Page 80 of All In
My eyes were trapped by his stare. My body trapped in the chair by a sweet ache of longing burning between my legs. I didn’t blink. He didn’t look away.
With loud drum riff and a glissando down the piano keys, the live music began, finally tearing my eyes free. The band was fronted by a young woman with long brown hair wearing a fedora hat, black leather jeans, and a white shirt with a black vest. Three African American men made up her band of guitar, piano, and bass. They opened with a slow song that permeated the air like fragrant smoke.
I concentrated on the music, pretending to listen and resolutely not looking at Theo. But the damn music was bluesy, sexy… A slow burn of want and longing. It dialed into my already aching body, filling me with a need to be touched.
A shadow fell over me, and I looked up to see Theo standing, his hand outstretched.
“Dance with me.”
It wasn’t a request, and my traitorous body was already rising to its feet before I could think.
Theo took my hand in his and led me to the small dance floor, where a dozen other couples were swaying to the music. Some, driven by the sultry tones of the song and the singer’s smoky voice, were grinding their hips together, thighs intertwined.
Theo slung my arms around his neck, then put his hands on my hips, and began to move.
I’d never stood this close to Theo before. Our bodies pressed tight. Our faces so close, I could smell the sweet heat of his food, the bitterness of beer, the salt of his sweat. His heart beat thick against mine. The ragged exhale of his breath.
“You told me at the wedding you didn’t dance,” I said, every part of my body conscious of touching every part of his.
His mouth shaped the words, “I lied,” but no sound reached me over the music.
I could barely breathe. I was losing myself in him. Our eyes locked. I couldn’t look anywhere but at him. The light brown of his eyes fiery, like a shot of whiskey backlit by a white-hot flame. His hips ground a slow circle against mine, his thigh inching between my legs. One arm slid around my waist, the other came up the middle of my back, holding me close. My arms wound around his neck, my fingers burrowed into his damp hair.
“I like this,” he murmured. His whole body was flush against mine. I could feel its power, the strength of his muscles holding and moving me with the music. The hollow of his neck glistened. I felt my own sweat slide over my collarbone and between my breasts. My blood was on fire in a way that was entirely separate from the Louisiana summer. A heat Theo was building in me with every roll of his pelvis against mine. I felt the stiffness of his jeans against my skin as his hand slipped down to my ass, pressing me tighter against him. Grinding in a dance that felt more like…
Foreplay.
My breath caught as Theo’s forehead came to touch mine, our gazes locked. Deep within, a greedy instinct and a growing need I hadn’t felt in a long time. I hooked one leg around his waist.
“Touch me,” I breathed.
He made a noise deep in his chest and his hand slid under my dress, up my thigh to my hip, pulling me into him. I bit back a cry as he dipped me back. I let my head fall, arching. He bent with me, his mouth on my throat, his tongue sliding against my skin. Feverish. Burning from the inside out. His touch was scorching, sending trails of fire across my skin in every direction. My nipples hardened. Heat pooled between my thighs where Theo ground against me mercilessly. Slowly his lips dragged up my neck, then my chin, both of us pulling upright until we were face to face again.
The look in Theo’s eyes—the almost feral hunger—stole my breath.
“Kace,” he whispered.
I expected his kiss. It was right there between us, waiting hungrily. I didn’t expect his hands, so rough and hard before, to hold my face gently. I didn’t anticipate the furrow of his brows, almost as if he were in pain.
I tilted my chin, wanting this, needing this so badly.
Please.
He laid his lips to mine, kissing me softly, slowly. The world turned around us, blurring and disappearing. I had to hold onto his wrists to keep from slipping away with it, gasping at the sensation that came roaring to life inside me. A match lit in a dark room, flaring with brilliant light. My lips parted with that gasp, and Theo, with a growl of pure want, kissed me again, this time hard and deep.
I wrapped my arms around his neck, clinging to him, opened my mouth to take all of his kiss. The taste of his tongue, the heat of his mouth. We started dancing again, our bodies acting of their own volition, our mouths opening and closing, heads tilting back and forth. Our tongues slid and tangled when the kiss went deep. Teeth and lips bit and sucked when it turned shallow.
On and on, we danced and in the back of my delirium, I knew I’d been right about Theo: if you had him, you had all of him. His kiss was the purest essence of himself: intense, fiery, devoted entirely to the moment. This close, he was my entire world, with no place for anything else. His body pressed to mine, his hands on my body, his sweat, his mouth…
He was so much. My instinct balked, used to thinking it was too much. But no, he was giving me everything and I was taking it. I could take it. And I wanted more.
“Oh, God,” I breathed into his mouth. He replied with a groan, and I took it in, inhaled him as he kissed me again.
We kissed until the song ended and the applause of the crowd broke the spell. Slowly, the circle we’d been turning in ceased. My feet felt the floor again, our bodies detached. The real world rematerialized. We remained on the dance floor a moment longer, our eyes searching each other for…I didn’t know what. Both of us blinking and dazed, as if coming out of a trance.
We walked back to our table—me on shaking legs—and I drank deep from my water glass, trying to quench the swirl of boiling emotions in my body.
“You want to get out of here?” Theo asked, his voice hoarse with desire. I could see it burning in his eyes.
