The Dare

“Sorry about that.” He rests his phone on the table beside him. “So, what were we talking about?”

I smile through my annoyance because I am determined not to lose more time with this man. “I can’t remember now,” I declare instead. “But I think you were telling me more about yourself…”

The conversation flows much more easily than I was expecting. It’s almost as if me and Zack have always been friends rather than boss and employee, the dynamic is really easy going and I love it. Although Zack’s cell phone does continue to bleep out every so often and he always looks at it and replies. There is never any consideration of me, which over time starts to over shadow all the goodness that tonight has brought.

I know that he clearly isn’t great with women, but this is just common decency. If I don’t even deserve him to give me a little bit of his time, then perhaps the rest of it doesn’t matter. The intense sexual chemistry between us, the way that we clearly get on well when he is giving me his attention, the length of time for which I have liked him… none of that means I have to take him being rude to me.

“I’m leaving.” I scrape my chair back once I have finished my wine, which finally drags his face out of his phone screen. “Watching you texting someone else all night long isn’t my idea of fun. You have brought me a drink now and made up for the way that you treated me last night, but we are done here…”

“Wait.” Zack grabs on to my arm to try and hold me in place, but I shake him off. “Latesha.”

“No.” I shake my head hard, fighting back tears. “No, Zack, I am going now.”

As I tear off out of the bar, I am overwhelmed with the sense that I’m not good enough for Zack and that’s why he couldn’t give me his attention. Because I’m not enough. His words might have told me that I’m good enough because apparently, he’s always noticing me even when it doesn’t seem like it, but I don’t feel it now. Whatever was happening on his cell phone took precedence over me, which makes me feel like shit.

“Latesha.” Before I can fully escape, Zack is back by my side. “Wait, let me explain…”

“I don’t want your explanation now.” I shake him off. “I wanted your focus before, and I didn’t have it.”

“I’m sorry, that was rude. I keep acting badly, don’t I? I can’t ever seem to get it right…”

“Don’t use your lack of experience with women as an excuse,” I spit out. “Because this is just common decency. I deserve to be treated like I am there when I’m with you. Not second best to your cell phone.”

I try to get away again, but Zack gets hold of me and this time I find him too hard to resist. He tugs me with him in to a dark alley way so small that we are pretty much pressed up next to one another, breathing one another in. I can feel the air coming from his lungs, washing all over my skin, tickling me all over…

“What do you want?” I hiss in a whisper. “You want me to forgive you? Fine, I do. But that doesn’t mean you can continue to treat me like shit. I won’t have it, Zack. Like I said to you, I deserve more.”

The next thing that happens stuns me to the core, but somehow in the best way ever. His lips have crashed against mine and his hands are knotted up in my hair, the anger that flooded between us has dissipated and transformed in to wonderful, phenomenal passion instead. I should hate him still, all of the issues that we share haven’t gone anywhere, but instead I find myself rolling against him, my hips grinding in to him, needing him desperately. My rational thoughts have switched off completely and I’m a slave to the sensations he has careering through my system, which is only made worse has his eager fingers cup my breasts and tweak my nipples.

“Shit, Zack.” I toss my head back as Zack’s lips move off mine and move to my cheeks, my exposed throat, my collar bone. Everywhere he brushes over my skin he leaves electrical buzzing sensations behind. That’s just what his lips are doing to me, never mind his fingers which are grazing all over me, now tucking under my top to brush over the hyper sensitive skin of my torso. “Oh my God,” I groan. “What are you doing to me?”

I slide my eyes closed and block the rest of the world out, while Zack finds the waist band of my lacy French knickers and he plays with it. He must know that I need his fingers to dive inside, whether we are in public or not, but he’s taunting me, tantalizingly teasing me until I can’t handle it any longer.