I was still struggling as I pondered this, but he was stubbornly yanking at me, murmuring nonsense about me playing ‘hard to get.’
“You get her hands off her now or the only thing hard to get is gonna be your teeth off the floor of this place,” a voice thundered from behind me.
Yes, thundered.
Kismet had timed the band to pause shouting into the microphone to let the deep masculine and threatening tone filter not only to my ears but through the drunken haze of the man holding me.
He let me go immediately and I stumbled back, I would’ve fallen right on my ass and into whatever substances lived on the floor had two strong arms not caught me.
“Steady, Sunshine,” that masculine and throaty voice murmured in my ear.
My entire body rebelled against the command. Because those hands, that warmth, that voice, made me feel anything but steady.
Yes, it was the ultimate cliché, the man saving the young girl from the sweaty paws of some pig.
I did manage to steady myself, right about the time the man tried to round me, with an air about him that was palpable with violence. It sounded like a silly thing to distinguish from the unpleasant mix of scents and sounds inside the bar, but it was louder than the man who had resumed screaming into the microphone.
I had my hands flat on my savior’s chest in a restraining gesture before I completely knew what I was doing. It felt natural—the touch. And hard—his chest. His pecs could’ve doubled as a marble countertop.
He didn’t have to pause with my hands on his chest. He was bigger than the man who had held me before, bigger in every way and he was all muscle. I was no match for him, should he decide to use his strength against me.
He didn’t.
He paused and let me pretend my small hands on his large chest were effective in restraining him.
“I’m assuming you’re going to divest that man of his teeth,” I half yelled since the music had started up again. “But remember you promised to do so only if he didn’t let me go. And he did. So the violence would be unnecessary at this point.” I paused, looking from where my hands had unwittingly fisted the fabric of his tee to blink upward at him. “Are you a man to keep promises?”
His eyes roved over me in surprise. And in something else. “I’m a man who doesn’t stand by when some sleazebag fucking assaults a girl in a bar,” he replied, voice still a low and thundering rumble.
I increased the pressure on his chest, mostly to get his attention, but also because I needed more from him. I wanted my hands to explore every single inch of him. Preferably without the tee in the way.
I’d never had such a reaction to a man in my life. Instant, visceral and almost unbearable attraction.
It was distracting, to say the least.
“Well you are not a man to stand by while that was being done,” I said. “Because you didn’t. Now I’m standing in front of you asking you not to respond to violence, ignorance, a misplaced ego and entitlement with more violence. Because I’ve got a feeling you’re better than that.”
I swallowed roughly before I spoke again.
“And you’re a man to keep his promises, are you not?” I repeated my previous question, my voice as uneven as my heartbeat.
He gave me a long intense look that did not belong between two strangers. Something tugged at the bottom of my stomach with that stare, with my hands pressed into his chest, with the nearness of his body, and the energy around it.
I was in tune with energy. I studied it. And I’d always believed that people gave off certain vibrations when two souls recognized each other, for good or for bad, those vibrations became more intense.
Of course, every single member of my family thought this was “new age bullshit”— it was just Lucy that said that, but the sentiment was echoed by everyone else.
But I believed in it. Because it happened with people. People who would become important to me in the future sparked something.
This was different than that.
This was an inferno.
Not entirely unpleasant. But not as nice as any kind of ‘love at first sight’ was communicated in any movie.
“Yeah, Sunshine,” he murmured, somehow getting himself heard above the music. “I’m a man who keeps promises.”
Something about that sentence was so final. So ominous.
And I wanted more.
“You want to make a promise to buy me a beer?” I asked, deciding that I could not possibly leave this bar now.
I would stay in this place, for as long as this man was going to be in it.
And I was going to be leaving with him, I decided.
He glanced down to my hands, which were still fisting his tee. I probably should’ve let go, it wasn’t exactly socially acceptable to be fondling a man’s pecs when you didn’t even know his last name. Or first name for that matter.