Avery sighed and turned on her heel, intending to leave the dance floor. She walked straight into a brick wall of a chest. This beautiful, fresh woodsy smell fluttered up her nose and she tilted her head back slowly, her eyes taking in the dark suit, crisp white shirt, the broad-shoulders, the strong jaw. And then that face. That scar. For a moment she could look at nothing else. It was so deep the skin around it seeming to curl into itself, slightly red compared the paleness of the rest of his face. It was a hateful disfigurement. It was hard to see past it. But as that unfamiliar heat crawled up from her lower belly Avery managed to unglue her eyes from the scar and catch his gaze. His eyes bored into her with an intensity that freaked her out. His eyes were black. Jet black. Fragments of light flickering and reflecting back at her from them. Now that she wasn’t so transfixed by the scar she could see he was older than her by the sharp, strong planes of his face. He was so pale. And that scar… she shivered.
He scared the crap out of her.
“May I have this dance?” He asked in a soft accent she couldn’t quite place – it sounded English but it wasn’t.
Her jaw dropped. Creepy scarred guy wanted to dance with her? She felt her throat closing as she glanced around. Just as she feared, people were watching. Her heart began to escalate as the old irrational terror came back. Her aunt had tried to get her to see a psychiatrist about it but that would mean someone being completely focused on her and well… wasn’t that really the whole fruit of her fear. Avery felt a panic attack come on as people grimaced at her for talking with creepy scar guy.
But then he touched her wrist.
Delicious heat, like dipping into a hot bath on a cold, rainy day, rushed up her arm and her chest opened, her heart slowed. Turning back to him his face was still taut but his eyes seemed… kind? Calm flooded over her, and despite her fear Avery found herself nodding. Why am I nodding? She asked herself distantly. He slowly reached out and placed a strong hand on her waist, drawing her close. Her breath hitched in her throat as she raised her arm, placing one hand on his shoulder and the other in his left hand. Her tiny hand got lost in his huge one and he smiled softly at her, knocking the rest of the air out of her body. She was so sure he was hideous but when he smiled… the scar seemed inconsequential.
His wicked smile widened. “Breathe,” he whispered softly, and pulled her tight against him so that her head rested against his shoulder. She shuddered as he breathed her in, positive he must feel her heart thumping against his chest. The hand at her waist slid gently up and down her spine and she shivered, wanting to burrow closer to him. The hot tingles unfurled across her body and she felt this overwhelming need to melt into him. Even as her mind told her he frightened her, repulsed her even, a fog of intoxication descended around her as they moved perfectly together. Her mouth quirked up in surprise as he repeated the lyrics to the song in her ear. In that moment all she wanted were those lips of his on hers.
No, she jerked back, shivering at the thought. She didn’t really want this creep anywhere near her right?
He tugged her back, almost as if he knew what she was thinking, his hands tightening around her angrily. “This is right,” he growled in her ear.
It was, wasn’t it? She thought, her heart picking up pace again. She was frightened again. Because now this weird stranger seemed so familiar.
An upbeat dance track merged into the last chords of the song and a gust of cold air blew across Avery’s skin. She blinked, opening her eyes, gobsmacked to find she was dancing alone, the dark scarred guy nowhere to be seen.
***
“Seriously, girl, I thought Josh was going to bust a blood vessel.” Jemima chuckled drunkenly as the cab driver headed towards Avery’s apartment. “Did you dance with that ugly guy just to piss him off?”
Avery shrugged, smiling weakly, feeling a little sick. “I don’t know.”
Sarah nudged her with her shoulder, her blue eyes concerned. “I dunno if you should have danced with him, Ave. He’s really… ugh… and I think he may have paid the DJ to play that song just so he could dance with you.”
She flinched at her friend’s unkind words. But hadn’t she been thinking the same? God, they were all so shallow. So what, she argued with herself, frowning. Scarred guy had drawn a huge amount of attention to her by dancing with her and she was furious. Every time she thought about it she shuddered in horror. He deserved the cruel words.
“Did you guys see where he went?” She asked softly, her rational mind telling her that no person alive could move that fast.
>The guys danced with them for a while, and Avery’s elbow found Josh’s stomach a couple of times when he danced too close. Just as he was beginning to destroy her buzz, the guys decided they were too hot and went off in search for a table.
Sometime later Jemima persuaded them to leave the dance floor to get another drink and find the boys. Eventually they found them upstairs at one of the low tables and sofas that overlooked the dance floor below. They already had a round of drinks waiting for them. Avery stood with Sarah a little away from Jemima and the guys, who lounged on the sofa, sipping the JD and coke this time as they swayed their hips in time with the music. As she surveyed the huge club, Avery felt a prickle of awareness and her eyes automatically sought out the cause.
Her breath caught in her throat.
It was him again.
The last couple of months at the club Avery had become aware of this guy watching her – well, her friends said he was - but every time she looked over at him his gaze was elsewhere. He was pretty hard to miss. It wasn’t just the fact that he was so tall and wide of shoulder. Or that he was always dressed in this stylish suit that looked as if he should be melting in it. It wasn’t his longish silky black hair or eyes that seemed to burrow through the crowds with power. No. It was the hideous, long scar across his stark face. It cut from just above his right eyebrow, across the bridge of his nose and deep along his left cheek in a diagonal slash. In the flashing light of the club that’s all she ever seemed to see. That ugly scar. That ugly scar that made people turn and look at him with a mixture of fear and awe. The stir he caused made Avery shrink from him in her natural disinclination to be centre of attention. While she swore she found him repellent, at the same time her eyes were weirdly drawn to him. She couldn’t stop wondering what colour his eyes were.
A heavy arm thumped down across her shoulder making her spill her drink.
“Hey, pretty lady,” an unfamiliar voice slurred in her ear and she drew back from the breath that stank of alcohol and looked into the face of a very drunk guy.
Irritated, Avery tried to pull away from the stranger but he clung like a burr.
“You wanna dance?” His hips gyrated at her and she heard Sarah giggle beside her. She threw her an ‘I am not amused’ look.
“No thank you.” She tried to get out from under his arm again but her dark hair got caught in his grubby hand. “Will you let go,” she snapped. Why was it drunken guys thought it was OK to manhandle strange women in public?
“Hey, baby, chillax, I just wanna dance.”
She grimaced. “Chillax? Really?” She tried to shrug him off again and only ended up spilling her drink.
“She said get off her, man!” Josh was suddenly in the guy’s face, pushing him aggressively away from Avery so she lost her balance and would have fallen if Sarah hadn’t been beside her.