Page 63 of All Saints: Pledge

I snatch up the folder, and open it on my lap.

He sighs. “Fine, be responsible.”

I look up and tap my chin with the pencil that had been nestled inside the folder. “Don’t blame me. This wasyourcover story.”

He sits forward, reaching for the choir folder and snatching it out of my hands before settling back again. “Not an excuse. Thatiswhy I am hiding away. I wasn't joking about practicing.”

He sorts around in the center drawer a bit, finds another pencil, and then stands to come sit in the opposing high-backed chair. “Shall we?”

“Shall we what?”

“Practice,” he says as if I'm slow.

“Together?”

“That's the general idea,” he says, his brogue rippling through my body like warm caramel. “You see, when you sing in a choir?—”

“Shut up, smart ass,” I say, playfully punching his arm.

“Here in Ireland, we call them ijits.” He doesn’t look even one iota sorry. And it is so much better in here with him than up in the main house with Augustine and Kendall.

“Fine, we can practice.” It sounds absolutely mortifying and terrible, but I'm feeling the odd need to impress this gorgeous dark-haired boy. To look brave. To look like the thought of singing in front of him doesn't make me want to throw up. I clear my throat. “Where do you want to start?”

I swear his eyes flick down to the collar of my shirt again, but it's gone in an instant. He opens the piece to the middle, a place where each part has a rising and falling melody stacked over another. “The harmonies here are complicated.”

It's immediately clear that he doesn't need to practice. Using a piano app on his phone, we each work slowly through the parts several times until I know mine like the back of my hand. I've lost some of the shyness, but I’m still quiet.

“You need better breath support, even while practicing,” Teague motions to my midriff. “May I?”

“May you what?” I ask. At his quirked brow, I nod, still confused.

“Breathe from here,” he says, laying a hand across my stomach.

Immediately, I stop breathing altogether. His hand spans my entire front. My brain is stuck on repeat.He’s touching me. He’s touching me. The man of the angelic voice and face is touching me.

“You have to breathe for it to work,” he chuckles, clearly not understanding that his nearness and touch is short circuiting everything.

I drag in a breath.

“Lower. Make my hand move,” he commands.

Heat floods my body. He’s firm, and commanding in the absolute sexiest way, and I can’t help but instantly wonder if he’s this bossy…other places. I breathe in again, and when his hand rises with my breath, he gives me a wicked look.

“Good girl.”

I’m dying, and it takes everything in me not to hyperventilate. I’m vibrating all over, but pull in a few more deep breaths. Each time I breathe into his hand, and I feel it solid against my stomach, I wonder what it would feel like if he just…slid it upwards. Or downwards. Sadly, he sits back in his own chair, and we pick back up like nothing ultra-intense just occurred.

He’s right. I'm singing out louder with those deeper breaths. Our voices mingle and rise and reverberate off the dark grained wood and it's...

“Glorious,” I say, pressing my hands to my cheeks. “The music,” I clarify, the buzz subsiding enough for me to realize I'm staring at him again.

“Indeed, this is a lovely piece,” he says, his eyes steady on mine. Intense.

Silence falls. I shift on the chair. “I, ah, probably should go find Clara. She's going to wonder what happened to me.”

He nods. “I'll walk you up.”

“You don't have to,” I demure, gathering my things. The sunlight has definitely got on in the day, and my stomach gives a growl.

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