Permission. We’re giving each other the permission we both so desperately want.

“We’re at a make-believe party,” I say, as we move closer to each other, and he glides his hand around my waist.

I want to melt into him. My bones dissolve into honey as I raise my hands to his shoulders, sliding over them, looping around his neck, then drawing him near. “You never know what might happen at a costume party,” I whisper as we glide closer. Inches separate us. Inches and air and restraint that’s frayed so thin it’s unraveling at breakneck speed.

“One dance, maybe more.”

Music plays softly in the background, and I swear it’s Linda Ronstadt crooning the opening notes to “Someone to Watch Over Me.” Or maybe that’s how my body feels. Like it’s become a torch song. Like I’m living inside the lyrics to a smoky, sexy tune of desperation and wanting.

My eyes flutter closed for a second, and warmth spreads from the center of my chest all the way to the tips of my fingers. A shiver runs through me as his hands tighten around my hips.

Once again, we exist on two planes. We seem to slip back and forth in time like we did when we visited the subway station. Like we exist here as Flynn and Sabrina, and we exist in the past as Angel and Duke.

I dance, though I shouldn’t.

I sway, though it’s risky.

I look into his eyes, though that only makes me want him more. Wanting is such a painful emotion. It aches and throbs and hurts even as it asks for more of the torture. More of the things that I can’t have. A real chance with this man. A real date. A real love.

“Sometimes you look at me like you did the other night,” I whisper.

“How did I look at you the other night?”

“As if you liked being kind of dominant.”

“I think you liked it when I was kind of dominant.”

“I liked it when you raised my hands over my head.”

“And you liked it when I hiked your legs around my waist.”

“I did,” I say breathily.

“Why?”

“Because I didn’t have to think. I didn’t have to worry. I could get lost in the moment.”

“Do you want to get lost again?” he asks, in a voice that betrays his want for me. It makes me dizzy. It makes me high.

I’m swallowed whole by a new kind of desire that floods my body. I want to lose myself in him. I don’t want to be found.

“I do,” I whisper as my skin prickles with the clawing need to get closer to him. My pulse spikes. “I wish we didn’t have to pretend.”

“So do I.”

I stop pretending. I lean in, part my lips, and give in.

He brushes his lips across mine and hums as he kisses me.

It’s a soft, aching kiss. Like the song. Like my need for him.