t planning the first time I kissed you to be because we were going to get caught otherwise.”

“I think technically I kissed you.”

“You may have started it, but I was an active participant.”

“Well, do you define kissing me as initiating it or just being involved.”

“I’m happy to do both just to avoid any confusion.”

Ford leaned down and I tilted my chin up and our lips were a hair’s breadth away from one another before I could get my head around straight.

I felt his exhale on my lips, which only made me want to launch myself at him. “You’re right. We do need to talk about this. I’m not starting anything physical with you unless you are damn sure that’s what you want.”

“I—” Ford’s hand reached up to cover my mouth and I licked the palm of his hand. Clearly the Bond had decided to infect my system on such a deep level I was no longer conscious of it because where was this coming from?