The words she spoke were ordinary, but the moment after was anything but. As her sentence trailed off, her lips parted slightly, and her tongue slipped out—quick, subtle, deliberate. It grazed across her lower lip, leaving behind a faint sheen, and then disappeared as quickly as it had come.
He saw it. She knew he did. She timed it that way, choosing a moment when his eyes were already fixed on her face. The gesture was small, almost innocuous, but it carried weight far beyond its size. It wasn’t hunger, not overtly. It was suggestion—an invitation tucked into a reflex she made sure wasn’t accidental.
His gaze caught, refused to move. The brief flick of her tongue had drawn his attention so completely that he barely registered the words she had spoken before it. His mind replayed it in slow motion, the way her lips had glistened, the way the tip of her tongue had lingered just long enough to make him wonder if it was for him.
Her eyes shifted to his, and the faintest curve of her mouth told him she knew. She had noticed the way he froze, the way his breath stalled, the way his body betrayed the thought he tried to suppress. She didn’t need to exaggerate the gesture; its subtlety was what gave it power. The less she gave, the more he filled in the silence with his own wanting.
The image of it stayed with him long after. The shine on her lip, the deliberate slow press of her mouth afterward, as though savoring something only she understood. It wasn’t a mistake. It was a message, crafted for his eyes alone. And he knew he’d be haunted by the memory of it, watching every movement of her lips afterward, waiting to see if she’d do it again.