He rushed a hand through his hair, a hand that was big and tattooed. His arm muscular and covered in ink.
I had a fleeting thought that I should be terrified of this stranger standing in front of me and shouldn’t relish in this confused comfort that struck my bones and touched those secret places in my spirit.
“Alexis,” he said. The word might have been a question had it not glided across my skin like familiarity and warmth.
I barely nodded, my response a whisper as my heart fluttered and sped. “Alexis.”
His gaze dipped for a moment, tracing me head to toe. As if he needed reassurance I was there.
Something about it felt so intimate and private. As if maybe he was aware he now held that piece of my soul he’d chipped away.
His tongue swept his lips.
My eyes dropped to follow it, a slow heat lighting in my belly as they roved. I took in his face, glancing across the short beard I had the urge to scratch with my nails, memorizing the way his cropped light brown hair was really bronze when it was struck by the sun.
It was a little longer on top, and a silky lock flopped over the lines on his forehead that I ached to reach out and smooth away.
“I hope it’s okay I’m here,” he said, forcing my attention back to his eyes.
A lump grew heavy in my throat and I swallowed around it, nodding as I tried to find my voice. “Of course it’s okay.”
Maybe I should have been hearing warning bells. A thousand caution flags tossed in the air and raining down around me. Because there was something about this brilliant boy that screamed trouble and mayhem. Undoubtedly, he wore his own beautiful brand of destruction.
And I was the fool who always seemed to run straight for it. Diving right in to the middle of it without having the first clue what was waiting for me.
“I’m Zachary Kennedy. Friends call me Zee,” he said, shifting on his feet as if he were wondering what he was doing on my doorstep.
I could feel the pull of the soft smile at the side of my mouth. “I know who you are.”
“Is that so?” he asked. Something about it rang with a tease.
I nodded.
Of course I did. He was the drummer for one of the biggest rock bands in the world.
And I realized that probably put both of us at a disadvantage. No doubt he had women throwing themselves at him any time he walked off a stage or into a room. Wanting a taste of fame or maybe a name to drop, I could only imagine the number of women who salivated over this boy simply for who he was.
It didn’t help he had to be the most gorgeous man I’d ever seen.
But this was different. The staggering need I felt to know him more. Not the boy pinned to Pinterest boards labeling him a sexy, tattooed bad boy. Not the boy splashed across the tabloids with their speculations and judgment.
The real man.
This man made up of flesh and bone. The man who rushed into an alley in the middle of the night to defend a complete stranger. The man who’d tenderly rocked me in his arms while I’d felt the controlled rage radiating from his body.
The one who stood in my doorway, spinning my mind with how he could both look so powerful and vulnerable.
My insides shook, and I took a step back and widened my door. “Would you like to come in?”
A smile crept to his mouth, this tug of full, soft lips framed by his beard. God, that expression alone would be my complete undoing. He tilted his head to the side. “You’re awful brave to be inviting a complete stranger into your house.”
I lifted my chin and met his gaze. “A complete stranger who put his life on the line. A stranger who stood between me and a gun. You could have died, and I very well might have if it weren’t for you. Trust comes in a lot of forms, and I’m pretty sure you’ve already earned mine.”
His strong throat bobbed as he swallowed, and he looked down at me with those brown eyes that should be nothing else but plain. All except for the flecks of bronze that perfectly matched his hair. They shimmered and flashed in the sunlight, like treasures secreted away. I had the urge to discover them all.
His tone dipped in severity. “What if I don’t deserve it?”
“What if you do?” I challenged.
He shook his head as if he couldn’t make sense of me. His gaze stole a little more of my breath as it grazed my skin like a rough caress, and his slow perusal sent a scatter of chills down my spine.
Tension rose between us. Bottled and shaken. Questions churned in the air. Each of us in limbo.
Somehow, I knew we were standing at either the beginning or the end. Neither of us seemed to know whether we should stop or start.
What had happened between us wasn’t normal. I knew that. And maybe everything I was feeling was a result of it. Maybe every single emotion rushing through me was dependent upon the fact that this man had saved me.
But standing in front of him, I didn’t care where it’d been born. The only thing that mattered was I felt it stronger than I’d ever felt anything in all my life.
I widened the door even farther, taking my stance.
I wanted to start.
“Please come inside.”
Maybe I shouldn’t have noticed the way his jaw clenched and all those muscles bristled, as if he were holding himself in restraint, or maybe he was cursing himself, because something dark moved through those eyes before it was gone.
He angled his wide shoulders to the side as he stepped inside, the movement sending a flash of heat against my skin when he passed and stepped into the quiet sanctuary of my home.
I latched the door shut, pulling in a steadying breath while I faced away, before I slowly turned to find the man standing in the middle of my living room with his back to me as he looked around. I got the distinct sense he was studying, learning little bits of me.
Silently, I watched him there, larger than life in my small, small space.
He was tall. Arms masculine and thick. His back strong and wide. A white tee was stretched across the expanse, hugging his sculpted shoulders and tapering down to his narrow waist and his perfect ass, his dark jeans snug in all the right places.
No. The Pinterest boards weren’t wrong.
This gorgeous man was the epitome of sexy. Tempting. Tattooed with a tapestry of ink littering the entirety of his exposed skin.
Delicious and dangerous.
Attraction heated my blood. It was an onslaught of need that had me itching to run my fingertips across every inch of him, to discover, reveal, and unearth.
That desire felt forbidden. As if my thoughts had strayed into territories that might be dark and perilous.
He turned to look at me, his arms lifting up at the sides, a soft puff of air escaping between those full, full lips. “This is exactly what I pictured.”
He stared back at me with his captivating face, almost catastrophic in its beauty.
At least that was what I felt when standing beneath the intensity of it.
Destroyed.
Wrecked and unsettled in a perfect, absolute way. Every inch of the man was a sublime contradiction.
His entire demeanor serenity and war.