Chapter Twenty-Eight
THE CLUBHOUSE THUMPED with music, bass rolling through the floorboards, and for once, the night belonged to me.
Lucy grabbed my wrist before I could even decide what to do with that freedom. “Come on,” she said, dragging me toward the dance floor. Zeynep followed, laughing in soft bursts, and Fiona watched us with an amused shake of her head before stepping in too.
The room pulsed with noise, boots stomping, laughter. Alive. The air smelled like whiskey, heat, and the kind of promise that letting yourself enjoy the moment could make.
I moved without thinking, letting the music loosen each tight place in me. Lucy spun wild, Zeynep swayed shy but smiling, Fiona rolled her eyes but still matched the beat. And me? I laughed—high and real—and the sound felt strange in my own throat, like something I was learning I could do.
Then a shiver crawled up my spine.
Not cold. Aware.
I lifted my gaze and found him.
Chain sat across the room, half in shadow, bottle in hand but forgotten. He wasn’t smiling. Wasn’t talking. His stare was fixed on me alone—unwavering, dark, intent in a way that felt like a touch.
The air thinned. The music faded at the edges.
Heat slid over my skin like his eyes were mapping every place he wanted to put his hands.
I turned away, but the pull was instant, electric.
My body knew he was still watching. Knew the exact direction of him.
Knew the way his attention tightened the space between us.
Lucy nudged me. “You keep moving like that, he’s gonna burn holes through the wall.”
I didn’t answer. Couldn’t. Not when the heat between us was already tightening like a wire.
I let my hips catch the beat, slow and deliberate. My fingers brushed down my sides. My chin lifted. Every movement felt like a silent dare aimed straight at the man who hadn’t blinked since he noticed me.
Chain leaned back in his chair, jaw working once, then went still—too still.
My pulse kicked.
I should’ve looked away. Instead, I met his stare head-on.
The air snapped.
Something in his expression darkened—not anger, not hunger, something deeper, something claiming. Something that made my breath come shorter and my skin feel too tight.
That was when a shadow slid beside me.
“Didn’t know you could dance like that,” a voice said.
Reed. One of the younger guys who floated around the club. Friendly enough. Lean, tattooed, a little too eager. He smelled like beer and cologne, and he smiled like he was used to women smiling back.
But I wasn’t looking at him.
My eyes stayed on Chain.
Reed didn’t notice the silent pull across the room. “Can I get you a drink?” he asked, leaning closer to be heard.
“No, thank you,” I said softly.
“You sure?” He grinned. “Wouldn’t mind keepin’ you company.”
Lucy’s eyes went wide. Fiona muttered, “Oh damn.”
Because Chain had moved.
Not fast. Not aggressive. Just… decisive.
He set the bottle down without looking away from me. The crowd parted instinctively, like his presence rearranged the room.
Reed finally glanced toward him. “That your man or somethin’?”
“No,” I breathed.
But my body reacted like he was. Heat climbed my throat. My pulse stuttered. My stomach tightened in a way that felt nothing like fear.
Reed smirked, misreading everything. “Good to know.”
He reached for my hand—
Chain appeared beside us before Reed’s fingers brushed mine.
“Lark,” he said, his voice quiet but edged. “You good?”
I swallowed. “Yeah. I’m fine.”
Chain nodded once, slow, but his eyes cut to Reed with a heat that wasn’t polite. Reed stepped back immediately, hands lifted. “All right, Chain, all right. Didn’t know she was—”
Chain didn’t let him finish. “She’s not yours to know.”
Reed didn’t argue. He disappeared into the crowd.
And just like that, the air tightened again—worse, better—because now it was only us. No interruptions. No distractions. Just the simmering, dangerous charge we’d been building long before Reed wandered over.
Chain stepped in close, but not touching. His restraint made the space between us burn. “Enjoyin’ yourself?” he asked, his eyes filled with heat.
“Maybe.”
His gaze dropped to my mouth before lifting again. “You got a dangerous kind of maybe.”
“Guess I’m figuring things out.”
His smile tilted—slow, crooked, devastating. “Keep movin’ like that, little bird, and you’ll tempt the wrong man.”
“Who says it’s the wrong one?”
For a breath, maybe two, everything around us fell away. No music. No bodies. Just heat coiling tight in the inch of space he hadn’t closed.
Then Lucy crashed into my side, laughing and sloshing her drink, and the moment shattered. Chain’s jaw clenched. His eyes dragged over me once more, slow, lingering, like he was memorizing something he had no business touching.
The music shifted—slower, heavier—rolling through the room like a warm current. The kind of beat meant for hips, not feet. The kind that changed the shape of the air itself.
Chain didn’t walk away.
He stayed right there in front of me, close enough that I could feel the heat of his body even without him touching me. Close enough that the bass vibrated through him before it reached me. His gaze dipped to my mouth, then lower… then back up, controlled but burning.
“Dance with your friends,” he murmured, “or keep temptin’ me. Your call.”
My pulse scattered.
I didn’t step into him. But I didn’t step away either.
Instead, I let the music guide me again—slow this time, deliberate—my body finding the rhythm with an awareness I hadn’t allowed myself to feel before. Lucy and Zeynep spun off into their own little storm, Fiona laughing as she grabbed Bolt’s hands and dragged him into the mess.
But Chain stayed right here.
Watching me with a heat that tightened everything inside me.
I lifted my arms, running my fingers through my hair, letting the movement pull down the line of my throat. His eyes tracked it—hungry, restrained, like he was memorizing the shape of every breath I took.
The space between us grew thick. Heavy. Electric.
“Lark…” he warned softly, but his voice wasn’t reprimand. It was rough want wrapped in control.
I tilted my head, letting my body sway closer, not touching, just brushing the edge of his heat. “Something wrong?”
His jaw ticked. “Nothin’ wrong, little bird. Just debatin’ whether you know what you’re doin’.”
“Maybe I’m learning.”
“And maybe,” he said, stepping a fraction closer, so small it could’ve been the crowd shifting, “you’re playin’ with fire.”
“Maybe I like it.”
His breath hitched. Barely audible, but there.
The music shifted again, dipping lower, a sultry rhythm that invited slow circles and lingering movements. I let my hips follow it. Let my shoulders roll with it. Let my eyes stay locked on his the entire time, because something in me wanted him to see this.
Wanted him to see me choosing the heat. Not running from it.
Not anymore.
His hand twitched at his side. Not reaching for me, restraining himself from reaching.
“Lark…” My name was almost a groan, almost a prayer, almost a curse.
I stepped closer—just an inch—just enough that the heat of his chest brushed my arm like a spark waiting to catch.
His breath shuddered out. “You’re gonna kill me.”
I smiled, small and real. “You don’t look dead.”
“You don’t look scared.”
“I’m not.”
Something in his eyes changed then—lowered, softened, darkened.
A slow, charged shift that went straight through me.
He reached up, lifting one hand a few inches like he wanted to cradle my cheek…
but he didn’t touch. His fingers hovered near my jaw, close enough that my skin went hot under the promise of it.
“Tell me to stop,” he murmured.
I didn’t move. Didn’t blink. “Why would I do that?”
His control snapped just a little, just enough to make him step closer, bodies aligned by a breath, the faintest brush of heat-to-heat. Not touching. Not quite.
But we both felt it.
He exhaled like he’d been holding his breath for an hour. “You’re trouble tonight.”
“Maybe I’m learning how.”
He let out a low laugh, low and rough, like it scraped something loose inside him. “Hell. You keep lookin’ at me like that and I’m gonna forget every damn line I swore I wouldn’t cross.”
“Maybe,” I whispered, leaning in just enough that my lips brushed the sound of his voice, “I want you to forget.”
His eyes closed for one tight beat, like the control cost him something.
Then the music swelled again, the bodies around us shifting, the dance floor becoming its own living thing. But it didn’t matter. Not when he opened his eyes and looked at me like I was the only thing worth seeing.
He didn’t leave. He didn’t step back.
He stayed right there, inches from touching me, every muscle in him drawn tight with the effort not to.
And God help me, I’d never felt more alive.