Chapter 10
Adalyn
Shit.
Dammit.
I was such an idiot.
I sat in Ian’s bed for well over a half an hour, internally cursing at myself for drinking the night before. I remembered most of it, but there were enough fuzzy parts for me to know that I could have been missing vital pieces of information. I went back and forth over whether or not I even wanted to fill in the gaps.
After internally berating myself, I turned my thoughts to Ian. He really was remarkable last night. No matter how many times I tried to keep reminding myself that he was no different than all the other assholes I’d met, he kept finding ways to prove me wrong. Fighting the urge to open up to this man was becoming a constant battle of wills. I’d known him less than 24 hours, and in that little amount of time I had managed to be the biggest bitch to him. Even bitchier than I even thought I was capable of. With anyone else, I would actually be proud of myself for that, but after last night all I felt was guilt.
The guilt didn’t last long though, quickly being replaced with confusion. Why was he doing this? Why weren’t my normal tactics pushing him away? He was dangerously perceptive and was figuring me out much more quickly than I was comfortable with. I wanted to choose when people got to know me, I didn’t want to be tricked or manipulated into a relationship. Not that he would want any kind of relationship with me. But if he wasn’t interested in me, why would he keep pushing me?
Games. It’s always a game.
Either way, he was a close friend of Stacy’s and whether or not his motives were genuine, he still took care of me last night and like it or not, I owed him for that. Hopefully he didn’t expect more than a simple ‘thank you’ as a means of showing my gratitude, otherwise he would be in for a huge let down.
Deciding it was time to face the music, I got up to find Ian. And hopefully some aspirin and a gallon of water. First things first, though. Bathroom. After relieving myself I chanced a look in the mirror and almost screamed in horror. I didn’t just have panda eyes, I had black makeup running literally all down my face. My hair looked like the only thing that could salvage it was a weed whacker. I wasn’t super self conscious about my appearance, but this was just unacceptable.
Considering that Ian had been trying to force me to be ‘comfortable’ around him, I decided to do just that. Get comfortable. I helped myself to a shower, used his toothbrush and hairbrush and stole some clothes. I even used his deodorant. I smelled exactly like him. Between the shampoo, deodorant and his clothes, I was literally engulfed with Ian’s scent.
Yep. I was just going to ignore those butterflies that I got from that thought.
After taking my time getting cleaned up I finally navigated my way to living room, but I immediately stopped, frozen in place. I couldn’t believe what was in front of my eyes. Was I in Ian’s apartment? I mean, I remembered him saying that’s where he was taking me, and I could see him laying on the couch, but this surely couldn’t be where he lived. I saw his office, and this had to be the exact opposite.
It was a large, open room with high ceilings, and I could see the kitchen and dining area off to the left. The massive size was not what shocked me though, it’s what was all over the walls and filling the room that caused my jaw to drop. Every wall was covered in a bright paint, none of them matching the other. The largest wall in the living room had a mural covering it in what looked to be street art. Photographs, framed posters and canvases covered large portions of the other walls. It was a hodge podge of art to the extreme, nothing matching anything else in the room.
Then spread out sporadically throughout the space were vintage video games. The ones you find in arcades, but they were all the classics. The dining room table was clearly not being used for entertainment, at least not the traditional kind. It was covered in Legos. LEGOS! To the right of it was the biggest television I had ever seen, underneath of which appeared to be some sort of shrine to video games.
It was by far the most bizarre bachelor pad I’d ever seen. I knew “boys and their toys” was a thing but this was to the extreme. Did I just step into a scene from the movie ‘Big’? If I found a giant floor piano and a trampoline in this place, then I would be convinced I’d died and was spending the rest of eternity with Tom Hanks reliving a childhood fantasy.
Then it hit me. Did he have a kid? That would complicate things exponentially. Wait. No it wouldn’t. Only if I were thinking about dating Ian would it complicate things. And I was definitely NOT thinking about dating Ian...at all.
I didn’t even realize I had made my way over to him, but before I could stop myself I was shaking Ian awake. I still hadn’t managed to close my jaw and form any type of expression other than shock and awe, but Lord help me, I was just stuck in a state of surprise.
“Where are we, Ian?”
“We’re at my apartment. I told you I was bringing you here, remember?” He groaned, his voice muffled from being pressed against a pillow.
“This is YOUR apartment? Are you shitting me right now?”
“I know what you’re thinking, and it’s why I never bring women here. It looks juvenile and I’ve never felt like having to explain myself, so if you could keep this between us I would appreciate it.”
I finally looked down at him as he was sitting up, rubbing his face with the palm of his hands. He was wearing loose sweat pants and no shirt or socks. Holy Hell in a hamster wheel, if my jaw dropped any further then it might dislocate itself. You could easily tell by looking at him in clothes that he was fit, but nothing prepared me for seeing him without a shirt. I didn’t think I’d seen that type of perfection unless it was photoshopped.
Sitting there, half naked on his couch, he wasn’t as intimidating somehow. I didn’t realize until just then exactly how he really affected me. Especially when he was in his power suit, perfectly tailored to fit his toned body. He was the epitome of success and power. Everything I loathed in a man. Yet here, he just seemed…. normal.
Suddenly, I found it damn near impossible to resist reaching out and touching him. I wanted to run my fingers through his gorgeous hair, feel it’s silkiness between my fingers. I was still in so much shock from his apartment and his glorious abs that I had even less control over myself than I did when I was drunk.
Before I could stop myself, I pushed my fingers through his hair. It felt even better than I imagined and a moan slipped out of my mouth involuntarily. He jerked his head up from my unexpected touch and I could see clearly on his face what he was feeling. Desire. Not just desire, but pure, unadulterated lust. His tight jaw told me he was forcing himself to stay still, the muscles on his forearms twitched from fighting the urge to reach out and touch me.
I should be questioning that line of thinking. I should have been warning myself to be careful, reminding myself that it wasn’t possible for him to have those feelings towards me. That feeling anything towards him wasn’t safe. But before I could force myself back to reality, I felt his big hands pulling me down, straddling me over his lap. My hand was still in his hair, the other placed firmly on his shoulder. One of his hands was placed firmly on my hip while his other hand found it’s way around the back of my neck.
I wanted to resist. I should have resisted. I knew what would happen if I didn’t stop both us. Pain. Not right then, right then would be glorious. But later, when he grew bored with me or realized that I couldn’t satisfy him like he wanted, that’s when the pain would come. As the harsh truth of those thoughts started to send signals to the rest of my body, warning me to stop, he broke my train of thought by crashing his lips to mine.
I froze at first, tightening every muscle in my body, but his mouth was gentle and warm. Involuntarily, my body relaxed and my lips had a mind of their own. His tongue started gently massaging my lower lip, coaxing, begging for an invitation. The throbbing between my legs won the battle over my logic, and with the proverbial snap of a finger, all inhibitions were lost.