Page 10 of Midnight Rebel

I grunt, my jaw tightening. “I can do both.”

Christ, at this rate, she’ll have me doing tricks like a trained puppy.

What’s next? Fetch? Roll over?

Tickle my balls?

If Garrett could see me, he’d never let me live it down.

For a long moment, she doesn’t move. I’m half-convinced she’s going to run. But then her hand slides into mine, small and warm. “Lead on, Ghost.”

I guide her onto the dance floor, pulling her close as a new song begins. It’s slower than before, more intimate. My hand settles on the small of her back, and she shivers.

“Cold?” I murmur, noticing the way she trembles in my arms.

She shakes her head, but the tension flickers behind her smile. “I was thinking.”

“About?”

Her gaze locks with mine—open, exposed, and searching. “How this is probably a bad idea.”

I spin her out, then draw her back in, even closer than before. “Probably. Want to stop?”

“No.” The word comes out almost as a gasp.

The final notes of the song fade, but our dance doesn’t end. My arms remain around her, and she makes no move to step back. The moment hangs between us, fragile and charged.

“Another dance?” I ask.

She nods, a slight smile playing at the corners of her lips.

As the next song begins, we fall into step once more. Our movements are fluid, seamless—two bodies moving as one. It’s like earlier in the garden but intensified.

We dance. And dance. Song after song blurs together. I lose track of time, lost in the feeling of her in my arms. In the way she moves with me as if we’ve known each other for years instead of hours.

I’m hyper-aware of every point where we touch. Her hand in mine. My palm against her back. The brush of her skirt against my legs.

It’s intoxicating. And dangerous. I shouldn’t be letting myself get this close. I shouldn’t want her this much.

Don’t get too close, Montgomery. Self-control is all you have left.

We dance in silence for a while, lost in the magic of the moment. But as the music swells, I become aware of a shift in the atmosphere. A sense of anticipation rippling through the crowd.

“It’s almost midnight,” Firefly says softly.

We stop dancing, but our fingers remain laced together, connecting us as the rest of the crowd gathers in the center of the ballroom.

All around us, glasses of champagne are raised in celebration as the tension builds toward the finale: the grand unmasking.

An impulse flashes through me to whisk her away, to preserve the enchantment of our masked encounter. But a deeper yearning wins out: the desire to see her face, to know the woman behind the mask who’s bewitched me so completely.

My mother’s voice rings out, counting down the final seconds.

“Ten...nine...eight...”

Firefly’s grip on my hand tightens. She’s trembling slightly.

“Seven...six...five...”

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