Chance Encounter(37)

She was soft and warm and smelled incredible, and his body reacted immediately, violently.

“It’s perfect,” she whispered, oblivious to his reaction. Still grinning, she pulled away. But when she caught him staring at her, probably with the hottest look of undisguised, unadulterated hunger she’d ever seen, her smile faded. Self-consciously, she tugged at her vest. “This must be where Brian and his secret girlfriend get together.”

“You’re reaching now.”

“No, look. It rained two days ago, yet this scarf—Brian’s scarf—is perfectly dry and clean, which means it had to be brought here recently, right? As in maybe even the day of the fire. That girl, whoever M.M. is, can provide an alibi for Brian.”

“Maybe.”

“Probably,” she repeated stubbornly.

“It’s not a bad make-out spot,” he said, looking around at the thick trees, at the lush growth underfoot, all of which had been spared certain death by the firefighters. It was private, and he could imagine pressing Ally back against the tree, could imagine stripping her slowly, then burying himself between her soft thighs.

“It’s definitely a spot for lovers.” There was no mistaking her soft voice, her dreamy little sigh.

Which served as a vivid reminder that his prim little Ally wasn’t so prim after all.

“Not that I condone them coming here,” she said quickly. “They’re far too young. But there’s something magical, something—”

She broke off and shot him a quick glance before turning away, but it was enough to see the spark of heat, the slight blush to her cheeks. “Never mind.” She slipped off her vest and kneeled on the ground, stuffing it in her backpack. Her hair fell over her face, and she was half turned from him, but there was no mistaking her emotions, which were all over her face.

Confusion.

A hunger to rival his.

And hurt.

It was the last that killed him. “Ally—”

“We’d better get back, it’s a long walk.”

“Brian’s in school, or he’d better be,” he heard himself saying. “We can ask him about the scarf later.” He carefully removed it from the tree.

Still hunkered down by her backpack, she looked up warily. “Why would you want to stay here when you can hardly even look at me? You certainly can’t talk to me. Or be friends with me the way you are with every single other person on your staff. In fact, if you’re not yelling at me, you’re—”

“I’m…?”

“Kissing me,” she whispered. “You need to stop that. It just…messes with my head.”

He found himself squatting beside her, reaching out to touch her arm. “It messes with mine, too.”

“Then stop.”

“I can’t seem to do that.” His fingers skimmed up her forearm past her elbow, passing lightly over her upper arm. She didn’t so much as blink. What was she thinking? For once, he didn’t have a clue. His fingers dallied at her shoulder, and she shuddered.

“When you touched me before,” he said softly, in apology. “When you hugged me—”

“I shouldn’t have,” she interrupted. “It was silly, I was just happy, that’s all. Forget it.”

He wanted to see her smile again. He didn’t understand it, or the need to be the one responsible for that smile. But then again, he’d never understood half the emotions she caused in him.

So he stopped thinking and acted, slowly standing, drawing her up as well. Their bodies were close, and he entwined one hand with hers. With his other hand, he gently slid the scarf over her cheek, her jaw.

Ally closed her eyes. She couldn’t help herself. When he stroked her again, she made a sound that surely told him exactly what he was doing to her. “Don’t worry,” she managed. “Lucy will be back really soon.”

“Yes.”

“And I’m leaving.”

“Yes.”

She opened her eyes and lifted her gaze to his, and there was something so hot, so intense in the way he looked at her. Like he wanted to consume her, inhale her, devour her. But they weren’t intimate. They weren’t even friends. “You’ll be glad when I go.”

“Yeah,” he agreed, in complete contradiction to the regret in his eyes. He touched her again.

Again she closed her eyes, needing to protect herself from that look, from the wonder and the heat and the affection, because it wasn’t real, it couldn’t be real.

He couldn’t really feel those things for her. “You want to stay away from me, remember?”

“I can’t,” he said softly. The cool scarf slid over her neck now. His thighs brushed hers. His chest slid close too, in a touch so light she wasn’t sure it was real. But her nipples hardened and her heart sped up. She gripped his fingers tight. “Chance…”

“When you touch me,” he said, his voice as silky as the scarf, “I get instantly hard. Did you know that?”

“N-no—”

He rocked his hips to hers.

“Um…yes.” He was most definitely hard.

He rocked again.

Very hard.

She felt the scarf through her thin, V-necked T-shirt as he slid it down further, over her collar bone. His eyes followed the movement with dark intensity as he skimmed it over a breast and the very turgid tip. Unable to contain her small gasp, she reached behind her and grasped the tree so that she didn’t collapse. “Chance—”