“One day,” he said.
“Yeah… I hope so.”
“I know so.”
The confidence in his voice made me turn and face him, no longer caring what emotions he was able to read on my face. He looked back at me and for a moment, we held each other’s gaze, saying nothing. He had kind eyes and a nice jawline, and he smelled like I imagined those guys in cologne commercials smelled. When he took a step closer to me, I felt my breath catch in my chest and I wondered how someone I had only just met could look at me in a way that made it seem like he had known me for years.
He closed the gap between us, put his arm around my waist, and next thing I knew, our lips were touching. I had never kissed a man I hardly knew before, and it was both exhilarating and terrifying all at the same time. My heart was pushing me forward against him while my brain was telling me to pull back and think about this practically. They warred with each other for just a second longer before my heart won out and I gave into the physical sensations. His mouth tasted sweet, like he’d had a margarita at the party, and he picked me up in his arms as if I weighed nothing.
Something fluttered in my stomach and I wanted him to put his hands on me. I wanted him to push me up against the wall—and that’s exactly what he did. As if he had read my mind. He leaned my back against the side wall of the elevator and I wrapped my legs around his waist. He started to kiss my neck, and I clawed at his back, wanting him more than I’d ever wanted anyone in my life.
I pulled away from the kiss just long enough to whisper in his ear, “take me,” and then we were back at it, our lips locked and our hands exploring each other’s bodies. He put me back down on the ground so that I could slip out of my dress and the underwear I was wearing underneath, and he admired my body as I stood there naked in front of him.
“You really are stunning,” he said. “I can’t believe you don’t know that about yourself.”
I shrugged and suddenly felt very self conscious. I put my arms around my stomach in a lame attempt at covering up, but he pushed my hands away and kissed me once more. This one was less passionate, but also more romantic. “Don’t do that,” he said. “You have nothing you need to cover up.”
Feeling very much relieved by that sentiment, I put my arms around his neck and pulled him down into another kiss. He slid his hand down the side of my body, in between my legs and—
“Steph!”
Somebody else was touching me, and not in a sexy way like the man in the elevator was just a second ago. Then my eyes snapped open and I realized where I was.
It was a dream.
“Steph!” Rose repeated my name. She was sitting on the edge of the bed, shaking my shoulder vigorously. When I looked up at her, she sighed and put a hand to her chest. “Oh thank God you’re okay. Man, you really scared me for a second.”
“Iscaredyou?” I balked. “You’re the one shaking me awake with the panic of someone who just heard there was a tornado coming! Seriously, what is going on?”
“I was worried about you,” Rose said, getting off the bed and walking over to the coffee machine on the other side of the hotel room. “You always wake up before me. Like,wayearlier than me. When I got up a little bit ago, I was shocked to see you were still sleeping away. For a while, I laid in bed trying to be quiet, but then I started to panic the more I thought about how weird it was that you weren’t waking up yet. Then I started thinking about how insane it would be if you died in your sleep and I didn’t even know it, all the while I was just sitting in this bed over here, scrolling through social media like a total idiot!”
I looked at her with wide-eyes, then laughed. “You are ridiculous, you know that? Can’t a girl get a few more hours of shut-eye without her friends thinking she died?”
“Sorry for being concerned,” Rose said. She got the coffee machine going then went into the bathroom and turned the shower on. I laid back in the bed and stared up at the ceiling for a second, thinking about the dream I’d been in the middle of before Rose’s rude awakening.
I couldn’t believe I’d had a sex dream about a man I hadn’t even officially met. He was just some guy I saw walking past me in the hallway, and yet I couldnotstop thinking about him.
“Hey, can you call the girls?” Rose said from the bathroom. “Find out what time we are meeting for breakfast down in the lobby?”
“Sure,” I said, trying to snap myself out of it. I grabbed my phone and tried Gina first. She answered after the third ring.
“Hey,” she said. “Are you already downstairs?”
“Er, no, I’m still in bed.”
“What?” she laughed. “No way.”
“It’s true. I slept in.”
“You never sleep in. You go to bed at like the same time every night, and then wake up at the crack of dawn every morning.”
“That’s not true,” I said. “I’m a lot more flexible than that, and anyway, my schedule aside, Rose and I are still in the process of getting ready so we can meet you guys down there in a bit, okay?”
“Okay… Are you sure you’re alright though? Did you have a lot to drink last night?”
“No,” I said. “Everything is fine. Don’t worry about me.”
“If you say so. I guess we’ll see you downstairs then.”