My mind spins while my heart pounds against my chest. The knot in my throat is tight and it’s hard to swallow past it as I turn down the dirt road that leads to the tracks.
When we pull to a stop, I let the engine run. It’s already ten forty-five. I have to be home by midnight. We can’t stay long. My sweaty palms grip the steering wheel while blood rushes to my ears, anxious to know what will happen next.
The alternative rock station we’re listening to switches songs and “All I Need” by Radiohead pours from the speakers, the dark sound setting the tone as he catches my eye, turning it up.
“Love this song,” he says.
“It’s one of my favorites, too.”
He continues to smoke his cigarette casually and damn it all to hell if he doesn’t look hot doing it. Then he swings his eyes to mine once more as the dark lyrics fill the space between us, his gaze bringing me down to a level of need I don’t understand.
But the need is not within me.
It’s in him.
With a sense of resolve, he drops out of the truck and rounds the front, flicking what is left of his cigarette into the night before opening my door.
Reaching for my hand, he pulls me out. “Dance with me.”
“Here?”
“Yeah…here.”
There, on a dirt road in the middle of nowhere, with nothing more than the low beam headlights guiding our way, we dance. His arms wrap around me and so does his scent, intoxicating and new.
Different.
He pulls me closer, our cheeks touching, breaths meeting warm skin while my heart races in my chest. I want him to kiss me. He’s probably kissed tons of girls, good-looking as he is.
Girls who know how to kiss.
Girls who know how to do lots of things I don’t.
He is a man, after all. And I’ve never kissed a man before. I’ve only kissed two boys and their sloppy tongues and groping hands were nothing to write home about.
His fingers press into my lower back before his warm mouth whispers in my ear and my body tingles.
“I’m going to kiss you now, Sylvie.” A rough thumb works back and forth across my fevered skin as he pulls back to gaze down at me, my heart thunders so hard in my chest I think I might pass out. His face is but a shadow in the still of the night, however, there is no mistaking the want in his eyes.
It tugs at something inside of me, calls to me in a way that I cannot fathom.
Then his mouth descends on mine, paralyzing me. I’m not sure what to do with my hands so I let them hang loosely by my side, but the moment he backs me into the front of the truck they gain purchase, fisting in the sides of his shirt.
He tastes of smoke, fire, and desperation. It’s overwhelming, frightening, and addictive—his need for me.
The kiss begins to slow but my blood rushes faster, eager for more.
“Sylvie,” he breathes against my lips.
My panting heart grows sluggish and weak as he brushes his thumb across my swollen lips. His forehead drops to mine, his shoulders tense and tight beneath my hands. Something flickers in his eyes, something dark and mystifying, luring me in.
“You’re going to make me fall in love with you, aren’t you?” Warmth sings in my blood while resolution settles in his eyes. He breathes the words against my lips, a whisper of possibility that has me flying across the star-covered sky.
Past
Idon’t want to fall in love with Dean but it happens anyway. Or perhaps it is the idea of falling in love that has me tumbling fast and hard. Either way, it happens.
In a single heartbeat.
