“Three years.”

Her eyebrows dipped and she tilted her head.

“It’s how long I wasted not being able to do this.” I wrapped my arm around her back and another at her waist, pressing her against me. Our lips met in a heated, hungry collision. Every time was explosive with her, overwhelming and too little all at once.

She squeaked, falling against my chest, her kiss matching mine. Her arms wriggled out from under mine and wrapped around my neck.

A car pulled into the lot and she tensed.

I palmed her ass and she yelped, pressing her palms against my chest. Intensity overdrive and I’d scared her. I let her go, allowing her to drop down from her tippy-toes and stared into her eyes.

She wore a lopsided smile and her chest heaved in pants like the ones I’d breathed racing to get over here. The car parked and someone hopped out.

Bay took a step back and cut her gaze in their direction.

“Sorry.” I dropped my arms.

She released her lip from between her teeth, but she watched the car idling in the parking lot. “No need to apologize. I was caught off guard is all.” Taking my hands in hers, she wrapped them around her back, letting me hold her close again.

Not until the car pulled out of the lot did she turn back to face me completely.

“This was me showing up to give you a ride home and nothing more. I don’t expect anything from you, Bay.”

Every part of me wanted to throw open my car door and lay her down in the back seat, but I reigned in those thoughts with a crack of my mental whip. Bay wasn’t a backseat kind of girl. The anvil of information she’d dropped on me about being a virgin hadn’t been forgotten.

“Shouldn’t you be out celebrating? It seems that’s all anyone’s doing through the end of the year.”

“Not until next weekend when the trophy finally gets here. They don’t put the order in until tomorrow morning.”

Her jaw hung open and she laughed. “I was joking.”

“Oh. You’ve never paid attention to all the shit they do when we win?”

“It’s more than they normally do? I can’t say I’ve paid much attention to football until now. Until you.”

Why did that make me feel this way? Tethered and free all at once. Grounded by the way she looked into my eyes and flying when her lips touched mine.

“After four it’s more of the same. Mainly a chance for Coach and the mayor to get up and talk until everyone gets restless and then our QB lifts the trophy over his head and pretends he did it all himself. You didn’t miss much.”

“If you’re there, I’ll watch from the crowd.”

“Why don’t you watch as my date?”

Silence. She stared up at me with a stunned expression.

“After all this, do you think I’m not into you, Bay?” I brushed the back of my fingers along her cheek.