“Fuck me. I’m gonna have to sleep facing the wall, aren’t I?” There’s nothing bitter in his voice, just tortured resignation.
“I thought all this anticipation was your idea?” I taunt.
“Yeah, well, much more of it and we might have a problem on our hands.”
“My hands can handle it,” I promise.
Weston yanks a pillow out from beneath his head and slams it down over his face, muffling an exaggerated groan. He pulls it off his face and looks over at me.
“Why? Why did we agree to this last night bullshit again?”
I slide down the mattress until my body is flush against it, on my left side so I’m facing him, one hand supporting my head as I concentrate on taking in his features. His strong cheekbones and square jaw. That sharp nose and forehead that the ancient poets would’ve written sonnets about.
Me? Best I can do is trace the shape with the tips of my fingers, vowing to memorialize him in my mind like he is right now. Selfless, gorgeous, and without judgment.
Though, if he knew who I really was, that might be different.
But for my own sake, I’m going to enjoy the rest of my time in the Heights as Amelia Marsh. And Amelia Marsh has no reason to be judged, to fear this closeness that we’re pretending isn’t blooming with every interaction between us.
So I allow myself this moment of weakness. Where my feather light touches across his face—those hewn features I’m tracing, imprinting on my soul with every touch—they dust goosebumps across his flesh.
I relish in the power of it, the rush it sends through my bloodstream to see the way he’s affected by the simplest of connections between us. Let myself imagine it could be more.
Just while we’re here, in the dark, I can dream that it’s not just the physical attraction that’s moving him, reducing him to this shivering vessel of need.
ThatIcould be what he needs. This beautiful, selfless man who makes the world around him so much brighter just by existing.
That my darkness doesn’t dampen his light, my taint can’t corrode his bronze shine.
The hunger in me ramps up, desire coursing through my cells, liquifying me and pooling in my center.
He sucks in a sharp breath through parted lips, whether it’s the way my fingers caress his forehead, the lazy fall of his golden strands across it, or the look in my eyes.
Fuck, maybe he can scent the change in my pheromones, my chemical makeup that’s radiating my lust to him on a base level that defies words but has existed for millennia. It’s what’s propagated society and civilization all this time. This ancient, primal signal between the hunter and the hunted. Right now, I’m not sure which of us is which.
Weston grabs my hand and stops it from continuing its exploration, down his jaw and beyond, where it would’ve loved to have gone.
“Amelia.”
No one has ever said my name like that. None of my names.
Like he needs me.
Like I’m what’s tethering him to this plane.
Like I’m killing him with every touch.
“Weston.”
It’s a breath, it’s a request, it’s permission.
“You’re making it really fucking hard not to touch you right now,” he whispers, face inches from my own.
“Don’t touch me,” I say soft as velvet.
He stares at me, trying to follow.
“You don’t want me to touch you?”
