25. Chapter 25
Ames
I'm dancing with someone I don't know, and I'm not having a lot of fun. I close my eyes and try to lose myself to the music. The rhythm is deep and sexy, and I can follow it easily, letting my body perform to it… but it's an act. I don't feel it in my bones.
It's all fake. It's hard to connect with my current dancing partner, and I move on to find someone else. I catch myself comparing him to Saint, and how natural it felt to sway with him. How much I fed off being close to him that night, dancing in his arms.
I tell the guy in front of me that I need to use the washroom. Cold water on my neck might help calm my confused feelings, and let me figure out what I truly want.
When I'm done, a new dancing partner doesn't fix things. His hands feel wrong when he tries to pull me closer, and discomfort takes a hold of my stomach.
This is not working.
I should give up and go back upstairs. Ask my friends to set me up on a few dates if that will help me break this pattern of jumping from one long-term relationship to the next, without taking a breath or figuring out what I truly want out of my happily ever after.
"I'm Brad," my dance partner whispers into my ear.
His breath has my skin crawling. He keeps talking but I can't make out what he says. I can't look him in the face either. I push away.
"Thanks for the dance," I say. "I'll go to my friends now."
He doesn't let me go. "One more dance."
I push away again. He still doesn't let me go.
"I'm going to my friends," I insist.
"Can I get your number?"
"It's not going to work."
"How do you know?"
"She knows."
I whip my face to Saint. His look is menacing on Brad, and his voice hard.
"Let her go," Saint demands.
My mouth hangs open.
"You're—" Brad frowns in surprise. "You play for the Strike—"
"Let. Her. Go." Saint steps closer to us.
I'm free.
Brad lifts his hands like saying, no harm done .
Saint keeps his eyes on the blond man in front of us, and shifts his body until he stands between Brad and I.
"All good," Brad turns and mutters something I can barely make out, but sounds like, you better win us the championship, you dick .
Saint faces me. "Everything okay?"
My heart is beating a hundred beats a minute, but it's mostly the shock of Saint's sudden appearance. Brad is already less than an afterthought.
The fact Saint looks amazing in tailored black pants and a blue-gray satin shirt, printed with large tropical flowers in shades of burgundy and pale yellow, only adds to my body's response.
I have to tear my eyes away from his chest, and the patch of skin calling for my lips in front of me.
"I— yes," I say. "Thank you."
"May I?" He offers me a hand.
I take it and he brings me close. Gently, he guides my body to move slow.
"Did you want to dance?" he asks.
I put my hands on his shoulders and smile. "I would love to."
This. This feels good.
Saint holds me, one hand on the round of my hip and the other one on my back. He gazes at me and we start swaying to the music.
We're transported to that first night when we danced together. Except he studies me like he's checking if I'm doing alright.
"Thank you," I say.
"What a piece of shit. He wasn't letting you go."
"You were watching?"
"I saw you when I arrived. Stayed. Paid attention to what was going on."
He looks like something sour landed on his tongue.
Beats and music surround us, but we don't follow their instructions. While everyone around us moves at a fast pace, Saint and I slow dance.
"I wanted to make sure they were treating you right," he adds. "Looking for a sign that you wanted what you were getting."
"It didn't go as planned."
"What did you plan?"
I hesitate.
The satin of his shirt is soft under my fingers, and I trace patterns on it with a nail. My eyes land on his chain.
I study each link as I speak. "You date a lot. You make sleeping with people look easy. Do you think I need a rebound?"
He slows down further. We're mostly immobile on the dance floor as he inspects me. The way he licks his lips, his dimples come out to play .
I lose track of them when he speaks to my ear.
"Do you want a rebound?" he asks.
I take a deep breath to soothe my haywire pulse. It's a mistake. Now my nose, my lungs, my brain is full of his cologne.
"What do you want?" His breath plays with my tender skin. "That's all that matters."
I close my eyes and breathe in his scent again. "I don't know what I want, but I'm trying to figure out what I need. I spent years investing in a relationship that fell apart for reasons I may never understand. Every relationship I've had, I've gone all in. They have all failed."
"So you're thinking you might want to try something different."
It's not a question.
"Before you ask," I say, "I have not had a single drop of alcohol since last night."
He doesn't say anything.
"You're an expert at this," I try again. "It's all you do, right? Casual relationships only. Bake and Bye, three dates in. Teach me."
"Ames…"
I pull away, only enough to see his eyes. Intensity fills his dark irises, punctuated by a rare frown.
"Teach me to seduce someone," I say. "How to have mind-blowing sex with them for a short while just for the fun of it.
I want to learn how to end it when things are not meant to last forever.
Because I was settling with Aidan and fuck me if I will ever settle again.
One day I'll go for forever again, with someone who wants it with me too.
Until then, I want to be myself and have easy, casual fun, then walk away. Like you do."
We're not dancing at all anymore. I'm in his arms, he scrutinizes me, and determination beats in my chest.
"You have no idea what you're asking me," he says .
I lift my hands up his chest, channeling the soft fabric at his neck between index and middle finger. It lets me touch his skin, just a bit, just one pad on the warmth of him. A nail grazes against his chain, and I repeat the motion a couple of times.
His fingers clench on their spot on my body.
"There's no one I trust more to show me how to do this." I lick my lips. "You won't lead me astray. You're so… warm, and incredible, and last night— you were so good to me last night, rejecting me softly for the right reasons—"
"I didn't reject you. Please. Ames—"
"You've been so good to me. So generous. Last night you were genuinely kind. Can I ask you for this, too? Please, Saint? It's the last thing I'll ever ask."
The wrinkle between his brows intensifies, and the inner corners pull up in an unhappy gesture.
"It won't take much." I make a gesture to the people dancing around us. "Help me pick. Then tell me what you would want from someone trying to seduce you. What would turn you on, if I were someone else?"
"You have no idea, do you?"
His voice is gravelly, clear to my ears despite the loud music around us.
"I have no idea what I'm doing." I shake my head. "That's why I need your help."
He watches me for a long minute.
He smirks. "Don't ask me to help you pick someone else when I'm right here."
I blink a few times. "What?"
He guides me back, his step certain, slipping past a velvet rope telling us we shouldn't go where he leads me. He doesn't let it stop us, like such rules are not meant for him.
The light on the dance floor is already low, but in the nook under the stairs it's almost nonexistent.
He pushes me against the wall. I gasp.
"Next thing," he says, "you'll tell me I can add it to the rent invoice as consulting services. "
He lets out a humorless chuckle. The barest hint of irritation weighs down his voice, in a tone I had never heard coming from him.
He rests his forearms by my side on the wall, hands under my shoulders. It brings him right next to me, and it cages me.
"Saint— I—"
"I won't help you pick. If this is what you want, then I don't trust anyone else to do it. This is what I'm good at, isn't it? What I'm good for."
"What do you mean—"
"I'll show you what I do." He presses on me. "Do you want fun sex? Mind-blowing sex? Short-term sex with no strings attached, so you can walk away when you're done with me? I'll be that for you. I'll be your rebound."
He's hard against me and, with a roll of his hips, he makes sure I know it.
I gasp. I cling to his shoulders. I'm sure my nails must be hurting him, but I can't stop it, and he doesn't complain.
"I'll be such a good boy for you, Ames, you're going to thank me at the end. I'm a ride you won't forget."
I forget how to breathe. His confidence and his promise, and the shock drumming in my chest at his suggestion— an electric current runs through my skin, and every tiny hair in my body stands at attention.
"Is this a good idea?" I finally gasp.
"I doubt it," he rasps, "but isn't that partly why you want this?"
"Do you mean it?" I fist my hands on his satin shirt. "I thought you didn't— want me—"
He lets out a pained, unbelieving laugh, and kisses me.