I could feel it, the helplessness that might cause her to snap seeping from her pores. Pooling on the ground around her like the blackest puddle of mud.
Slowly kneeling in front of her, I pried her hands from her face. Blood was smeared across one cheek and down her chin. I pulled her palms toward me, searching the superficial scrapes that oozed red beneath the moonlight.
“Fuck, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you.”
It didn’t come out sounding like much of an apology, considering my teeth were clenched and my stomach was seething.
One hundred percent on edge.
Lust still blazed, and that crazy feeling of possession that left me itchy was making me feel like I was going to lose my goddamned mind.
She turned her face away, shoulders heaving as she cried almost silently. Like she was trying to rein it in, pull it back, hide it behind the strength I could see radiating from her.
Like she was ashamed to be seen that way.
Broken down.
Vulnerable.
I took her by the chin, a gentle prod for her to look at me.
And I tried to remember every reason I’d ever given myself not to get involved.
How women couldn’t be trusted.
Tried to remember the oath I’d made.
But when she looked up at me with a river of mascara running down her cheeks, I fucking forgot everything.
My mind. My sanity. My reason.
“Hey. Are you okay? Tell me where you’re hurt. Let me help you.”
What was I saying? Offering? But I didn’t know how to stop.
Wide eyes stared back at me.
Vast.
Endless.
A churning, icy sea.
“I . . .”
“It’s okay. I’m right here.”
“I need . . . I need . . .”
Confusion tumbled off her tongue before she was struck with panic again, and she jerked out of my hold, flipping around to get onto her hands and knees. She began to frantically scrounge around to collect her things, whimpers coming from her mouth as she did.
Keys and a compact and lipstick that she shakily shoved back into the small bag.
I grabbed her cell phone and a tin of mints and passed them to her.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
We shared a glance.
A pass of agony in her eyes and something that felt like compassion coming from me.
Good God. What was that?
But it was there.
I swallowed hard, my throat dry, everything so goddamned wrong. And the question was coming free without my permission. “What’s your name?”
She stilled, her body trembling while that same awareness surged between us. Thick and deep and consuming. “Grace,” she whispered.
“Grace,” I repeated, testing it on my tongue. I handed her a crinkled scrap of paper. “I’m sorry I scared you. I just needed to make sure you made it to your car okay. Couldn’t turn my back after the way you took off like that. Are you?”
She looked at me like I was crazy. Apparently, that was the case.
“Okay?” I prodded.
A self-deprecating sound scraped up her throat, and she gave a harsh shake of her head. “No, I’m not okay.”
She climbed onto her shaking feet. I followed, rising to my full height.
Had to curl my damned hands into fists to resist the urge to reach out and rub the smear of blood from her chin.
I didn’t care.
I didn’t care.
Didn’t have the capacity.
Hell, my caring only ever led to bad, bad things. The last thing she needed was some asshole like me getting into her business. Never turned out pretty.
Still, I couldn’t keep from pressing her. “You seemed . . . upset back there.”
“You could call it that,” she mumbled in something that was close to a drawl, something sweet and Southern and still modern.
Guilt. It was a bitch. Hated feeling it. But somehow it was there, the idea that maybe I’d been responsible for this. This broken girl who somehow managed to glow beneath the moonlight.
“Did I scare you? Out on the dancefloor . . . what I said?” And just because it was me, it still managed to come out sounding like a threat.
The shake of her head was slow. “No,” she quietly admitted.
“Then what happened?”
“I was just reminded why I can’t do this.”
“What, dance?” I tried to inject a little lightness into the mood when there was absolutely nothing about it that felt that way.
She laughed a short, disbelieving sound, and she looked directly at me, her voice stronger than I expected. “Pretend as if things don’t matter. You might be able to pretend as if you don’t matter. As if I don’t matter. As if the people who come into your life don’t matter, whether if it’s for a fleeting moment or for years.”
Her delicate throat trembled. “But that isn’t me. People matter. A man touching me will always mean something, and you assuming that it doesn’t is a reminder that I deserve so much more than what you’re willing to offer. I’ve lost too much, but I have even more to lose.”
Her words speared me like darts, chest going tight with more of that regret. To ask her what that meant. What she’d lost and how the fuck I could help her get it back. I struggled with what to say, to apologize, but I didn’t fucking know how to apologize for what had happened upstairs before she’d gone running.
The energy that had blazed between us.
Fire and heat and need. Even if she’d been able to ignore it, I wasn’t sure I was a strong enough man to do it. Because even with her standing there bloodied and scraped and bruised, I wanted to erase the space, push her against her car, get under that dress, and disappear.
Hadn’t had a girl make me want her this way in a long, long time. Maybe not ever. The need urgent. A thrumming command that beat through my blood.
She looked away, into the vacant distance toward the bay. A breeze rustled through the strands of her long blonde hair. It whipped around her like a disturbance that shivered across her skin. “I need to go. Coming here was a terrible idea.”
“Yeah, and why’s that? Seems to me you were exactly where you should be,” I said, pushing more. Not wanting her to leave.
Wondering how the fuck I might be able to keep her. Just for the night.
She laughed a disbelieving sound. “And that right there is the exact reason I shouldn’t have come.”
She started to hobble toward her car, one shoe on, the other foot still bare. Her dress was torn and shredded on one side and the fabric was dotted with blood from the cut on her knee.
She was a mess.
A gorgeous fucking mess.
A disaster waiting to happen.
She pressed the fob and the lights flashed.
Panic welled up like the build of a surprise storm.
Coming from out of nowhere.
Hitting land without warning.
She clicked open the door and started to climb inside.
My fingers twitched with the impulse to reach out and stop her from leaving. Or maybe it was just my dick aching to get messy. Knowing this girl was somehow as wild as I was. Desperate and willing to do whatever it took to get her where she needed to go.
I could see it written all over her.
Determination.
Strength.
Courage.
All of those things made for something I couldn’t get into, and the only thing I was doing was aching to get into it.
Let her go. Let her go, I silently screamed at myself, knowing I was begging for trouble. There was something about her that was too different—too good and fierce—that had me trembling.
She didn’t need my bullshit. The only thing I wanted was to fuck her. Use her up and toss her aside before she got the chance to do it first.
Consume before you’re consumed.
A motto that had served me well.
“How about that number, Grace?” If my conscience could have drop-kicked me, it would have. God, I was just asking for it, wasn’t I?
But I thought the girl looked like she might be worth a little pain.
She paused to look back at me from over her shoulder. If I didn’t know any better, I’d have said it was something close to amusement that infiltrated her tone. “Doesn’t seem much your style. I thought you were more of an ‘in the moment’ kind of guy?”