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“You’ve been busy.”

“Yes.” There’s unmistakable satisfaction in the way he looks around the room. “I can leave things where I want now.”

“I see that.”

His smile is familiar enough that some of my nervousness slips away. Then I notice the open doorway at the back.

A metal bed fills most of the smaller room, with rumpled sheets, a little table and lamp, shelves of clothes, a kettle, a few dishes, and a small refrigerator tucked beneath the shelves.

I knew he’d moved out. Until this moment, I don’t think I understood that he’d moved into a life of his own.

The bed. Clothes on shelves. Paintings crowding the walls. Money he earned himself. Nothing here exists because I chose it for him.

He has been alive less than two months, and all of this is his.

“It looks good, Kell.”

“I need a dresser. And better towels.”

I turn back to him. “How bad are the towels?”

“Bad. They dry things, but they aren’t soft.”

I laugh, and Kell smiles. For a few seconds, the distance between us doesn’t feel quite so large.

My gaze catches on the green paint near his jaw again. “You’ve got paint on your face.”

He touches the wrong side.

“The other one.”

He misses again, and I laugh softly. “Hold still.”

I reach up before thinking better of it. My thumb brushes his jaw, and he stops trying to wipe the paint away. The paint doesn’t come off on the first pass, so I rub again, feeling the familiar warmth of him beneath my fingertips.

God, I’ve missed touching him.

My hand stays against his face. Kell’s gaze drops to my mouth. The pull between us is hot and immediate, familiar despite everything that has changed. His fingers close lightly around my wrist, not moving it away.

“Laura.”

I kiss him.

He answers without hesitation, one hand sliding around my waist and pulling me against him. I catch the front of his shirt and kiss him harder. The low resonance beginning inside him travels through his chest into mine, and my whole body recognizes it.

His other hand comes to the back of my neck. For a few seconds, there’s nothing tentative between us. No weeks apart. No careful decisions. Just Kell’s body against mine, his mouth on my lips, and the dizzying familiarity of something I have missed more than I wanted to admit.

I slide my fingers beneath his shirt and spread them against the warm weave of his back. He makes a rough sound and pulls me closer. I feel how hard he is through his jeans.

Relief hits almost as strongly as desire.

He still wants me.

I move against him, and the resonance inside him deepens. His hand tightens at my waist while mine slides higher beneath his shirt. Heat gathers low and fast, and suddenly I’m very aware of the bed in the room behind him.

I drag my mouth from his long enough to breathe. Kell follows, kissing the corner of my mouth and then my jaw, and whatever I thought I was going to say disappears.

“Kell.”