Page 40 of Something Like Sunflowers

“Will you dance with me, Devyn?”

I nod, taking his hand and letting him lead me to the dance floor, like we’ve done a hundred times before. But we were just teenagers then. And this feels more intimate with him than it ever has in any of the memories I recall. I resist the urge to squeeze his palm three times…once for I, twice for love, thrice for you. It was our secret thing. And it feels almost robotic for me when our fingers are entwined like this.

“She Is” by Lady Antebellum plays in the background as we walk to the center of the floor and sway. One hand holds mine, while the other comes to rest on my hip, creating a spark of electricity that makes my thighs tense.

I can’t help it. I whimper. Always me whimpering involuntarily. What the heck is wrong with me?

He smirks, eyeing me suspiciously. I feel my face flush, wondering if he can read the inappropriate thoughts, or if his smirk has something to do with whatever he and Lemon were whispering earlier, when I was talking to Garrison Presley, King of the Glow Ups.

They may think I didn’t notice their plotting, but they are sorely mistaken. I might not know what they’re up to, but I know it does involve me.

“Make me a deal,” Hunter says.

I raise my eyebrow in question. I’m listening.

“If I can sweep you off your feet with one song, you’ll get drinks with me and the old crew.”

“I don’t know,” I tell him, backing away. “They don’t really like me anymore.” I notice Katie Simmons is at the table, too, and she had some words to say to me the last time I was here.

I did flake out on the pageant council the year I left, though, and I may have screwed some people out of references I’d promised to give them for the larger pageant circuits. Katie being one of them. But the rest of them just hate me because of Hunter. Because I left and got out of this town. And they stayed here and believed whatever version of things people think they know.

Whatever.

“They’ll like you just fine, Dev. Look how it turned out with Lemon.”

I raise a brow, still unconvinced.

“People grow up, and you’re the first one to remind me of that, so take your own advice. Let’s put the past behind us. Please, Dev?”

“Fine,” I say. “If you sweep me off my feet with one dance, I will hang out with your friends—”

“Our friends.”

“I will hang out with our friends, tonight. If your dance moves knock my socks off. That’s all I’m promising.”

“And I get to call you babygirl whenever I want.”

I twist my lips. Seriously?

But it is kind of cute, and I half like it.

“Fine.”

The slow song ends, and “Backroad” by Tanner Adell starts to build in the speakers. I smile because this song always takes the energy up a notch. I used to take some swing classes growing up here, and I surprise myself as I fall into the moves with Hunter, leading me along in a pas de bourrée that comes one hundred percent from his sexy, TikTok-famous hips. He’s so good at this. I lick my lips, eyeing every muscle in his arms as he twirls me around the floor.

Why is he so good at this?

The way his hips move to the music, and his strong grip presses into my curves as he leads me across the dance floor, it’s both sexy and exhilarating. The bass rumbles as he swings me out then twirls me back into his arms where I’m surrounded by his smell. Sandalwood and pine trees. I can’t breathe in without feeling him all over me, around me, and all I can think about is how I wish he were inside me.

I gasp as he grabs my neck with his huge hand, a hand that somehow has the power to kiss my whole body, even though it’s only in one spot. He’s not quite choking me, but he is at the same time. And the messed-up part about that is I don’t seem to mind.

I like it.

My whole body likes it.

His fingers curl around my neck, pressing into my flesh, but still offering me protection as he lowers me into the sexiest fucking dip I’ve ever experienced in my entire life. Our eyes lock while my head is inches from the floor, and my heart thumps in my chest so loud I swear he must hear it. This feels dangerous, raw, passionate.

And I want him to consume me.

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