Chapter 6 – Reese #3
“Definitely a tiger,” Dakota murmured, forcing my focus back onto him. His eyes trailed lazily across my face, stopping on my birthmark for a long moment. When they made their way back to mine, little wrinkles formed at the corners as his lips curved upward. “That was a compliment.”
My heart was beating so fast that I was having trouble breathing, and the horror of what I’d done made me want to bash my head into the wall.
To not stop until I couldn’t feel a thing.
“You’re naked,” he said, never breaking eye contact.
The flush those words brought forth scorched through my chest, flying up my neck and burning across my face.
He was right. I’d lost the towel at some point and now I was just sitting on him bare-ass-naked.
Dakota’s body was firm and startlingly hot beneath mine; I was straddling his waist in the most obscene way, but my lower body was hidden from his view because my wet chest was plastered to his.
The more I paid attention, the more I could feel a responsive heat simmering in the pit of my stomach and starting to spread.
I’d forgotten my entire reality because I thought he’d taken my violin. Fucking hell, I was worse off than I’d thought. Just lying to myself every day and blocking it all out like it wasn’t happening. Like I wasn’t one light tap away from shattering completely.
I was thankful he wasn’t looking at any other part of me. The longer I lay on top of him, the more I didn’t want to get off because he’d see everything—every single scar on my thighs. Every single mark I’d intentionally carved into my skin, all my suffering forever etched on the surface.
Panic ricocheted through my bones, and my heartbeat—which had started to slow—began to pick up again.
He couldn’t see. I couldn’t let him see them, but I didn’t know how to get out of this without him seeing them.
I threw aside the ragged tatters of my pride and whispered, “Can…can you close your eyes?”
I felt like such an asshole for jumping to conclusions and getting myself into this mess. I probably deserved to have my secrets revealed; to be exposed because of my own atrocious behavior.
I’d called him a bastard, but I was the one making assumptions and attacking people like a fucking psycho.
“Please? Please close your eyes?” I heard how desperate I sounded and I didn’t care. I was desperate—to get off him so I could go nurse this crushing shame alone.
Dakota’s mouth turned up in a smirk and he said, “Why? You gonna kiss me?”
I stared at him in horror and couldn’t stop myself from glancing down at his despicable mouth that kept saying the most ridiculous things. “What? No, I’m not going to kiss you! What the hell—”
“Chill, I was just joking. You’re way too serious. When’s the last time you had any fun? Have you ever had fun?”
“I—” I didn’t know. I couldn’t recall. Before I was thirteen, that was for sure. Damn it, that wasn’t the point! “Can you please just close your eyes? Please?”
Something flickered in Dakota’s eyes and was gone before I could pin it down.
He licked his lips, the movement drawing my gaze back down to that full, wide mouth.
He had a freckle on his bottom lip, far in the left corner.
So many fucking freckles. “I will if you tell me what that pretty mark on your face is. And if you say please again.”
…pretty?
He was making fun of me again.
I brought my eyes back up to his as my lip lifted in a snarl, and vicious words gathered on the tip of my tongue, but I kept my mouth shut and moved my gaze to the enormous scar cutting across his face.
His freckles softened that harsh, jagged line; the edges of it were dotted with neat little lines that looked like the remnants of staples, like they’d tried to staple the skin back together and in doing so, had only left even more damage behind.
It was…beautiful, in all honesty.
Pretty.
What had happened to him?
I met Dakota’s gaze again and said, “I’ll tell you if you tell me how you got your scar.”
He blinked at me, and then his lips stretched into a wide, wicked smile that made my heart race. His teeth were white and straight, and though his incisors were sharp, they weren’t dripping with venom like I’d imagined that first day.
“Well, look at you making deals. Okay, I’ll play. You first.”
I wasn’t sure what was happening anymore, but all I knew was that if this was what he needed to close his eyes so I could keep my secret, I didn’t care. I’d do it. I’d do anything to keep him from finding out.
I scraped my teeth against my bottom lip, then said, “It’s called a port-wine stain. It’s a type of birthmark caused by a gene mutation. That’s it.”
Dakota’s gaze trailed down to my shoulder, where I had a similar smaller mark, then back to my face. “Hm. I really like it. Looks kinda like a butterfly. Very cute.”
I blinked as he kept smiling.
Very…cute?
My lips parted, but my vocal cords had frozen. Heat bloomed across my cheeks again, and I hated the fact that I was blushing, but…what? He was fucking with me, right? He had to be. No one had ever called my birthmark pretty or cute. It was always ugly ugly ugly.
Gross.
Nasty.
Repulsive.
Weird.
Dakota lifted his head up off the bed and tilted it to the side a little, and I was still stuck on his earlier words, so when the tip of his nose brushed against my neck and he inhaled, I reared back.
“What are you doing?”
Dakota let his head fall back to the bed and licked his lips.
“Smelling you. You smell really good. Like—” He lifted his head again, and this time when he touched his nose to my throat, I felt the softness his lips ghost against my skin.
“Like flowers in the sun,” he murmured, his warm breath fanning over my neck.
I sucked in a sharp breath as the heat in my cheeks intensified, and an answering warmth spread through my groin with a shocking speed.
My dick started to thicken against him, and I heard the sound of cotton ripping.
I looked down to see I was still clutching his shirt in my hands—so hard that I’d fucking ripped it open.
But rather than looking upset that I’d just destroyed a piece of his clothing, Dakota just seemed amused.
“No need to go ripping my clothes off, darling. I would’ve gladly taken it off if you’d just asked.
” He pursed his lips like he was thinking about something, then said, “No, never mind. That was hot. You can do that anytime. Blanket permission granted.”
His eyes were shining with heat as he stared up at me. I thought maybe his skin had some kind of toxin in it, because my mind was not working properly right now. “What?”
“You know I can feel you, right?” he said softly, those dark eyes boring into mine.
Why were his eyelashes so thick? “I usually don’t like people touching me, but you…
” His expression momentarily darkened, as if a bad memory had passed through his mind like a dark cloud.
It bounced back to amused as quickly as it happened, and he was smiling up at me once again. “I like it. I really like it.”
He sounded a little surprised by that, but in an almost excited way. It was like when he’d said What if I don’t want to leave you alone? Like he had no clue why he was reacting the way he was, like he didn’t understand himself.
I didn’t know how to handle someone saying things like that to me. I didn’t even know if he was coming on to me or what he was doing, if he was just amusing himself at my expense.
All I knew was I was uncomfortable in a way I’d never been before in my life, and the heat that was coalescing between us was about to set me on fucking fire.
No one had ever said anything like that to me before, and if he kept saying things like that, I wasn’t sure what I’d do.
“I can feel you, Reese.”
Feel me? I looked at his right hand, which loosely held the bow, then at his left hand, which was still holding the violin.
Dakota laughed quietly, the vibration of it sinking into my chest. “Not with my hands. I can feel you. There. On my stomach. You feel really big. Surprising, since you’re so peti—”
I covered his mouth with my hand because I didn’t want to hear another word.
“Stop it,” I whispered in horror. His eyes sparkled with mischief, and I cursed myself for always taking the bait.
The bastard enjoyed getting a rise out of me, pushing my buttons, drawing out every negative reaction he could.
I had my answer.
He wasn’t coming on to me, he was just amusing himself at my expense. I wasn’t sure why he was doing this, but I really hated it. Even after all these years, I still let people get under my skin so easily.
I wanted to get away from him so badly that I almost said fuck it and jumped off him, but the fear of him seeing my legs was so great that it broke through that impulsive need in less than a second, and I stayed put.
When something warm and wet slid along my palm, a line of heat shot straight to my groin and I gasped. My cock twitched where it was trapped between us, and I knew he felt it too because his nostrils flared and his eyes narrowed.
I pulled my hand away from his mouth so he couldn’t lick me again, then wished I hadn’t when he said, “Fuck, I really want to touch you. Can I touch you?”
“No!” I cried. “Just please close your eyes so I can get off you!”
“Why do my eyes need to be closed? It’s nothing I haven’t seen before. Or maybe it—”
“Dakota!” My voice broke halfway through his name, and the desperation in it was humiliating.
Dakota stopped smiling, those dark eyes studying every inch of my pitiful face.
“First time you say my name, and it’s like that.” When he sighed and closed his eyes, I just sat there for a long moment, unable to believe that he’d given up so easily.
Was this a trick? Was he going to open them as soon as I moved?
My gaze trailed down to his lips again.
Why? You gonna kiss me?
He’d planted the seed in my mind, and now it was spreading its roots.
What would it feel like, to press my lips to his? Would they be soft and warm? What would he do if I leaned down and—
I slowly slid off him, never taking my eyes from his face, making sure he really kept them closed.
And he did. He actually did.
I didn’t understand him at all. Just when I felt like I was starting to get a read on him, on who he was, he slipped through my fingers and did or said something entirely unexpected. It was maddening.
I quickly looked around for my towel, found it in a heap at his feet, and wrapped it around my waist while darting to the bathroom.
I shut the door, leaned against it, then slowly slid to the floor.
When the tears started to fall, I just sat there and let them, hoping if I cried enough I could drown in them.