Page 103 of It Happened on a Sunday
For the second time in as many minutes, my stomach drops, only this time it’s as much from anticipation as it is from fear.
I force myself to look at the well-worn boots, the denim-clad legs, the form-fitting white T-shirt. But I pause there, because if I look any higher, I already know the eyes waiting to meet mine are going to be warm, melted chocolate.
Sly.
Sly is in my dressing room…and he looks as devastating as I am devastated.
All the defenses I’ve been stacking like bricks around my heart all day? Gone. Crumbled by a single look.
Even before he says in that dark, gravelly voice that never fails to send shivers of the very best kind down my spine, “Don’t you think we need to talk about this?”
I’m not sure if it’s his words or the look in his eyes, but my brain short-circuits. Just flat-out ceases to function. For a woman who’s spent almost a decade getting by on her wits alone, it feels like a betrayal.
And that’s before he starts walking toward me. Slowly. Deliberately. Like gravity itself—pulling me toward disaster one relentless step at a time.
“I didn’t think you’d come,” I whisper.
“Eighteen hours ago, you asked me to hold you until you fell asleep.” The words flow like warm syrup from lips I ache to taste. “Did you really think I’d walk away at the first little bump?”
“They were coming after you. They were using me to hurt you. I saw—” My voice breaks as that horrible press conference comesback to me.
“So you thought you’d take yourself out of the equation?” He takes up where I left off. He’s closer now. So close that I can feel the heat rolling off him in waves while the warm, safe scent of him wraps around me like a blanket. “Let them come. Do you really think a bunch of reporters I don’t even know matter more to me than you?”
“You don’t know what it’s like.”
“I don’t,” he agrees, his eyes finding mine. “I know I haven’t suffered the way you have—”
“That’s the point!” I insist as my heart takes up residence somewhere around the vicinity of my throat. “I don’t want you to suffer. I don’t want you to end up like me.”
“Strong? Brilliant? Powerful?” he fires back, though he still doesn’t touch me. “Gorgeous? Melodic? Kind—”
“That’s not fair.” I clench my fingers into fists to keep from reaching for him. “You know what I mean.”
“I do. But I already told you I’m not going to leave you alone in this, Sloane. Unless you want me to, that is.” He leans forward until his lips—his perfect, soft lips—are only inches from mine. “Do you want me to leave, corazón?”
My head spins. My breath catches in my throat. My heart beats out of control. And all I want is to touch him. And for him to touch me, even though it terrifies me.
“You shouldn’t be here.” I force the words out when what I really want is to ask him to stay.
“That’s not the same as not wanting me here.” As if he can hear the need burning inside me, he lifts a hand to my face, his warm, calloused palm cupping my cheek while his fingers slowly brush against the careful disarray of my hair. “Tell me you don’t want me, Sloane. Look me in the eye and tell me you want me to go, and I’ll never bother you again.”
My eyes dart around the room, searching for something to grabonto, something to concentrate on, besides the long, lean heat of the passionate man standing in front of me.
I want him so badly it hurts, and all I’d have to do to put myself out of my misery is lean forward just a little bit and press my body against his.
But I don’t. I can’t. Not when any move on my part will set us both off and ruin all the time I’ve spent today trying to distance myself from him. From us. From the mess we’ve made.
Not for my sake but for Sly’s.
“I don’t—” My eyelids flutter shut as my voice breaks on the lie.
“Uh-uh,” he tells me gently as my shaky words hang in the air between us. “You have to look me in the eye when you say it.”
“I don’t want—” I manage to gasp out one more word this time. But my hands are on his chest, trying to push him away, even as my fingers twist in the soft cotton of his shirt to bring him closer.
I can’t look at him when I say it, can’t lie to his face.
His hands tangle in the ends of my hair and pull in a way that’s more coax than command until my eyes flutter open. And then he’s there, right there, his deep brown eyes gazing into mine while the corner of his mouth tilts up in a half grin that I can feel in my core. “Third time’s the charm,” he whispers.
