Page 66 of Dove
I’d never danced this close with anyone. Never let myself. Because I’d always known exactly who I wanted to dance with—and while dancing might seem harmless, I didn’t trust myself to be that close to him. Not when I knew it would mean more to me than it would for him. So, if I couldn’t dance with Josh, I was better off dancing alone.
Which meant this moment was like a dream come true and my heart floated, light and untethered, as my feet followed his, each step a quiet echo of his own. We weren’t doing anything fancy, but I was having fun, content to let him lead.
Until his hand slid up my back to raise my arm—twirling me around and around—the dance floor becoming a blur of dancing bodies and flashing lights.
“Josh!” I yelped, coming to an abrupt stop as he spun around me in a flurry of impressive footwork.
His chest pressed to my back as he guided our arms to cross over my front, and I shivered at the rasp of his shirt against mybare skin. Every point of contact sparked, as if I was the flint of a lighter, waiting for Josh to strike me into a full flame.
“What?” His grin once he was back in front of me was boyish and so utterly handsome.
That look alone had me going along with whatever else he had up his sleeve.
His hand stayed a constant companion to mine, but it loosened its steady hold whenever he wanted to spin me. His other spanned my back to nudge me faster in tight circles or to cradle me to his chest.
I found myself smiling through laughter, as the world turned, and I twirled. When he pulled me back in, he lifted our arms over our heads and let them rest across our shoulders until we stood side by side. My steps mimicked his, and in that moment, I was the happiest I’d been in a long, long time—as if the tragedy of my past and the weight of the past few weeks melted away like an ice cube on a hot summer’s day.
Still there, but no longer such a heavy, solid weight.
“That’s it, little dove,” he encouraged in my ear as I completely surrendered, allowing myself to stop worrying about anything but Josh and the heat of him pressed against me. Fueled by the music pounding through my veins, my hands wandered Josh’s wide shoulders, and I pressed my body to his like I’d dreamt of doing for longer than I cared to admit.
It was the best kind of torture, the most addictive drug. And with it came the crushing realization: one hit of Josh would never be enough. I’d spend the rest of my life chasing the high this moment with him was giving me.
But even that couldn’t touch this moment. I stayed anchored in the now, letting the warmth of something long-lost settle in my chest: hope.
The dance floor pressed in around us, bodies tightening the space and making it hard to dance freely. But as the song nearedits end, I spun out of his arms, laughing, my hair whipping around me. For a moment, I let the music flood me—wild and free.
That is until I collided into something hard.
I blinked the dizziness away and a solid, T-shirt-clad chest came into focus. When my gaze moved up, the eyes looking back at me were all wrong, displaying a murky shade of green that reminded me of pond scum instead of the color of sunlight on tree bark.
I knew those eyes.
Torrence Weller.
Glancing over my shoulder, I scanned the dance floor for Josh, hoping he’d come to my immediate rescue, but I must have lost him in the crowd.
When I turned back, a smile stretched across his annoyingly good-looking face.
“Hi,” Torrence said, voice low and smug, like me falling into his arms had been his plan all along.
“Hi.”
I stepped back to gain some distance, but he followed, crowding himself up against me. His hand slid along my ribcage, and I hated that his touch was just as warm as Josh’s, and twice as familiar.
Traitor, I hissed at my body.
“It’s been a while, Riley.”
I contained my eyeroll and gave a curt nod. Why did every athletic guy in existence have a hard-on for using last names like they were nicknames?
Torrence and his football bros used to show up to Josh’s parties—thanks to Eddie—but he’d barely noticed me back then, a fact I’d always been thankful for. He was known for being obnoxious and vain, which came from being a good-looking rich boy.
Stillwas. I just hadn’t cared much—not when we’d been occupied doing...other things.
“You here with anyone?” He bent down to speak over the music. My nose wrinkled. His breath reeked of tequila, making it obvious he’d been drinking.
My gaze drifted over my shoulder one more time, hoping to find Josh standing there with a murderous glare, just as he always had whenever the boys from the football team had been lurking around, considering their reputation back in high school. But what I saw instead, through the parted, crowd had a sharp pain lancing through my heart.
