Chapter 2
SEAN
For some reason, I didn’t really register that it was her. I mean, of course it was her. Who else in our crappy apartment block has all that long, coppery hair? But I was so mad at her for invading my one private place, I just didn’t think of it.
Then I spun her around by the arm and I was staring into those same green eyes that had looked up at me in the elevator.
Lush. That was the best way to describe them.
Like deep green moss by a waterfall. And lush was a good word to describe her body, too.
Lush and... bountiful. Natural, somehow, not like one of those Photoshopped blondes who wandered into our neighborhood looking for adventure.
She looked like she’d been born in a different time. She looked like—
This is going to sound stupid. But when I was a kid, back in Ireland, my mom and dad used to take me to these stately homes: big country houses that the rich people used to charge us to mooch around on a Sunday afternoon.
In the gardens, there always used to be these statues of women: pale stone, almost white, with green ivy growing up them.
Sometimes the women were nude and sometimes they had a sheet or a toga or something wrapped around them, but they were always busty and they had softly curving hips and asses.
Sexy as hell...yet, somehow, they always looked innocent.
That’s how Louise looked: like some goddess of nature, a statue come to life. Gorgeous but innocent, completely unaware of the effect she had on me. I wanted her, even more than I had done in the elevator.
Which meant I had to scare her off.
Fortunately, I’m very good at scaring people.
I tightened my grip on her arm. God, her skin was so soft. And so pale, almost white next to my own big, tanned fingers. And she was just a little thing, the top of her head only just brushing my chin. She still hadn’t spoken. “Well?” I demanded.
“Sorry!” she squeaked. “I won’t tell anyone!
” She said sorry a lot. The sort of person who’d get stuck holding the door while other people went through, too shy to step forward herself.
The setting sun was lighting up her copper hair in glorious reds and yellow, turning it to fire.
She was beautiful—why the fuck was she shy?
“What are you doing up here?” I grunted.
She pointed across the roof. “My plants. I grow stuff up here.”
Now it made sense. I knew someone must be growing those plants, but I’d presumed it was some old lady—gardening’s a retirement thing, in my mind. That’s why I’d hidden the weed where you had to climb up to get to it. “Which ones are yours?” I asked.
She blinked at me. “All of them.”
All those? There was a small forest of greenery there, plants I didn’t even know the names of.
If it was all hers, that meant we were probably the only two people who came up here—good news for me.
My weed was safe, as long as she didn’t blab.
It wasn’t the law I was worried about—I only had three plants and that’s legal, these days.
It was the fact they’d get stolen, if anyone knew about them.
I realized I was still holding her arm. I let it go and she slowly dropped it to her side, crossing it protectively over her chest. God, she was terrified—terrified of me. My stomach lurched at the thought.
Wasn’t that what you wanted? To scare her away?
Yes. Damn right I did. But my eyes were drawn to her lips—so full, so soft, and the lines of her cheek and neck were so delicate.
She really was like some statue carved hundreds of years before—classically beautiful.
And from what I knew of her, she’d kept herself clean of all the crime around here. She really was innocent.
I wavered for a second. But she wasn’t like one of the women I took home from a bar. She was so much better than that. I wasn’t going to taint her, however much I wanted to. I could control myself.
Then a warm breeze blew across us and suddenly the scent of her was in my nose—flowers and warm spices and nature, a smell totally unfamiliar in the middle of the city.
She was staring up at me with those huge green eyes and breathing just a little too fast with fear, those full breasts lifting and straining at the tight fabric of her t-shirt.
I felt a sudden, overwhelming urge to just slide my hand across her cheek and kiss the fuck out of her, tell her it was all okay, that she didn’t have to be scared of me.
I wanted that to be true. And then I wanted to peel those tight jeans off of her, get my knee between those milky thighs and plunge my fingers into her, jerk her t-shirt up to her neck and go to work on those breasts with my lips—
“Just stay away,” I grated. “Stay away from my stuff.” And I jerked my head for her to leave.
Her throat worked as she swallowed. She nodded silently and hurried away—I watched her ass sway with every step, a perfect heart shape that made my palms ache with the need to get hold of it. I dug my nails into my palms.
Then she was climbing down the ladder, breasts bobbing and swaying, and running across the roof to the door that leads to the stairs. She put her hand on the handle and I knew that this was it—once she’d gone, I’d probably never see her again.
And then she did the one thing she shouldn’t have done.
She turned around.