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“What color are my eyes?” I asked again, turning to face him.
“That’s a hard question.” He practically bit out the words, taking a step away from me. “Alex, you should go. I don’t…I can’t…”
I reached for his hand, timidly taking it in mine. “My eyes.”
He looked down at me, hesitance all over his features as he tried and failed to leash the adrenaline coursing through him. “Blue,” he ground out the answer. “But that isn’t really a good enough description. They have different dimensions of blue depending on what light you’re in,” he continued, and my heart skipped. “Like now, in the partial dark, they’re deeper, like sapphires, but when we’re outside, like at the stadium, they’re crystalline, almost like blue diamonds.”
My lips parted open, and I continued to rub his hand, massaging the muscle between his thumb and forefinger. “Still angry?”
He nodded.
“What do you smell right now?”
He nodded again, understanding the process I was walking him through. We’d talked and experimented with grounding extensively the last couple of weeks. It was one of the best tools I had for him right now, knowing what I did.
“You,” he said, inhaling deeply and holding it for four seconds before releasing it slowly, just like we’d worked on. “Woodsy and floral and—” He stopped himself, wetting his lips as he let out another long breath. “You,” he said again.
My pulse skittered beneath my skin. I wasn’t fishing for these answers in my attempts to ground him, but I couldn’t stop my reaction to his words, either.
“Your dress is black with flecks of silver,” he continued, and I switched to the other hand, massaging there. “The walls around us are white marble, and it’s at least ten degrees colder out here than it was in there.” He jerked his head toward the ballroom. “I can see the chills raising across your skin,” he said, stepping closer like he wanted to envelop me in his warmth. “And Jepson was wearing an atrocious yellow tie, and I wanted to knock his teeth in.”
I paused in my massaging, a laugh ripping from my lips that wasn’t at all professional. I quickly covered my mouth with my hands, shaking my head. “I’m sorry,” I said. “You just surprised me with that direction. It’s not funny—”
“I know,” he said, his tone evening out, his shoulders dropping a fraction as the tension left his body. “Your laugh,” he said. “God, it’s wonderful.”
A shock radiated through me, awakening things that should so not be awake right now. Shit, I was dancing on a very dangerous line. I was grounding him, for fuck’s sake. How could I want him while I was actively working on him?
“How are you feeling now?” I asked.
“Better,” he said, then shrugged. “Slightly embarrassed.” He sighed. “I thought all the work we’ve been doing…I thought I wouldn’t slip like that.”
“You didn’t slip.”
He eyed me.
“You didn’t.”
“Only because you were there.”
“That’s not true,” I said, and he cocked a brow at me. “We don’t know that’s true. You would’ve breathed, I know it. You would’ve grounded yourself. That’s why you were already noting the ugly tie he wore.”
He shrugged again. “Maybe.” He cocked a brow at me. “You still felt the need to whisk me away and into this private space.” He smirked. “Or have you just been looking for an excuse to get me alone again?”
“Deflection,” I said. “Super cute.”
“Can you blame me?”
“Never,” I said. “We’re getting there, Ethan,” I said. “I promise. You’re doing great.”
“Because of you,” he said, making my knees weak with the intent way he was looking at me.
With how little space rested between us.
With how hot my skin felt despite the chill in the air.
“Still trying to make me fall in love with you?” I teased, trying to fall into jokes and banter rather than anything serious.
“Always,” he whispered, leaning closer. “I haven’t stopped thinking about that kiss.”
A lightning strike snapped down the center of me with his directness. “Oh, really?” I asked, breathless.
“Really,” he said, leaning an arm against the wall behind me, partially caging me in.
“Ethan,” I tried to warn, but it sounded more like a plea. “I just grounded you. We’re…working.”
“What if we weren’t?” he asked. “What if the session is over? Would it make a difference?”
“Maybe,” I breathed the word, and internally chastised myself. God, this was wrong, but I couldn’t stop the draw, the pull, the longing.
“What if I want to thank you?”
“Thank me for what?”
He drew up his free hand, gently sliding it along my jaw. I leaned into the touch, instinct taking over. “For not looking at me and seeing an asshole, seeing someone you should be afraid of.”
I reached up and held his hand in place. “Never,” I said again. “I could never be afraid of you.”
Something guttered in his eyes, something dark and aching from his past. I filed it away, not able to think clearly with him so close.
