His head didn’t move but I saw his eyes flicker, taking in the still damp exposed flesh.
I gripped the towel around me closer, not from fear of him ripping it off but to keep from dropping it myself and letting the devil take me. When I saw him look at me, like the way he was now, I could almost feel his hands gliding over my skin. Memories kicked in to full gear. They always started an avalanche of heightened senses.
I liked to pretend sex with him hadn’t been that good. Problem was, it had been. Of course, Cupid had been involved. Logic dictated that he must have added some extra bonus points on because I’d only had sex with Fate twice. We should’ve still been in the awkward getting to know you phase. I tightened my grip. Yeah, it had been Cupid for sure.
“I thought you weren’t coming for another hour?” I licked my lips after I said the words and then had to stop my hand mid-motion as it sneakily approached my hair. I might not have been sleeping with him but my body kept sending the signals that I was interested. Every time I let my guard down, a little sneaky telltale sign would slip out. From the look on his face, he was reading me like a scholar well-briefed in the ancient language of desire. It was probably where that smirk had crept up from.
This was all Cupid’s fault. Maybe I should sleep with him just to prove it wouldn’t be that good again. Yeah, that was a plausible excuse to do what I wanted, a solid reason for walking straight into my emotional demise with eyes wide open. That would surely make me feel better when I was picking up the tattered pieces after he dumped me. I mentally snorted at my own twisted thinking.
“I was running early.”
That was a lie. Some people thought Fate ran late, later and sometimes early. I knew him well enough at this point to know he just didn’t give a shit about time. He came and went whenever he felt like it and that was when he meant to get there.
He stood and my lips parted. I shut them quickly before my tongue had the chance to moisten them again. Goddamn it, they weren’t even dry. I’d just put on lip balm.
“You didn’t forget that there is a psychopathic non-human creature running around this town wanting us both dead? Maybe a little heads up, next time, so you don’t scare the hell out of me?” I leaned my shoulders against the wall and realized my back was arching. Why was I not sleeping with him? Sometimes I couldn’t keep the reasons straight. Oh yeah, this week it was the perfume. I wasn’t sleeping with him because he was a flirt and he bought Mother perfume.
No, that wasn’t it. It would be a disappointment. That was the most current excuse. Or was that why I should sleep with him?
Nope, that wasn’t it, either. Now, I remembered. He’d crush my heart like a meat pulverizer.
While I was flipping back and forth between do or don’t quicker than they were serving up flapjacks down at the diner, he was getting closer to me, close enough that I could smell him, feel the heat he threw off and that other certain energy that was pouring off of him right now at levels not seen since Chernobyl.
If I didn’t move soon, I’d be in trouble…or ecstasy. He was close enough that he had to tilt his head downward to look me in the eyes. “Malokin won’t.”
“Won’t what?” My brain was getting fogged with Fate pheromones. He should bottle this stuff up and sell it. He could make a fortune, not that he needed it.
“He won’t give you a warning.”
My chest rose and fell with his words; they seemed to take on a different meaning. His eyes darted to the tops of my breasts above the towel and watched a drop of moisture drop from my hair to travel their surface. I had an image of his tongue licking it off. He moved another inch closer and I was torn between running or staying right there and dropping my towel.
Another inch. I should move. I should go into the other room and stop this; I should be running from him. I stood there as he moved yet another inch closer.
And another.
A palm landed on the wall on either side of my shoulders. He was everywhere but not touching me at all. I felt overwhelmed and longing at the same time. My back arched further, my body seeking the contact that my heart feared.
“How long are we going to play this game?” he asked, his eyes moving from my mouth and back again.
“What game?” Was he changing the rules on me? Did he want to talk? Warning bells were flaring as loud as a car alarm outside my door. Sleeping with him was one thing. In no way was I ready to talk about it, too. Oh no, that would be way too intimate. If I slept with him, I might still be able to pretend I wasn’t attached. If we talked, it would be out there and somehow real.
“We both want this.” A jolt shot through me as we made contact. His hips pressed against mine, letting me know exactly how much. His head tilted down to mine, closing the gap and I couldn’t or didn’t want to stop him. I couldn’t decide which and my brain wasn’t functioning on full steam. My libido had kicked it out of the wheelhouse.
His tongue brushed across my closed mouth as I tried to keep myself in check. His teeth nipped at my lower lip, pulling on it, teasing me, tempting me to play.
My lips parted on a moan, not able to reject the invitation and his tongue dipped inside and tangled with mine; trying to draw me into a kiss I was still attempting to fight. But I knew I’d lose. I didn’t have the will to resist completely.
His hand came up, cupped my cheek, his thumb under my chin. Tilting my head back slightly, his lips followed the line of my jaw working his way toward where it met my neck, only breaking to whisper, “Come on, I know you want it too. Why not have a little fun?”
I’d had fun with him before. Then watched his back as he walked away taking all the fun with him. Fun. That was all this was to him.
I stiffened.
So did he.
His head pulled back. “I don’t understand what the problem is.” His eyes were intent on mine. He really didn’t get it, and I wasn’t going to explain. It was bad enough without the words.
I would’ve stepped away but his arms were there again, on either side, blocking me. “What is the problem?” he asked, repeating himself. “Those other times, they weren’t only Cupid. We both want this.”
“It might not be a good idea is all. We work together.” I turned my head because if I kept looking at him, I was going to go down again, hard and quick.
“Why? It’s not like it would be the first time for us.” He took the opportunity of my exposed neck, kissing his way upward toward my ear where the tingle of his breath made it hard to remember what was stopping me. “I can see the way you look at me,” he whispered in my ear.
His hands went to my waist and lifted me to my toes for better access as his chest brushed against mine. We were flush from the shoulders down.
He stopped talking and so did I, as I let the sensation of being so close absorb into my senses fully. God, I missed this but it was dangerous.
How did you tell someone that you cared more? It didn’t change anything. It wouldn’t make the other person magically love you equally. Why did I just use the word love? Why did that word even pop into my head? No, I didn’t love him. The word made me go stiffer than rigor mortis.
Sensing my hesitance again, he took a step back.
“Go.” The word was a pardon and a sentence from his lips.
“What?” I asked, partly sad he was letting me off the hook and not understanding why. The logically side of me was screaming run but still had a death grip on the steering wheel.
“Go. Now.”