“It’s okay, seriously.” I gave him a hopeful smile that did nothing to ease his expression. “I have Renata now. She’s a better mother than I could’ve ever asked for. And... I think it’s sweetthat your parents love on you as much as they do. Even if they are a bit extra about it.”
At last, a snort.
“More than a bit,” Mal said, and I used that as an opportunity to change the subject.
“So you’ve been telling them about me, then?” I teased.
My feint worked masterfully. Mal gave me a queasy look, then started the car.
“We’re not talking about this,” he said.
“Oh, so we can discuss my childhood trauma, but asking why you’re out here giving your parents my whole government name is off-limits—”
Mal turned up the radio to full blast, drowning out my cackles, and then we were on our way. We parked, and he procured a pair of beach towels from his trunk—“I was hoping I hadn’t taken these out”—and we sprawled out on the lawn of Millennium Park, listening to live jazz as the sky darkened. Dusk brought a chill with it, and when I shivered Mal pulled me backward into his chest, draping himself around me for warmth. Our arms stacked against each other, and I looked down at the layers we made, my skin reflecting streaks of violet light, his absorbing them. A girl sitting a few paces away stopped to tell us we were “a cute couple,” then offered to take a picture, and when she handed Mal back his camera I felt a strange surge of gratitude, glad that she had captured the moment, like it was a memory to which I might someday want to return.
“Thank you for confiding in me, earlier,” he said into my hair, during a sonorous saxophone solo. “I know it wasn’t easy for you.”
“It was nothing,” I said, following the path of his veins down to the tendons in his hands.
“It wasn’t,” Mal said. “But I appreciated you letting me know you a little better, all the same.”
Shit shitshit. What happened tohaving fun? What happened tono strings attached, like Dahlia had suggested? Instead I was walking right into Mal’s web.
When the concert ended, we walked back to the parking garage in silence that would’ve been comfortable if not for the thoughts buzzing through my mind.
“I still don’t want to say goodbye,” Mal confessed when we reached his car. I knew that he meant it in the most innocent possible way, and it irked me as much as it thrilled.
“Then don’t say goodbye,” I said, meeting his eyes in a challenge. “Then take me home with you instead.”
I half expected Mal to resist. Minus his singular lapse of control at the carousel weeks before, he’d done an excellent job of exercising very unnecessary restraint. But then instead, his smile tightened, shadows deepening the hollows of his cheeks and casting darkness under his brow, and I felt the air between us crackle.
“You sure that’s what you want?” he said, his voice lowering to a rasp. “I’m not sure if I can be held accountable for what I might do to you if I do.”
“You mean in a sexy way, not in a murder way, right?” I joked, stepping closer to eradicate the space between us.
Mal sighed melodramatically, but he didn’t pull away. “Of course, though, you’ll have to just take my word for it.”
“Then I’ll forgive you,” I said, shoving my hand into his back pocket.
Turning Mal on was like flicking on a switch; one second he was gentle, his touch overly respectful, and in the next he pulsed with desire, his body flattening mine against the passenger doorof the car as his hand looped around the back of my neck to direct my face to his. I closed my eyes expectantly, but instead of the clash of mouths, I felt the glide of his nose against my cheek, skimming, featherlight, past the angle of my jaw. The innocuous touch ran down my body like a lightning strike, and I gritted my teeth, frustrated.
“You’re not going to kiss me?” I whispered.
This close, Mal’s face was a study in cubism, his deep chestnut eyes overlapping, his chagrined smile repeating twice. Then, finally, slowly, he pulled my bottom lip into his mouth.
I opened to him, winding my arms around his waist as he tilted my head to his. My body felt compressed, molding into the dips and divots of his.The only thing better than the taste of victory—vanilla mint, like the lip balm he favored—was the head rush that came with it. God, I wanted this man. I wanted his hand up my skirt and his mouth on my neck, wanted him to hike my legs around his waist and take me right here in this garage. Wanted to hear our breaths echo against the concrete, the squeal of our hands sliding against glass—
Mal wrenched himself away. I stared, breathless, as he guided my still-pliant body away from the passenger door, opened it, and directed me inside. His drop into his own seat was graceless, his expression strangely stoic, a muscle in his cheek as tight as a cord. We drove in clinical silence, tension thick as clouds in the small space, and I watched the flex of his hand around the steering wheel, the skin pulling tight on his knuckles. When he slid into his parking spot in front of his condominium, his movements were methodical, shifting the car into park, pulling his key from the ignition, stepping out, opening my door. He walked ahead, leading me up the stairs to his apartment, then stepped aside to let me in.
I’d been in Mal’s apartment twice before, and both times I’d left decidedly not deflowered. But today felt different. The air felt charged as Mal stalked behind me, flicking on lights one by one, and I swallowed, suddenly feeling less like a sexy lioness and more like cornered prey. My heart racing, I sat down on his couch, listening to the sound of glass clinking in Mal’s cabinet, ice grinding in a fridge. There was a flyer on the table: Mal’s updated headshot on a brightly colored background, announcing his upcoming event at Em-Dash Books. I picked it up just as a pair of legs appeared in front of me.
“I wouldn’t have done something like this if it weren’t for you, you know,” Mal said. He turned to place two glasses of water onto his coffee table coasters, then took the flyer out of my hands.
“A bookstore event?” I said. “Of course you would’ve.”
“No, I wouldn’t,” Mal said. “Before that day, when we went to Palmisano Park, I hadn’t been in a bookstore sinceDusk’s launch party. But I passed by Em-Dash Books and I remembered what you’d said. That if I wanted something, I had to reach for it.” He swallowed jaggedly, then propped a knee onto the couch next to me, caging me between his arms. “And so I did.”
“That’s great,” I started. “I’m not surprised they wanted to do an event with you. They were probably so excited to—”
