And then he made eye contact with me.
My entire body seemed to glow when he made contact with me. Those fierce yet haunted eyes just had a way of burrowing in on you, of locking you in place. Plenty of guys in the club had fierce eyes, but only he had the mixture of rugged, haunted, and beautiful. It was like looking at a forest fire—it was dangerous, but there was something oddly majestic about it.
He turned to the girl, whispered something to her, and then stood up and left her behind. I gulped and kept eye contact with him as he came to me. It was a bold move for him to leave the girl behind and…
Walk right past me and get a drink.
OK. Well, that was kind of a dick move. And with no one else to pull me away from the conversation, it wasn’t one that I was just going to let him get off the hook of.
“Hello, Connor,” I said.
Connor grunted in my direction. It was kind of more than I was expecting, but it was still a dickish response. What, he couldn’t even manage to say hello?
“What the hell is your problem?” I said.
That got Connor to turn to me.
“I didn’t expect you to be the one to invite me to this party, but I didn’t think you’d act like a teenager ignoring his parents.”
Connor eyed me up and down for far longer than any comfortable amount of time. I refused to show my distress, but I prepared myself for a scathing response. I started to wonder if, at this point, getting him to agree to coffee or drinks was more about an ego thing than it was an actual attraction thing.
“You know, funny enough, despite how you sound just now, you’re actually nicer than I thought for someone like you.”
What the hell does that mean? Someone like me? What have people like me done to you before?
“But I’ll ask this once as nicely as I can. Don’t bother me. I’m more trouble than I’m worth. I’m not perfectly put together like Brock or Steele or any of the other guys. OK?”
He tried to walk past. I should have just let it go, let him carry on with his merry self, and moved on to having boring house conversations with the Rogers girls. Unfortunately, I was really bad at letting go of things—it worked well in business, probably terribly in personal relationships.
“Who says anything about being perfectly put together?” I said. “You think I got my shit figured out? I know there’s more to you than you’re letting on, Connor.”
“Is that why you keep pushing? Because you think there’s more to me than I’m letting on?”
I opened my mouth, but the intensity of his gaze kept the words in my throat. And it wasn’t like the other moments when he looked at me, when he seemed hellbent on acting like an ass. There was something…
Almost something soft about it.
Nothing about Connor could really be called soft, but his eyes suggested that his questions weren’t an accusation. They were a hope. A hope that I was, in fact, seeing something more than he was letting on. There was also, weirdly enough, almost a fear with showing me those eyes, like if the guys around us saw that look, they’d mock him relentlessly for it.
No one had ever looked at me like that. The terrible boys I’d dated in the past had never let themselves look so curious, and the few good guys I had dated hadn’t needed to resort to that. It was sweet, albeit in a very odd and unusual way.
But for however long that gaze was held, it wasn’t long enough to get either of us to bite. Connor just grimaced, shook his head, and walked away, almost seeming disappointed that he had not had the chance to speak more. I watched him walk back to the girl that he’d been with moments before, but he didn’t put his arm around her.
He did not, however, look at me.
What a strange guy,I thought. The more time I spent with him, the more I became curious. Even when he acted like an ass, it was almost like I had to “bust through” his asshole side to see the true side. Maybe I was making excuses for my attraction to him; Connor was far from the first guy that would have freaked my mother out if she saw him.
But I really, honestly, and truly felt like that I was seeing something more to him than he would allow. But boy, was it several layers deep.
I knew I wouldn’t get anything out of him, and so I decided to turn my attention back to the Rogers sisters and their guys. But within a mere half-hour, I found myself bored and at that crossroads spot where I had to decide between continuing to drink alcohol and enjoy myself versus sobering up and heading home. Judging by the direction of the party, I leaned toward sobriety.
Two hours later, the party had still not escalated, and I decided to take my leave. I thanked Brock and Steele, hugged Tara and Elizabeth, went over, and told Zack that I’d have his beer for him at the store on Monday—what a steal that deal turned out to be for him—and looked for Connor.
But he was nowhere to be seen. Knowing how biker boys went, he probably had taken that stupid girl back to the room and was deep inside her right now. I was kind of repulsed by the thought, but then again, the thought of a naked Connor before me…
Yeah, it was kind of hot.
I gave it another minute, just in case he’d gone to take a piss, but aware after some time that just wasn’t the case, I called an Uber and headed for the front door. I walked outside when the ride was two minutes out.
I stopped.
Connor was sitting on a chair, sipping on a glass of liquor, looking out toward the stars, his back deliberately turned away from me and anyone else walking in and out of the front door.
Once again, I opened my mouth to speak, and once again, the words got caught in my throat. I didn’t see the girl he’d been with anywhere, nor did I hear her from around the corner. But he was clearly deep in thought, and a part of me told me that if I tried to say anything, tried to look like I was making a move, I would never have a chance at Connor again.
My phone dinged loudly enough for Connor to hear. My Uber arrived. He did not turn around.
I walked to my ride home, leaving him behind, as curious as ever about Connor Burns.
