Good thing I have the doors shut or else all that dust would be in here withus.
“Fuck me,” I mutter, running a hand through my hair.
“Hendrick?” A light hand presses to my back.
Tension lights a fast path through my body, heading south. That she’s up now, at almost sunset having slept through the day, slams me with need. Because here, she felt safe enough to do that.How long has it been since you slept properly?
I pivot sharply on my heel, catching her wrist and pull her into my chest. Adora’s eyes flare wide. The need to cup her nape, and meld our mouths together, find out if she tastes like the moonlight that her eyes look like, even in daylight, is overwhelming.
Fuck. I have to stop this.
“Tell me what you want for dinner, love. Your team has arrived.? I drop her wrist, willing her to understand the change in me as I throw on the professional facade that should have been the cold, brutal truth between us all along.
We should never have been close.
I should never have touched her.
Adora considers me for a moment, when offers me the faintest smile I know I’ll fucking treasure for days.
“Pizza, please.”
Then she steps back, her distance both physical and mental as her own persona slips on.
The masks we wear. Protection for ourselves and from others, in her case, I suspect.
There's so much I want to say to her, so much I wish we had more time to talk about, discover about each other. Hell, not only have I broken all her rules, I’m fast working through a list of my own. And the one that I should never, ever break?
I’m falling for this woman. All too easily I can see why she has stalkers. Plural, because she’s liked to me, both on the sheet and in person. But I think I understand why. Either it’s denial or she’s been told otherwise. And now that herfriendshave arrived, I can find out a little more.
“Pizza it is, love. Pineapple?” I can’t help myself. I am an asshole.
“Only if you want the remains spread across your pillow later,” she murmurs, and glides away, herAdorashaped persona fixed perfectly in place. Even her voice fades, for fuck’s sake.
I stare after her and will my hard on down. Hell, I’m an inch from chasing after her, sliding my hands around her waist and?—
Stop. It.
“Fuck,” I growl, low enough that I know she hears me. Hears, and does nothing. Maybe I’m imagining it, but I swear that she’s responded to me the way I have to her.
I’m turning into her next pet stalker.
Maybe it’s for the best that her entourage has arrived. I need a reality check or a cold slap in the face.
A knock on my door provides just that.
I glance back at Adora, but she’s already disappeared back along the hallway toward the back of the house where the bedrooms are situated. A moment later, the door shuts. To either her bedroom, or mine it doesn't matter. But it’s telling that she's hiding from the people who have come for her.
I make a mental note and greet the hoard alone. The moment I unlock the front door, it pushes in. three bodies tumble toward me, mid conversation. The volume in my home ratchets up two hundred percent or more, and so does the color factor.
I had no idea how serene being with her was until this moment, and how much I crave her sense of silence. She’s beautiful and perfect, and this is…
Fucking chaos.
A man who stands half a foot taller than me with short rainbow spikes decorating his head bounds through my door, enveloping me in a bear hug. “Oh, you’re the hero! Thank you for saving her. Miracle worker. And you got her out here? Twice as good. Thank you so much. Where’s the beer? And you have aircon. Dying!” The hug lasts half as long as his speech before he’s off, exploring the house, starting with the kitchen.
I stand, slightly shell shocked, as two other people, one dressed in corduroy that that could have come straight from the seventies, and another in flashes of pinks and golds that leaves my eyes watering slightly both eye my checked shirt and singlet over my dusty jeans from my ride this morning and blessedly give me a wide berth.
Keen to ensure that Adora isn’t inundated with attention and suddenly aware of why she hid, I close the door on a brusqueahem. Jerked out of my mind fog, I pull it open again and am blinded for the second time in two days.
