“What’s your name?”
He chuckles, low and dangerous. “You’ll learn it when you earn the privilege of knowing it.”
“How do I do that?”
His hand tightens at my waist. “When you’re on your knees begging for more. When you can barely breathe because you need me so badly. That’s when I’ll give it to you so you can scream it while I ruin you.”
He exhales, voice low and edged with promise. “I’ll only ask one more time if you want to play this game with me. Not now, not tonight, but soon. Decide and be ready to give me your answer when I ask again.”
Then he slips away, gone, swallowed by the crowd, leaving me exposed, restless, and trembling in his absence.
I twist around and shove into the bodies, frantic, eyes scanning faces I don’t recognize. I’m not sure what I’m searching for. I just want the heat he left behind and the echo of his voice burned into my skin.
My heart pounds, trying to break free from my ribs. Lights strobe, blinding and violent, but I push forward, desperate to see him and know him.
But he’s gone.
Vanished.
As if he were never here at all.
When I stagger back to our table, Eden and Marissa jump up atonce. Brielle, still propped on some poor soul, freezes mid-laughter. All three go silent when they see the look on my face.
“I… I just…” My voice cracks and my stomach knots.
Eden’s eyes go huge. “Laurette? What the hell happened?”
Marissa’s fingers grip my wrist. “Are you okay?”
I stare at them, breathing heavily, the tremble in my chest refusing to settle. “He was on the dance floor, right behind me, pressed up against me.” My voice drops to a whisper. “He spoke to me, his mouth right against my ear.”
I swallow, throat tight. “It was him. B.”
A shot lands in front of me, tequila with no lime, and I throw it back without pause. The burn cuts through the fog, sharp but fleeting. My pulse still races, wild and unevenly.
Eden reaches across the table and cups my face. “Jesus, Laurette. That’s one step away from a true-crime podcast. We need to get the fuck out of here.”
Marissa pushes back in her chair. “We should go. Now.”
Brielle leans in. “Fuck,” she says, a slow smile curving her lips. “That’s hot.”
Eden spins around to look at her. “Brielle!”
“What?” Brielle shrugs. “A mystery man dances up behind her in a club and gets her hot and wet? That’s not danger. That’s foreplay.”
Eden’s eyes narrow. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
Brielle flicks her fingers, dismissing their concern. “He’s not just some creep. That was curated. Controlled. The man knows how to deliver temptation.” She shifts her gaze to me. “Tell me you didn’t feel the way he read your body. That wasn’t random. That was art.”
“He could be dangerous,” Marissa says.
“I think he is dangerous,” I whisper, eyes unfocused, skin still buzzing where he touched me.
Brielle leans closer, voice low and smug. “Your body didn’t exactly say no.”
Silence settles over the table because she’s right, and we all know it.
Heat blooms across my cheeks. “He touched me as though he already owned me.” And I allowed him to.
