“Running away?”
His voice was a low rumble right beside my ear, and I jumped, my heart hammering against my ribs. I hadn’t even heard him follow me.
He was standing so close the sleeve of his jacket brushed my arm, and the clean, sharp scent of his cologne—sandalwood and something faintly like rain—eclipsed the bar’s stale smell of beer and perfume.
“I needed air,” I said, my voice coming out breathier than I intended. I refused to look at him, focusing instead on a crack in the plaster on the opposite wall.
“Liar,” he said, not unkindly. “You were suffocating. ”
I chanced a glance at him then. In the dim light of the hallway, the sharp planes of his face were softened, but his eyes were just as intense. They saw too much.
“It’s a great party,” I said, the defense sounding weak even to my own ears. “Your sister is having the time of her life. ”
“My sister is three tequila shots past knowing what planet she’s on,” he countered with a wry twist of his lips. “And Marcus is trying to pretend he enjoys this. And you… you look like you’re about to be sick. ”
He wasn’t wrong. The guilt, the desire, the lies—they were all churning inside me, a toxic cocktail. “I’m fine, Rhys. Just… a lot of pressure. The wedding is next week. ”
He took a step closer, effectively caging me against the wall. He wasn’t touching me, but his body heat was a brand. He lifted a hand and gently tucked a stray strand of hair behind my ear, his knuckles grazing the sensitive skin of my neck. A full-body shiver traced its way down my spine.
“Stop hiding behind the wedding, Ava,” he murmured, his voice dropping to a husky whisper that sent another tremor through me. “This isn’t about the seating charts, is it?”
My throat was dry. “We can’t do this,” I finally managed to say, the words feeling like dust in my mouth. “Here. Anymore. At all. “
“I know. ” He didn’t move away. If anything, he leaned in closer, his gaze dropping to my lips. “I know we can’t. But for a different reason than you think. ”
He paused, and the silence stretched, thick with tension. The muffled thud of the bass from the bar felt like a distant, foreign heartbeat.
“It was supposed to be easy,” he said, his voice raw with an emotion I couldn’t name. “No strings. Just… a release. A secret that would burn out on its own. ”
My own secret shame burned in my cheeks. That’s all it was supposed to be.
“But it’s not,” he continued, his eyes finding mine again, pinning me to the wall. “It’s not easy, and it’s not burning out. It’s getting bigger. ”
I shook my head in a weak, desperate denial. “Rhys, don’t. ”
“I have to. ” He took a ragged breath, the sound loud in the quiet hallway. “Because I can’t stand there next week, as his best man, and watch him put a ring on my *sister’s* finger while all I can think about is you. This has become more than just sex for me, Ava. ”
The world tilted. The floor seemed to drop out from under me.
“It’s more than anything I’ve ever felt,” he whispered, the confession hanging in the air between us like a suspended bomb. “I’m falling for you. “