Page 44 of Night Shift

The words alone make me feel like I’m on fire. But then Vincent crooks his fingers the way he’s saying he’ll crook them inside me, and the brush of skin—the strength he has in one stupidly enormous hand—makes a muscle deep in my stomach clench.

“All right,” I say with a shaky laugh. “Let’s not be too confident in our abilities.”

Vincent blinks innocently. “I’m just trying to communicate clearly.”

He knows exactly what he’s doing. And he’d better not stop.

I sprawl back on the bed, a soft gust of air escaping his pillow when my head hits it. His duvet is smooth and crumb-free under my hands. It’s not the kind of unmade, bedbug-infested mess that Nina, Harper, and I always joke about college boys having in their rooms. Vincent keeps his space clean and bright. (I don’t know what it says about me that this is a huge turn-on.)

Vincent follows, one knee braced between mine and hands on either side of my head. He looks so beautiful above me. Dark hair falling in dark eyes. Biceps straining against the sleeves of his T-shirt, which has ridden up just enough to reveal a sliver of skin above the waist of his jeans.

This is happening.

I’ve spent so many hours of my life reading about characters getting naked. I’ve lived vicariously through a thousand different rituals of kissing, undressing, and exchanging heated words and tender confessions. And now that I’m here, actually living it, all I can think is that I really, really hope Vincent thinks I’m pretty. It’s such a silly thought. I swore to myself, back during freshman year, that I’d stop letting the male gaze influence any of my decisions. But this one male’s gaze has single-handedly fucked me up.

Vincent must know me well enough by now to recognize the agonized look on my face, because he nudges the side of my calf with his knee.

“Talk to me, Holiday.”

My eyes refocus on Vincent, who’s watching me with a little concern.

“Go easy on me, okay?” I try to make it a joke, but my voice wobbles.

Vincent catches it. His hand—the one that’s finally free of the brace—finds mine and weaves our fingers together. It’s so soft. I hate him for it, a little, because it makes something in my chest clench so tight that it’s almost too much.

“Hey,” he says.

“Hey,” I parrot.

“I’ll do whatever you tell me to do. You’re in charge here.”

I can’t tell if the room has inexplicably grown smaller or if the low and rumbling cadence of his voice is like a weighted blanket draped over my shoulders, but I’m suddenly ten degrees warmer. The weird shivering thing my body has started doing fades. I go still. Calm.

You’re in charge.

“I trust you,” I blurt, even though he didn’t ask.

Vincent stares at me for a moment, his dark eyes sparkling in the soft light, before rolling forward on his knees to place a gentle kiss to my forehead. It’s a moment that’s far too serious and sentimental to match the muffled sounds of college debauchery seeping through the floorboards.

“I won’t let you down, Holiday,” Vincent says. Then, with the same seriousness: “Now let’s get your pants off.”

Nineteen

Vincent—a true gentleman—pops open the button and unzips my jeans for me. He tugs them down my thighs and calves and then over my sock-clad feet, which look utterly silly now that my legs are bare. But Vincent doesn’t laugh at my dorky mismatched socks (one dotted with flowers, the other with a cartoonish black cat by my toes). His eyes are locked onto the place where my borrowed bodysuit snaps together between my legs.

“This,” he says, hooking a finger under the fabric at my hip and letting it snap back to my skin. “I love this thing. Whatever the hell it is.”

I snort. “It’s called a bodysuit.”

Vincent sucks his lips in like he’s trying to stop himself from saying something.

“What?” I demand.

“Okay, you’re going to hate me for this, but have you ever seen those warm-up pants that basketball players wear before their games? The ones with the snaps up the sides? And then they just, like, fucking rip ’em off?”

A laugh rips out of my mouth. “Vincent! Why would you say that—”

“Is this one of those situations?” he asks through his own laugh.

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