A Stone in the Sea(39)

Suffocating silence swallowed us while I focused on the way his muscles flexed and bowed as he shifted hard, the ink covering his skin contorting like it ached to tell a story.

A strangled moment passed before I turned to take in the rigid defiance set in his profile. “Thank you,” I finally whispered into the stillness. He swallowed hard, and my eyes trailed the bob of his thick, muscular throat. “You saved me tonight. I don’t know what would have happened had you not been there.”

Dents of conflict slashed all over his gorgeous face when he glanced at me—his voice hard, the words grating up his throat. “I lost it, Shea. That guy touching you?” Disgust deepened those dents. “Couldn’t handle it. You don’t belong to me, and still, there wasn’t one place inside me that could accept the idea of another man touching you. Not one. And I don’t fucking know how to make sense of that. But when he hurt you?” A curse flew from his mouth. His brow pinched when he spit the word, and he slammed his palm down on the steering wheel, obviously unwilling or unable to finish what was burning to be said, words I knew made him just as vulnerable as the ones boiling inside of me.

He jerked to a stop at the curb in front of my house.

The engine still rumbling, the man stared unseeing into the blaze of lights stretching out into the slumbering night.

Lost in the tension that wound us tight, something that only belonged to us, I stared out into the same nothingness.

My voice was quiet. Unsure. “You think I understand this? You think I like feeling this way?” I chanced peeking at him, taking in the sharp curve of his jaw he held taut, and I was sure he wasn’t immune to whatever this was, either. This consuming feeling that came over me every time he was near.

I knew that’s why he was here.

“Do you think I like it that you’re the only thing I can think about? That when I close my eyes, what I see is your face? That I don’t even know you, and somehow you feel like one of the most significant people to have ever walked into my life?”

With both hands, he squeezed the steering wheel, still refusing to look my way.

God, maybe this was the most foolish thing I could do, stripping myself bare, laying myself completely at his feet. But I couldn’t stop. That unexpected grief from his absence that had followed me through the week pulsed at my insides, those many hidden thoughts and desires seeking a way free.

My voice softened and took on a tone of resignation. “I gave up a long time ago, Baz.” Sadly, I turned to consider my house, the windows darkened, the porch swing rocking in a barren sway. “Gave up on dating and men and the idea of love because that little girl has enough love for me. Since the day she was born, she’s been the only thing I needed.”

I looked back at him, and he was barely breathing—his chest tight and his posture rigid. The air escaping his nose was nothing more than a whispered grunt.

If it were possible, my voice softened more. “And then there was you.”

And then there was you.

I figured that’s all he needed to know.

Because it was everything. Both an admission and a plea.

I’ve got you, baby.

It was the only thing I wanted—for Sebastian Stone to have me, even if it was just for a little while.

Without further words, I released my seatbelt and slipped out, quietly latched the door shut behind me, and didn’t look back as I headed up the walkway.

Leaving him with the decision.

Because mine had already been made.

A disconcerted thrill sped through me when he finally killed the engine, though I could feel it was done with reluctance and doubt. My nerves lit in a frenzy, with a desire that sang and a fear that stung as my ears tuned into the creak of a door being cranked open then discretely closed. The front running lights flashed and the horn blipped as the car was abandoned on the street. That thick, consuming presence spread over me from behind as I slowly made my way up the three steps onto the porch.

Unsteady and irregular, my heart hammered.

His boots thudded on the freshly stained boards.

I paused at the door and he stopped a fraction away, a heady heat burning into my back. Shakily I dug through my bag to find my key, slid it into the lock, and slowly turned the latch, letting the door drift open to reveal the darkness from within.

A heavy expulsion of air blew strands of my hair. Like a bull before it charged. Filled with lust. Maybe even anger.

“You sure you want me to step through that door?” The words sounded like a threat when he breathed them across my ear.

Because we both knew exactly what would happen if he followed me inside.

“Yes,” I promised, knowing it was true, knowing it was wrong, knowing it would ultimately wreck me.