I feel like prey, caught in his amber gaze, his eyes echoing the thought of wolves. Even at this distance, they are striking—bright gold with a darker ring. I wonder if up close his amber eyes, seemingly identical in color to mine, will have the same flecks of green around the pupil. Unlike mine, his are magnificently matched.
As we lock eyes, his pupils dilate and his nostrils flare, like he is scenting me as prey. I feel my heart speed up and know my pupils dilate in response.
My only thought is I would happily sacrifice myself to this wolf. I realize my mouth is open and wonder just how long I have stood there slack-jawed, awestruck by this gorgeous man.
I tear my gaze back from his intense amber one to take in his entire face. His hair is as dark and velvety as midnight. Tousled like he had been pulling at it and lightly curled around his ears to his collar, just long enough to pull back if he wanted.
Black stubble graces a jaw so beautifully chiseled I could cut myself on the sharp edge of it. He has a straight Greek nose and lush lips with a full bottom and upper cupid's bow. He is entirely too symmetrical, like a marble bust from antiquity.So, this is the male archetype,I think.
He must be lost on his way to a modeling interview. He is ridiculously hot, like all the pieces of every late-night romance novel I have ever read rolled into one body of raw and freaking alluring masculinity. I wished I had a security surveillance system solely to watch the footage of this man on a loop, like my own personal porn channel.
My purview drifts over his porcelain skin, in contrast to his dark hair, and takes in the entire image of him. He is well over six feet and seems tall even with my ten-foot-high old ceilings. His shoulders are broad and taper down to a narrow waist.
Sublimely worn jeans encase his thick thighs, and glory be, he has on oxblood docs. I drift my gaze back up his body, trying not to zero in on the serious heat he is packing in the front of his pants.
He has a tight T-shirt that appears soft and weathered. I am jealous of the way the cotton clings to him, framed by a leather jacket. He has one thumb hooked in the front pocket of his jeans, his other hand rests against a tree trunk of a thigh. Light winks off several rings and I'm fascinated by his large hands. I can’t help but think how they would feel on my body.
He looks like James Dean and a wolf had a baby that grew up into the hottest damn specimen of man I have ever laid eyes on. I blink, close my mouth before a fly gets in, and swallow hard.
It is audible in the stillness that has lasted through my embarrassingly long perusal. It has been the ogle of all ogles in the history of ogling. But dear God, when would I have the chance to lay eyes on a man like this again?
I try to speak, clear my throat, and try again. My mouth is like the Mojave Desert, while further south it is most definitely Monsoon season. I finally get out, “I’m sorry, you were saying?”
Seriously? Could I have said something lamer to Mr. Tall, Pale, and Handsome? His mouth quirks up in a panty-melting half-smile, and I know this is it. He has ruined all men for me from now until forever. He is H. O. T. with that grin. I dub the mystery man Hottie McHottenstein.
He quirks an eyebrow, and I sincerely hope I haven’t accidentally said that part out loud, as I sometimes do. My slips of the tongue are a constant source of embarrassment for me and entertainment for my friends. And the more stress I am under, the more I do it. And this is such a good stress.
“I said, ‘hello again,’” comes the exotic voice. There is something niggling at the back of my mind with the accent, but I'm too preoccupied by his looks to pay attention. It is subtle but somehow familiar.
Tomorrow I will not be shallow, I tell myself. But in this second, I am so, so guilty of judging a book by its cover. And I want to devour this book, again and again and again.
Crap, he is waiting for me to respond, and I am so distracted. I stammer, “I-I’m sorry, I don’t think we’ve met. I’m pretty sure I would remember.”
We stand there, staring at each other, the air becoming more and more charged. The store’s sound system plays my curated streaming eclectic playlist. As one of my favorite songs, “Dragula,” starts playing, the man’s half-smile blooms into a full smile.
If I thought the half-smile was panty melting, the full smile is freaking nuclear. I wait for my clothes to incinerate right off my body under the attack.
He takes a step forward and I take one back, his sheer presence pushing the air against me, forcing me into a hasty retreat. I startle when my back is brought up short by the counter and freeze in the face of his intense scrutiny.
His gaze slips down my body to my docs as I stand trapped and then begins a slow perusal back up, taking in my striped tights, zombie nurse tank dress, and I swear lingers on my breasts for just a second too long. Or maybe that is simple optimism.
I could fall easily for this guy. So damn easy. He ticks every item off my checklist as if he were made for me.
I can feel his eyes staring at the pulse point in my neck, which must be visibly pounding, as I can hear the blood rushing in my ears. He runs the tip of his tongue along the edge of his teeth and meets my eyes again. He does not seem displeased with what he is looking at, and I blush furiously.
My skin heats and sweat blooms on my lip. I wonder if this is what menopause feels like. But I'm fairly sure my ovaries just dropped half a dozen eggs at a machine gun pace, so nope, can’t be the change.
I realize I am awkwardly standing there with my lunch in hand, so I turn around and set it down on the counter. I surreptitiously wipe my sweaty palms down my dress and take a sip of seltzer to stall from facing him again.
When I spin around, I find him following my every movement with his eyes, reinforcing my earlier feeling of being prey caught in his predator’s gaze. I don’t hate it.
His stare is intense, forward, and unapologetic in contrast to his words. “I must apologize for this morning. Is your hand better?”
Again, in that mysterious accent and cadence that pools deep into my belly. He holds his hand out to me, palm up, and I feel that I have no choice but to lift my burnt hand to his, the synapses in my brain misfiring.
He takes my hand and brings it to his lips, grazing a kiss over the burn. His hand is cool in my overheated grasp, while his lips ghost over my skin.
I let out a small gasp, electricity zinging straight to my core in this grandiose moment, like the alignment of the universe itself has shifted. This is achingly, hauntingly familiar. I swear I’ve felt every whirl of his fingerprints on my skin a million times before, know every crease of his lips, felt his words drip down my spine chased by his mouth.
