Fuck, and then some.
With a groan, I release the clutch and sit back on the seat. I’ve never been so turned on by a lecture. Resigned to my torment, I glance at my wristwatch. “You want to help me.”
She nods once. “Yes.”
“How about right now?”
Her fine eyebrows draw together. “Now?”
“And it has to be in a place of my choosing.”
She catches her lip between her teeth. “Fine.”
On impulse, I hold out the helmet to her, a slow smile hitching the corner of my mouth.
A nervous laugh spills past her lips. “Oh, no. That’s not happening.”
“You agreed,” I tell her, a dare edged in my tone.
It’s only a flash, but something akin to pain creases her soft features before she flips her hair off her shoulder. “Not to getting on your bike.”
“An impasse already?” I lower the helmet. “Shame. I thought you had a little more fire in you, archer.”
She rubs her thumb across the starry points along her wrist as a defiant flame ignites the center of her eyes. “There are ways to get me alone other than putting my life in peril, Orion.”
As her gaze daringly holds mine, I can feel the matter between us charge, known and unknown forces colliding.
Intoxicating.
“Goddamn, Dr. Holbrook. Maybe I should be worried about being corrupted by you.”
With a cute scowl, she locks an arm across her midsection. Beneath her tough exterior, I sense something restless and desperate curling her hand tight around the strap of her case.
“I’m not exactly dressed to straddle the back of that thing,” she reasons.
Her words conjure the image of her straddling the seat, her fitted skirt hiked up her thighs, her arms wrapped around my waist—and the sudden, vicious nature of my thoughts turns aggressively heated.
I unsnap the collar of my leather jacket, listlessly untucking my necktie from my suit vest. Then I anchor the helmet to the handlebar and climb off. As I step toward her, I can make out the faint freckles across the bridge of her nose, the warm striations buriedin her irises, so bright that, in the drabness of Stonehurst, they sparkle in contrast.
In the time that’s passed, the grounds have cleared. Students no longer mill through the quad, the lot nearly empty. The sky has darkened to a deep shade of umber, and the distant, hollow crash of waves drifts on the mist.
Staring down at her, I weigh my options, torn between escaping on my bike and surrendering to the hypnotic lure of her melody, the one quieting the chaos in my head right now.
Decision made, I point toward the courtyard. “There’s a bench right over there.”
Her perceptive gaze rakes over me. She knows I watch her on that bench every morning. A flash of hesitancy crests behind her eyes, and I wonder if she’s suddenly wary of being alone with me in the dark.
Something deviant rears within me at the thought.
“This isn’t the way I conduct sessions, just so you know.” She pivots in the direction of the fountain, indulging me with the sinful sight of her walking away.
“I’ll take that to mean I’m special,” I say, helplessly dragged in her wake as I follow after her.
Collins drops her leather briefcase on the dry grass before running her palms along her backside and taking a seat on the concrete. A shiver forces her arms across her chest as she looks up at me expectantly.
“Take a seat.” She nods to the bench.
“A psychiatrist who avoids pointless foreplay,” I say, landing in the space next to her. “And for the record, I never punched Prescott.”
