Chapter 33
Chapter thirty-three
One Year Ago
New York City
Helen
The club Teddy takes me to is in Chelsea. He says his friend Jamie told him about it. It’s perched on a narrow rooftop with a stunning view of the Empire State Building.
I point at the multitiered structure over his shoulder and shout in his ear to be heard over the pulsing beat of the DJ spinning at the front of the room. “You can check another New York City icon off your list.”
He turns to me, a grin stretching across his face. “Times Square, the Brooklyn Bridge, and the Empire State Building all in one night. Not bad, right?”
“Well.” I pretend to inspect my nails, which is hard to do because we’re being jostled by people who dance all around us. “You do have an incredible tour guide.”
He slides his arms around my waist, tugging me up onto my toes. “The most beautiful, smartest, funniest, wonderfulest tour guide.”
I blush. No one has ever given me so many compliments in such a short amount of time. My first instinct is to argue, to explain how I’m not actually the best at anything, but I don’t.
Not tonight.
Tonight, I let it happen.
I let this handsome man lavish me with compliments and kisses under the shifting lights.
I let him move his body against me, slow and sensual, in a way that feels less like dancing and more like foreplay.
I let myself forget about tomorrow, about my mom, about the fact that I’m about to leave this city and move across the country. All of that can wait.
Tonight I’m young, and alive, and free, and damn if it isn’t the best feeling in the world.
One song melts into the next and the next, until suddenly the floodlights blaze on, harsh and blinding.
The DJ’s voice cuts through the haze of music and heat. “That’s it, folks. Time to go home.”
“What?” I blink, disoriented. The dance floor is still full, but at the edges the crowd starts to drift away. “How is it already four a.m.?”
“No idea. It feels like we just got here.”
We follow the wave of people toward the elevators, slipping into the back of a long, shuffling line.
“This gives a whole new meaning to time flies when you’re having fun.”
Teddy looks down at me, eyes crinkled with that smile I’m starting to crave. “You’re having fun?”
“You couldn’t tell from the dancing and laughing and smiling?” I tease, bumping his shoulder.
“What about the kissing? Don’t forget about the kissing,” he jokes back, his tone light but his eyes darkening.
Those words hit harder than they should, a jolt straight to my chest. I think about how much we’ve touched tonight, how often his mouth has found mine, how his hands have roamed my body like he already owns me, and still, I’m not satiated.
I haven’t had my fill of him yet. It’s crazy, reckless.
I barely know him, but I’ve never had this much fun, never wanted a man as badly as I do right now.
Teddy must be thinking the same thing because he grabs my hand, threading our fingers together, his thumb brushing over my knuckles. “Ask me again.”
“What?”
“Ask me to take you to my hotel room. Is that still...,” he swallows thickly, “something you want to do?”
God yes.
It’s all I want to do.
“Take me home with you. Back to your hotel.” I kiss him, deep and sure. My tongue finds his, stroking the metal bar I can’t stop thinking about. I like the feeling of it. The taste. “I want to be with you.”