waiting this long, he kissed me, and it was only as pleasant as Silas’s kiss? What if the dynamic between us was all in my head? The tingling I felt in my soul just a fantasy?
“You think too much. Next time, just kiss him,” Jada said before slipping into an uneasy slumber.
I couldn’t sleep at all. I lay looking at the ceiling, wondering. Wondering what had happened when we’d left the billiard room, and Dawson had been left with the schmuck claiming Jada as his. Wondering what Dawson’s connection to it was. Wondering why Dax’s and Jada’s families were at odds. Feeling like I’d been thrust into a fairy tale halfway through the story. The part where the villain was winning.
My brain was on overdrive, tossing through scenarios almost as if they were formulas. Math and science melding together. I needed tea. Something to relax me enough to push aside the white chalkboard drawings in my head.
I dragged myself out of bed, slipped from the room, and found my way to the immaculate and very expensive kitchen. I’d been at the penthouse once before. It felt like a lifetime ago, but I’d spent a couple of nights there as a teenager. Back then, Obaasan had been in residence with her Michelin-starred chef and a much bigger staff. Jada had brought me here to escape Dawson, and now here we were with her forcing us together.
As I looked around the expensive, professional kitchen, opening any of the cabinets to find tea suddenly felt like an invasion into the chef’s personal domain. Instead, I resorted to looking in one of the two huge refrigerators for a glass of milk. I’d barely tugged it open when the door was slammed shut from behind me.
“What the hell are you doing?” a deep voice demanded.
I gasped, twisting to stare up into Dawson’s face. Dark. Upset. Angry.
“Jesus,” I replied. “Getting a drink. Don’t act like I’m stealing the Crown Jewels or anything.” I leaned my back against the cool metal. A chill went through me, tightening my nipples, and making me suddenly aware of how little I had on.
“You’re running around the house…in…God.” He looked down, saw my taut breasts, groaned, and looked away. His hands went to either side of me, caging me much as he had two nights ago in his room. The same overwhelming feeling of longing welled through me.
Just like that night, he was bare-chested. It made me think of the gun he’d had then, and when I glanced down, I saw the dark metal shoved in the waistband of his sweats, but it was the other bulge thrusting against the material that caught my eye and held it.
I swallowed hard.
By the time my look made it back up to his face, it had darkened even more. Anger and lust. God, it really was lust. Dawson Langley was lusting after me. That thought was enough to end with me in a powdery pile. A byproduct of a burn that had gone too long. A leftover residual of long chains of chemicals that fueled desire and attraction.
I wanted to demand he tell me why he felt the need to carry a gun. I wanted to demand he tell me why he hadn’t defended Jada. I wanted to demand he reassure me he wasn’t messed up with drugs like Silas had insisted, because today’s events had left me wondering if he’d been right. But over and above all of that, I simply wanted to demand he kiss me.
“Go to bed, Violet,” he said. It was a plea again. Tortured but still commanding.
“I’m not sixteen, Dawson. I don’t need anyone telling me it’s bedtime.” I lifted my chin, glaring at him.
“I swear to God, you make me want to―” He stopped himself.
“Make you want to what? Just finish it.”
His eyes strolled down my face to my lips, and another groan escaped him.
“Strangle you,” he said. But we both knew it wasn’t what he’d been about to say.
“Coward,” I taunted. It had to be him. He had to kiss me first. If I kissed him, I’d only end up feeling like the teenage girl I’d once been, tagging after him, begging for attention.
His hand slid from the refrigerator door to my face, where his calloused finger ran along my skin. Palms rough from the work he did on the boats. The raised skin of the scar that traveled from his knuckle down onto his palm from when he’d saved me from a sinking car was equally