Page 118 of Their Arrangement

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Three. Four.

I should’ve spoken. Should’ve moved.

But I couldn’t.

I was frozen under the weight of something too thick to name.

By the time he reached six, his knuckles were white.

And then he looked at me.

Really looked.

Not at my face.

At my mouth.

Then lower.

His gaze dragged down my throat, over the line of my blouse, to where the silk curved around my chest and disappeared into the waistband of my skirt.

Lower still.

To my hips.

My thighs.

The tension between them.

His eyes didn’t flicker.

Didn’t flinch.

He watched me like a man making a purchase.

Like a man justifying it to himself in real time.

And in that moment, I realized?—

He wasn’t angry.

He was aroused.

Heat bloomed between my legs, hot and slick and immediate.

My stomach twisted.

I tried to step back.

Couldn’t.

He took one step forward.

And placed the money in my hand.

Six hundred dollars.

Not fanned. Not dropped.

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