Attraction

“Come on,” he said, holding one of his dangerous hands out to me.

I accepted it, and he led us down into the water, his eyes holding mine. It lapped at my ankle, then calf, then we were submerged to our waists just three feet from the edge.

“How deep is this?”

“Uh, that’s an entrance to the cave where the waterfall is.” He indicated with his head to the far side. “It’s relatively deep over there, maybe fifteen or twenty feet. But on this side,” he pointed to my right, “it’s flat and about three or four feet.”

“Have you gone into the cave?”

He nodded, his eyes traveling over me. It was a slow perusal of my body that did things, unexpected things, like made me tremble, my stomach flip, and my nipples harden. The longer he stared the hotter and more intense his gaze grew. It felt like he was on the precipice of something, saying something.

I didn’t want him jumping off any verbal cliffs, so I interrupted him, pulling my hand from his, before he could speak. “What’s the plan, Stan? What’s the deal, Neil? Is there a schedule for the rest of this week? Anything I should be aware of? I remind you again and in all seriousness that I have two papers to write and a vector calculus test to study for. Also, again, you and I do have that lab assignment we need to prep. I have you trapped here, therefore I expect you to help with the literature search. Also, I have two books I’ve been dying to read.”

Martin wasn’t smiling, but his eyes were warm and interested. “Do you always talk like that?”

“Like what? Like awesome?”

“Yeah, like awesome.” His tone was serious, verging on earnest.

I felt pleased by the compliment despite the fact I’d self-deprecatingly complimented myself and he’d merely agreed. Because I did want to be his friend so it was important to be honest. “Actually, no. Truthfully, you make me nervous so I’m a little more jumpy and vociferous than usual.”

“Vociferous. You have an excellent vocabulary.” He pushed himself backward a few feet and began treading water near the center of the cove. His eyes seemed to glow, reflecting the sea-green of the saltwater.

“Ah, yes. That I do. I’m a big fan of synonyms.”

He exhaled a soft laugh, peering at me like I was weird and wonderful. It made my smile widen.

“So, plan for this week? What can I expect?” I took small steps near the edge, not wanting to venture too close to Martin and his glowing eyes and dangerous hands.

“Well, team practice, like this morning. The waves are minimal on this side of the island because we’re basically set in the middle of a large inlet. The Gulf is like a big lake. We’ll be practicing and training in the mornings, so you’ll get your quiet time.” His voice was downright conversational. It was nice.

“Good.” I tucked my hair behind my ears, this news settled my nerves somewhat. If he was training in the mornings then I could use the time to prepare my friend attacks.

“But in the afternoons and evenings…,” he paused, licked his lips, his eyes flickering over me, “I want us to be together.”

This news halted my progress around the rim of the cove. Paired with the predatory glint in his eyes and the slight undercurrent of a mandate in his words, my insides felt like a jumble of knots…made out of magma. That’s right, magma knots. Perhaps if I hadn’t skipped breakfast my stomach wouldn’t have been so tumultuous.

“To have tacos?” Despite my best efforts, this question emerged somewhat high-pitched and breathless.

“Yes, tacos. And there will be parties and other things.”

Parties.

Parties?

What?

I frowned. I’m pretty sure I scowled. This reaction was instinctual. I hated parties. Hate.

“Parties?” I may have curled my lip in a miniature sneer.

“Yeah, on the island, at some of the other houses, friends of mine. You know, the usual college scene stuff.”

Usual college scene…just a bunch of billionaires’ kids and their friends. It sounded delightful.

“Yeah, no thanks.” I pulled my eyes from his, inspected the rocks. “I don’t go to parties. It’s one of my life rules.”

“Life rules?”

“Yes. Good ideas to live by.”

“You just made that up. Not going to parties isn’t one of your life rules.”

He was right, I had just made up not going to parties as a life rule, but he didn’t need to know that. Therefore I ignored his last comment and tried to act blasé. “I don’t want to go, but don’t let that stop you from going.”

“Parker.”

I sighed, then met his gaze.

“I want you to come.”

“No, thank you.”

He ground his teeth. “Kaitlyn, you promised you were going to give this a try.”

“I will…”

Once again he was giving me the severe stare down, likely because my weakly delivered I will didn’t even sound convincing to me.

Managing to swallow around the sudden thickness in my throat, I squared my shoulders so I was facing him.

“Here’s the thing, Sandeke. I am. I am going to give this a try. Despite my worries—”

“What worries?” He sounded exasperated.

I ignored his question. “Despite my worries and reservations, I’m going to give this the good college try. But I don’t even know how to dance. I can tango like a pro, but I don’t do the body wiggle weird thing. And isn’t that what the kids do these days at parties? Dance?”

He lifted an eyebrow at my excuse—obviously unimpressed—and with two fluid strokes moved to join me.

I stiffened, my eyes wide, and backed up a step at his advance. “What…what are you doing?”

“I’m going to teach you how to dance,” he said simply, already on me, reaching for my body.

I stiffened further, feeling unaccountably breathless as his big hands slipped around my waist and settled on my hips and lower back.

“But there…but we…but—”

“Shhh,” he said, pulling me closer. “Relax.”

“Create cold fusion,” I murmured in response, unable to relax and placing my hands nowhere, because placing them anywhere on Martin felt perilous to my wellbeing.

He glanced down at me, his eyebrows in a perplexed V. “What does cold fusion have to do with anything?”

“You tell me to relax, which is impossible. I tell you to create cold fusion, which is impossible.”

His answering smile was crooked. “You can’t relax?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“You know why not.”

“Well, it might help if you touched me.”

“That will not help.”

“It might.”

“It won’t.”

“Touch me.”

I scowled at his chest, my hands still in the air at my sides. Stupid perfect chest.

“Parker, if we’re going to dance you have to touch me.” He sounded amused and his fingers flexed on my bare skin. I felt the roughened calluses of his palms just before he released my body to grab my hands. He brought them to his shoulders, pressed them there, then returned his own to my hips. I didn’t miss the fact that his hand placement was now a bit more daring than it had been a moment ago, lower, closer to my bottom.

I swallowed thickly, glaring at my fingers where they touched his perfectly sculpted shoulder.

“Don’t you want to touch me?” he asked, his inflection daring, teasing, but also something else. Something hesitant and uncertain.

I lifted my eyes to his; they were guarded, his smile looked bracing, almost like a grimace, like he was preparing himself for bad news.

I sighed. I knew I sounded resigned and a little pitiful. “Yes…”

His gaze thawed as it dropped to my lips. “Then you should…because I want you to.”

“I don’t know how,” I blurted.

“I’ll teach you.” His voice was low, soft, and held a promise.

“I’m not good at this.”

“We haven’t even started.”

“I don’t mean the dancing, I mean the touching. I’m pretty sure I’ll be good at the wiggle dancing once I apply myself, as I have excellent rhythm.” Heat was beginning to build in the space between us where we didn’t touch; my stomach and his, his chest and mine. I had the sudden sensation we were magnetized, and I had to make my body rigid to keep from plastering myself against him.

“Why do you think you’ll be good at dancing? You’re very stiff, you need to loosen up.” He swayed his hips and mine to the left, then the right, then back, his movements measured and slow. I moved with him, trying to loosen up without succumbing to the magnetism.

“Because I used to ballroom dance and I play three instruments. Did you know that? And also the drums…so I guess four instruments.”

His eyes, which were still on my lips, flickered to mine and his eyebrows ticked upward with surprise. “Really? What else do you play?” He sounded interested.

“Guitar mostly. But also the piano and saxophone and the aforementioned drums.”

He smiled. I swear he’d been smiling so much it felt unnatural. Before now, I thought I’d seen him smile three times in the last six months and all three of those times the smile had been mean and hard because he’d been about to unleash a world of hurt on someone.