Page 27 of When Hearts Awaken

“Idareyou,” I grit out, leaning further down, so close I could smell the sweet scent of alcohol drifting from her parted lips, once again painted in dark purple.

Her breathing comes in quick pants. Her smooth, pale skin flushes pink as her eyes dart across my face like she doesn’t know what to look at first. A pulse flutters rapidly in her neck and it’s like a beacon drawing out the beast I’ve tethered tightly within me. I have the strangest compulsion to touch it. To wrap my hand around that slender neck and feel her pulse hammer into my fingers.

What’s wrong with me?

Maybe you’re your parents’ child.

I rear back and she lets out a huge breath.

“Hey, I’m fine. I really am,” Kristi’s soft voice sounds from behind us. She obviously senses Taylor’s terror too. “Charles is just teaching my husband a few tricks as a Dom. I’m fine. We’re all good here.”

I see the moment when her words click for Taylor, when she realizes she has misread the entire situation. She rakes her hand through her hair.

“I…I see,” she whispers before swallowing, a flush creeping up her face. “Shit. Shit. Shit.”

I curl my fingers into my palm to stop myself from doing something insane, like reaching out and shaking her for sending me on a maddening rollercoaster of unsavory emotions.

Instead, I can’t help myself and say, “Are you done here? You barged into a private scene.”

Taylor’s lips flatten and her eyes narrow into slits. Stiffening, she turns her attention back to me and sneers, “I’ll never understand twisted men like you. Can’t get hard without hurting women?”

With that parting backhand, she spins around and glides out of the room like a fucking queen.

“Fuck,” I mutter under my breath, my pulse rioting in my veins. I feel out of control. This woman drives me insane, and I’ve only met her twice.

“Well, that was wild,” Colt comments. The entire mood of the scene is completely ruined.

“Sorry, guys.” I let out a halfhearted chuckle and turn back to my friends. “On behalf of her, I apologize for ruining your night.”

Kristi grins and buttons her shirt—well, the buttons Colt didn’t rip off earlier. “Don’t worry about it, Charles. Seriously, who is she? I’ve never seen anyone set you off like this before.”

“Or anyone who doesn’t like Charles.” Colt snorts before pulling his wife to his side.

My forced smile twitches on my jaw. “I have no clue.”

No fucking clue.

Chapter 11

The rain lashes againstthe windows in a torrent of violence, the weather warning us winter is around the corner. I look at the traffic far below, a blur of navy speckled with red and white lights, before taking out my cell phone and scrolling to my photos app. It’s been another long day of meetings after a late night in the office yesterday.

My thumb hovering over the icon, I wonder what the hell I’m doing. Why I am even entertaining this ridiculous nonsense.

But I can’t stop thinking about her. Taylor Peyton. The fiery, contradictory minx who looks like she’ll fall apart one second and rip out my guts the next. She’s like the weather in Tibet—sunny one moment, pouring rain the next—calamitous and unpredictable.

A fucking hurricane blowing through my calm and orderly life.

The fireplace crackles, providing more warmth inside the luxurious confines of the gentlemen’s club within The Orchid, where I’m waiting for the rest of the guys to show up for drinks.

“It’s been six years! I’m over this! The past is in the past!”

“I’ll never understand twisted men like you. You can’t get hard without hurting women?”

Her vicious words and haunted eyes float to the surface again. The way she stared at Ian in horror. The fear in her eyes at ABTC and at The Sanctuary. She’s out of her fucking mind and I shouldn’t pay her any attention, but a niggle of doubt bothers me like a phantom itch I can’t scratch.

What if?

“You never listen to us! You always think we’re overreacting! Look what that got us, Charles! Look what happened to Firefly!” Liam shoved me and I staggered back, collapsing on the pavement, the storm drenching my clothes.

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