Wasn’t used to strangers having the power to wind me so tight. Wasn’t used to the uncontrolled adrenaline spike that slammed me when she came near, sending all this unfound anticipation firing through my nerves.
Though now it shivered through me like a high gone bad.
Shit.
Exhaling heavily, I stepped outside the restroom and into the long hallway.
Shea stood at the end of it, scribbling something onto a board hanging on the wall.
My lungs squeezed painfully, and that tension grew thick. Solid. Suffocating.
I felt her tense when she sensed me there, that invisible tether stretched taut between us straightening her spine, long hair swishing down her back.
Powerless to stop myself, I edged forward, unable to grasp the draw this girl held over me.
But it was there.
Unmistakable.
Irresistible.
The closer I got, the harder I breathed. Inhale. Exhale. Matching her. Matching me.
Her shoulders lifted and fell, anticipating, and I stopped only inches from my chest meeting her back. For the longest moment we stood there saying nothing, because the silence was too busy shouting a million questions neither of us had the answers to.
God, she smelled delicious, and I had the fundamental urge to get closer.
I lifted my hand, and my fingers grazed across the soft curls that bounced along the small of her back. My cautious touch skimmed up her side, barely brushing over her ribs, up, up, up as it swept under her arm still set to scrawl her pretty script on the whiteboard.
A small gasp shot from her when she realized the hold I had on her, the way my palm came up to rest at the center of her chest, right over her heart that thudded wildly against my touch.
Her body felt so delicate against all my hard—my cock and my heart and the muscles rippling in my arms as my hold tightened.
“Go out with me,” I whispered at her ear. But this time it didn’t sound so careless or aloof. It was curious. Filled with a primal need to figure out what this was.
The rush of chills sliding down her back was palpable, slipping into me.
She pressed her hand over mine, holding it closer. “I can’t,” she whispered just as low, though it sounded like it actually hurt her to force it from her mouth.
“Why?”
“You don’t understand.”
No, I definitely didn’t.
“I like you.”
“You don’t even know me.”
“Maybe I want to.”
I hugged her a little closer in an attempt to change her mind—her sweet body tight up against mine—and I was sure I hadn’t felt anything so good in a long time. For the briefest moment, she let me, and God, if holding her didn’t feel right. Like she was supposed to be there.
Then she untangled herself and took two steps forward, her shoulders slumped and her head dropped toward the ground.
Defeated.
Pausing, she looked back at me. Warily. With sadness? I wanted to wipe that look from those caramel eyes, eyes whose golden flecks glinted in the light above us.
Maybe that’s why I was here, because I could feel her inner turmoil, something deep and dark, just like me, something hard and tainted that was searching for freedom.
I felt my control slip a little further.
I knew it then. What I wanted.
To lose control.
Just for a few hours.
And I wanted to lose it with her.
I SQUINTED THROUGH THE HAZE of light shed by the sagging lamp swinging from the low ceiling, peering over my shoulder deeper into the hallway where I’d left Baz staring back at me. I wanted to make sense of his expression. To make sense of the confusion and hunger smoldering in those strange grey eyes. To make sense of the crazy reaction he’d sent curling through every last one of my nerves.
This wasn’t me.
Heart thundering, legs shaking, desire a constant throb right between my thighs.
Yet here I was, my senses on overload, all from a stranger’s accosted touch in a dim, dank hallway. It wasn’t as if I didn’t get hit on all the time. It came with the territory of working at a bar. The alcohol-coated pick-up lines, things guys would never have the guts to say without the courage found in the bottles lined up behind the bar, too friendly hands, and leering eyes.
I’d always remained immune.
Until him.