Page 38 of In Case You Didn't Know
The hallway is quiet, lined with gold sconces and heavy wooden panels. Female laughter spills faintly from the powder room. Then silence.
I shouldn’t care who she’s dating.
She made her choice. She left without a word. That’s fine, I can live with that. I’m not my sister’s-best-friend’s keeper. And from a completely dispassionate perspective, she’s better off without me. I’m might be in my mid-thirties but the last year has felt like an overwhelming mid-life crisis.
Being attracted to somebody way too young and way too pretty matches the modus operandi.
But when she steps out of that bathroom and stops short at the sight of me, eyes wide, chest rising, I feel it again.
That pull. Like gravity, like a goddamn weapon. And I keep stepping into the line of fire.
She presses a hand to her chest, like I’ve shocked her. “What are you doing, skulking around women’s bathrooms?” she says softly, her brows scrunched.
I don’t answer. Instead, I reach for her wrist before I can think better of it. Her pulse thuds beneath my fingertips, fast and hot and alive.
“Who’s the man you’re dating?” My voice comes out low, rougher than I intend. “Were you with him when we were together?”
Her eyes flare, and I feel it – the crack in my armor. I didn’t want to say that. I wanted to be cool. Detached. Indifferent.
I wanted to lie. To pretend I don’t care that somebody else gets to kiss those lips, gets to see her lose control.
That somebody else gets to watch her smile.
But she’s not smiling now. She leans in, defiant as hell. “Of course I wasn’t. I’m not a cheater. And you can’t exactly judge me. Not with all these reviews you’ve been getting.”
I wince, even as my lips twitch. I deserved that. I’m an idiot. There hasn’t been anybody else. Even if I had the time, I have no inclination.
The only woman I’ve been seeing is her, when I close my eyes in the shower.
“Why did you leave the island without saying anything?” I ask.
She blinks, like I caught her off guard. “I was busy. I had to get back to the mainland for meetings.”
“No, you didn’t.” My fingers tighten slightly on her wrist. “You were afraid.” I don’t tell her I know that because I was too. Which makes me a dipshit, I’m fully aware.
Her jaw drops. She scoffs. “I’m not scared of you, Asher. Or your fingers. You were good, but you weren’tthatgood.”
I grin, because she’s lying and we both know it. I may be an asshole, but I’m not an idiot. “The way you moaned my name says otherwise,” I murmur, enjoying the way her eyes flare.
“I didn’t moan your name.”
God, I want her.
I want the way she feels against me. I want the fire in her voice, the fight in her eyes. I want to undo her zipper and wreck her lipstick and fall apart as she moans my name again.
But I can’t.
“We need to get back to the table before Myles starts wondering why we’ve both disappeared,” she mutters.
I don’t move. “Tell me who he is.”
Her shoulders rise and fall with a sharp breath. “What are you going to do, take out a hit on him?”
My lips twitch. I’m a sarcastic word away from a full blown smile. “I’m not a killer, Francine.”
She used to wrinkle her nose when I called her by her full name. And she still does. Some things never change. “Call me that again and I’ll never tell you,” she says.
I lift a brow. Of course she’s still angry with me. Of course she still makes my heart kick like it’s trying to get out.
