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How? Hooow does this keep happening to me? Remove Laura from chat. I said remove Laura from the fucking chat!
Chapter 14
Laura
“You’ve got two choices, sugar.”
Dean pauses behind me just long enough for my soul to leave my body, wishing a hole in the floor would open up, and I’d drop down into it. I decide to remain facing the bar to avoid any further humiliation with direct eye contact.
“Wheel of Fortune keeps my brain sharp,” he finally finishes.
“It really does,” Karen adds from one side of me.
“I still don’t understand why everyone shouts their letter guesses. You have a microphone attached to you!” Birdie complains from the other side.
I am mid eye-roll when my entire body tenses as I feel Dean move right up behind me. He crowds me against the bar, his chest against my back and his arms brushing against the sides of mine as he brings them up on either side of me, flattening his palms on the wood and caging me in. All of the heat and power from his body surrounds me and makes me lightheaded. I hold my breath, standing completely still and staring straight ahead as his head dips, putting his mouth right by my ear.
“And just so you know, I wouldn’t be napping if you were next to me on the couch,” Dean speaks quietly, making a shiver run down my spine. “I’d be too busy fucking the hell out of you.”
My breath leaves me on a shaky whimper when all of a sudden Dean is pushing off the bar and stepping back from me, taking all the heat of his body with him. Once again, I’m wondering why in the hell I ever dated younger men. And why in the hell I couldn’t have just kept my mouth shut, instead of spewing all that bullshit he heard, which I didn’t even mean.
“Ladies, it’s always a pleasure,” Dean says to the girls as I slowly turn around to face him, an apology on the tip of my tongue, but nothing comes out.
There’s fire in his eyes even with the grin on his face, and that nervous anticipation I like is back with a vengeance. The butterflies flap wildly in my stomach, thinking about what he just said to me and all the images he just implanted into my brain. Hot, sweaty, naked images that make me want to grab onto the bar for support.
Almost like Dean knows I’m barely holding it together, he reaches down and grabs my hand, lacing his fingers through mine before taking his eyes off me to nod at the girls. “If you’ll excuse me, I’m just gonna steal Laura away from you for a minute.”
Before I can even utter one word, Dean turns and starts walking away, his tight hold on my hand pulling me right along behind him. And I let him. Because I’m quickly realizing I would let Dean take me anywhere, as long as it’s with him.
“You better last longer than a minute!” I hear Karen shout, followed by loud peals of laughter from all of them.
Dean doesn’t even look back or say a word. He just continues charging through the crowd, quickly weaving us around clusters of people who all start heading out to the deck as the band begins to play. I stare at his back in a daze the entire way, my feet moving on autopilot, not even caring where he’s taking me. I’m too consumed with the words he just whispered in my ear and the way my body feels like it’s on fire.
He keeps going until we round the corner, and we’re walking down the long hallway that leads to the bathrooms and Ed’s office. My mind is racing as fast as my heart, and I finally open my mouth to ask him what we’re doing, when the muffled sounds of “Why Don’t We Get Drunk” echo down the hallway. I let out a hysterical giggle instead, wanting nothing more right now than to get drunk and screw this man.
Dean’s hand is suddenly dropping mine, and my feet come to a stuttering stop when he spins around to face me. I’ve told Ed a hundred times to put more light back in this hallway, because it can be creepy at night with just the one light fixture on the wall and a dim bulb lighting the way. There’s nothing creepy about it now, standing here alone with Dean. It’s quiet and intimate. There’s just enough light for me to see him, and see him I do.
His hands are clenching and unclenching down at his sides, the muscles in his tattoo-covered arms rippling with the movement, making me ache to feel the power of them around me again. His chest is heaving with every breath he takes, and that heat still burns in his eyes as he stares at me, making goose bumps pebble my skin, even as it feels like it’s going to melt right off my body. I have the urge to take a step forward and close the distance between us, to run my palms up the front of him until they’re resting over his chest to see if his heart is pounding as fast as mine, but I don’t move. I am completely frozen in place by the power of this man staring at me like he doesn’t know whether to kiss me or spank me.
I’ll take one of each, please.
The muted sounds of Jimmy Buffett fade away, along with the cheers and whistles of everyone out on the deck with them, until I can’t hear anything but the blood rushing through my ears. I’m supposed to be out there on the deck with my family, enjoying the live music and celebrating with them, but right now, this is the only place I want to be.
And I know in this moment that I’m finally giving up. Waving the white flag. Realizing it was ridiculous to think I could avoid having a fling with this man, when I honestly just don’t want to. Why in the hell should I deny myself something I want, even if it will only last for a few days? That’s a few days of absolute bliss I’d never get to experience otherwise, and that’s just stupid.
“I’m too old to be playing games,” Dean finally speaks, one of his hands coming up to swipe through his hair.
“Me too,” I whisper, wishing I could calm my racing heart.
“Can we be finished with the bullshit now?”
His voice is pleading, begging me to comply, and my racing heart cracks wide-open with how desperate he sounds.
“That would be nice.”
“You like that guy at the bar?” he asks gruffly.
“Tanner?” The shock in my voice is evident, and a part of me wants to laugh that he’s asking this, but it’s not funny. He’s serious. Ed’s warning comes back to me, and now I can see with my own two eyes that Dean really is a little jealous. Another thrill of excitement makes its way through me, even though I never want Dean to think in a million years I would prefer Tanner over him. Or anyone over him, really. But that’s too much, too soon, and I’m just here to have a fling.
