Page 53 of Take Me Home

“Open the door.”

She did, and he was right there on the other side, ready. Only,he didn’t step in right away. His gaze swung straight to the ceiling.

“You’re going to have to look at me to help.”

Slowly, his eyes tracked down to her face. They flitted lower, as if to close but his lashes didn’t quite meet. Then, he was taking her in thoroughly, abandoning any attempt to avert his dark, dark gaze. He licked his lips. “It fits,” he said, his voice oddly gruff.

“Please, get it off me.”

Ash swallowed then motioned for her to make space. The backs of her knees hit the bench seat as she accommodated him in the tight stall.

“Turn around.”

When she did, he squeezed in against her backside, jostling her against the mirrored wall to clear enough space to close the door. Already short of breath, Hazel held her sharp inhale until he stepped back and broke the contact.

Behind her, in the mirror, his shoulders and chest rose with a deep breath. Then, she felt his fingers at the upper edge of the dress, just below her shoulder blades. Goosebumps broke out on her skin despite the heat.

She felt him tug at the zipper to no avail. He cursed softly, and the hairs on her neck stood on end, her shoulders flexing back against the warm brush of his knuckles. His attention was laser-focused, eyebrows determinedly drawn together. His tongue licked out over his lips once more. Hers did the same, and she caught the movement in the mirror, her focus shifting to her flushed cheeks, her shallowly heaving chest. Despite the bright fluorescent lights above the mirror, her eyes were dark, pupils overtaking the irises almost entirely. She looked deranged. She itched to hide her discarded bra, which lay open in all its pink lacy glory atop the pile of her clothes, but he would find out assoon as he unzipped her just how naked she was under the dress.

“This zipper is tiny,” Ash said.

“Can you get it or not?”

His mouth twitched up in the corner. “Patience, Hazel.”

“I’m not good with small spaces.”

“Small spaces,” he repeated, like he was noting it in an official record.

“Or suffocating dresses.”

He stopped working at the zipper to place one big hand over her bare shoulder and meet her eyes in the mirror. She expected him to make light of her outsize reaction, but there was no trace of mockery when he said, “I’ve got you.”

Maneuvering her back a step closer to him, he gathered the fallen strands of her hair and tucked them over one shoulder. “The light,” he said by way of explanation. This didn’t explain, however, the slow stroke of his thumb down the side of her neck, down the ridges of her spine, his other fingertips trailing featherlight after, the scrape of a callous lighting a fuse under her skin. Her eyes snapped to his reflection, and that was when she realized he wasn’t looking at the zipper but ather—her eyes, her mouth, lower. His throat bobbed with his swallow, and she felt it behind her.

He noticed her noticing him and cleared his throat. His next firm tug pulled her onto her heels, and she tipped back, her backside flush against his front, his hands dropping immediately to her hips. They both issued breathy apologies. Hazel was ready to just pay for the dress and wear it out of the store to escape.

Ash dropped a knee onto the bench, bringing his face closer to the problem. “I think it’s just caught on the lining. Can I…”

She had no idea what he wanted to do, but she nodded anyway.His hand slipped inside the dress, knuckles brushing a spot she had no idea was ticklish until now. She let out a little laugh as he made adjustments.

Finally, the zipper gave. He slid it down all the way to the curve of her butt, his hand stilling there. A desire to sway back seized her. Just enough to press against his fingers, just enough to let him know she wanted…What did she want? For him to touch her, here in a public dressing room? She wanted his body pressed against hers like it had been when he first squeezed into the stall behind her. She reached up for the lace straps of the dress, now loose, and held them, wondering, her heart hammering, breath halting, what he would do if she let them fall.

He met her gaze in the mirror, his eyes as dark as hers, jaw clenched. “There.” The syllable scraped out of his throat.

She moved to let him pass at the same time he tried to get by. They continued the dance in the opposite direction, Hazel turning around to face him as they shuffled. She laughed, but the sound was cut short by his hand at her hip, first stilling her, then grasping her through the dress like he couldn’t help himself. She backed up against the mirror and gasped at the cold against her shoulder blades. His body closed in the space between them, trapping her there.

“Don’t move,” he said, barely audible.

She could inhale, and their chests would touch. She could reach up and pull his face down to hers. His fingers were still gripping her hip.

Then, somehow, he let go, squeezing around the door and out of the stall without even a whisper of contact.

Chapter

Twelve

He could have kissed her.Shouldhave kissed her. Her lips were stained cranberry red, and he could have devoured her mouth when he backed her against the mirror. He’d told her not to move, a last-ditch request that every fiber of his being wanted her to disregard. If she had, if she’d pushed forward even the tiniest bit, he’d have given in to the flash flood of desire. But Hazel hadn’t moved. And he’d made an escape out of the dressing room stall before he did something he couldn’t take back, like tug the loose straps out of her grasp to free her breasts, push that skirt up over her hips, press every aching part of himself against her…

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