“More or less,” she said, looking at him from the corner of her eye, color creeping into her cheeks. Probably not the smartest question to ask. Why was he struggling with his words and actions? That never happened to him. Not anymore.
“The less would be me being a jerk and planting my lips on you, right?” Might as well go for honesty. Clara was the only person in his life who rated that. He didn’t want to violate it.
She blew out a breath. “Um … mostly the being a jerk. You’re a pretty good kisser, it turns out.”
“So you didn’t mind that?”
“Not as much as I should have.” Her words escaped in a rush.
“Glad to know I’m not the only one,” he said, forcing the words out.
“Not sure it helps anything.” She walked ahead of him, straying beneath the overhang of a curled roof, her eyes on the murals painted on the walls of the temple.
“Maybe not.” He leaned in, pretending to examine the same image she was.
“So … is there a solution?” She put her hand on the wall, tracing the painting of a white elephant with her finger.
He covered her hands with his, his heart pounding, his hand shaking like he was a teenage virgin. “Let me see.”
He leaned in, his mouth brushing hers. He went slow this time, asking the question, as he should have done the first time he’d kissed her. She didn’t move, not into him or away from him. He angled his head and deepened the kiss and he felt her soften beneath him, her lips parting beneath his, her breath catching, sharp and sweet when the tip of his tongue met hers.
He pulled away, his eyes on hers.
She released a breath. “How do you feel?”
“I was going to ask you the same thing.”
She looked up. “The roof didn’t fall in.”
“No,” he said, following her gaze. “It didn’t.”
She leaned into him, her elbow jabbing his side, a shy smile on her face. “Good to know anyway.”
“Glad it comforts you.”
She laughed, her cheeks turning pink, betraying the fact that she wasn’t unaffected. “Comfort may not be the right word.”
He looked around the teeming common area, at the completely unfamiliar surroundings. And he found he wanted to pretend that the feelings he was having for Clara were unfamiliar, too.
But he couldn’t. Because they had been there, for a long time, lurking beneath the surface. Ignored. Unwanted. But there.
“No. Comfort is definitely not the right word.”
They’d spent most of the day at the temple, then taken a car back to Chiang Mai where they’d wandered the streets buying food from vendors, and watching decorations go up on every market stall for a festival that was happening in the evening.
Now, with the event coming close, the streets were packed tight with people, carrying street food, flower arrangements with candles in the center, talking, laughing. It was dark out, the sun long gone behind the mountains, but the air was still thick, warm and fragrant. There was music, noise and movement everywhere. The smell of frying food mixed with the perfume of flowers and the dry, stale scent of dust clung to the air, filled her senses.
It almost helped block out Zack. But not quite. No matter just how much it filled up her senses, it couldn’t erase Zack. The imprint of his kiss. It had been different than the first one. Tender. Achingly sexy.
It had made her want more. Not simply in a sexual way, but in an emotional way. It didn’t bear thinking about. Still, she knew she would.
She kept an eye on the food stalls, passing more exotic fare, like anything with six legs or more, for something a bit more vanilla. Maybe food would help keep her mind off things. At least temporarily.
“I definitely don’t need this,” she said, stopping to buy battered, fried bananas from the nearest food stall.
“But you bought it,” he said, breaking a piece off the banana and putting it in his mouth.
“Well, that’s because sweets are my area of expertise. You’re here for the beans and tea leaves, I’m here for the pairing, right? This is research. It’s for work. I need to capture the new and exotic flavor profiles Chiang Mai has to offer,” she said, trying to sound official. “Maybe I can write off the calories?”
They dodged a bicycle deliveryman and crossed the busy, bustling street, moving away from the stalls and toward the river that ran through the city. “You don’t need to worry about it. You’re perfect like you are.”
She looked down at the bag of sweets. “You’re just saying that.”
“I’m not.”
She sucked in a sharp breath and looked at the lanterns that were strung from tree to tree, glowing overhead. “We should do this more. At home.”
“Eat?”
“No. Go do things. Mostly we work, and sometimes I feed you at my house, or we watch a movie at yours. Well, we do go out to lunch sometimes, but on workdays, so it doesn’t count.”
“We’re busy.”
“We’re workaholics.”
Zack frowned and stopped walking. He extended his hand and took a lock of her hair between his thumb and forefinger, rubbing it idly. “Is that why you’re leaving me?”
She looked up at him. “I’m not leaving you. I’m leaving the company.” And she was counting on that to put some natural and healthy distance between them. Roasted had brought them together, and because they got along so well, after spending the day at work together, half of the time it felt natural to simply go and have dinner together. Watch bad reality TV together. Once they weren’t involved in the same business it would only be natural they would drift apart. And with any luck, it would only feel like she was missing her right arm for a couple of years.
“What do you need? I’ll give it to you.”
“You’re missing the point, Zack. It’s about having something of my own.”
“Roasted isn’t enough for you? You’ve been there from the beginning, more or less. You’ve helped me make it what it is.”
“No. I just bake cupcakes. And there are a lot of people who can do my job.”
“But they aren’t you.”
She closed her eyes and let the compliment wash over her. She’d say this for Zack; he gave her more than most anyone else in her life ever had, including her family. But it was still just a crumb of what she wanted.
“No,” she said, “some of them are even better.”
She wove through the crowd to the edge of the waterfront. People were kneeling down and putting the flower arrangements with their lit candles into the stream. The crowd standing on the other side of the waterfront was lighting candles inside tall, rice paper lanterns, the orange spreading to the inky night, casting color and light all around.
Zack was behind her, she could sense it without even turning around. “I’m glad we came tonight,” she said.
Zack swept his fingers through Clara’s hair, moving it over her shoulder, exposing her neck. He didn’t normally touch her like that, but tonight, he found he couldn’t help himself. Things were tense between them. The kiss at the temple certainly hadn’t helped diffuse it.
He wondered if most of the tension had started in the bedroom back in the villa. That moment when they’d both looked at the bed and had that same, illicit thought.
If