Chapter 11 Dominic #2
She says the last bit with practiced indifference, trying to make it seem like she doesn’t care, but I see it for what it is: the source of her shadows, the reason for the restless flame that called to me before.
And it sends anger slicing through me on her behalf.
The idea that anyone could treat her that way makes me want to rip the world apart with my bare hands.
My body tenses. Not just at the thought, but at the realization, I would do that for her.
“Your mom said that?”
“Among other things, but please don’t feel bad for me. I should have given up trying to please her a long time ago. Now, are you going to dance with me, or should I find someone else to help me check off the last two items on my list for tonight?”
I lift an unamused brow at her, and she blushes as I stand with her in my arms. “Don’t tease me, Sloane.”
Both of her legs wrap around my waist, nestling the heat of her right along my abs.
We stare at each other for a beat, and then our lips crash together in a fierce entanglement that’s all lips, tongues, and teeth and punctuated by a feral groan that takes my brain a full second to realize belongs to me.
Sloane giggles against my lips, and the sound of her laughter being swallowed by my mouth is so intimate, so exquisite that my heart starts trying to beat itself right out of my chest.
“More, Dom.” Sloane moans into my mouth. “I need more.”
“I know, baby. I know.”
I want more too. I want to peel this dress off of her body with my teeth.
I want to kiss every inch of her bare skin and mark her with my scent.
I want to taste her and tease her while she moans my name and leaves welts on my back, because it all just feels so fucking good.
But I can’t give her more. Not while we’re standing on the back porch of a frat house where anyone can see us.
And not while she’s drunk.
The image of Sloane tossing back drinks is like a bucket of ice water being poured down my back, sobering me up even though I haven’t had a drop of alcohol tonight.
I pull back and look at her. She looks even more beautiful now with her lips swollen from my kisses and her eyes half hooded with lust for me, but I can’t keep going.
I shouldn’t have taken it this far when I knew she was drinking.
Although it pains me, I reach around and loosen the death grip her legs have on my waist. Sloane drops them to the ground, complying even though the furrow in her brows tells me she’s a little confused.
“What are you doing?”
“Stopping this before we jump straight to list item number four.”
“Oh, right.” She pulls her dress down and casts an alarmed, but almost regretful, look at the erection tenting my pants. “We should head back inside.”
“Yes, we should.”
The moment the words pass my lips, Sloane starts walking without looking back to see if I’m following.
She marches onto the dance floor, claims a spot, and starts to move.
Her hands are in her curls, lifting them off of her neck, and the additional flash of skin has me damn near running to get to her.
As soon as I’m behind her, she leans back into me, grabbing my hands and placing them on her waist while she sets a rhythm I’m all too happy to follow.
I don’t know how long we stay like that, but I love every minute of it.
Every roll of her ass into an erection I don’t even try to control because she’s so fucking happy to have it pressing into her.
Every whiskey-laced kiss she gives me when she comes back from the kitchen with another drink in her hand.
Every sultry smirk she throws over her shoulder as we work together to check off the third item on her list.
“You okay, Dom?”
She gives another swivel of her hips. The movement makes her scent waft up to me and tickle my nose. I don’t answer. I’m too caught up in the graceful curve of her neck and the curly black strands that graze her shoulders, demanding that I touch her there.
I obey, my fingers gliding over soft, creamy skin the color of honey. Sloane shivers at the touch and throws yet another lazy smirk over her shoulder. My heart does a flip in my chest as I realize why I couldn’t walk away even when I thought I wanted to: She fucking owns me.
The knot of emotions in my chest digs in deeper, making themselves at home right behind my rib cage.
I can’t even begin to name them all, but I know they’re there and I know what they mean.
Know it the same way I know whatever my parents had wasn’t love.
I mean, the abuse and the cheating made that clear, but I also never saw them look at each other the way I know I look at Sloane.
Gripping her waist and pulling her back into a roll of my hips, I ignore the doubts running through my mind. The ones that tell me falling in love with a girl at the first college party I’ve attended is not only dumb but a terrible cliché.
It can’t be love.
The voice in my head shouts at me, searching for something, anything to explain away the thing happening to me. But no matter how hard I think about it, how long I wait, the tangle doesn’t go away.
I glance around the room. Bodies writhe all around us.
Moving together to the beat of the music blasting through the speakers.
Every one of them can blame the shameless bumping and grinding they’re doing on the liquid sloshing around in their red Solo cups, but I’m not drunk.
I never get drunk, so it has to be something else.
Something real.
Something more than alcohol-laced lust masquerading as love. And I know I’ll only find out if I get us out of here.
I brush her curls to the side, liking the way she shivers when my fingertips skim her shoulder, and lean forward to whisper in her ear.
“Do you want to get out of here, angel?”
She spins in my arms and nods. Her pupils are blown, hazel giving way to pools of molten gold that burn into me. “Yes, please.”
***
To my surprise, and relief, the absence of other people only seems to intensify our connection. Sloane grabs my hand, pulling me down the street and back toward the path Chris and I took a few hours ago when we walked over, which means she must stay on campus.
We take our time walking back, a slow stroll that gives me time to pull her into my side, feel the warmth of her body melting into me, and notice how much the moonlight loves to caress her skin.
Dancing over the elegant features of her face, illuminating the curls cascading down her back.
Making her look even more like a celestial being that came down on a cloud from heaven just to capture my heart.
If that celestial being was drunk and stumbling over nothing the entire way back to her dorm.
When Sloane nearly falls for the third time in a row, I ignore her protests and pick her up, cradling her in my arms while she gives me directions back to her building, which is on the nicer side of campus near the cafeteria and student life center.
Everything around us is quiet without the gold heels she’s wearing click-clacking on the sidewalk, but I don’t care because she’s looking up at me with those soft eyes I know will bring me to my knees one day.
“What?” I ask softly, trying to hide how affected I am by the swirl of emotions I see on her beautiful face.
She shakes her head. “Nothing. You’re just a little too nice for a guy who screams trouble.”
“And you’re an exceptionally shitty planner for a girl who came out just to find it.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You came to a party for the sole purpose of drinking and hooking up. And you were probably already drunk when you walked across campus with your friends wearing”—I nod vaguely at the dress hugging her curves—“this.”
“Don’t be dramatic. I wasn’t drunk, and we didn’t walk.” Her chin lifts defiantly. “My roommate drove us. She’s the designated driver for the night.”
Knowing she wasn’t walking around the dark campus in this dress makes it a little better, but she still came to the party, drank like a fish, and lost track of the only people she knew there, one of whom was her ride home.
“This the same roommate who ditched you after she found the guy she was looking for?”
She rolls her eyes. “Yes, but I also left her to come find you.”
“And what if we hadn’t met? How were you planning on getting home?”
I can’t even stomach the possibility of any other guy being the one to walk her home tonight. Someone who wouldn’t care she was drunk and would have taken her mile-long legs, golden skin, and full lips as an open invitation regardless of what she said.
Sloane taps on the thin strap of the cross-body bag she’s been carrying all night that’s now sitting in her lap. It’s a small rectangle that’s barely big enough to hold a tube of lip gloss, but she manages to pull a phone out of it.
“See this? It’s called a cell phone. You can use them to get in touch with people who aren’t in the same place as you. Ever heard of one?” Her nose wrinkles as she waves the phone around in my face, letting me see that the device she hinged her entire rescue plan on is dead.
“Do you happen to have a charger in that Ziploc bag you call a purse?”
She frowns. “No. Why?”
“Your phone is dead.”
“No, it’s not.”
I balance her weight on one arm just so I can pluck the phone out of her hand and flip it around to let her see the screen is black. She curses and snatches it out of my hand, which makes me laugh.
“It’s okay, angel. You must have forgotten to charge it when you were downing wine coolers.”
Sloane slaps me on my arm. “Shut up! They weren’t wine coolers.”
There’s no heat in her eyes when the blow lands, only playful annoyance and a slight glassiness that reminds me of her current condition. A happy silence stretches between us as we approach the door to her building. I stop outside the doors to set Sloane on her feet.