My voice is shockingly steady, my grip tightening on the cue.
Parker inhales a hard breath, licking his lips as his gaze skims my face. “I don’t. I just wanted an excuse to touch you.”
I feel my insides pitch with arousal, and my eyelids flutter closed. “Oh.”
“Take the shot,” he mutters softly, his tone subdued, so only I can hear him.
Nodding towards the three ball, Parker pretends to position me, his groin pressing into my hip as his fingers coil around my wrists and his breath beats against the shell of my ear.
I pull the stick back…
And scratch hard.
Damn it.
“You missed,” Parker says.
“Can I help you, man?”
Shane’s aggravated baritone rumbles over to us, and I rise up from the table, noting how Parker takes his time backing away, his hand lazily gliding down my spine. It feels like he doesn’t want to let me go. I come to my senses and pull myself together. “Shane, this is P—”
“We’ve met,” Shane bites back.
Oh, right.
The smoldering.
Sensing how incredibly awkward this is, Leah attempts to come to my rescue with an overdramatic hair flip and an invitation to accompany her to the bar, but Shane stands there with stoic firmness, his wrists crossed and draped over the chalky end of the pool cue.
I glance back at Parker, who is aiming his own death glare at Shane.
This is not going to end well.
Shane cuts in again, his words pointed at Parker. “Is there any good reason why you decided to put your hands all over my girl?”
Parker doesn’t reply. He just stands there, glowering.
I take the lead, spinning around and planting my palms against Parker’s chest as if to prevent him from doing something regrettable, even though he seems to be content with the silent intimidation act. Maybe I just want an excuse to touch him, too. “Let’s go talk?”
It takes a moment for his eyes to flick back to me, but when they do, they flare with heat, and a fever stirs within me. He nods slowly. “Yeah… okay.”
I turn back to my group, throwing a knowing look at Leah, a promise of future explanation at my brother, and an apology at Shane. Clearing my throat and pacing forward, I murmur, “Be right back.”
—TWENTY-THREE—
I’m not a violent person.
And that’s mainly because I’ve never given a shit about anything enough to have an emotional reaction that strong. But when that motherfucker put his hands on her, wrapped her up in his arms in some kind of macho, possessive move—like she belonged to him…
I saw red.
Jealousy crawled through my veins like a new kind of poison. Something sinister and unfamiliar. All I wanted to do was knock his teeth out, drag her the fuck out of that place, then scrub her clean of that asshole.
Every muscle in my body aches. Every cord in my neck strains. Every heartbeat feels like a ticking time bomb as I follow Melody out of the bar and into the damp humidity, almost ramming into her when she comes to an abrupt stop and whirls around to face me.
Her chest heaves with quick, hard breaths. “What are you doing here?”
I’m not answering that. She fucking knows what I’m doing here.
Instead, my hands clasp her hips, backing her up until she’s pressed against the distressed brick building. A little whimper escapes her when her shoulder blades hit the wall, and the sound thunders through me. “He called you his girl.”
“Does that bother you?”
My eyes dip to her lips as my fingers curl around her waist. Pink and parted, demanding to be kissed. Tensing my jaw, I admit, “Yeah, it does.”
“Why?” she probes gently.
Fuck. She wants to talk about my feelings, while all I want to do is claw them out of me. I drop my forehead to hers, closing my eyes through a ragged exhale. “Because… I remember every noise you made that night, every breath you took, the way your body trembled and swayed, molding into mine like it was designed that way,” I confess, the words spilling out of me like a pathetic purge. “I remember every goddamn inch of you, Melody, and you sure as hell didn’t feel like his girl.”
You felt like mine.
I don’t say that last part because I’m not prepared to deal with the implication of it, nor the inevitable fallout.
Melody’s eyes drift closed as she swallows my words down, her fingers gliding up the front of my abdomen, and then my chest. When I tug her arms away, her lids pop open, a glare surfacing. “I can’t touch you. I can’t kiss you…” A huff of disappointment hits the summer air, and she slithers from my hold. “This is pointless.”
I watch her saunter away, but she doesn’t head back inside the bar—she traipses down the back alleyway, her heels clicking with each deliberate step. I call after her, following. “Where are you going?”
“Away from you.”
“In a sketch-ass alley to get yourself kidnapped?” My pace quickens until I catch up, moving in front of her to hinder her escape. “That Matchmaker killer was nabbing people not far from here.”
She sighs weakly. “I’ll be fine.”
“Where are you even going?”
Trying to wind around me, she lets out another defeated sigh when I block her. “I’m going to my car. I had to park on the street. Can I please leave?”
“That dickwad didn’t even pick you up? Jesus… I’ve never even been in a relationship, and I have enough sense to know that much.”
“You…” Melody pauses, confusion settling into her features. “You’ve never been in a relationship? Ever?”
“No. I told you, I—”
“Don’t like women,” she finishes, glancing away. “That’s kind of a huge red flag, Parker.”
I take in the way a light blush shades her cheeks, and I wonder if I put it there. My feet move in closer. “There’s a lot you don’t know about me… a lot you don’t want to know.”
She nibbles her lip, raising her eyes to me. “You can tell me.”
Goddammit.
She’s looking for a way in. She’s throwing me all these chances, all these bones, all these golden fucking opportunities to spill my guts to her, so she can understand.
But I’ve never let anyone in before.
And she’ll never understand.
So, my response is pulled from the only shred of certainty I have: I want her.
I fucking want her just as much as I wanted her that night in the rain. Savage, raw, and unrestrained. My gaze dips to her cleavage, recalling the taste. Salty skin and earthy raindrops. Her dress is red, seductive and curve-clinging, and I recognize it from the night she invited me out with her friends while I was remodeling her bathroom. I glance back up. “You’re wearing the “fuck me” dress,” I state, my voice hoarse, giving away my growing arousal. Melody’s irises flash, dancing with green and gold flecks. Tiny embers. Inching closer, I lower my chin until my lips are a hair’s breadth from her ear. “Did you wear it for him? Or did you namedrop the bar earlier in hopes I’d show up and tear this dress off of you?”
Melody’s breath hitches as she raises her chin, our eyes meeting, faces only centimeters apart. She swallows, her gaze drinking me in while she considers her response. “Him,” she finally whispers.