Page 38 of Forbidden Lyrics

“Singer gets to choose.”

“Um…” I peek over at him. “But you have to play it––”

“So? Don’t underestimate my guitar skills, Dove. I might not be Fen, but I do know how to put my fingers to good use.” He winks.

With a light laugh, I challenge, “Cocky much?”

“Pick a song,” he orders, not giving me an inch.

“Fine. Do you know anything by Taylor Swift?”

He scoffs. “Do I know anything by Taylor Swift.”

The intro to “The 1” vibrates from the guitar strings, and I close my eyes and start to sing. At first, I’m quiet, my voice nothing but a whisper. But I can’t help it. I can feel his eyes on me. Taking in every inch of exposed skin. Peeling back my layers, one by one, until the real me is all that’s left.

My nerves settle as he slowly transitions to “Lover” before the other even has a chance to finish. Like he can tell that I’ll throw in the towel as soon as it ends. Like he knows my thoughts before I even have a chance to dissect them myself. Over and over, he strums the guitar, and I’m left keeping up with him until my throat is raw, and I’m convinced his fingers are too.

With a final stroke of the strings a little while later, he stops. “Do you need some water?”

I smile. “How could you tell?”

“Just a hunch.” He reaches onto his nightstand and grabs a black refillable water bottle that’s still half full and offers it to me.

“Thanks.” The cold metal presses against my lips, and I take a long pull while trying to ignore the fact that his mouth has been on this very bottle.

I shouldn’t find something as trivial as drinking from the same cantine intimate, but I do.

I so do.

Again, I can feel him watching me. Studying me as I swallow the icy cold liquid. Like I’m an enigma when I’m the opposite. I’m nothing but an ordinary girl with a crush on a guy who can have any woman he wants. A guy who hasn’t made a move on me, when I know this wouldn’t be his first rodeo, even though it would very clearly be mine.

The question is… Why?

When I first showed up for my job at SeaBird, he insinuated that I looked like an average girl. Nothing out of the ordinary. Nothing to write home about. But when he looks at me like he is right now, a small part of me wonders if he was lying.

Or maybe I’m crazy.

“Thanks again,” I murmur, wiping a bit of moisture from my lips with my thumb.

He grabs the bottle from my grasp and takes a swig, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down as he swallows. The butterflies in my stomach go haywire at the sight before I force myself to look away and fidget with the sleeves of my sweatshirt. Again.

I’m acting ridiculous.

A few seconds later, he stretches his arms over his head and lets out a yawn. “We’ve been going at this for hours.”

“We have?” I blink slowly and check the time on my phone. He’s right. But I’d been so lost in the moment that I hadn’t noticed.

“You succeeded, by the way,” he adds.

I flick my gaze from my phone and back up to his warm, penetrating eyes. “I succeeded in what?”

“Distracting me.”

“Pretty sure it was the music that did the trick,” I counter.

“Yeah, but it sounds prettier when it comes from those lips.”

I suck said lower lip into my mouth, praying to keep the blood from rushing to my face at his compliment, but it’s no use. My cheeks are burning up. And it’s all because he gave me an offhanded compliment. One that he’s probably given a dozen times to a dozen different women.

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