Page 21 of Arranged Obsession
But Cormac’s reaction isn’t remotely what I expected. He leaps up from the chair like something just stabbed him in the chest.The book tumbles to the floor with a low thud as he steps away from me, backing toward the windows. His fist holds the glass so tight I think it might break. He takes a long swig of the alcohol, grimacing, his tight black t-shirt pulled taut across his incredibly sculpted chest and stomach. The man’s got muscles on hisshoulders, for God’s sake. It’s obscene and truly unfair.
“I’m sure my brother has reasonable expectations,” he manages to say, grimacing like he’s in agony.
“I know, I know, I’m sorry. I’m just having trouble coming to grips with all this, you know, and I figured since you’re his brother—” I stop myself since I’m rambling and don’t have a point. Silence stretches with Cormac glaring death at me. “Right, okay, I can leave you alone.”
“Finn wants a girl.” He barks it at me, almost like he’s forcing it out. His lips twitch, and he has to take another drink as I process what he said.
“Really? He told you that?”
He nods sharply. “Once, when we were younger. He said a girl would be cute.”
I smile to myself. “A little girl wouldn’t be bad, I guess. But I feel like everyone would be disappointed if we didn’t have at least one boy.”
“Nobody’s disappointed so long as the child’s healthy.” He backs away from me like he’s trying to escape. And I can’t blame him. I just interrupted his midnight reading and started interrogating him about whether his brother’s going to knock me up or not.
“What else can you tell me about him?” I feel desperate to keep him talking all of a sudden. I keep getting whiffs of my ghost, and it’s like an intoxicant straight to my brain.
“He’s kind. Honorable. Adrift, but finding himself. He’s ambitious, but lacks direction. He’ll find it eventually. Finn’s a good person. You’re lucky to marry him.” Cormac reaches the door. He leans against the frame and looks down at my body, his eyes raking up along my legs. I don’t know what he’s seeing, since I’m decked out in baggy sweats, but he licks his lips unconsciously like he enjoys it anyway. I feel strangely flattered, and my cheeks flush again.
“You two are close, right? You and Finn? I guess you’re here to check me out for him.”
Cormac shakes his head. “Not particularly.”
“Really? I just assumed.”
“I’m here because I had to be.” I wait, but he doesn’t elaborate.
Strange. I don’t know what that means. I frown, tilting my head, but decide not to press. The tension between us is incredible and I don’t know why. It’s like every muscle in his body is ready to spring, and the pounding in my chest and the churning in my core feels like I’m about to tumble off a cliff toward a wine-dark sea below. I’ve never felt so overwhelmed before in my life.
“I guess that makes two of us,” I murmur and chew on my thumbnail without thinking.
“You shouldn’t do that.” He’s looking at my thumb and my mouth with real, primal hunger. “Your hands are too beautiful.”
And with that incredible, bizarre little proclamation, he turns and walks away.
I watch after him, trying to calm myself down, but still reeling. It’s that smell, it’s the way he looks at me, it’s his voice and his body, all of it comes together to make my brain into a pathetic pudding mush.
Slowly, I turn to the chair. The book he was reading is still on the floor. I pick it up and read the spine. Kurt Vonnegut’sSlaughterhouse-Five, one of my favorites. “Huh,” I say, eyebrows raising.
But then I get another whiff. It’s my ghost, all right, and this bookreekslike him.
I suck it in, reveling in it for a moment, until it hits me.
And dread fills my spine with a cold horror as I look over my shoulder.
The library door is still open. The hall beyond is totally empty.
“It can’t fucking be,” I whisper and start sniffing like a freaking dog, snorting and snuffling over the chair, and God, yes, it’s definitely my ghost.
Definitely right where Cormac was sitting.
I feel sick.
My hands tremble as I put the book back on the shelf. I don’t know how this is happening.
It’s got to be a coincidence, but there’s only one way to be sure.
I’m going to have to get close enough to smell that psychopath again tomorrow before they leave.
