Wicked Burn

“You’d better just go, Evan,” she managed shakily. “Please,” she added when Evan opened his mouth like he was going to argue. He finally turned, keeping the grim, tall figure that menaced him in the corner of his eye until the last second before he headed down the hallway.

Niall exhaled unevenly when she heard the ding of the elevator door as it closed. She found it difficult to meet her neighbor’s stare.

“Thank you,” she said.

“You okay?”

His voice reminded her of a stark landscape of open plains domed with the vast mystery of a starlit sky.

“Sure.” She laughed a little unevenly. “Feeling a bit dense, actually. I didn’t see it coming.”

“How about a drink?”

She shook her head. “No. I’m all right. He just caught me off guard, that’s all.”

“I wasn’t asking if you wanted to have a drink with me in order to calm you down.”

Her eyes snapped up to his. For the first time, she saw that they were a light gray, the outer rim edged by a defining black line.

A second passed . . . then several. A tiny smile pulled at his well-shaped lips, softening the hardness of his mouth infinitesimally.

Had he really just propositioned her so casually? Niall questioned herself. And was she really considering taking him up on the offer?

Something flamed to life inside of her as she met his steady stare . . . something Niall had assumed had been snuffed out of existence three years ago. His lips twitched slightly, and she realized she’d been wrong.

What she experienced at that moment wasn’t anything she’d ever known in her thirty-three years of life on this planet.

“All right,” she agreed softly.

He stepped back so that she could move past him toward the door of his apartment. Niall noticed that he didn’t look smug at her acceptance.

Nor did he seem even vaguely surprised.

Niall smiled a moment later as she glanced around his living room while he moved about in the kitchen.

“I see we have the same decorator,” she said through the little window over the counter that overlooked the kitchen. She heard the anxious tremor in her voice and admonished herself for it. Just because she had agreed to have a drink didn’t mean that she was going to sleep with him—a complete stranger.

His dark brown hair fell over his brow as he bent to retrieve a bottle from a lower shelf. When he stood, her gaze brushed appreciatively across his ridged abdomen, the sweep of his wide shoulders, and the hard, defined muscles of his upper arm. Most of the men that she knew would have put on a shirt in this situation. But Niall was glad that he hadn’t.

He was such a beautiful, sinuous male animal that it seemed a shame to cover his body.

He never responded to her attempt at small talk, but Niall found that his silence didn’t make her feel awkward. When he handed her a glass through the window, she held it up in a brief salute and took a drink. Her sensual appreciation of the taste must have shown on her face, because he gave a small smile before he took a swallow of his own. Heat expanded in Niall’s lower belly at the sight of the muscular movement of his throat.

“You approve,” he stated rather than asked.

Niall blinked. Had he been reading her mind? A modicum of common sense returned to her, however, and she realized that he’d been referring to the liquor, not his beautiful body.

“I don’t drink much, but when I do, I’m a Scotch drinker. This happens to be my favorite brand,” Niall said. She realized that her voice had become unintentionally husky as she stared at his mouth. His upper front tooth slightly overlapped the one next to it. She thought of what it would feel like to run her tongue over that sexy little imperfection, and then wondered how many women he encountered every day who had the exact same fantasy.

She forced her eyes away from him and transferred her gaze to the windows. It unnerved her, this strong, unprecedented physical reaction to him. She felt awkward and foolish, like a gangly teenage girl.

She took a deep, uneven breath and tried to focus on what she saw.

His apartment faced east, granting him a spectacular panoramic view of Chicago. The lights of the high-rises shimmered in the black, winding river. The Riverview Towers offered their residents every luxury and convenience: a concierge, a dry cleaner, grocery delivery, shopping, and a central location in downtown Chicago. Residents and the corporations for which they worked paid sky-high prices for the flexibility and conveniences of the apartments. But to Niall the temporary residences felt depressingly sterile. She longed for the stability of a home again.

“So what’s your excuse for staying in this god-awful place?” she asked him when he came around the corner into the living room. She glanced up when he leaned his hip against the counter next to where she sat on a stool.

“I’m working in the city for a while. I sleep here Tuesday through Thursday nights and drive home on Friday.”

“To the suburbs?” Niall asked as she took another sip of Scotch. With him standing and her sitting, her eye level was at his chest. His nipples were dark brown and even more erect than she’d speculated when he was feet away from her instead of inches. She inhaled slowly, and the male scent that she recalled all too well from sharing the elevator with him filled her senses, more subtle, but nevertheless more potent, than the fumes of the Scotch.

The desire that he’d awakened in her reared its head, causing a shimmering sensation of heat to spread along her tailbone, only to surge and swell at her sex, liquefying her in a matter of seconds.

His singular gray eyes flickered down to her lap when she stirred restlessly on her stool.