“I…” can’t finish my sentence.
“You?” Asher mocks, but his eyes crinkle with mirth.
The bartender chooses that moment to set a tray of shots down in front of us. “On the house,” he says cheerfully in heavily accented English. “Amazing driving today, Lawrence. I can’t believe—”
“Thanks for the shots,” Asher cuts off, momentarily ungluing his gaze from me to glare at the bartender. The attractive young man balks at whatever he sees on Asher’s face and promptly hurries away.
Asher and I are surrounded by dozens of people, but it feels like we’re totally alone. He returns to staring at me. I pick up a shot and down it without thinking twice, but underestimate the strength of the liquor, because it sends me into a fit of hacking and coughing.
I haven’t done shots since… that drag show when Keith kissed me. That’s the only reason I actuallylethim pull me onto the stage in the first place, and I swore off hard,undiluted liquor after that when pictures of us started circulating social media.
Asher hides a smile at my display of drinking incompetence. He picks up a glass and takes a shot himself, not even wincing, then lifts the tray in one hand and takes mine in the other.
Oh,shit.
Pleasant tingles erupt in a flurry of sensation where his warm hand wraps around mine, engulfing it entirely. We’ve touched before, of course, but it’s mostly been casual or accidental—and each time sent a bolt of lightning through me.Thisis nothing compared tothosetimes, because it isn’t just a bolt; it’s a storm of butterflies that churn my stomach and light me up.
“Come on,” Asher says, flashing me a devilish smile over his shoulder. “Let’s find somewhere more private to talk.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Victoria
Asher navigates us towards a room somewhere in the bowels of the third floor. There’s a sofa along a wall, and a low table in front of it with some half-empty drinks. Pictures of famous athletes and F1 drivers hang on the wall, all of them signed.
I guess this is the VIP of the VIP part of the club. It’s small, intimate, and currently abandoned—save for me and Asher.
The air is so thick, you’d need a scythe to slice through the tension. I don’t know what to say or do, so I just stand there like an idiot, staring at Asher with wide-eyes and waiting for him to make a move. I’ve already inadvertently made my play of the night by shouting my question into the ether. Now, it’s his turn.
If he brought me here to let me down gently, I’ll never recover.
He sets the tray of shots down on the table and rounds on me. His eyes are dark, his expression intent. He threads his fingers through mine. It’ssuch a casually intimate gesture that it nearly undoes me. Slowly, he steps forward, and I match it with a step back, until our dance ends with my back softly thudding against a cool wall.
It’s not cold enough to dim the heat blasting through me like a firestorm of biblical proportion. I’m alone in a room with one of the most famous and gorgeous people in the world, who’s staring at me with a silent intensity that makes alarm bells blare in my head. What is he going to do? What amIgoing to do?
“Ask me,” he says.
“W-what?” Jesus, I’mstutteringnow?
“Stop going behind my back. If you have a question, ask it to my face.”
“Uh…”Get yourself together, Victoria. It’s hard when he’s so overwhelmingly masculine and devastatingly sexy; any moment now, I’m going to start drooling all over him. It should be illegal for someone to bethishot, or smell this good. Like a dark wintery forest on a cool night; pine, frozen earth, fresh-sprinkled snow.
“Ask,” he commands.
“Are you dating someone?” I squeak.
A slow, sensual smile curls his lips. “No. I’m free game.” He curls a lock of my hair around his finger and tugs playfully. His hand squeezes mine. “Who were you with that night at the restaurant?”
“My brother,” I whisper.
“Good. Are you dating anyone?”
I shake my head, stomach dropping as if I’m going over the steepest curve of an out-of-control roller coaster. “No.”
“Verygood.”
I blink at least twenty times in a row. “Why?”
