Fighting Fate (Granton University #1)(61)

Feeling very full inside with a positive, glowing kind of energy swirling through him, he turned to grin at Paige.

She beamed back. “So, did that totally suck or what?”

He chuckled. “Yeah. Totally.”

Spinning away, she made a sound of absolute delight. “Oh my God. I had no idea playing with a group of sick children could be so…so fulfilling. Wow.” She whirled back to him, her gorgeous, dark eyes sparkling with her elation. “I haven’t had so much fun in…I don’t know. A long time.”

“Yeah, well, you didn’t have to wear the dress,” Logan reminded her.

Rolling her eyes, she playfully nudged his arm. “Oh, whatever. You know you liked it.”

Stuck in the playful disposition from their hour of silliness, Logan primped for her, cocking out his hip and cradling the back of his head as if poofing an imaginary mound of hair. “I am totally rocking this dress, aren’t I? Pink really is my color.”

Paige threw her head back and laughed.

The sound wavered through him. Captivated, he stared at her, enthralled by every facet of her being: the wash of healthy, laughing color on her cheeks, the liquid flow of her hair as she tossed it over her shoulder, the way her lashes swept low over her dark eyes and barely rested against the tops of her creamy cheekbones.

“I was so right,” she admitted with a smug sniff and a lift of her eyebrows. “It does match your eyes brilliantly.”

And her visual beauty only mirrored what lay deep inside her.

He couldn’t say the way she’d handled the kids today surprised him in the least. The two times he’d worked with her at The Squeeze, he could tell she was good with people. But watching her in action still left him reeling and in awe.

There was just something so amazing about her.

She made him feel—

Oh.

Wow.

Realizing exactly what she made him feel struck Logan like a thunderbolt. He’d always been attracted to her and had formed that strange obsession thing for her, but this…this was worse.

He was in huge trouble.

Paige noticed his horrified stare a moment later.

She did a double take before focusing on his face, knitting her brow as her smile faltered. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

He shook his head, utterly bowled over. He’d killed her brother, been indirectly responsible for the death of her mother, turned her dad into an abusive drunk, ruined her relationship with her best friend, and had permanently altered the course of her life. She should hate him, but there she stood, looking worried.

About him.

He was in more than just huge trouble. He was totally screwed.

This wasn’t some stupid, misdirected crush anymore. It wasn’t some mild obsession. He’d fallen irrevocably flat-out in love with Trace Zukowski’s little sister.

“Logan?” She stepped toward him, lifting her hand as if she wanted to touch him, maybe feel his brow for a fever.

He shook his head, commanding himself to get a grip. “It’s nothing,” he assured her.

Deciding he no longer needed to wear the dress, he turned away and went about shrugging it off over his head. As he rolled it into a ball around his arm, he caught her watching him, skimming her gaze down his physique with the gleam of sexual interest in her expression. And just like that, heat ran over his body, prickling his skin, making all his hairs stand on end, aware of nothing but her assessing eyes.

He told himself it didn’t mean what he wanted it to mean. But, oh, how he wished. How he envisioned the whole thing.

It’d only take him two, maybe three, steps to reach her. He’d cup her face in both of his hands and tilt her chin just so to align their lips perfectly. She’d kiss him back, willingly, gently. His mouth watered, already imagining what she’d taste like, how she’d feel against him.

Soft. She’d be so soft. That gorgeous hair of hers would slip over the backs of his fingers as he cradled her face. Like silk.

He jerked his attention away and tossed the balled dress into the opened chest.

She wandered closer to him, or maybe she was heading toward the trunk. But to him, it felt like she was the fly unknowingly heading straight into his tangled web.

“I can’t believe you actually wore the dress. For some reason, I always pictured you as a snob, all conceited and full of yourself, too good for the rest of the population. Certainly too good to wear a pink dress for a group of sick children.”

He glanced at her. Nothing malicious lurked behind her statement, but it pained him anyway. Because it had been a little too true.

“Yeah. Well, you’re not too far off the mark. Back in the day, I was pretty full of myself.”

Kneeling before the trunk, he reached out to collect the clothing accessories strewn across the floor. When he realized tossing them haphazardly into the trunk wouldn’t allow everything that had been in there before to fit, he rearranged items, slotting them in in a more organized manner.

He was busy piling the shoes on one end when Paige closed in.

“Well, I think the Logan Xander you are now is a remarkable person.”

And all he’d had to do to become this way was eliminate one of the most important people in her life.

Sadness and regret cramped his stomach muscles. “Yeah,” he mumbled, keeping his attention on the shoe arrangement.

Paige leaned past him to pick up the pink dress he’d worn. And as she did, her hair fell down in front of her face, cascading before him to dangle into the depths of the chest. Those glossy black strands swayed inches from his nose. He held his breath, but a whiff of her shampoo—that alluring cinnamon and vanilla—had already fluttered up his nostrils, captured in his heightened senses.