I woke the next morning to the incessant ringing of my phone. Fumbling my way through the air, I managed to press the answer button somehow and croaked a greeting to the caller.
“I’m engaged!”
Molly’s shrieking voice snapped me out of my half-asleep state as I struggled to comprehend what she just said.
“Ky? You there?”
I sat up, running a hand over my eyes. “Yeah. Sorry. What?”
“I’m engaged! Like, engaged, Ky!”
I smiled at her excitement while trying to absorb her news. “Wow. Congratulations!”
To say I was a little shocked was an understatement. Molly was your typical free spirit—tall, slim, drop dead gorgeous, and not interested in relationships. She’d been dating this guy, Chris, for nearly six months, which was a record for her. I had been more than surprised when she’d agreed to go on holiday with him.
“When can you come over? We have so much to catch up on!”
I sighed as I threw back the bed covers. “Give me an hour.”
A squeal of joy pierced my eardrums before the line went dead.
***
I arrived at Molly’s an hour later, more awake and ready for her barrels of joy. The car door hadn’t even opened before she came running out of the house, waving her new bling in my face.
I held her hand and stared at the huge diamond ring sitting on her finger. “Wow. That’s huge.”
She nodded, her long blonde hair waving with her enthusiasm. “I know.”
“So how did he do it?”
A broad smile swept across her face as she relived her special moment. “It was so perfect. We were in this gorgeous restaurant right on the sea front. Candles, stars in the sky, he got down on one knee and everything.”
I smiled. “I’m so pleased for you.”
She grabbed my arm, dragging me out of the car before enveloping me in a bone crushing hug. “You know what this means?”
I stepped back, stretching out my shoulders. I raised an eyebrow, daring to ask, “What?”
She clasped her hands together and jumped up and down on the spot. “Shopping!”
I plastered a fake smile on my face and suppressed a groan. It wasn’t that I was unhappy for her, it just didn’t seem right. Before her holiday, she’d been detailing the hot personal trainer in her gym to me. Now, it was like he never existed. Still, she deserved someone decent and Chris was a good guy.
As I followed her in the house, my phone rang—Paul. I burst into my own smile as I realised this news would kill her. When he started at the company a few weeks ago, she used any trick in the book to be upstairs in my office, poised on the end of my desk when he emerged from his office. He never even batted an eyelash at her, which only served to fuel her more.
I ran back outside, answering the call. “Well, hello there.”
“Good morning. I’m delighted you decided to answer.”
I giggled. “It was accidental. I meant to press reject.”
A soft, honey laden laugh trickled down the line, sending shivers up and down my spine. “Well, I’m guessing that answers my question, then. May as well hang up now.”
“Didn’t anyone ever teach you that if you don’t ask, you don’t get?”
“As a matter of fact, Miss Wilson, I happen to live by that rule. Are you free tonight?”
I bit my lip, stifling the need to jump for joy. “Perhaps…”
“No use playing hard to get after your seduction attempts this week.”
“Touché. I suppose since it’s you, I’m free tonight.”
He chuckled. “Want to catch a movie?”
My mind started whirring with ideas as I held in my giggles. “Sounds perfect.”
We hung up after confirming times, which then left me to deal with Molly. I walked inside her house, ignoring her prying glances, and sat on the sofa with a cheeky grin.
“Who was that?” she asked
I grinned. “My hot date.”
“What hot date? Who? When did this happen? Details!”
“He took me out for dinner last night. Nothing happened.”
She sat on the opposite sofa, her eyebrows wiggling with impatience. “So who is it?”
I bit my lip to stem my growing smile. “Paul.”
She frowned. “Paul?”
“Mr. Connors to you.”
She gasped, her hands flying to her open mouth. “No way! You’re freaking kidding me?”
“Nope.”
She jumped over to me, her green eyes filling with glee. “I want details.”
“There are none. Yet.”
***
Paul picked me up at six p.m., as punctual as ever. When I opened the door, I couldn’t help my eyes roving over his fine form. Dark denim jeans hugging all the right areas combined with his bright white t-shirt clinging to his broad shoulders, I made sure I closed my mouth to prevent any drool escaping.
He smiled as he looked over my own casual look. “You really do look good in anything, don’t you?”
I licked my lips and skipped outside. “You haven’t seen me in my birthday suit yet.”
He chuckled. “All in good time, Miss Wilson.”
We arrived at the cinema early, which meant we had pick of the seats. Smirking to myself, I headed straight to the back corner. Paul’s raised eyebrows with his own quirky smile told me he knew what I was doing. All afternoon I’d been thinking of devilish ways to seduce him in the darkness.
As the lights dimmed, coating us in shadows, his hand fell over my arm, tracing tiny, hair-raising patterns over my skin. My heart reacted to his touch in an instant, thumping away against my rib cage as goosebumps appeared all over my body. I enjoyed it for a few minutes before I let my hand relax into his lap, resting just above his knee. I began drawing my own teasing shapes on his leg, inching my way towards that area as the film went on. I bit down on my tongue to hide my giggles, making sure I didn’t move my eyes towards him at all.
He shifted in his seat then whispered in my ear, “I know what you’re doing.”
I dared to meet his sapphire eyes, almost gasping at the fire sparking in them. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He leaned in closer, his breath sending shivers down my spine. “You know damn well what I’m talking about.”
I batted my eyelashes several times and shrugged my shoulders. His eyes closed for a brief second as I happened to brush a little closer than before. When he opened them again, the intensity of the blaze burning through them took my breath away.
“Kyra…”
I smiled, widening my eyes in my best innocent look. I couldn’t let him know how affected I was by this too. “Yes?”
I continued to walk my fingers around his lap but said nothing more as he turned his attention back to the screen. Every so often, he would let out a slow, deep breath before fidgeting in his seat.
When the film finished, he grabbed my hand and marched us out to the car in fervid silence. I dared to steal a sideways glance at him. A muscle in his cheek twitched and his piercing blue eyes were consumed with desire. His focus was straight ahead on the car. Everything about him screamed a darkened sense of being. His ash blonde hair was now the only light to the charged atmosphere between us.
Closing in the last few feet towards the car, he swung me around and pressed me up against the cool metal with his solid body. My breath caught in my throat from the sudden movement. Before I could stop my world from spinning, he grabbed my face and planted his lips on mine, sending me into a whole new whirling reality. His tongue searched out mine, taking control of every essence of me with his assertive kiss. I could do little but melt into him as he continued his assault on my senses.
After a couple of minutes, he broke our heated moment, his breathing short and ragged. The intensity of the ardour simmering in his eyes seared right through my soul.
“That was the least I could restrain myself to,” he said. “Think yourself lucky.”
I held his fiery eye contact and inched my way back towards his lips. Keeping him locked in the moment, one of my hands grabbed his crotch, making him jump from the sudden contact.
“That was the least I could restrain myself to, so think yourself lucky.”
He settled a hardened stare on me, a promise of unrestrained pleasures coursing my way. “Oh, Miss Wilson…”
I shrugged my shoulders and let go. I turned round and opened the car door, purposefully pushing myself backwards into him before getting in. He strode round to the driver’s side, his jaw set in a hard line and his eyes ablaze with lust. The entire ride home was cased in silence, the atmosphere between us continuing to pressurise by the second.
I let myself out of the car and walked to my front door, well aware of his radiating heat behind me. I stepped through into the house and turned to him, biting down on my bottom lip as I asked, “Are you coming in?”
He continued to stare at me for a few seconds, a wild mix of primal need and lust tumbling through his eyes. And then he launched himself at me, hands grabbing at anything and everything whilst crushing his perfect red lips to mine.