Page 21 of King of Wands

Chapter 8

Lust and Instinct

Ifound King thirty minutes later. Yep, it took me thirty freaking minutes to track the guy down. Apparently he was accosted by an actress who demanded a dance, after which he was intercepted by some businessmen who wanted him to invest in...something. I forgot what they yammered about. Yachts maybe? Then I heard from another group that he told jokes and was generally charming while he got a drink from the bar.

That definitely didn’t sound like King so I started to get worried. I frantically searched the halls and bathrooms. He was nowhere to be found. Then I was told about a terrace. That’s where I found him.

Smoking.

Yep. A cigarette. Sucking on it like his life depended on it.

“Aren’t athletes supposed to stay away from tobacco?”

He tensed then took another long drag. The end turned bright orange before fading away. “I don’t smoke.”

“Funny, it looks like smoke is coming out of your mouth right now.”

“Naw. You’re imagining things.” He took another drag. “I used to smoke. Every now and then I’ll have one.”

“Every now and then? Every day?” See? These were the things people should know before becoming invested. Did they smoke? Would they die of lung cancer at an early age?

“No.” He stubbed it out on the bottom of his shoe then tossed the butt in the gravel atop the trashcan. “When I’m home sometimes with my brothers. Mostly that’s when. Every so often when I’m feeling particularly stressed out.”

I stayed several feet away because I hated the smell of cigarettes but there was a lovely evening breeze I hoped would clear the air quickly. “And parties make you stressed?”

Even in the dim light I could feel the moment his eyes began searching my face. I wanted to refuse to meet his gaze. I wanted to be stronger than his magnetic pull, but I wasn’t.

“Seeing you dancing with another man makes me stressed.”

“It was only Adam—a happily marriedolderman.”

“Doesn’t matter, Isabel.”

I loved the way he said my name. Three syllables starting with an E sound. E-sa-bel. No one else said it quite like him. “Why doesn’t it matter?”

He looked so sad, as if he expected me to turn and run the moment he told me the truth. “I want to be the only man who touches you. Does that scare you? It scares me.”

It definitely bothered me. I never wanted to be a possession, but with King it didn’t feel like ownership—it felt more like a mutual claiming. I didn’t want anyone else touching him either.

“Why does it scare you?”

He pushed off the wall and came closer. The lights of the party danced off him as he walked, highlighting his hair, eyes, and chin in alternating patterns. When he stopped in front of me I realized he was sucking on a mint. He sighed, slow and deep. “Why do I feel this way about you? I like it, but it’s unnerving to have zero control over it. Especially when my feelings seem to hurt you. Like they did on the way here.”

“I feel the same way, you know?” I wanted to move into his arms and sink into his embrace, but that was crazy, right? So I stayed where I was. “But feelings aside, at the end of the day, we both have lives to lead. Lives that have rules we need to abide by.”

Or was that just an excuse I was telling myself?

King cocked his head a little to the side, a faint, sexy smile forming at the corners of his lips. “You know what? You think too much. You’re too analytical. That’s the difference between us. You’re all analysis and I’m all instinct.”

I couldn’t argue with that. The one thing I kept coming back to over and over again was that I needed to be logical. Every minute in the same space with King was a battle between good and evil, the evil obviously being my lusty, traitorous body that chose the worst possible time to awaken.

“And my brain is telling me I need more data while yours is what? Horny?”

He smoothed his hand down my arm. “You’re confusing instinct with lust. I am not.”

“What’s the difference?” It was an honest question because to me it would seem a man’s instinctual desire to have a woman would have to come from lust.

King wandered to the edge of the balcony, turning to lean against it. Out there the breeze caught his hair more fully and it danced along his forehead. “I was raised by my aunt, did you know that?”

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