35. CHAPTER 32 #4
I didn’t let the voice in my head win.
When I finally looked up, his gaze was locked on me.
It wasn't the distant, stoic look he’d been giving me for weeks.
This was dark and unapologetically hungry.
It started at my heels and swept up the length of my legs, lingering on the hem of the dress where it cut high across my thighs, before dragging upward, slow and agonizingly deliberate.
By the time he reached my face, his pupils were blown so wide his eyes looked like hollowed-out obsidian. He looked like a man who had just been handed a blade after six months of being told he wasn't allowed to cut anything.
Heat leaked up my skin in a violent wave.
Beside him, I heard the hard clack of Marcus’s glass hitting the table. The silence from his friends was stunned. They were looking at me, then at him, watching the disciplined husband evaporate in real-time.
I focused on how nice the weather was today as I walked toward the group, each click of my heel on the stone path sounding too loud in my ears.
I didn't know these men well, but I knew their type, all inherited wealth and inherited damage, and eyes that looked permanently unimpressed. Especially Marcus. He always looked as if the entire world bored him. Reminded me too much of Laurent.
“Hi, guys,” I said. I forced my voice to stay casual, even as the air around the table felt thick enough to choke on.
I went straight to Orion. In a room full of men who barely registered as human, he was the only fire I wanted to be burned by.
The short hem of the dress riding up my thighs as I bent over him. I didn't see the way Marcus’s eyes widened or the way Julian’s jaw clenched. I only saw Orion. I pressed my mouth to his quickly, before I lost my courage.
It was a new starting point. I'd define it as a peace treaty written in pink cotton and lingerie.
For a second, he went still... and cold. I was about to second-guess my move when his lips reacted in a desperate press, driven by the need to claim. I felt a tremor run through him, heat and need so raw it made my toes curl in my heels.
“I didn’t expect you to be home early,” I said, taking a step back to look at him, disregarding my racing pulse.
He answered—something about meetings—but his voice was a ruined rasp. His eyes weren't on me. They were fixed on the ponytail, travelling from the nape of my neck, down to the dress. His pupils were so blown they swallowed the brown of his irises.
Not sure what possessed me next, but I asked.
“Do you like it?”
I placed my fingers on my waist to brush the fabric in a playful gesture that, in this company, was like dropping a match into a powder keg.
The look that flooded his gaze wasn't husbandly. It was terrifying, and predatory. He wasn't even trying to hide what he wanted anymore.
He looked as if he was seconds away from grabbing me and doing something outrageous.
Victory rolled through me.
Why was I so excited at the thought of him pushing me against the nearest surface?
I dragged myself back to the present and smiled.
I had no idea why his friends were staring at me with such open astonishment, and I didn't care.
The only reaction I was interested in belonged to Orion, and judging by the look on his face, I already had it.
Maybe Isolde had been right. This was just what I needed.
My smile widened. “I’ll be inside.”
As I walked away, I didn't have to look back to know I had his undivided attention. I felt his gaze trailing fire behind me, a searing, possessive heat that tracked the curve of my hips and the swing of my ponytail.
The silence of his friends was deafening. No one made a joke, or uttered a single word. Everyone seemed to be waiting for the next move.
My hands were shaking by the time I crossed the threshold, but I didn’t let it show.
Inside, the estate was unusually quiet for a weekday afternoon. Mrs. Lewis had been out all week on vacation, but was due back tomorrow, and most of the staff were tucked away in the east wing. For the first time in weeks, the house felt too large, and too empty.
I dropped my purse on the console table and leaned against the wall, my heart beating a wild, nervous rhythm. I could almost feel it in my mouth.
I’d made the first move. I’d planted the seed. Now I had to do the hardest part.
Waiting.
I busied myself in the kitchen, the normalcy of the task offering a brief distraction from my nerves.
I pulled out pans, the clink of metal too loud in the stillness, my brain too wound up to even cook anything from scratch.
I eventually settled for leftover pasta, stirring the sauce with a focus that was entirely fraudulent.
Part of me wanted to march right back outside to ask if he was hungry. Or maybe fold myself into his side as I’d been doing in my dreams.
No. I wasn’t going to shamelessly chase him. He’d seen me. He’d felt the kiss. He knew exactly where I was. He knew exactly what I wanted.
So I stirred the pasta in sauce, sat down to eat, and I waited.