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It’s not what I was expecting him to say. All I can come up with is “Oh. ”
Then it’s silent again except for his music, and there’s this … this atmosphere. I think it must be him. I think he’s making the atmosphere with his skin and his eyes, which look almost silver right now, and maybe he’s also making it with all the muscles in his forearms, which are clenching and unclenching his hands in this way that’s just—
It’s just something. Intense, I guess. Menacing, but without the menace.
I have never stood this close to him before. I’ve never been alone with him since the day he parked his car right next to my feet and made me pass out.
I’ve never felt this excited, awkward, and senselessly worried in my whole entire life.
Until he takes a step toward me. That’s worse.
Better, too.
Better-worse. It’s totally a thing.
I back up.
He’s supposed to stop stepping toward me when I back up, but he doesn’t. He keeps coming. He moves right into my zone of personal space, and I get pinned up against the stacks, my butt pressing against a low shelf, West’s hands braced on either side of my head.
“I’m working,” he says. As though I’m a book, and he’s shelving me.
I try to say, I’ll come back later, but instead I make this sort of clicking, gargling noise that makes me sound like a bullfrog. I can feel my throat flushing—always a dead giveaway that I’m embarrassed. I clear it and manage to say, “That’s fine. I can … come back. Or I’ll c-call you. ”
I don’t have his phone number. Or any intention of calling him.
I don’t know why I’m imagining I can feel the heat off his skin, because that’s impossible. He isn’t that close, surely. I cast my eyes up, trying to visually measure the number of inches between our faces.
It’s not very many inches at all.
West doesn’t touch me, but he is much closer than he needs to be, and the way he’s looking down at me, his chest rising and falling rapidly, color high in his cheeks—I can’t help but think about his fist connecting with Nate’s mouth. The way Nate fell to the floor, heavy and limp.
He did that for you, I think.
I came here to ask him, but I already know.
He did it for me, and this is how he looked afterward. Dilated everywhere, his skin warm and his breathing rapid and shallow.
This is how he would look in bed.
I close my eyes, because I need to get my bearings. I had imagined a businesslike talk with West. Please don’t do that again, I would say. Okay, if that’s the way you feel about it, he’d reply. Yes, that’s the way I feel, I would tell him. Then maybe I’d give him a lecture about the importance of settling conflict without violence, followed by a brisk handshake.
I didn’t imagine the ruddy skin of his neck right by the collar of his shirt. The stubble on his jaw where it curves into his ear. I didn’t anticipate his smell, like spearmint and library books, detergent and warm skin.
God, he smells fantastic, but he’s also kind of scary, and I have no idea what the rules are right now. No idea at all.
I need rules to get through this. I’m a rules kind of girl.
“West,” I whisper.
It’s supposed to sound calm and businesslike, but instead it sounds like I’m begging him for something, and I guess he takes that as a cue. He drops his head toward my shoulder. His lips … I can’t be sure, but I think his lips are really close to my skin. I feel his breath near my ear, and my nipples harden.
“West, what the hell?”
“Why’d you come here, huh?” he murmurs.
And then—this is the worst-best part, by far—he turns his head and kisses my jaw, openmouthed.
It’s like satin. Like lightning.
