Tyler is familiar—a beacon in its own treacherous tide but one Iknow.
All I want is a night to forget that I’m alone in this city, that people rise and fall in an instant, that the only boy I ever loved has moved on and so haveI.
The song changes again, a sexy downtempo remix of “Pretty YoungThing.”
I turn but don’t step away. My shoulders bump his chest, my ass hitting his thighs. I roll my body once, twice. The friction of his clothes on my ass, the bare skin of my back, makes me bite mylip.
He doesn’tmove.
Catching Tyler by surprise is reward enough, but I push myluck.
I reach up behind my head for his neck, brush the edge of his hair above his collar. My fingertips trail along hisscalp.
Tyler responds so fast it makes my breathhitch.
He drags me closer with strong arms. His hand splays across my stomach, and when his thumb slips under the edge of my shirt, his pinkie under the top of my skirt, he hardens against myback.
Fuck.I wonder if I’m tall enough to ride thisride.
But I’m more than capable of handling TylerAdams.
So, I lean my head back against his chest and close myeyes.
The bass in the club pulses through my heels. The pounding music drowns out everything between us, shakes loose the hurt and feelings until there’s no room for anything but this moment. Sweating, wanting, moving,living.
My fingers trace the hard forearm banding around my waist, the lines of ink. “You got atattoo.”
Tyler’s face bends close to mine, and my breath hitches as his lips graze my temple. “More than one. You want to seethem?”
The crowd presses in on us, and I sense Elle, Rae, Beck, and others. Friends and strangers. Celebration andoblivion.
I want to disappear intoit.
“Yes,” Iwhisper.
The hair above the neck of his shirt is damp. Not quite long enough to tug. Some part of me wants to tryanyway.
His lips graze my ear, and I tilt my chin back as they drag down my jaw. Heat streaks between my thighs, weaves a rope of need that joins us together, as I move against him in thedark.
He’s moving too, holding me, pressing againstme.
We’re action, reaction. Like musicians who’ve never played together, attuned to each other because this melody we’re weaving depends onit.
There’s nothing outside this club. My beautiful boy, my twisted muse, my rebel prince is gone, but the man holding me ishere.
He doesn’t give an inch, hands possessive on my hips, holding me against hishardness.
I have a sudden vision of Tyler dragging me into one of these dark corners, yanking up my skirt, and fucking me to the driving rhythm of the bass, our sounds swallowed up by the music aroundus.
I turn my face more to meet his gaze, and his expression hits me square in thegut.
His lashes are half-lowered, his jaw tight with restraint and hunger, those dangerous eyes filled with emotion I can’t read in thedark.
When Tyler speaks again, it’s a vibration against myhair.
“Seventy-eight.”
I focus on the warmth of his skin through his shirt, the steady echo of his heartbeat. “Seventy-eightwhat?”