Just for a Little While

The songs bled together, and even from my perch on the stool, I could see the sheen to her skin, desperate to taste it.

Maybe it was because we were out of the house. Maybe it was because we were just tired of pretending. Maybe it was that the ten feet between us made it feel safe, but all pretenses fell away, and we let the desire we both held back flood the room.

“Would you like another, sir?” the bartender asked.

Would I? Yeah. I could sit there all night watching her. But then Xander stepped into view, coming up behind her, and I swear, the music scratched. She faltered for a moment but met my eyes again and started dancing. Almost like a challenge. A challenge I couldn’t answer in the middle of a public bar.

A challenge, I shouldn’t ever answer.

“No, thank you.”

I dropped a ten into the tip jar and walked past Arabella to the back. I tried not to look at her, tried not to issue my own challenge as I passed, but failed. Our eyes locked, and the half a second froze time, and a million wants and needs tore between us.

I rounded two corners before I found a semi-private corner to catch my breath. I should have gone into the bathroom rather than walking past. I should have walked out the front door and not looked back, but I wasn’t ready for it to end just yet.

“I thought you left,” her soft voice brought my eyes up.

“Just taking a piss.”

She stood three feet away, and I tried to use crassness to hold her back. A useless effort since she closed the distance with slow, measured steps. The world shrunk to a bubble around us, the thump of the music beyond nothing but an echo matching my heartbeat.

“Why are you here, Willem?”

Less than a foot away, and I did my best to swallow it down and choke out part of the truth. “I just wanted to check on you and have a drink out. Been a while since I’ve been down here.” Her trademark smirk called bullshit. “Have you been drinking?”

“No. Just having some fun with friends.” While I stood leaning against the wall, hoping it would hold me in place and stop me from taking her like I craved, she prowled closer, chin high, sexual strength pouring off every inch of her as she cornered me. “Want to dance?”

“Arabella,” I warned.

“Come on.” Her hands slid to my hips before moving up my chest. “Just for a little while.”

Her fingers scraped across my shoulders and down my arms as she swayed side to side. My hands remained pressed to the wall, my willpower the only glue keeping me steady.

When she turned and pressed her ass against my groin, the first fracture formed in my weak resolve. She dropped low and straightened her legs first before rolling her back up.

In this darkened hallway, she danced for me like she hadn’t danced for anyone else. My own private performance. She stood and looked over her shoulder, that perfect lip that taunted me even before she arrived, buried under her straight teeth.

Crack.

Any strength I had to hold back, broke.

She thought she was stronger than me. That she would be the one to control the situation.

She had no idea what I was capable of, but I was damn well ready to show her.

I gripped her hips and switched our positions, slamming her against the wall.

She winced when her back hit the wall, but I couldn’t step back. “Did I hurt you?” I asked, looking her over, down her body, growing harder to find her nipples pressing against the thin material of her top.

“No,” she answered, leaning up to my ear to whisper, “I liked it.”

“Fuck.” My hands fisted against the wall, caging her in, maybe some small semblance holding me back.

Some pinch of sanity telling me not to fuck a nineteen-year-old in the back hallway of a bar. Her hands rubbed up and down my chest, over my shoulders and around my neck, pulling me in for what we’d done almost every day, but making it so very different.

Her hug was anything but comfort and everything like a tortured sexual tease. Her soft tongue flicked my ear before whispering, “Just for a little while.”

Without pushing her back because I didn’t want to part from her, I growled, “We’re leaving.”

“What?” she almost shrieked, jerking back, hurt marring every part of her face.

She didn’t understand.

But she would.

My inactive hands snapped into action, one gripping her hip hard and the other framing her jaw, not giving her a chance to look away. “We’re. Leaving. Now follow me and get in the car. We’re going home.”

“But—”

I pressed my hard cock against her stomach, grinding on her, leaving no room to miss what I wanted. “Now.”

With that last order, I walked away, praying she followed.