It was sweet. She was sweet. She smelled like chocolate and tasted like the chocolate mint tea they’d been drinking. God. He shuddered hard. He wanted her in his arms, but he didn’t dare let her go even to move around to her side of the table. He didn’t want to scare her away. He didn’t want to do anything to jeopardize this moment.

Because he was kissing her and she . . . He couldn’t suppress the growl that rose in his throat. She was kissing him back. He heard the scrape of a chair across the floor and then she was standing, leaning into the kiss, her hands gripping his wrists, running up his arms, over his shoulders, cradling his face.

She hummed a quiet moan, then pulled back way too soon, resting her forehead against his. Panting.

He’d made her pant. She might not want to want him, but she did, and he’d take it for now. But then she spoke and his confidence began to crumble at the edges.

“Oh God,” she whispered, and his heart skipped an apprehensive beat.

He was afraid to ask, but he needed to know. “Oh-God-good or oh-God-bad?”

Her chuckle was shaky. “Both?” She lifted an equally shaky hand to caress his skull, her hand fanning back and forth in a rhythm that calmed his fears. But then she dropped her hands to his wrists, holding him in place as she pulled farther away, creating an unwelcome distance. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

He straightened, sliding back until he held her hands over the table. He wouldn’t tell her that she wouldn’t hurt him, because she had the power to destroy him, and that scared him to death. “Let’s just see, okay?”

She bit her lower lip, still plump and wet from his kiss. “I can’t promise you anything.”

He met her eyes directly. “I didn’t ask you to. Let’s take it a day at a time.”

She opened her mouth to say something, but was interrupted by a throat being cleared. As one they shifted to look at the doorway, where an uncomfortable Michael stood. Dani yanked her hands away like she’d been caught shoplifting.

Diesel wanted to snap at Michael for interrupting them, but pushed his annoyance down. It wasn’t the kid’s fault. In fact, he might have done them a favor, because Diesel was pretty certain he didn’t want to hear what Dani had been about to say.

Dani gave Michael an awkward wave. “Hey.”

Michael’s gaze flicked from Dani’s face to Diesel’s. “I’m sorry,” he signed. “I’m hungry.”

Diesel didn’t miss the sheer relief that passed over Dani’s face. “I’ll work on dinner,” she said brightly, then turned to the fridge, where she stuck her face in the freezer a second time in less than an hour.