“Mm-hmm.” She nods. “But it feels good not to hold on to it alone anymore.”

“Good. It shouldn’t be yours to hold on to.”

“That boy, the shooter, he didn’t survive.” Lainey drags her finger along my clavicle, body jolting with the next rumble of thunder. She exhales a shaky breath before she continues. “People came rushing out of the lecture hall. Everyone was screaming.” She presses her palm against the side of my neck, thumb brushing back and forth slowly along the edge of my jaw. “I was just . . . frozen on the steps. I knew I needed to move, but I couldn’t make my body follow the command. By the time I turned to run, everyone was on me. I twisted my ankle on the steps, but someone grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the way before I could get trampled. I was lucky I didn’t see any of it firsthand.”

The last part sounds more like something she says as self-reassurance. “I’m so sorry you went through that.” No wonder she was so terrified when I came to pick her up. And I realize that Lainey is far stronger than I ever could have imagined. To survive something like that and still be able to look at life with such positivity is a miracle.

“My classmates went through much worse, but now you know why I hate thunderstorms so much. I’ve always been anxious, but after that . . . I have a very hard time with crowds, so the airport was a challenge for me. And being on a plane with no way of escaping, that wasn’t pleasant either. But I used all the strategies I have to stay calm, and I made it through just fine—and then you were on the Cessna, so that helped. I should be able to handle a thunderstorm, but the memories are hard to deal with sometimes.”

“Is there anything I can do? Some way I can help now?”

“Being here with you makes me feel safer.” She smooths her hand over my shoulder and down my biceps, slipping under the hem of the sleeve. “I don’t like to rely too much on people to help calm me, because it’s not always effective—especially if those people aren’t there when the anxiety becomes intolerable—so I usually do a sensory calming exercise.”

“What is that?”

“I focus on the five senses, counting down from five to one. So unless it’s dark, I usually start with five things I can see.” A flash of lightning startles her, and she digs her nails into my biceps.

I tuck a finger under her chin and turn her head away from the windows behind us, since she’s waiting for the next rumble of thunder. “Tell me what you see right now, Lainey.”

Her eyes search mine, bottom lip trembling. “I-I see flecks of blue and gold near your iris when I’m this close to you.”

“That’s one. What else?”

“You have a dimple high on your left cheek. It’s always there, but it’s more obvious when you smile or laugh.” She skims my eyebrow with her fingertip. “You have a scar above your eyebrow that makes it look arched all the time.”

I laugh, and she smiles. “You have a tiny freckle right here.” She taps my bottom lip, then drags her finger down the side of my throat. “And this vein right here shows me exactly how calm you are right now.”

“What’s next? Touch? Or do I get to play this game too?”

“That depends.”

“On?”

“Are you anxious?”

“Maybe a little.”

She frowns as if she’s concerned, which is ironic considering what she’s been through and how it’s affecting her right now. “About what?”

“I have a gorgeous woman that I really like who’s anxious because she’s been through something bad that I can’t fix, even though I want to be able to. I don’t want to mess this up by saying or doing the wrong thing.”

She shifts, and for a moment I think she’s going to move off my lap, but instead she straddles my thighs. “Everything you say is perfect, so you have nothing to worry about.”

A flash of lightning has her sucking in a breath.

“Hey, hey, stay with me, right here. Focus on me. Tell me what you feel.” I cup her face in my palms to keep her eyes locked with mine.

“I feel . . . my heart racing, the warmth of your palms against my skin, the heat of your body under me even through our clothes, and an ache . . .” She bites her lip and her cheeks flush.

“What kind of ache?”

“For you to touch more of me,” she whispers, almost shyly.

I skim her throat lightly. “Like this?”

“Yes, please.”

I drag my fingers over her collarbone and down her arms until I reach her hands. I bring one to my lips so I can kiss her knuckle. “Is taste next?”

She nods, eyes staying on mine. “It is.”

“What do you want to taste, Lainey?” I run my hands up the outside of her thighs, wishing I were touching bare skin. I know what I want to taste, but I’m not exactly sure what direction we’re heading, and I’d like her to lead.

“Your skin.” She leans in, nose brushing along my jaw as her lips find my throat, right over the pulse point. Her soft, warm tongue strokes along my skin before she kisses her way up to my ear. “I taste salt and the bitterness of aftershave.” Her lips travel over my cheek until they finally brush over mine. She sucks my bottom lip. “I taste mint and chocolate and marshmallows.”

She angles her head, lips parting as she comes in for another kiss, this time with tongue. I keep my hands on her thighs, even though I desperately want to touch more of her. Her tongue strokes mine, and she whimpers quietly.

She slides her fingers into my hair and latches on. Lainey shimmies forward until her chest is flush with mine, and I’m sure she realizes that her calming exercise has been having the opposite effect on me. I groan into her mouth.

“I hear desire.” She drops her hands and grabs the hem of her sweater. “And the soft rustle of fabric.” She lifts it over her head, along with the thermal shirt under it, skin pebbling—possibly because it’s cold, maybe because she’s still anxious . . . or turned on.

She’s gloriously topless, and my imagination has proven absolutely abysmal in concocting anything close to the reality of what this would look like, feel like, be like.

I couldn’t have predicted a set of circumstances that would bring us into each other’s lives like this, let alone to this point. It feels . . . different. Like there’s significance in every single touch and caress, and I feel the sharp bite of guilt over not being completely honest with her about who I am. But I won’t ruin it now, not when she’s shared something so obviously painful for her. Not when she’s here, looking for me to take it away for a while in whatever way I can.

“You’re gorgeous.” I smooth my hands down the sides of her neck and kiss her.

“We never got to smell,” she murmurs against my lips.

“I smell mint and cucumber shampoo.” I brush my nose along the column of her throat. “And the sweetness of your vanilla lotion. What about you?”

“I smell need and lust and wanting.”

“We should do something about that, shouldn’t we?” I settle my hands on her waist.

“Yes, please.”

I kiss her again, and this time restraint becomes unnecessary. Like every other time we’ve kissed, it’s as if someone has flicked a lighter in an ocean of gasoline. She wraps herself around me, and I have to coax her to loosen her hold. “I want to taste every inch of you, Lainey, starting right here.” I touch a finger to her lips and drag it down between her breasts. “And I’ll make a stop here, before I continue”—I draw a line straight down, circling her navel, and stop at the waistband of her leggings—“under here. Do you think that would be a good sensory calming exercise?”