4. Riggs
SHE’S NOT HERE. It’s been almost two weeks since I saw Seven—nope, not Seven, Magnolia—at the party. My right hand, the one she shook, has tingled ever since. Not constantly, but enough to make me wonder what the hell is going on. I need to talk to her, whatever her name is. She wasn’t at karaoke last week, and I’ve never seen her miss twice. Come to think of it, I’ve never seen her miss at all. She has to show.
“What are you singing this week, Riggs?” Carol asks, her voice raspy from years of cigarette smoking. She still holds one in her hands every now and again, even though she doesn’t smoke anymore. Says it makes her feel better, whatever that means.
I blink. I haven’t thought about it, so I tell her, “Dealer’s choice,” then drop a twenty into her tip jar before heading to the bar for a bottle of water. No beer for me tonight. I need to keep my head one hundred percent clear, because I want answers.
I’m still trying to get my head around it. Seven, the mysterious woman I’d tried to get to know over the past year to no avail, is Magnolia Rowan, chemistry teacher. Seven, the woman whose whiskey-colored eyes I’ve wanted to fall into, whose white-blonde hair my hands have itched to touch, whose body I’ve wanted to dominate, is one of my teachers.
What the actual fuck.
It’s not great, but it’s not insurmountable. A good start would be for her to actually show up first.
A flash of white on black catches my eye, and there she is, walking toward Carol like a woman on a mission. She talks to Carol while writing her song down, puts a tip in the jar, and turns around. After seeming to war with herself, she heads my way, and when her eyes finally meet mine, there’s a challenge in them.
I tip my water bottle at her. “Seven.”
Surprise flashes across her face as she answers, “Riggs.”
Did she think I’d use her other name here? “Glad you showed up.”
She shrugs. “I didn’t really have much of a choice.” She turns to the bartender and orders a whiskey, neat, and a glass of water. Her usual.
“Why not?” I ask, genuinely curious. “Last I checked, there’s no karaoke police. Probably need some to keep our ears from being assaulted on a weekly basis, but other than that…” I grin, hoping it softens her. It usually does.
“Needed to sing,” she states, her eyes not meeting mine.
Fine. She doesn’t want to give me a solid answer on that, then whatever. I hold my palm up. “Care to explain why my hand won’t stop itching?”
She blanches, then faces me as she croaks, “What?”
I wiggle it in her face. “You heard me. Keep your little karaoke thing a secret all you want, but you shocked me—literally—when we shook hands two weeks ago, and my hand hasn’t stopped feeling weird ever since.”
“I…shit,” she mumbles.
Enough. I reach for her and tilt her chin up. The touch sends a jolt of electricity through me, and I narrow my gaze. “That’s twice. Talk to me, Seven.”
Her eyes, so expressive, flare in the dim light. “There’s nothing to discuss.”
“Bullshit.”
She swallows, clearly nervous, and it releases something in me. Now that I’ve touched her, I can’t stop. My fingers trace her jaw, then her ear. She doesn’t stop me. She does the very opposite, in fact, closing her eyes and leaning into me like a cat, practically demanding to be touched.
Don’t have to ask me twice.I thread my fingers through her wavy hair and swallow a groan at its silky texture. I tilt my head down, breathing in her clean, floral scent, and my lips are on her hair—literally on her hair; when in the world have I ever done that?—before I can stop myself.
She inhales sharply and takes a step back, her expression ruinous. “No.” Straightening, she breathes, and repeats herself, more calmly this time. “No. I…can’t. We can’t.”
Yeah, well, tell that to the craving that’s come roaring out of nowhere, the urgency to pull her to me, the base instinct to protect her and keep her close.
Fuck. I shake my head and clear my throat, trying to come back to myself. She’s right. We can’t. I know we can’t. She may be Seven, but she’s also one of my teachers. I flex my fingers, then ball them into fists to keep them to myself. “Okay. You’re right.”
Her shoulders relax.
“But my hand,” I push.
Swallowing, she reaches out, and together we watch as her delicate fingertips touch my chest, a gentle spark coursing in its wake as she traces up and down my arm. The woman is electric. Literally. I turn my palm out, everything inside of me crying out for her to thread her fingers into mine, to grant me what I so desperately need. After slowly trailing down my forearm, so slowly I feel every bit of her fingertips as they move, she does.
Thank fuck.
I use our clasped hands to close the final inch separating us and lean down again, my lips hovering above hers. It doesn’t matter that we shouldn’t do this. It doesn’t matter that outside this bar, we have entirely different worlds and responsibilities. And it doesn’t matter that the light in here is too dim to see the details of her eyes, because I know their whiskey depths are darker than usual, the caramel and oak of them swirling into longing. There’s no stopping what I say next. “Kiss me, Seven.”
After a beat of hesitation, she tips up, and her lips, soft and sweet, are on mine. A sense of absolute rightness steals over me. There’s so much more to this woman, and I need to know her. Have to know her. She’s behind a shroud of mist, amplifying just how much I don’t know. Seven’s hand tightens around mine, and I work to deepen the kiss. She doesn’t open for me. Instead, she breaks contact and stares at me once more, her eyes searching mine.
Something has shifted. Something intrinsic. I can’t explain it, but I know there’s something between us. I lean down, needing her lips again, when Carol calls Seven’s name through the haze. With one final squeeze of my hand, she withdraws.
As the song begins, it’s obvious she picked the song on purpose. “Stand Back” by Stevie Nicks. And sure, the lyrics are pretty straightforward: stand back. The message is clear. The thing is, there’s a yearning in this song, too, even a little magic, and as Seven transforms her voice into Stevie’s, dropping flawlessly into character, I see the moment she realizes that she forgot about the last part of the song. The part where she has to sing “take me home.”
I can’t take my eyes off her. I’ve never been able to, but after that kiss? That touch? Understanding that the woman on stage in black jeans and boots is only one small piece of the person I’m desperate to know?
I’m riveted.