Chapter 17 Kolton #2
If I thought flames danced in her eyes before, I was dead wrong. Before was nothing but embers. Now, I was pretty sure we’d need that fire department after all. It was like that scowl that ripped across her face was an out-of-control brush fire, and I swore there was smoke coming out of her ears.
“You asshole!” She pushed off my chest, rising to her feet before she spun away from me, only to turn and look back.
I raised my hands, sure I needed to fend off her wrath.
“I am so tired of you men treating me like this! I have done everything in my power to take care of you and get us the hell out of here, and you wake up from your damn nap and think you can still talk to me like that?”
“Hey, hey!” I tried rising to my knees but decided against it when I collapsed into the wall beside me. Instead, after dropping back to the floor, head resting against the cool metal of the elevator wall, I told her, “It’s not meant to be bad.”
“Right. Save your lies for someone who gives a damn.” She crossed her arms over her chest, and I squeezed my eyes closed, because damn, the way she looked when she did that always had my body reacting in the most inappropriate of ways.
“Not lying,” I moaned, pressing my palm to my temple to try to stop the room from spinning. “Do you even know what the word means?”
“Of course, I do. I’m not an idiot.”
“You don’t.” I sucked in a breath, desperate for her calming scent. Then, over a tongue dryer than the desert, I forced out, “Look it up.”
“Fine.” She pulled up her phone, tapping at the screen as she muttered under her breath. “You want me to prove you’re an asshole, I will.”
Settling against the corner, I turned my attention back to her scowling face while she waited for her search to load on the screen.
“‘Diva’,” she finally said, reading from her phone. “‘A famous female opera singer. A famous female singer of popular music. A self-important person who is temperamental and difficult to please.’”
Even with her scowl, with her full wrath directed at me, she was still the most beautiful woman in the world. I held out my hand, gesturing for her phone. She rolled her eyes, then stomped toward me, showing some of that temperament she tried to deny she had.
Snagging the phone with one hand, I grabbed her hand with my other and held onto her as she tried to pull away.
I looked at her screen, reading over the words she’d just read to me, then scrolled lower, lower, before peeking up at her.
She put her free hand on her hip, raised an eyebrow, and pursed her lips.
“‘The word diva is derived from the Italian for a goddess,’” I told her, barely looking at the words I’d memorized long before we ever met. “‘In the early 19th century, many leading sopranos became so famous and celebrated that they almost became goddess-like in the eyes of their adoring public.’”
A slight smile tugged at one side of my mouth as her attitude started draining away.
“You’re a diva, Sloane,” I said, tugging her hand and pulling her closer.
“You’re a goddess, and I’m your adoring fan.
I’ve been in awe of you since I first heard your voice.
You’re confident, beautiful inside and out.
You care about others, and you know how to get shit done.
I admire you so much, and I have never, ever thought of you as anything but the very best.”
Bottom lip trembling, Sloane lowered herself to her knees by my side. Her eyes zipped back and forth like she was trying to make sense of what I said.
I’d say it again if I had to. I’d say it a million times if it meant she could see herself the way I did.
Sloane raised her gaze to find mine, and her grip tightened on my hand. “Do you really mean that?”
“I would never lie to you, Diva. I… like you too much.”
She lifted her free hand to my face, sliding her fingers along my jaw once again, and I sucked in a breath of her divine scent.
My heart thudded in my chest, and saliva pooled in my parched mouth as she leaned closer.
Closer, until she hovered over me, and I could feel her breath on my face, could almost taste her glossy lips.
“I like you, too.” Her whisper touched my ears as her lips caressed my own. And I thought I’d died and gone to heaven when Sloane Rivera, my idol and the woman who’d starred in my dreams, kissed me like maybe, just maybe, those four words were true.
I kissed her back, tentative at first, because this had to be a fucking dream. But when she gripped the back of my head and pulled me into her, when she deepened the kiss like she was trying to steal my breath from my lungs, I couldn’t hold back any longer.
One tug was all it took, and Sloane was climbing into my lap. One touch was all I needed to feel that fire that burned so bright within her eating at my skin. I was in love with her taste, obsessed with her touch, and I was sure I’d die if I woke up and found this wasn’t real.
She let out a quiet moan as I cupped her ass and pulled her closer. She tightened her grip around me as she moved her body against mine. And every indecent thought I’d ever had about her rose to the forefront of my mind as she dragged herself across my aching dick and shivered in my arms.
“Kolton.” It was a gasp. A plea. My name falling from her lips like the prayer I was sending up to the heavens to make this all real. I wanted her more than I’d wanted anything in my life.
I gripped her ass, pulling her into me, and she gasped again, breaking free from our kiss. Her mouth fell open, but she didn’t get to speak the words hanging on the tip of her tongue.
Because the lights flashed on, and the elevator jolted.
And we were moving once again.