A. Jackson - When We Met

Because no one here knew.

A month had passed since I returned to campus, and not one person had uttered a word to me about what had happened.

Courtney started dancing with some random guy, and she cast me a telling smile as she turned away. I returned an accepting grin, giving her the go-ahead before I lifted my face toward the high ceiling that strummed with lights. Colors flashed across my face and lit up behind my closed eyes, and I completely gave myself over to my newfound freedom.

I was lost in the crowd, but still I felt it strike me. Tension infiltrated the already heavy air, thickening it more, making it difficult to breathe. I felt them, eyes watching me dance, traveling my curves as I moved.

A burst of modesty tried to crack the surface of the buzz that sedated my mind.

But tonight, it couldn’t touch me.

Because I welcomed it. I wanted him to see me.

God, how much time had I spent dreaming of him? Darryn Wild, that boy-man-god who’d stolen so many of my thoughts, that teasing smile that did something to me I’d never felt before, made me shy in a way I liked, like he saw beneath all the red to the girl below.

Now I could feel him, his eyes all over me, caressing me slowly, up and down.

I let all my insecurities drift away as I swayed in time to the music, in sync with the throb of the crowd and the intermittent lights that glowed against my lids.

A charged moment passed, before strong hands found my hips and gripped them from behind. For a beat, I stiffened, before I again gave in to this sublime release. And again, he felt good. Right. All this intense energy that ricocheted between us wrapped me up in a frenzy of nerves, alight and alive. The smell of him took me whole, all soap and man and sex.

Oh God.

My heart beat frantically, racing to keep up with my thoughts that were spiraling out of control.

A shimmer of fear slithered through me, before he pulled my back into the safety of his firm chest.

And that was what I felt.

Safe.

With him, and I didn’t know why, and I was searching inside myself for resolve, for the commitment I’d made to never allow myself to be so easily played again.

But it was just out of my reach.

Darryn held me close, our bodies moving in time, like we shared the same breath, the same space. I leaned back, my head on his shoulder as his face found the curve of my neck. Chills sped, spinning my body into a violent cataclysm of need. He let his hands roam, palms pressing hard as he ran them down the front of my legs, spanning them wide as he trailed them back up to my hips and over my stomach. Fingertips dipped into my ribs as he slid them up the curve of my sides, and he lifted my arms as he went, in the same fluid motion fastening my hands around the back of his neck.

All those butterflies scattered, a clash of discordant wings that fluttered haphazardly through my insides, leaving my stomach in a coiled mess of confusion and need.

Why him? Why now?

Holding me close, he brushed his mouth over the shell of my ear, his whispered words injected directly to my manic heart. “Goddamn, Misha. What are you trying to do to me?”

I suddenly found it impossible to breathe, because it was him who was slowly undoing all the fibers of reservation woven through my weakened spirit.

“Can’t get you off my mind.” He leaned in closer, his hand sweeping up my stomach. Fingers brushed between my breasts, and I released a sharp gasp.

“Been dying to touch you,” he murmured low. He began to prod me back, slowly leading me away from the heaving bodies on the dance floor. The riot of the crowd bled into black as he edged us through the club, his roaming hands leaving me completely stripped of any defenses. Walls rose on each side of us as he drew me backward into the darkened hallway. Darryn pulled me into its depths, before he suddenly spun me in his hold and pinned my back up against the wall.

And it wasn’t fear I felt when I looked at up at him, captured by those hazel eyes that were more intense than anything I’d ever seen as they searched me frantically, his hands just as frantic when he twisted his fingers through the locks of my hair on both sides of my head.

It was desire.

He yanked me against him, tilting my chin up by the force of his hold in my hair.

I grunted.

“Tell me you want me, too,” he demanded in a pained whisper, his eyes flying across my face. “Tell me you lie in bed at night and when you close your eyes, you see me. Because all I can see is you.”

Shock punched all the air from my lungs, and my mouth dropped open—I was stunned by his blatant admission.

That gaze darted to my parted lips and back to my eyes, our bodies heaving with the tension that continued to wind us higher and higher.

Shivers lifted on a swollen wave and broke over my skin with a heated rush of desire.

And I wanted to laugh through the haze of alcohol. Because none of this made a lick of sense, how this boy-man-god could say things like he could see right inside my mind, like he’d just mimicked my most secret thoughts, ones of him that I couldn’t escape every single time I closed my eyes, how he could make me feel like nothing else in this world mattered except for his hands on me—right here, right now.

Just for tonight, he made me want to be brave.

Even in my heels, I had to push to my toes to reach his mouth, but it was me who closed the distance, me who seemed desperate to feel.

His reaction was immediate, and his breath rushed across my face as his body crushed mine to the wall. His mouth overtook mine, unyielding, his tongue demanding as he swiped it across my teeth, then dove in to tangle with mine, assaulting me with long, hard strokes.

Trembles rolled through me, and my knees went weak, because whatever desperation I’d had to feel his mouth against mine paled in comparison to the recklessness he devoured me with now. His hands and mouth and the racing beat of his heart consumed all my senses.

Shaking, I kissed him with all abandon, like this was the one chance I had, like it was the one moment I’d been granted to feel like this—like I was important and beautiful and somehow this gorgeous man could want me for who I was and it didn’t stem from the infamy Hunter had cast like a bounty on my head.

Hunter.

The errant thought of him caused a resurrection of my insecurities, the memories blossoming full as I thought back to the way Hunter had initially made me feel. When Hunter first asked me out, I’d been so shy and scared, sure no one would pay any interest to the small-town girl who’d been sheltered all her life. Hunter had showered attention on me, and I’d clung to the way it made me feel.

Special.

Sickness coiled in my stomach.

Because again, I was feeling it, although Hunter hadn’t come close to skimming the magnitude of what Darryn had bounding through my veins.

Fear took hold.

God, what was I doing? Rushing into the same thing as I’d done with Hunter? Desperate to feel? Desperate to please?

I couldn’t do this again.

I managed to wriggle my hands between our bodies that were plastered together, and there was nothing I could do to stop the whimper that escaped my throat at the feel of his chest under my hands. Darryn did something to me, touched me somewhere deep inside that I didn’t even recognize, drew me in, tempted me.

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

Hadn’t I been humiliated enough?

With trembling hands, I nudged him back. He only kissed me harder, like he again could read my thoughts and that tongue was at work to convince me to trust him.

Moisture gathered in my eyes, this time my hands firm as I pushed him. “P-p-please, stop.”

I could feel him submitting as he stumbled back, not by my force, but by a force of his own as he tore himself away. His entire body vibrated with what roared through mine, this desire that pooled so heavily in my core.

I pressed my hand to my mouth, as if I could contain it all, as if there were a chance I could stop the outpouring of emotion Darryn had brought on me. He filled my thoughts with need and want. Made me feel beautiful and good and not like a stupid little girl. But the fear was so much greater than all of that, molding the idea of Darryn Wild into nothing but a threat. All the warnings about boys like Hunter my mother had ever hammered into my head were ringing out.

Danger. Bad. Hurt.

I couldn’t go through that again.

Even if walking away from Darryn now felt like I was ripping away something essential to my soul.

“Misha,” he started to say in a grating voice, taking a pleading step forward.

I stuck my hand out to stop him. “Don’t. Please. I can’t do this.”

“You can’t or you don’t want to?” he challenged, fisting his hands at his sides, like he didn’t know what to do with the energy barreling through him any more than I did.

Mine manifested as tears streaming hot and fast down my face.

Oh God, did I want to.

“Can’t,” I whispered, shaking my head.

Couldn’t go through this again.

Regret flashed in his eyes, like he could see straight through me, like he knew exactly what I was thinking and why I was pushing him away.

If only he really knew.

He wouldn’t want me then.

“I have to go.” I turned to flee. He grabbed me around my wrist and spun me around. His hands found my face. For a flash, agony took over his expression as he hesitantly pulled me closer. This time his kiss was slow, fueled by passion. It cut me so much deeper than the frenzied kiss we’d given ourselves over to minutes before, because this one spoke of what could be, of what I’d always dreamed of as a little girl before Hunter showed me just how cruel this world could be.

I surrendered to it and kissed him with everything I wished I could be, before I ripped myself away. Standing there panting, I stared at him and said, “I’m so sorry.”

Swallowing hard, I took two steps back, watching something that looked like anger flare in the depths of Darryn’s eyes. Harshly, he blinked. “Yeah, so am I.”

Darryn

Fuck.

It was official.

I was a creeper.

Not the I’m going to drag you into an alley and slit your throat kind of creeper.

More like the I’m going to drag you into an alley and kiss you senseless and leave you begging my name kind of creeper.

Different, right?

I sure as hell hoped so.

Because this was the low I’d stooped to.

Trailing her from a distance, I kept my eye on the mass of black curls that bobbed through the surging crowd on the sidewalk while doing my best to remain hidden.

Misha Crosse had done this to me. Made me a little bit crazy and left me partaking in tactics I’d never consider for another girl. Clearly she knew I was pursuing her, the way she kept peering over her shoulder, keen eyes searching through the horde of people as she sought out my presence.

Like she could feel me.

That same insane way I could feel her.

She didn’t appear so much scared as she did wary. The thought of her being afraid of me made me sick, although I knew she was fearful in an entirely different way. I’d never damage a hair on her head. I think she knew that. But it was that weakened heart the girl was protecting.

But that kiss. That searing, shattering kiss? I thought I couldn’t get her out of my mind before. After that kiss this weekend, she was all I could think about. The way she felt. The way she tasted. She’d singed through all those exterior layers of indifference that covered me up in callousness, straight down to splay open wide the deepest part of me.

God, I wanted her. Wanted to fix her and hold her and promise her I’d never let anyone hurt her.

But she wouldn’t give me the chance.

Misha had been avoiding me at all costs. Sneaking from her house when she thought I wouldn’t see her, leaving me standing outside their front door like a lovesick fool when I knocked, had me pacing when she didn’t return the text messages I’d sent after I begged her number off one of her roommates.

That girl was pretending she wasn’t affected.

But I knew better.

I’d felt everything when she kissed me, when she kissed me like she could taste freedom, like she’d finally found what she’d been searching for.