The Arrangement Anthology 2(179)

My heart is racing, unable to calm down. Sean smiles softly, taking my hand and pulling me toward him. I shake my head, refusing to move.

“Are you afraid of heights, Miss Smith?”

“Only when there isn’t a plane around me.”

“Seriously?” Amusement lights his face, his expression betraying his belief that this is a silly thing to fear.

“Tell me something," I say nodding and closing my eyes tightly. "Talk, or I’m going to flip out.”

He notices the way I’m shaking and comes to sit beside me. He places his hand on top of mine and gently squeezes it.

“We’re in my old tree house. Peter and I played up here as children. I had a tendency to find the tallest tree and climb it. My mother,” his voice catches in his throat, but he spits out the rest of the thought, “didn’t like it, but my father encouraged us to climb higher and go further. One day he took us back here and asked which tree I liked best. I picked this one. I showed him how high I could climb. The next time he walked us out this way, this tree house was two limbs higher than I'd climbed. When we were children, the man was always pushing us to go further, to climb higher, and to dream bigger. God, he’s changed.” Sean rubs his hand over his face and tips his head back against the wall.

“So, once upon a time, your dad was nice?”

Sean’s eyes cut over to me. He shrugs.

“Yeah, he was. Before the mistresses came around, he gave Pete and me all his attention. He told me that I could have this place and do anything I wanted with it if I could get up here. There wasn’t a ladder. It took me a month to get up here. I suppose it was more for me than Pete. He was still young then and couldn’t climb the way I did. Dad added the ladder later for him.”

“So, you played up here when you were little?” I look around again, wondering about the man sitting next to me. It’s a normal tree house, except that it’s practically in the clouds.

“Yeah, I did. I can’t remember the last time I was up here. I had to be thirteen or so.” He smiles softly, lost in thought. “I'd just had my first kiss, and came up here afterward to get away from Pete and Jon. By then, it was overgrown and aging poorly. This morning, I almost couldn’t find it. The forest has grown up around it, devouring it.”

The terror melts away as he speaks, and I get to see a side that he usually keeps hidden.

“First kiss?”

“Yeah.” He smiles. “It was sweet and quick. But at the time, it felt like a lifetime of bliss.” Sean realizes he has a smile on his face, and it vanishes.

“Sean Ferro kissed a girl sweetly? I can’t imagine it. That’s like saying Dracula’s teeth are candy corn.”

“How is that the same?” His eyes are laughing as he looks at me, and all I want is to keep him looking just like this.

“Well, you think that he’s going to be all mean and nasty, but no--alas! The dark dude in the cape with a taste for blood is just a sugar addict who--”

"You did not just compare me to Dracula,” Sean interrupts.

“Blah! I vant to suck your sveets!” I hold up my hands and point my fingers down like teeth, speaking with my best Transylvanian accent. Sean's eyes go wide, and then he actually giggles.

“You’re insane.”

“Holy shit! You giggled. I heard it.” I grab his ultra tight shirt and yank him toward me. “Open.” I tap his lips. “I need to check your teeth.”

Sean watches my mouth as I speak, with the sweet grin still in place. It’s so unlike him that it makes my stomach flip. He reaches for me slowly and, when our eyes meet, he holds my gaze. Sean brushes his hand against my cheek and slides his fingers around the back of my neck. His other hand finds my cheek and inch-by-inch he gets closer. My pulse is hammering in my ears, and it’s all I can do to not squeal. Butterflies erupt in my stomach and move through me in waves. The fierce flutter makes it hard to breathe as Sean’s beautiful mouth gets closer.

Normally he takes what he wants or tells me to, but this is different. It has me supercharged, and every inch of me is tingling. It’s like I licked an electrical socket. I can’t move. I want to lean into the kiss, but I want to see what he’s going to do. The way he moves toward me and looks at me through those dark lashes, the way he cradles my head and cups my cheek--it's as if he's asking and it leaves me trembling.

He stops right before our lips touch, a breath away. His gaze drops to my mouth, and he pauses, not kissing, just waiting. I can’t move. The magic of the moment makes the rest of the world melt away. It feels pure and perfect. I didn’t know he could be like this.