Page 14 of Loving Taylor
The need to still touch her made me keep my hands loosely on her hips. I smiled at her, trying to mask the inner struggle between what I knew was the right thing to do and what I wanted to do. In response to my smile her eyes fluttered slightly, proving she was as affected by me as I was by her.
"I hope you haven't taken any drinks from strangers tonight," I told her, allowing my eyes to drop momentarily to her soft pink lips that I wanted to kiss.
She bit down on her lip, pulling her lip between her teeth. It wasn't helping me trying to do the right thing instead of embracing my attraction to her and throwing caution to the wind. She shook her head. Thank goodness she had learned an important lesson. The sight of Jordan returning caught my eyes and I knew it was time to make myself scarce.
"I'd better go before your friend gets back." I leaned forward, my breath fanning her cheek.
"I'll see you around, Taylor," I whispered before I left her standing in the same spot as I disappeared in among the crowd at the party.
On the outside I kept my composure but on the inside I was shaken. The brief encounter with Taylor still had my heart racing and I could still feel the softness of her skin beneath my hands.
Now there were more reasons to stay away from her. She was far too innocent for me to taint and I knew no matter how brief any encounter with her would be it would leave a lasting impression. We hadn't even slept together yet and she was constantly creeping into my thoughts uninvited. How bad would it be if I tasted her lips and felt her naked skin against mine?
With that, I made up my mind. I was still trying to make a life for myself and there was no room in it for a girl who I could feel more for than I was prepared to.
I got another drink and focused on finding someone else to help me forget about Taylor.
There wasn't a shortage so it didn't take long before I had a girl's undivided attention. I made myself kiss her like I wanted no one else, but I was fooling myself.
In between flirting with the girl looking up at me with a promise of sex for the night, my eyes drifted across the crowd, looking for a glimpse of Taylor. But before I could stop myself I saw a guy trying to chat her up.
I didn't like the way it made me feel. I frowned. My hand balled into a fist and I smothered my first reaction to beat the crap out of him. It was a territorial feeling that felt so foreign and I had no right to feel it. The twisting of my insides as I watched her talk to him was agony. Girls never held my attention long enough to feel that way about them. It only confirmed how dangerous Taylor was to me.
Let her go,my instinct told me but I struggled to pull my attention away from her.
"You okay?" the girl in front of me purred, pulling my attention back to the girl I was planning on spending the night with.
"Yeah," I said, ensuring all evidence of my reaction was gone.
Even with my attention on the girl gliding her hand up my chest I was still mentally trying to shake the image of Taylor with another guy.
No matter how much I tried to argue with myself and all the reasons to stay clear of her, it was difficult to ignore the impulse to watch her.
While talking to the girl, I found myself looking at Taylor and relief flooded me when the guy walked away, leaving her alone. But my relief was only momentary. She was beautiful, I could see guys already circling her. She wouldn't be alone for long.
You're playing with fire,I warned myself. To help myself remember what it felt like when I let someone get close and what inevitably followed, I allowed myself to remember a memory, one of many, when my mother had promised to clean up her act. I had been hopeful, talking myself into it even though she had told me the same thing many times before, but I had been young enough to believe it.
The disappointment I had experienced when I had found her only a few hours later when she had passed out on the floor, an empty bottle of vodka in her hand, was devastating. I could still remember the stench of cigarette smoke that hung in the air and the combined smell of alcohol confirming she had spilled some on the carpet while she had tried to drink herself into a stupor.
The feeling of disappointment was sharpened by the realization that I wasn't enough for her to try to change her ways. Eventually I had learned that people didn't change, and letting anyone close enough would only cause me to end up with heartache and pain.
I had conditioned myself to go from one girl to another, never making a deeper connection, to allow myself to always be in a position where I could walk away without a second thought.
Remember that feeling of pain. If you let her in that's what will happen. I swallowed as I fought to gain my control. I wouldn't allow some girl I barely knew to affect me like this.
She was dangerous and the only way to keep myself safe was to avoid her at all costs. My thoughts confirming what my instinct was telling me should have kept me from searching for her but no matter what reason I used I couldn't stop my subconscious from looking for her or control how I reacted when I saw her.
I could tell we would be amazing in the sack. The way my blood heated at the vision of her in nothing but her underwear was enough to confirm I was more attracted to her than any other girl I had ever encountered before. Was it the innocence in her that made her more attractive, because she was forbidden?
Enough.I shut my thoughts down. I was going around in circles and it was doing my head in.
"Your place or mine?" the girl asked me, brushing the slightest kiss against the side of my mouth.
The usual thrill of what was to come wasn't there but I wasn't going to allow myself to pass up a chance to bed the gorgeous girl in front of me. I didn't even remember her name but all I needed was to lose myself in her for a couple of hours.
That's what mattered.
"Only one night," I told her. She had to understand the rules I played by.
