Page 9 of The Painter and His Poet

“I guess it is,” I reply, swallowing hard at the prospect of her departure, that chord I felt connecting myself to her earlier, tugging at my insides as she gives me a soft smile.

“Goodnight, Sterling,” she says, pulling her bag across her front, hugging it to her chest as she twists on her heel and takes a step away from me. “I hope you feel better soon.”

Inexplicably, the colour that has been hovering around her begins to fade, and it guts me. It’s as though the magic is wearing off, her departure cutting the connection with one fell swoop.

Fuck.

Before I can even contemplate what I’m doing, I’m striding after her, my fingers curling around her arm. “Don’t,” I bite out as she turns to face me.

“Don’t?” she whispers, her eyes wide.

Don’t go, I can’t fucking bare it.

“Would you like a coffee?” I blurt out instead.

“A coffee?”

“Or tea?” I ask, internally cursing myself.

“Most places that sell coffee… and tea,” she adds with a soft laugh, “Are closed.”

“Yeah,” I say, raking a hand through my hair, wishing the ground would swallow me up. “What I meant to say was, would you like to come back to my place, for coffee… or tea?”

There,fuck, I’ve said it.

I stare at her for long moments. Far longer than would be deemed socially acceptable, and being the awkward fuck that Iam, I don’t try to fill the silence, or say something charming to persuade her to come back home with me, I just wait.

“Sterling, are you propositioning me?” she eventually replies, her eyes dancing with a tentative kind of humour.

I baulk at her question. “No. Fuck… I… Shit… This isn’t… I didn’t mean…”

Yes, yes you absolutely fucking did, my inner voice needles me.

Because that’s exactly what I’m doing. I’m asking her back to my place under the pretence of a coffee when all I want to do is strip her bare, worship her body and sink deep inside of her just so she can feel a fraction of what I’m feeling now. That is, totally and utterly out of control.

Her laughter fades, her smile turns serious, and just when I think she’s going to walk away for good, she does something inexplicable.

She rests her hand on my arm before murmuring, “Yes, I want to go home with you.”

FOUR

HARLOW

“Yes, I want to go home with you.”

Did I actually say that out loud? Who am I?

Seriously, this isn’t like me, Idon’tdo these kinds of things.

I never go home with anyone for a one night stand. Actually, that’s a lie. I did,once. It was back when I was in college under the influence of a steady stream of cheap beer, and false confidence. I regretted it the second I slept with the douchebag, whose name I can’t remember. Pretty sure he only wanted me because I let slip who my mother was.

And that’s generally the problem with the men I’ve been surrounded with my whole life, they’re interest in me only extends to their fascination with my beautiful, gregarious,famousmother. There have been countless times that I've been taken out on a date by men who only feigned interest in me until they met my mother, then it was as if I no longer existed. Once my mother got her claws into them, I was long forgotten.

But this time it’s different.He’sdifferent.

I also don’t have the buzz of cheap alcohol running through my veins as an excuse to do something this reckless. Right now, there’s just this strange kind ofwanting. I want to get to know Sterling more. I want to know why he seems so in pain, why hefainted. I want to explore what this strange feeling is in my chest. Is it purely lust? Is it sympathy? Is it a culmination of my own loneliness? Is it simply the need to escape for a while in the arms of a beautiful, albeit troubled man who looked at me likeIwas someone worthy of their attention?

As we step into his exposed brick apartment, I don’t regret my decision, not in the slightest. People do this all the time, right? Go back to someone’s place for ‘coffee’, which everyone knows is a euphemism for sex. I can’t deny the magnetism between us, and for once in my life I’m throwing caution to the wind and acting on instinct. All I know is that I don’t want coffee, or tea, I want to get lost in him, even if it is for just one night. At least I hope it will be.

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