Page 11 of False Start, Real Passion

He pushes off the frame, stalking towards me with predatory grace. “Could’ve fooled me.”

I back up, my hip bumping against a shelf. “Jaxon, what are you doing?”

“What I should’ve done a long time ago.”

He closes the distance between us, his body crowding mine. I’m surrounded by him—his heat, his scent, the sheer magnitude of his presence.

“Why are you fighting this, Tori?” His eyes search mine, intense and unrelenting. “Why are you fightingus?”

“There is no us,” I breathe, but even I can hear the uncertainty in my voice.

His hand comes up, cupping my cheek. I lean into the touch, my eyes fluttering closed.

“Isn’t there?” His thumb brushes over my lower lip, and I barely suppress a shudder. “Tell me you don’t feel it. This thing between us.”

I can’t. I can’t tell him that, because it would be a lie. And I’m so tired of lying, even to myself.

“Jaxon...” It’s a plea, a prayer, a surrender.

He leans in, his forehead resting against mine. “Stop fighting it, sweetheart. Just let go.”

And God help me, I want to. I want to sink into him, to let the fire consume me. But the rational part of my brain, the part that’s clinging to professionalism like a life raft, won’t let me.

“I can’t,” I whisper, even as my body arches towards his. “We can’t.”

“We can.” His lips hover over mine, a hairsbreadth away. “Wewill.”

The room shrinks around us, the world narrowing to this moment, to the electric space between our mouths.

His gaze drops to my lips. “If we can’t, then stop me.”

“You should leave,” I whisper.

“Should I? Because you’ve been looking at me like you’re dying to know how I taste.”

Kiss me, I think wildly. Kiss me, and damn the consequences.

But the consequences loom large, a bucket of icy reality waiting to douse the flames.

This is madness. This is a mistake.

A mistake I’m about to make anyway.

Just as his lips brush mine, feather-light and searing, my knees weaken, and I grip his jersey for balance.

“Tell me to stop,” he breathes.

I shove him away. Hard.

He stumbles back, surprise and confusion warring on his face. “Tori, what—”

I’m already bolting, my heels clattering against the concrete floor as I flee the equipment room like the hounds of hell are on my heels.

I’m in the hallway, but the room—the moment—is still around me, still in me, my entire body thrumming from the closeness, the almost of it all. A mistake, I tell myself as I flee. This is a mistake.

This is stupid, stupid, stupid.

Stupid, stupid, stupid. The word pounds in my head with each frantic step. What was I thinking, letting him get that close? Letting myself get swept up in the moment, in the heat of his gaze and the promise of his touch?

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