Chapter Twenty-One #2
“I don’t dance.”
“It’s a gala. There’s a dance floor. People are going to expect us to dance.”
“People can expect whatever they want.”
“Banks.” I chuckle, lifting one brow.
He sighs—the sigh of a man accepting his fate. “Fine. But if I step on your feet, you can’t complain.”
“Deal.”
He leads me to the dance floor with the enthusiasm of someone walking to their own execution. When we reach an open spot, he turns to face me and immediately freezes.
“What do I do with my hands?”
“One on my waist. The other holds mine.” I take his hand, positioning it on the curve of my hip. “Like this.”
His palm is warm through the fabric of my dress. His fingers splay wide, almost spanning my entire side. He takes my other hand in his, and we’re standing there, arranged like dancers, neither of us moving.
“Now what?” he asks.
“Now we sway.”
“Sway.”
“Just—hold me and sway. That’s it. No complicated footwork. Just movement.”
He starts to move, stiff and mechanical, like a robot programmed to simulate human behavior.
“Banks. Relax.”
“I’m relaxed.”
“You’re the opposite of relaxed. You’re a statue. A very tense statue.”
“I told you I don’t dance.”
“You’re not dancing. You’re swaying. There’s a difference.” I step closer, closing the distance between us until my chest is almost touching his. “Here. Just follow me.”
I start to move—small, gentle movements, nothing complicated. After a moment, he follows. His body begins to loosen, his grip on my waist softening from desperate to secure.
“There you go,” I murmur.
“This is ridiculous.”
“This is nice.”
He doesn’t argue.
We sway in silence. The music washes over us—something slow and romantic that I don’t recognize—and I let myself sink into the moment. His arms around me. My head tipped toward his chest. The steady thud of his heart beneath my ear.
But Jake’s words are there too, circling, poisoning.
I should let it go. I should just enjoy this moment and stop overthinking everything. But the doubt is a sore spot I can’t help picking at.
“Banks?”
“Mm.”
“Can I ask you something?”
His hand shifts on my waist. “Yeah.”
I don’t know how to say this without sounding insecure or jealous or crazy. But I need to know. I can’t keep doing this—whatever this is—without knowing.
“My brother said something stupid at lunch the other day.” I keep my voice light and casual, pretending this isn’t tearing me apart inside. “He said athletes have options in every city, that women throw themselves at them.”
Banks goes still. Not frozen—just alert. Listening.
“Yeah, I guess,” he concedes.
“I know this is fake,” I continue, the words tumbling out before I can stop them. “And I know we never talked about… I mean, we have rules, but we never discussed… exclusivity. Or whatever.”
“Exclusivity.”
“I just—if you’re hooking up with other people, I’d rather know now. So I can manage my expectations. So I don’t—” So I don’t fall any harder than I already have. “So I know where I stand.”
Silence.
The music keeps playing. Couples continue swaying around us, but Banks has stopped moving entirely.
“Come with me.” He takes my hand and pulls me off the dance floor—not roughly, but urgently. His grip is firm as he weaves through the crowd, past the bar, past the silent auction tables, down a hallway I hadn’t even noticed before.
“Banks, where are we—”
He pushes open a door and tugs me inside.
It’s some kind of prep room—catering equipment, stacked chairs, extra linens. Dim lighting. Empty.
He closes the door behind us.
“Banks—”
“You think I could look at anyone else after having you in my lap? After having your hands on me?”
I blink, processing.
He looks almost pained. “Win.” His voice is low, rough. “I don’t share. I don’t wander. And I haven’t wanted anyone in years.” His hand tightens on my waist. “Until you made me want things I can’t have.”
Oh.
He backs me up a step, hands still on my waist. “And for the record, I haven’t touched anyone in three years. And I haven’t wanted to. Until you.”
The words land like a thunderclap.
He’s standing close now, so close that I have to tip my head back to see his face. His expression is intense, almost fierce.
My heart is hammering. “You haven’t?”
“No.” He takes a step closer. I step back until my shoulders hit the wall. “I don’t do hookups. I don’t do casual. I’m not good at letting people get close. So I don’t. I stay alone. It’s easier.”
Banks cups my face in his hands, tilting it up toward his. His palms are warm, and his eyes are burning as he strokes my cheeks with his thumbs. “There’s only you, Win. There’s been only you since the day you smiled at me in that cafeteria and I forgot how to speak.”
I can’t breathe. Can’t think. All I can do is stare at him.
“I don’t share,” he says, his voice dropping low. “I don’t even know how. If you’re mine—even fake mine—you’re mine. That’s it.”
“Banks—”
He kisses me.
It’s not gentle. It’s not tentative. It’s an explosion—his mouth claiming mine with a hunger that steals the air from my lungs. His hands slide from my face into my hair, tilting my head back, angling me exactly where he wants me.
I grab the lapels of his tux and hold on for dear life.
He tastes like champagne and desire. His tongue strokes against mine, and I make a needy sound I’ve never made before—something between a gasp and a moan. He swallows it and kisses me harder.
This is what I’ve been waiting for. This is what I didn’t know I needed. Every nerve in my body is on fire, every thought in my head reduced to more, more, more.
His hands drop to my waist, then lower. He grips my thighs and lifts me like I weigh nothing, pressing me against the wall while I instinctively wrap my legs around him.
The skirt of my dress rides up, but I don’t care.
I can feel him—all of him—hard and hot against my core, and the friction makes me whimper.
“Win.” My name is a groan against my lips. “Tell me to stop.”
“Don’t you dare.”
He kisses me again, deeper, his hips pressing forward in a way that makes stars explode behind my eyelids. My fingers find his hair, destroying whatever product he used to style it, and he growls—actually growls—into my mouth.
This is insane. We’re in a storage room at a charity gala. Anyone could walk in. We should stop.
But I don’t want to stop. I want to climb inside this man and live there.
“Banks,” I gasp. “I need—”
The door swings open.
“Oh!”
We freeze.
A woman in a catering uniform stands in the doorway, her eyes wide, a stack of napkins in her hands.
“You can’t—this area is for staff only. You can’t be back here.”
Banks sets me down slowly, keeping his body between me and the intruder. Ever the protector, even now. Even with his hair a mess, his lips swollen, and his breathing ragged.
“Sorry,” I manage, straightening my dress with shaking hands. “We were just—”
“Leaving,” Banks finishes. His voice is rough. Wrecked.
He takes my hand again—gentler this time—and leads me past the mortified caterer, back down the hallway, toward the noise and light of the gala.
We don’t speak. I don’t trust myself to speak. My lips are still tingling. My whole body is still tingling. I feel as if I’ve been struck by lightning and survived.
We’ve just reached the edge of the ballroom when Tori materializes out of nowhere.
“There you two are!” She’s flushed from champagne and dancing, with Zayden trailing behind her. “We’re taking photos by the fountain. Come on, the photographer is waiting.”
She doesn’t seem to notice my smeared lipstick or Banks’s disheveled hair. Or maybe she does notice and is politely pretending not to. Either way, she grabs my arm and starts tugging me toward the garden doors.
I glance back at Banks.
He’s watching me with an expression I’ve never seen before—dark, hungry, promising.
This isn’t over.
This is just the beginning.