Annie's POV:
The drum changed to something fast, and the crowd surged around me. I lost the kitchen girls in the press of bodies. I was trying to find the edge of the dance when a warrior's shoulder caught me. He was deep in his cups, spinning with a girl on each arm. He didn't see me. He didn't mean it. The push was pure accident, the way most harm in a crowd is.
The world tipped.
I fell forward. My hands went out. They caught nothing. I went down. My mouth met his.
The kiss was an accident. It had to be. I had been pushed, he had been turning, and our lips had met for a second, maybe less. It lasted less than a breath—long enough for the heat of him to come through my skin, the world to tilt, my heart to catch. For one heartbeat there was nothing in the world but his mouth on mine an
