Page 10 of Arran's Obsession

The solution darkened the bruise, some small balance restoring after I’d hurt us both.

More, my body was having a field day at being next to a warm-blooded, attractive man. My last boyfriend had been over a year ago, and I didn’t do the casual thing.

Need built in a steady, insistent coil. It was boosted again by Arran’s short intake of breath as I moved between his spread knees. His fists bunched.

“Do you often walk into traffic like that?” he said, low and gruff.

“No. I’m normally better at self-preservation. I was distracted.”

“By what?”

I shrugged and changed the subject, trying to keep my brain in order as attraction continued its climb. He didn’t need to know my personal life. “You said you’ve got work. What kind of job starts at night?”

“Management.”

“Of what?”

I pressed his collarbone, where the bruise stained darkest, and Arran winced. Abruptly, he stood, taking me by the hips to reverse our positions. “Your turn in the chair.”

Carefully, I sat, wide-eyed at the switch. “I’m okay.”

Arran knelt and peered at my cut-up thigh, not touching me but close enough that the man-effect was doubling. “You haven’t even told me your name.”

“Genevieve,” I breathed.

His lips curved. “Pretty.”

The atmosphere shifted. Tightened. My body became molten.

His question to me returned, and I laughed under my breath, a nervous sound, betraying everything inside. “Still not a prostitute.”

He blinked. “I know. Wouldn’t matter if you were. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

I eyed him. If I leaned from the window, I could probably see Cherry on the church steps, getting abused for cash by some grimy piece-of-shit guy. No one could think that a great careerchoice, regardless of the right for women to choose. What I didn’t get was why this man was protesting.

“Yes, there is. It’s a shitty job, if you can even call it that.”

Arran sat back, the haziness in his eyes clearing. The air between us cooled, and he stood from his crouch and shrugged his shirt back on. All business again. “You share this place, right?”

I nodded once.

“Good. Then you won’t be alone long.”

He leaned over me, and I froze, but he only plucked his wallet from the windowsill, slotting his card back in place. On his way to the door, he spied my iced coffee, the ice cubes nearly all melted. “This yours?”

Another nod, and he picked it up and took a goddamned sip from my straw.

“Not as sweet as I expected.”

I gaped at him.

Then the confusing-as-hell stranger disappeared out of my door.

I lurched for my precious coffee and opened the window again, gazing down at him walking away as I drained the cup. Sirens wailed somewhere nearby, life as normal in the city.

But just like when I’d run from Arran yesterday, he didn’t look back.

Chapter 4

---