eleven
WILLOW
The drive home took seventeen minutes.
I counted. Not intentionally—my brain just latched onto the details as a distraction from the fact that I was holding Callum Hayes's hand in the dark interior of his obscenely nice sedan and thinking about all the ways I wanted to take him apart.
Seventeen minutes. Eleven traffic lights, four of which were red, each one an eternity. His thumb tracing absent patterns on my knuckles while he drove, as if he wasn't aware he was doing it. As if the small, circular motion wasn't sending electric pulses up my arm and into parts of my body that had no business responding to thumb circles.
I'd made my decision somewhere between the third glass of champagne and the moment he'd stepped between me and Philip Reeves with cold fury in hisvoice. No—earlier than that. On the dance floor, when he'd pulled me close and I'd rested my head on his shoulder and thought:I'm done waiting for permission.
I was twenty-three years old. I'd spent the past year trading insults with this man over a coffee counter, convincing myself the attraction was a phase, a glitch, a temporary malfunction of my hormones. I'd spent the past week living in his apartment, sleeping in his guest bed, pretending that the kiss on his couch hadn't fundamentally rewired my nervous system.
I was finished pretending.
The city blurred past the windows. His profile in the dashboard glow—the sharp line of his jaw, the silver at his temples, the way his hand tightened on the steering wheel every time I shifted in my seat.
"You're quiet," he said.
"Thinking."
"About?"
About how I want to climb you the moment we get through your door. About how I've never wanted anyone the way I want you and that scares me but not enough to stop. About how if you try to be a gentleman and suggest we take things slow, I might actually commit a felony.
"Carpeting," I said. "Whether shag will ever make a comeback."
His mouth twitched. "Unlikely. The maintenance alone?—"
"Callum."
"Yes?"
"Drive faster."
He looked at me then—really looked, his eyes leaving the road for a beat longer than was strictly safe. Whatever he saw on my face made his knuckles go white on the steering wheel.
He didn't ask why. Didn't question it. Just pressed the accelerator and ran the next yellow light.
Two blocks from his building, he pulled over.
"What are you?—"
He was across the console before I could finish the question, his mouth crashing into mine, his hand fisting in my hair. The kiss was frantic. Messy. I grabbed his lapels and pulled him closer, and he groaned against my lips, and we were making out in his parked car on a public street and I didn't care, couldn't care, not when he was kissing me as though he'd die if he didn't.
"Couldn't wait," he rasped when we broke apart. "Couldn't drive another foot without?—"
“What are you waiting for?”
He stared at me. Pupils blown. Breathing ragged. Then he put the car in gear and covered the last two blocks in approximately fifteenseconds.
The elevator doors closed and Callum's hand found the small of my back.
Not guiding. Not polite. Possessive. His palm pressed flat against my spine, fingers splayed, as if he needed the contact to stay grounded. I could feel the heat of him through the thin fabric of my dress.
Neither of us spoke.
I watched our reflections in the mirrored walls. Him in that tuxedo, jaw tight, a muscle ticking near his temple. Me in burgundy, cheeks flushed, lips swollen from the kiss in the car.
