21 Stolen Kisses Read online

  “You broke my heart twice, K. Are you going to do it a third time?”

  I shake my head.

  “How do I know?”

  “I don’t know. How do you ever know?”

  “You don’t ever know. You just take the chance anyway.”

  “Take the chance,” I say, hope expanding inside me. So much hope that I don’t know how I’ll ever feel anything else. There can’t be room in me for anything but this.

  “You,” he whispers, then takes my hand and grasps my fingers, his eyes never straying from mine.

  “You,” I repeat, wanting him to know that this time is different. This time is for all time.

  Sometimes a person can start as a shield or a secret but then become something more. He is my something more. Here, with my hand in his hand, I ask him. “Do you want to meet my friends?”

  “I would love to.”

  We walk, hand in hand, to the table. They are all quiet, and I can tell they’ve been whispering about me. I clear my throat.

  “Lane, Catey, Amanda. This is my,” I say, then stop, look at him, the man I love madly, searching for the word, the title, the designation. “My Noah.”

  He laughs, that warm, deep rumbly laugh that thrums through me, filling me with happiness. “Evidently, I’m her Noah. Nice to meet you, Lane, Catey, and Amanda.”

  He extends his hand to shake with each of my friends, then sits down and joins us for coffee. It’s not a perfect fit. The five of us don’t slide into conversation like it’s all natural. But somehow, our quintet works.

  *

  It is not my eighteenth birthday tonight. That day is long gone, but I celebrate the way we had always intended. Together.

  We don’t book an inn or run off to a five-star hotel. We don’t plan the moment this time. We just stop resisting because we don’t have to hold back anymore.

  His home feels like mine. Or really, like ours. I no longer have to ask permission or spin a fable to be here. I am here because I can be. Because I make all my own choices now, including this one.

  Everything about tonight feels right, from the second he unlocks the door to his apartment, to the way we kiss and unbutton furiously as we stumble to the bedroom, to my clothes landing in a heap on the hardwood floors.

  I wait on the bed, the lights on, watching him strip off his final layers of clothes and grab protection.

  I can’t take my eyes off him. Seeing him like this makes my throat dry and heart pound. He is so stunning, and so mine. I grasp his shoulders and tug him down on me, whispering that I’m ready.

  “Me too,” he says.

  It hurts at first, but soon it doesn’t hurt. The pain washes away, and in its place comes something wonderful. This deep physical connection. This intensity that comes from this love. I can’t believe I waited so long to feel something so good, so pure, so blissful.

  But I am so glad I did.

  We fit perfectly, legs and hips entwined, lips and breath tangled. This is everything. This is the sky and the sun and all my music. This is the song I will play on repeat and never grow tired of.

  He is the only one I will ever want.

  “Hi,” he whispers in my ear.

  “Hi.”

  “Is it okay?”

  I nod as he moves in me. “It’s so much more than okay,” I say on a gasp. A sharp, fevered intake of breath as he hits someplace inside me that bathes my brain in pleasure.

  My toes curl, and my spine tingles, and my hands grip his back. He looks in my eyes, and the intensity of his gaze is almost too much to bear. Somewhere inside of me I’m still nervous. It’s my first time, after all. But mostly, I’m thrilled that I have so much more of this ahead of me. With the man I love, and he knows exactly how to love me this way. How to hold me, how to fill me, how to take me over the edge. Because I’m there now, and it’s like a whole new world here on this other side with him.

  I’m light-headed, buzzed on the new sensations rippling through my body. I grin happily as I trace my fingers down his chest.

  He didn’t take my virginity. I gave it to him.

  “Can we do that again soon?”

  “Anytime you want.”

  *

  The next night, I slip into a silver dress and black heels at his apartment.

  Noah holds my coat for me, and as I put it on and button it I admire his attire—black pants, sky-blue shirt, black jacket, no tie. Never a tie.

  “Wait,” he says before we go, and I tilt my head to the side as he opens a box on his end table and takes out a small silvery object. “This was your birthday present,” he says as he brings it to me and clicks open a locket.

  Sparklers ignite in my chest as I run my finger over the picture. “You found the deer,” I say, and I’m sure my eyes are twinkling. He unhooks my necklace, slides the new addition on, and clasps the chain around my neck once more.

  “You told me once they gave you hope,” he says, then runs his fingertips along my cheek.

  “I was right to hope.”

  “I always hoped for you,” he says.

  He takes my hand and we leave, heading for the theater.

  Inside the lobby of the Belasco, we thread our way through the crowd of men in suits, and women in glittery dresses, of men in jeans and women in simple tops. Not everyone is fancy, but everyone is abuzz with the hum and anticipation of an opening night, of taking part in the thrill of the curtain rising for the very first time. He tugs me closer, and I hold tight to his arm, glad to be next to him. We are surrounded by people like us. Those who love the theater. Who love a show. Some of them might be in love with love, like I am. Some might just be in love. I am that too. We are with our people, only this time we don’t sneak out to the alley to kiss, we don’t pretend we’re here as anything but who we are—together.

  We make our way to the usher when a man calls out to my boyfriend.

  Using his name.

  “Noah!”

  I’m not used to others calling him that, but somehow it seems right to turn around and see David Tremaine. Noah has said only good things about the man. He admires him, and I’m glad that they are working on the movie together that Noah sold last week to a Hollywood studio. They seem like a good match. Noah told me he bought David tickets to the show tonight as a congratulatory gift.

  “David, good to see you,” he says, and claps the gray-haired man on the back.

  “The seats are amazing. I just wanted to find you and say thank you so much for the tickets. I can’t wait for the show to start.” David turns to me, an expectant look in his eyes.

  Noah pipes up. “David, I want to introduce you to—”

  David cuts him off. “You don’t have to tell me. She’s the one who didn’t get away,” he says to the two of us, shooting us a wide smile.

  Noah wraps his arm around my shoulder tighter as I shake David’s hand. “Yes, that’s me,” I say, and I couldn’t be happier to be known this way.

  “Good to meet you finally. I’ve heard a lot about you. Take good care of him,” he says, tipping his forehead to Noah.

  I stand on tiptoes, plant a quick kiss on Noah’s cheek, and say, “I will.”

  It is a promise. To David. To Noah. To myself. For any girl who’s ever struggled in love. For any girl who didn’t want just a second chance, but needed a third chance. I make that promise for all of us. The girls who fell in love out of time. Who fell in love when they weren’t ready. Who found a way to try and try again.

  We reach our seats, and soon the overture begins and the theater darkens. Noah squeezes my hand, and I look at him—savoring the happiness in his eyes one more time—before we turn our attention to the stage.

  This revival is better than the one we cast on our first date, even though it still doesn’t have a happy ending.

  But we do. We have a happy ending because we’re just beginning.

  Acknowledgements

  Every now and then a book enters your life as a writer and you can’t let it go. This is that bo
ok. I started 21 STOLEN KISSES six years ago and it’s been through twenty revisions and rewrites. Maybe more by now. I stopped counting.

  Each and every rewrite, I LOVED spending time with Kennedy and Noah, even though it took me a long while to finally tell the story I wanted to tell, and to figure out what that story was. I stayed with it because this is the book of my heart. This is a book I fought for, a book I went to battle for. I don’t know precisely why I couldn’t let it go. I can’t say that it’s because of this or because of that. All I know is 21 STOLEN KISSES is the story I had to tell. Maybe because, ultimately, it’s a story of a love affair that should have been impossible, but insisted on working out anyway.

  Along that winding, twisting path to publication there were many people who believed in this book too. Michelle Wolfson found it a home, trusted my instincts, and went to the mats. Meredith Rich guided me through the edits that turned it into the story it was meant to be. Courtney Summers believed in Noah and Kennedy well before anyone else even met them. Kelly Simmon never forgot that this story mattered to me. My family and my husband supported me through every single rewrite, never questioning, always encouraging.

  My dogs were by my side as they always are.

  And through it all were the two loudest voices – Kennedy and Noah. I love you guys, and hope you are enjoying your happily ever after. You earned it.

  Bloomsbury Publishing, London, New Delhi, New York and Sydney

  Copyright © 2015 by Lauren Blakely

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

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  This electronic edition published in 2015 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

  First published in May 2015

  by Bloomsbury Spark, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing, Inc.

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  ISBN: 978-1-61963-409-1

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