The kiss ended.

Scarlett leaned against him, pressed there by his arms. Through the windowpanes, she stared out at the raging storm, her expression distant.

She wasn't lonely. She couldn't name a reason for letting Jeremy in that far. They hadn't slept together — it was just a kiss, nothing more.

But it wasn't nothing. The shift between a man and a woman didn't require a shared bed to mean something. It lived in an exchange of warmth, in small, quiet changes. She ...