The way she responded was momentarily discouraging — specifying that Nora would be happy to see him — but he only had to wait a beat before she added that she would, too. Ben smiled and scooted in closer to her, draping his free arm loosely over her waist. Were they still taking things slow? The reason to take things slow had been to keep them from getting in over their heads when their future was still uncertain. The reason to take things slow was to prevent things from moving far too fast. Now they seemed to be in alignment about what they wanted from the future, and Ben had gotten a wake-up call regarding how much time they really had left. It wasn't limitless — wasn't guaranteed to be, anyway. There were no guarantees. He thought they'd wasted enough time already, between all the years of arguments that hadn't mattered in the end and the artificial distance he'd put between them over the last year.

"No," he answered, and leaned in to kiss her forehead. "I know what I want now. There's no reason to wait." Then, to prove he meant it, he moved to kiss her fully.

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