MARISSA
It’s eleven past ten when my phone buzzed with a text. Swallowing down my third Hershey Kiss, I lazily grabbed it and gave it a cursory look just when Spike and Buffy get down and dirty fighting again. The name attached to the text had me sitting up and forgetting everything about the insane sexual tension between Buffy and Spike to focus on my stupid phone and the text.
It’s from Wyatt.
My heart sped up when I pressed to open the text, and it soared when the words registered in my head.
I know it’s late, but care to come by my place? - Wyatt
Biting my lower lip, I hesitated to answer right away but decided against my better judgment to get to the bottom of things. I was tired of playing games with that man, and I was sick of torturing myself.
Is this a booty call? Did you play shifumi and it fell on me? - Marissa
Not funny. - Wyatt
What am I supposed to think? - Marissa
After today? Fuck, I don’t know. Maybe that I want to see you, talk to you and then fuck you senseless. What do you think? - Wyatt
I pressed my thighs together and let my fingers hover over the screen, unsure of how to answer even if I knew what I wanted to say and do. The voice of reason was nowhere to be heard.
I don’t know what to think whenever you’re concerned. - Marissa
Welcome to my fucked up world, sweet thing. - Wyatt
I’ll be there in twenty minutes. - Marissa
It was useless to fight now anyway. I shot myself in the foot the day I met Wyatt Burton.
***
MARISSA
Wyatt’s door opened, and his frown and dark eyes would have given me pause if butterflies weren’t at war in my stomach and if my whole body didn’t burn with the promise of more of what had happened earlier.
I was stuck on a rollercoaster, and somehow it didn’t bother me if it meant that he tried not to hurt me again. I had to give him the benefit of the doubt and see where it would go. I wanted to see where it would go and I trusted him now that he reached out to see me again instead of blowing me off. Call me stupid for trying again.
“Are you going to stay there all night?’’ he gruffly asked when I didn’t move to step inside his apartment.
I shook my head and walked in, making sure to keep my eyes in his until my back was to him and I went to stand next to the couch in the living room. I’d like to say that I was starting to get to know him, but the truth was Wyatt Burton was mostly a mystery, complex and challenging to follow. He kept a lot away, and his eyes rarely let on what I should expect next. That only intensified my curiosity and the apprehension that never seemed to leave me since I’ve met him.
“I didn’t think you’d want to see me again,’’ I said once he closed the door and walked over, his swagger so distracting my heart fluttered, and my eyes fell from his face to fix his muscles. They flexed at his every move and were impossible to miss through the same t-shirt and jeans he had been wearing before he left my place earlier.
“I told you I didn’t want to hurt you again.’’ His voice took a harsher tone, dropping so low it raised the hair on my arms.
Then, slowly, almost as if testing me, he took a few steps closer until we stood toe to toe. My eyes were on his collarbone peeking through the stretched out collar of his t-shirt. His fingers traced my jaw, barely touching my skin. My whole face tingled and went up in flames. He put pressure under my chin to tilt my head up. Like a puppet, I followed his cue and let his dark eyes swallow me whole.
“You left so suddenly,’’ I said, voice shaking. I brought my hands to his forearms, but I didn’t push him away. I wanted that contact, that closeness that filled me up to bursting with the kind of energy that galvanized and thrilled so much that everything seemed possible and nothing appeared bleak.
“I had to meet with my boss.’’ He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. His fingers held my face tighter for a brief moment before he pressed his forehead against mine. “And I needed a few hours to myself.’’
“And now?’’
“Now I’m ready if you are, Marissa. I’m fucked up, you know it, but I’m willing to do my best to protect you if it means that I get to have you. You consume my every thought, and I can’t stop what’s happening. To hell with the rest.’’
“Don’t mess with me again, Wyatt.’’
“I won’t,’’ he said immediately, pulling away, cupping my cheeks softly. He was shaking. It was barely noticeable if I hadn't been so fixed on him and everything that made him at that very moment, but he was shaking. “I can’t explain what’s going on, but I want you, and it has nothing to do with my mom. It’s all about you and what you do in here.’’ He grabbed one of my hands and put it against his left pec, right above his fast beating heart. “It had never beat quite like this before you entered my life, Marissa.’’
I balled his shirt in my hand as emotions swelled inside of me. One took precedence for the first time since Wyatt entered my life and burrowed his way in my head.
Hope.
“You and I, but nobody else.’’
“You and I, but nobody else,’’ he said, echoing me with his deep voice, so damn smooth it caressed me from head to toes, coaxing my body into reacting to him more. “Let’s see where this is going.’’
I nodded and dragged my hand from his pec up to his neck and behind his head. My fingers delved through his thick hair. “Kiss me now.’’
And he did and so much more.
We’ll see where it goes, and in the meantime, I better remember that it’s not a promise for a future, only a promise for now and exclusivity. That was a lot more than I bargained for when I opened my door earlier that day.