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‘You OK?’ she asked Kainan after giving him a moment to calm down.
He shook his head, giving her an abashed look. ‘Sorry you had to witness that. She’s something else.’ He paused for a moment. ‘But she was never important.’
Selene smiled kindly in reassurance. ‘You don’t have to justify anything to me. We all have our fair share of embarrassing skeletons in the cupboard.’
‘And what would yours be?’ he said, baiting her with a straight face.
‘Not telling. You’ll have to work harder than that to get any of my secrets.’
Selene’s skin flushed as she realised she was enjoying flirting a little too much with this mysterious man who lit her up from within.
‘To hard work,’ he rumbled, lifting his beer to her glass.
‘To hard work,’ she agreed with a little smile.
Their main meal arrived, and the incident was soon forgotten, swept away by the taste of delicious spices and ingredients that melted on her tongue and filled her belly with goodness.
They spent the rest of the evening talking quietly. Selene’s imagination soared as he regaled her with tales of life growing up on the far-off floating city above Planet Earth and the adventures he and his brothers had indulged in over the years.
To Selene, it felt like the world around them - the bar, the restaurant, the servers and even the lights - faded away, leaving them in a cocoon of their own making.
Selene felt like she could talk all night. She’d never felt so alive in her entire life. The retelling of his past capers and sins made them sound as harebrained as they were brazen. His dry humour made her laugh to the point of tears, and his heated gaze left her with a buzz of euphoria that she hadn’t felt in years.
Hours later, he glanced at his wrist comm and raised an eyebrow.
‘It’s way past your bedtime, young lady,’ he drawled.
‘I’m hardly sleepy, though,’ she protested.
‘Are we having this conversation again, Selene?’
‘Which one’s that?’
‘The one about your utter disregard for sleep and rest?’
‘I take it you’re a lover of sleep yourself?’ she teased.
‘I’m a lover of the things I treasure the most.’
Selene held his gaze and thought for a moment about its dangerous promise.
He wasn’t flirting with her. He had an intensity about him that made flirting sound like mere child’s play. He was transcendental, cerebral, almost spiritual. The fierceness in him was as powerful as a planetwide tsunami. Was he as precarious as nature’s uncontrollable forces?
And was she even ready for this?Was he anything she had the time to explore, and was this the right time to probe it further? What would be the repercussions?
‘Don’t overthink it,khamila,’ Kainan said quietly, cutting into her train of thought. ‘Don’t worry about what may or may not happen, for when it comes; it’ll have enough worries of its own.’
Selene was amazed once more at his mysterious ability to perceive her deepest thoughts.
He jerked his chin at her and fluidly rose to his feet. ‘I’m calling it. It’s late, and we’ve got a heavy day ahead of finessing our deal, so I’m taking you back. To your room.’
She smiled at his oddly specific reference, took a deep breath and nodded, gathering her bag and comm tab.
He took her elbow and led her through The Osirian’s still-packed floors to a new elevator near the bar’s main doors. The lift smoothly rose ten levels before stopping on her floor, where he stalked silently beside her back to her suite.
Swiping in, he stepped into the apartment ahead of her.
Satisfied, he returned to the open doorway, where she waited as he checked the interior.
